Note Block

Crafting
Note blocks can be crafted by placing 8 wooden planks in a square with redstone dust at the center:

Music
Note blocks play a note when hit or when powered by redstone. Redstone current only causes the note to play once, even if it is a continuous current. A note block must have at least one block of air above it to play a sound. Notes can be heard up to 48 blocks away.

Each time a note block plays a note, a note particle will fly out of the top, with the color depending on the pitch (but not the instrument).

Right clicking increases the note pitch up a half step, with a total of two full octaves being available to play. The range of notes span from F#3 to F#5. After reaching the highest note, right clicking again resets it back to F#3, as does breaking the block and picking it back up. The exact pitch to click assignment is shown below.

Alternatively, there is a graphical version available:



The instrument played depends on the block underneath the note block:

Wiring


In order to wire Note Blocks to play a note, power must be applied to the side of the Note Block using Redstone Dust and a Switch or Redstone Torch, or to the bottom using a redstone torch directly. Simply placing a switch or pressure plate on an adjacent block or providing power to the block beneath the Note Block will not work.

Chords with Note Blocks


If want to get a richer tone in the song/sound you're creating you can bind different notes together into a chord, just like on any other kind of instrument. This will not only get a better sound to the song, it will also be simpler to place the Redstone. You can connect as many Note Blocks as you need to the same redstone wire, that eventually will lead to a pressure plate, lever or button.

Sequencer
It is possible to link together a set of inverters, connected to note blocks, which are then played after each other when the first inverter is given power. This can be used to create songs, without having to manually give power to every note (through pressure plates for example). See also Redstone circuits.

With the introduction of Redstone (Repeater) in Beta 1.3, the process for making a series of notes is much simpler. The delay can be set to one, two, three, or four steps, which simplifies the construction of multiple delay circuits.

Pressure Plates - Removing the click
Stepping on a Pressure Plate is a simple way to trigger a note block, but also triggers the pressure plate sound effect. People can remove the pressing/clicking sound by modifying the Plate's sound file in the Minecraft folder. This enables a screen recording of the created song without having the pressure plate sound messing up their recording.
 * 1) The sound file is .minecraft/newsound/click.ogg (Note: this is also the sound for the in-game menu buttons).
 * 2) Replace the press with silence, via the aid of sound editing software such as Audacity.
 * 3) Set the file as read only, thus preventing Minecraft from re-downloading the sound file.



Other Information

 * Note Blocks can only play when there is at least one block of air above them, so you cannot place blocks like torches and signs directly above Note Blocks (this includes water)
 * Note Blocks use the same texture as jukeboxes but the top texture is the same as the side textures.

Uses
The Note Block's original intentions are to play notes for music. This is a great use for Note Blocks, however, there can be other uses that are as fun to use and give you a great opportunity to improvise the original intent of the Note Block. You can use Note Blocks to...


 * Create music.
 * Make doorbells - for example, you can connect a pressure plate or button next to your front door wired to a Note Block and it can be used as a door bell. The most common notes are B Flat for the 'Ding' and F Sharp for the 'Dong' for the classic 'Ding Dong' of most real-life doorbells.
 * Come up with pranks, such as modifying the Note Block to be constantly playing notes and hide it underground to irritate a player.
 * Effectively design an emergency alarm. Like a doorbell, you can place multiple pressure plates outside your creation and wire them to your home so if something goes near your house you will be alarmed.
 * Make subway chimes - When a minecart reaches the end of the track, make note blocks play (similar to a real life subway)
 * Communication: Each note represents a letter, drums is "z"
 * Morse Code: Communicate in the form of Morse Code.

History
Note Blocks were released on 13 January 2011 for the Beta release 1.2.