Musical Practice and Performance Stack Exchange
Musical Practice and Performance Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [key-signatures]

In musical notation, a set of sharp or flat symbols placed together at left side of each staff, effectively indicating the default pitch class set of the notes to follow.

In musical notation, a key signature is a set of sharp or flat symbols placed together on the staff. Key signatures are generally written immediately after the clef at the beginning of a line of musical notation, although they can appear in other parts of a score, notably after a double barline.

243 questions
48
votes
12 answers

Key signature for writing in modes other than major and minor

I have trouble deciding what accidentals to put in the key signature for pieces in Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian or Mixolydian modes. There seem to be trade-offs associated with each choice. For example, when writing in G Mixolydian, setting an empty key…
Gauthier
  • 4,578
  • 2
  • 26
  • 34
38
votes
8 answers

Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D: Why do some recordings seem to be in C sharp?

There are at least two recordings on Youtube of Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D major which seem to be played a half-step lower, in the key of C sharp. I assume this is a artifact of the recording process or uploading to Youtube but wonder if…
daniel
  • 503
  • 4
  • 6
29
votes
7 answers

How many (major and minor) keys are there? Why?

I am wondering about how many major and minor keys there are and why. Here are some suggestions: 24 keys One could argue that there should be one major and one relative minor key for each of the 12 equal tempered enharmonic notes, that is for each…
Ulf Åkerstedt
  • 6,783
  • 4
  • 27
  • 52
29
votes
5 answers

Where do the double accidentals go in "theoretical" key signatures?

Recent questions led me to discussions of theoretical keys, which are defined by Wikipedia as keys with at least one double accidental in the key signature. (Unfortunately, the source of that definition is not given.) The key signatures on Wikipedia…
Richard
  • 82,618
  • 16
  • 186
  • 360
29
votes
11 answers

Are sharp keys "bright" and flat keys "dark"?

I was reading this book and on the "Circle of Fifths" chapter, it claims that keys with sharp key signatures (C, G, D, ...) are "often thought by musicians" to be "bright" sounding, whereas those with flat key signatures (F, Bb, Eb, ...) sound…
diegovb
  • 409
  • 1
  • 4
  • 6
28
votes
5 answers

Why is music for strings more likely to be in keys with sharps?

One thing I've noticed is that music written for strings, such as violin concertos, are a lot more likely to written in a key like D or A major than something like F or Bb major. I recently saw a comic that confirms my suspicions: Now, this does…
Tony
  • 778
  • 2
  • 6
  • 12
27
votes
7 answers

Why does the Dorian mode on C have two flats?

I'm studying scale modes and I just found on Wikipedia that the Dorian mode on C has two flats... Why is this? Because the Dorian mode is just the major scale (Ionian) starting from the second note, shouldn't it keep the key signature? In the case…
andrerpena
  • 373
  • 1
  • 3
  • 7
27
votes
6 answers

With sheet music, how do you determine whether the song is in the major key or the minor key?

For example, if the key signature on the left doesn't have any sharps or flats then it could theoretically be in either the C Major scale or the A Minor scale. How do you determine which one?
Ryan
  • 957
  • 3
  • 10
  • 12
26
votes
2 answers

What does it mean when one flat in the key signature is in parenthesis?

Can someone please help me make sense of why some flat symbols in the key signature are in parenthesis?
armani
  • 9,033
  • 3
  • 23
  • 60
25
votes
9 answers

How to select a key-signature for a song

There are so many songs in pretty odd key-signatures like 4,5,6 sharps or flats. At least this is my impression when I listen to songs on the radio/net while trying to follow them on my piano/guitar. I can understand that some instruments prefer…
MikeD
  • 405
  • 1
  • 4
  • 8
25
votes
10 answers

Why is there a key signature if I never play those notes?

I'm just getting back to playing on keyboard. I'm trying to play "Ode to Joy" from the piano sheet but I have a basic question. At the beginning of some staffs, on the right of the treble clef I can see a key signature with single sharp (#) sign on…
Piotr Sobczyk
  • 351
  • 3
  • 5
24
votes
5 answers

F# major vs Gb major?

I was looking at Dvorak's Humoresque (op 101 n 7) : it's mostly in G♭ major, in the middle it changes to F♯ minor. This would have looked more natural for me if F♯ major instead of G♭ major were used. I understand that F♯ major and G♭ major are…
leonbloy
  • 1,222
  • 2
  • 10
  • 19
23
votes
11 answers

Collective word for sharps and flats in the key signature

On a mailing list I'm subscribed to, someone recently asked what the collective name was in English for the sharps and flats you find in the key signature. Apparently, the closest translation from several languages (German, Dutch, Russian) is…
duncanm
  • 341
  • 2
  • 5
23
votes
6 answers

Difference between keys and scales?

I am a Tabla (a North Indian percussion instrument) player and I am trying to learn the western music theory. My study was going well until I stumbled upon keys and scales. Now though I know what scales are. They are just a bunch of notes the…
radiantshaw
  • 975
  • 2
  • 8
  • 11
20
votes
9 answers

Why did we never simplify key signatures?

I understand that the key signature indicates what are the exact notes represented on the staff lines and spaces and thus tells us the diatonic scale in which the music is composed, which in turns gives us a clue about which key the music is…
Thibault J
  • 319
  • 2
  • 7
1
2 3
…
16 17