UPDATE: My good friend Jermaine Griggs has put together an awesome 34-minute long video lesson on finding the key of any song. It has a ton a great tips and is free to watch so I suggest that you go Check it out now…
One key or another is always assigned to each and every music piece. It may be in the key of Bb or maybe even the key of E. The beginning of the score is used to determine the key signature that will be used throughout the piece, like if there are flats or sharps that will be used and which scale it is to be played or sung in.
There is a key signature in all pieces of music. It is signified just after the clef (the staff) and includes symbols for flats (b) and sharps (#). When you take a careful look at the start of each of the lines in the music you will surely recognize a grouping of flats or sharps (never both at once). They appear either on a space or on a line of the music staff and are put there to signify the notes that will be affected by them.
To say it a different way, if the #, or sharp, is placed on the top of a music staff, the F note will be played as F#. This means that anytime the note F is played, no matter if it is in the staff’s first space, on top of the staff, or below or above the staff (this will be signified by the ledger lines) it will be played as F#.
When the note that has the flat or sharp signified in the key signature needs to be played as a neutral then an accidental will be put in front of the individual note. In other words, if the music requires the playing of an F (neutral) in the G key, there must be an accidental put in front of it so that the person that is playing the music will not play it as an F#.
The key signature is put in place so that the sharps and flats will be limited on the actual notes in the piece of music. Basically, by putting the # in the signature key it avoids the writer from having to put a sharp or flat by each note when the F is in the music. It lets the musician know that each and every time the F note is required that it should be played as F#. The lines of music will not be as cluttered this way and it will be much easier to be read.
The most common key signatures are listed below along with the notes that are affected by them:
- Key of C: Includes no flats or sharps
- Key of G: Includes one sharp (F#)
- Key of D: Includes two sharps (C# and F#)
- Key of A: Includes three sharps (G#, F# and C#)
- Key of E: Includes four sharps (D#, F#, C# and G#)
- Key of F: Includes one flat (Bb)
- Key of Bb: Includes two flats (Eb and Bb)
- Key of Eb: Includes three flats (Ab, Eb, and Bb)
There is also a relative minor for each key. The similarities of the relative minor and the major are nearly all the same (though started in a different place, the scales are the same) they are not thought of as the same. The note that is found a minor third down from the major (key) is considered to be the relative minor. It is also known as the sixth note in the major scale. The A note is the six note of the C major scale, for example. This means that the relative minor to the C scale is an A minor. It is extremely common for music to use a particular key’s relative minor so if you know about them it makes understanding the chord progression in a song much easier to comprehend.
Below are some specific keys and what their relative minors (keys) are:
- A minor is the relative minor C
- B minor is the relative minor for D
- F# minor is the relative minor for A
- G minor is the relative minor for Bb
When a musician is experienced and plays his music in a nontraditional setting, like when they play free style with no music to read, all he really needs to know is the key that the music was written in and he will be able to play the scales or melodies and the necessary chords that will allow them to play the song freestyle.
Last of all, it is very common for a song to change keys before the end of the song. Musicians that are newer to the musical industry may find this very challenging.
Related Video Lesson: Find The Key To Any Piano Song
Time after time, I have come across pianists who cannot read music well and rely on memorization to save them. Do you admire pianists who can just pick up any piece of sheet music and play without stumbling? If you want to take your sight reading to the next level then check out the piano course "Mastering The Art Of Piano Sight Reading!"
* This is a guest post by Ron Worthy! If you would like to submit a guest post for consideration of publication to our site, please contact us.
CORRECT PRACTICE IS INDISPENSABLE!
Your success or failure at the keyboard may well hinge on how quickly and accurately you can memorize a new chord. To be really efficient at this you must use your eyes, your ears, and the muscles of your hands. You must learn a chord so that you can recognize and play that chord the next day without hesitation. Let me explain how to practice to gain this three-way control.
VISUAL CONTROL – After playing a chord, take your hands off the keyboard. Then return to the chord remembering visually where the fingers were positioned. Notice particularly the pattern that was formed by the black and white keys and the location of the melody and root notes. (No two chords look exactly alike.)
Repeat this procedure at least four or five times to learn a chord visually. And, as you are playing the chord, say its name OUT LOUD. You must associate the name of the chord with the actual notes you are playing, if the chord symbol is to have any real meaning later on.
TACTILE CONTROL – As you are playing the chord, try to feel it muscularly. Play each note of the chord, one note at a time, so that you use the muscles of the hand. You will develop a muscular memory for chords.
AURAL CONTROL – Listen to the chord. You’ll want to know its sound so you can instantly recognize and use it later on … “by ear“!
About The Author:
Ron Worthy is a Music Educator and Performer. His site offers online piano instruction for all ages. He specializes in Rock, Pop, Blues and Smooth Jazz Piano disciplines. Check Out Ron Worthy’s Website Now.
This seems to be the principal worry of many piano students. I do not, of course, dispute the fact that it is important to play certain pieces fast. Otherwise one cannot get the desired effects.
Still, it is a bad habit to try to play a new piece fast from the beginning. It only causes serious delays. Faults creep in that are not noticed and then are hard to eradicate. And worst of all, it ruins clearness, that virtue that perhaps more than anything else enables us to tell the artist from the novice.
Dear Students: when you take up the study of a new piece, do not worry about whether or not you are going to be able to play it fast enough. Play it slowly and correctly and let it work itself up. Remember what the great pianist, Harold Bauer, said, “If one catches the spirit of the music, it doesn’t make much difference whether or not it is played a few degrees faster or slower.”
Have you often dreamed of playing the piano, but feel it is a dream out of your reach? I was exactly like you before I stumbled upon some basic piano lessons which totally transformed my view. Not only did I learn to play the piano, but it had a true impact on my life.
Right from my very first lesson, the way I viewed the piano changed. I realized suddenly that the keys on the piano make a pattern and that pattern allows the keys to be separated into sections. When you break the piano down in such a manner it suddenly doesn’t seem so daunting or confusing. I never realized that the keys could be looked at individually rather than as a collective group.
It all started with simple lessons in material I already had before me. I realized that it was quite fun to try out the new ideas presented in each lesson and later on even tested myself to see how much I had improved. I learned to practice playing and writing notes, clapping rhythms, and eventually stringing together melodies. The more I practiced these things the more improvement I could hear.
What struck me immediately was how quickly I was actually improving. It’s true that many children are taught in a very slow, methodic manner, but I found it quite rewarding to see and hear my own progress happening so quickly. After all, I was making time for my self-taught lessons between a busy work schedule and active home life. I didn’t have time for slow!
Eventually, I wanted to play music beyond what I was learning through these lessons. I wanted to play something recognizable and familiar. That is when I headed to the store and purchased exactly what was suggested in my lessons: one Easy Piano Book and one Fake Book.
My Easy Piano Book was filled with familiar Broadway show tunes that I had heard throughout my life, and after learning rather quickly to sight read I was able to actually play many of them quite well.
My Fake Book on the other hand was filled with modern tunes that I heard a lot on the radio, and I found it more difficult to master these songs. I had to look up new chords before attempting each song because I didn’t know them all yet, so it was a new challenge to learn from the Fake Book.
Eventually, I found myself playing songs directly from the radio and my friends would have a blast singing along with me. I am by no means a piano expert today, but I do play quite happily on a regular basis.
I never really wanted to turn myself into a star or know all there is to know about the piano. I simply wanted to learn to play the piano to brighten my own world a little bit. I am quite surprised that I was able to do it so quickly, and all on my own. If you are looking for a great place to start, check out Rocket Piano today!
Note: Please pay close attention to this lesson as you will need to know minor scales when forming minor chords.
Minor Piano Scales:
2 Steps to Playing a Minor Scale:
1. Find the relative major key of the minor scale that you want to play. (Either refer to the chart above or find what scale has the keynote of the minor scale you want to play as it’s 6th tone … since the minor scale is also the Aeolian mode of a scale.)
2. Play the relative major key starting and ending on the sixth degree. (The 6th degree of the relative major key should be the keynote of the minor scale that you want to play. You can also verify the relative major key by counting 3 half steps to the right. If it takes more or less than 3 half steps to get to the relative major key, then the relative major key you have chosen is not correct.)
Natural Minor Scales
If you haven’t read our article on “Learning to Play Absolutely Any Song by Ear in Virtually Minutes,” then visit the link below …
http://www.learningtoplaypiano.net/learn-to-play-piano-by-ear/
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