- Hi.
Well, here we have a melody
and the challenge is to the name the key.
It's quite important to develop that skill
for a musician so we always know which key
we're playing in.
And it's often a
component in theory exams,
looking at something,
trying to work out which key it's in.
And just to make the task a
little bit more concealed,
here's an example of a melody
that doesn't use a key signature,
but had various
accidentals thrown at notes
as we go through.
And as you can see
there are quite a lot of
accidentals in this melody
which makes it look very
slightly intimidating.
But let's have a look and see how we might
go about the task.
And the first thing we
might just want to have
a little sort of snap shot thought about
is are we in a major key
or are we in a minor key?
And you might think, well
how am I supposed to know
the answer to that?
Well, there is a clue in
the middle of this phrase.
And let me point it out straight away.
If you look at this bar,
you can see we have an F-sharp,
followed by an E-sharp.
Later, in the same bar,
E-natural and then we've got a D-natural.
We don't particularly need to
have that natural sign there.
It's what we call a cautionary accidental,
so I've just thrown in an
example where sometimes
a composer puts in a
cautionary accidental.
In other words,
an accidental that you
don't particularly need,
but where it's possible a player might be
slightly confused.
So there's an example
of one that might just
get slipped in.
So don't let that put you off in any way
because D-natural, there's
no reason to worry about it.
But the clue is here.
E-sharp.
E-natural.
Now, why would you have
E-sharp and E-natural,
particularly in the same phrase,
and particularly at such close quarters?
Well, one possibility
is that we've modulated.
In other words, we've moved
from one key to another key.
But, I can tell you for nothing,
that's not happening in this exercise.
So there's only one
particular explanation,
if we're got an E-sharp there
and then we've got an
E-natural soon after it,
it's telling us that we're in a minor key.
Now, why would it tell us that?
If we are in a melodic minor,
use of the minor key,
then we would expect the
sixth and the seventh degrees
to be raised as the scale goes up.
When we're coming down,
the sixth and the seventh are
not raised in the same way.
So coming down, they're a semitone lower
than they are going up.
So if you know about melodic minor scales,
this is something that will
make complete sense to you.
So when you're designing
a melodic minor scale,
and you're coming down from the top
of the octave to the bottom of the octave,
you followed the key signature.
Whatever it says in the key signature,
that's what you need.
When you're going up in a melodic minor,
when you're using an ascending
form of the minor scale,
whatever it says in the key signature,
when you come to number six and seven,
you raise those two notes by a semitone.
Now, in reality, in a piece of music,
you might find there's a
bit of a mixture going on
if you're in a minor key.
We might be using a little
bit of harmonic minor here.
We might be using a little
bit of a melodic minor there.
We might be using a
melodic minor scale that
behaves itself,
that goes up with raised six and seven,
and comes down following
the key signature.
We may even have a melody
using a melodic minor scale
but the wrong way around.
So we're using the ascending
form coming down a bit,
or vice versa.
All these things happen
in a real piece of music.
You don't need to worry
too much about that.
But let me suggest that this
E-sharp, E-natural thing
is a big clue.
Not only does it tell us that
we're probably in minor key,
it's also telling us that
the E-sharp, E-natural thing
is probably something to do
with the sixth or the seventh
degree of the scale.
Because as we've just recapped,
those are the two notes
that get messed around
when you are in a melodic minor scale.
It's more likely than not,
this isn't a hundred percent true,
but it's more likely that
the seventh degree of scale
has been altered,
the sixth could well be as well,
but there'll be more alterations
to the seventh of degree
than to the sixth.
So it could be telling us
that E-sharp, E-natural
is the seventh degree of a minor scale.
So that could be an
interesting clue because
if we're dealing with E something,
well could it be that
if we're in a minor key,
the tonic is F something.
So is it F minor,
it could be F-sharp minor.
Those are the options aren't they really.
If you think about that for a moment,
it's never going to be F minor because
if you know your way around your keys
and your circle of fifths,
you'll know that F minor's got four flats.
Well, here's a piece of
music plastered in sharps.
If you're in F-sharp minor,
then the circle of fifths will tell you
that that's a key that's
got three sharps in it.
Well, it's nearer, isn't it,
than F minor.
So we may just sort of
store that thought away,
that maybe if it's in a minor
key, it's in F-sharp minor.
Okay, let's work with
that theory for a moment.
In F-sharp minor, the key
signature would be three sharps.
F-sharp, C-sharp, G-sharp.
Let's have a look.
Well, we've certainly
got F-sharp, haven't we,
sitting here.
There's another F-sharp there,
there's another one there,
there's another one at the end.
So yeah, F-sharp seems to
be certainly established,
doesn't it?
What about C-sharp?
Well, we have one right
at the beginning there.
There's another C-sharp there,
there's another one there.
So C-sharp is pretty
well established as well.
What about G-sharp?
Well, here we are third note,
there's a G-sharp,
and there's another one
that creeps up near the end.
So we seem to have those
three sharps, don't we,
that belong to F-sharp minor.
We better just kind of check
about what the next sharp would be.
Because the fourth sharp would be D-sharp.
Well, we don't seem to
have any D-sharps, do we?
And we've got a D-natural there,
so it's not pointing us in that
direction particularly, is it?
But we do need to notice something else,
and we've already talked about it.
If you think F-sharp, C-sharp, G-sharp,
it accounts for nearly
all the sharps in this.
F-sharp, G-sharp, C-sharp, F-sharp,
C-sharp, F-sharp, G-sharp, F-sharp,
that's those three
sharps we've identified.
F-sharp, C-sharp, G-sharp.
But we have got this E-sharp here.
Now if you work around
the circle of fifths,
you'd be thinking,
well that's a bit odd
because I've got the first three sharps,
F-sharp, C-sharp, G-sharp,
but then, I haven't got the next sharps
have I like D-sharp, and A-sharp.
So it's a long way
until I come to E-sharp.
Now, if you were in a major key,
you wouldn't be missing sharps out.
You'd have sharps one, two, three,
and if there were more sharps,
you'd have number four,
and number five,
and so on.
If you find you've got
the first three sharps,
like we have,
and then we've got a gap
because we haven't got
a D-sharp or an A-sharp,
but then we have got an E-sharp,
that gap,
those missing sharps or missing flats,
is also telling you,
you're in a minor key.
So that's helping to
confirm things, isn't it?
Now, we did say that the
most likely explanation
for this E-sharp in
relation to the E-natural
is that E-sharp might well be
the seventh degree of the scale.
Now, think about this,
if we're in F-sharp minor,
E-sharp would be the raised
seventh degree of the scale.
If the key signatures got
F-sharp, C-sharp, G-sharp,
E would be natural as it is
here in the key signature,
but if we're going to raise it,
E-natural is going to become E-sharp.
Well, in the harmonic minor scale,
we're going to raise the
seventh degree going up
and coming down,
so E-natural becomes E-sharp.
In the melodic minor scale,
we're going to raise the sixth
and the seventh going up,
so D and E become D-sharp and E-sharp.
And coming down, E-natural, D-natural.
So, that's the big thing that confirms the
F-sharp minor,
because that is the seventh degree.
Both in its raised form
and not in its raised form.
Are there other clues?
Well, the last note is
a nice long F-sharp,
so looks as if it
finishes on the tonic note
on the F-sharp.
At the beginning, you
might be saying to me,
well, it's not F-sharp in the beginning,
it's C-sharp.
But this initial C-sharp is an anacrusis.
In other words, it's a
note or notes that come
before the first bar line.
It's a kind of sort of up
beat before we get going.
And so the first thing
that happens on a main beat
is F-sharp.
If it goes dominant, tonic,
the fifth degree of the
scale to the first degree
of the scale,
that's also confirming
that we might be going
from the fifth to the
first of F-sharp minor,
which is what's happening here.
Then when it comes to it,
it's great to be able to
look through the melody
and have some idea what
it sounds like just
by looking at it.
If that's something that's
difficult to do at the moment,
try playing it on your instrument
and just make sure you've
got all the sharps in,
it's a good little sight
reading exercise anyway.
But then try to hear where it's homing in.
Is it really homing in on
the F-sharp as the tonic,
or not?
Let's have a listen.
So the beginning, you get C-sharp,
down to F-sharp,
so if put some chords, you'll hear it.
So you feel that F-sharp is
a kind of homing in note.
And you hear, particularly
when we get to the end,
that we really feel as
if we've gone home to the
first degree of the scale
to the tonic F-sharp.
And it feels minor, doesn't it?
There's no sense of it feeling or sounding
like it's in a major key.
So, lots of evidence there for why that
piece of music is in the
key of F-sharp minor.
