Hey gang! In earlier lessons, we talked about how logical music was, and how math (basic arithmetic) was a big part in how it's organized.
Music "theory" always has to make sense -- there's always a reason for the madness -- even though you may not quite have a handle on that reason just yet.
When you listen to music, have you ever thought that you've heard something similar before? Have you ever listened to the chords in a song and say to yourself: "Gee, there's another song that seems to have the same kind of chords in it"?
Well, there are reasons for this.
There are chords that just seem to go well together. You seem to hear them over and over in songs.
One reason is that some chords are natural to what is called a "key".
I don't wanna get all techy on you guys, so I'll just say that a key is a group of notes and chords that naturally sound good together.
Of course, there's a logical and mathematical reason for this. You just KNEW that I was gonna bring up math again, didn't ya'll?
Keys come from another mathematical thingamajig called a scale. There's lots of different kinds of scales -- one of them being the Chromatic Scale which you guys already know about if you've been reading my lessons.
Scales have mathematical "step" formulas. The formula for the Chromatic Scale is 1/2 + 1/2 + 1/2 + 1/2 + 1/2 etc...
The starting point of keys come from a scale called the Major Scale. Maybe you've already heard of these things before.
Major scales have a "step" formula too. That step formula is:
1 + 1 + 1/2 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1/2
Major scales have rules that ya gotta follow. Here they are:
1. The first letter name will be the name of the key.
2. The "structure" of the key will start and end on the same note.
3. You MUST use every letter of the musical alphabet (ABCDEFG).
4. Use the formula 1 1 1/2 1 1 1 1/2.
5. You cannot mix sharps (#) and flats (b). The scale will either have sharps, OR flats, OR neither.
Let me show ya an example. Let's say that we wanted to see what an A major scale was.
Rule #1 -- the key will be "A".
Rules #2 and #3 -- A B C D E F G A (I started and ended on same note without skipping a letter in the musical alphabet.)
Now rule #4 -- Use the formula (Use the chromatic scale to count the 1/2 steps. NOW you know one of the reasons why I harped and harped on you guys to understand and memorize this scale. A picture of this appears below.)
1 step (2 half-steps) above A = B
1 step above B = C#/Db -- But I MUST use the C#
1/2 step above C# = D
1 step above D = E
1 step above E = F#/Gb -- But I MUST use the F#
1 step above F# = G#/Ab -- But I MUST use the G#
1/2 step above G# = A
In other words:
A . B . C# . D . E . F# . G# . A
. 1 . 1 .. 1/2 . 1 . 1 .. 1 . 1/2
(The dots "." are there just for spacing here. They're not part of anything.)
That means that the key of "A" will naturally have these notes:
A B C# D E F# G# A
What this ALSO means is that any chords that NATURALLY appear in the key of A will use these notes.
Are ya'll confused yet? I wouldn't be surprised.
Key "theory" can take up a whoooooole lot of time. At this point, I see no reason to confuse you any more than I have to. I just wanted you guys to see that keys come from somewhere and not just something pulled out of the air.
However... (Isn't it funny how there always seems to be a "however"?)
It would be in your best interests to understand as much about this as you can.
What I would do if I were you, is to try to create major scales for the keys of C, G, D, A (do it yerself), E, F, Bb, Eb, Ab. Why these keys? Because they are the most common keys used in popular music.
Everyone cool here? See ya soon.
Professor Bruno Noteworthy
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Contributor's Note
Professor Bruno Noteworthy is a toon music professor who loves teaching the guitar to kids.
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