From: Mark Pulley <mrpulley@tpg.com.au>
The term 'key' refers to the musical scale being used in a musical piece (eg C major, A minor, major and minor referring to the sequence notes used in the scale, C and A (or other notes) referring to the 'tonic' note, which is the note the scale starts from).
I'm confused and have questions. When voice goes up by an octave, its frequency doubles. An octave is divided to 12 notes. The frequency ratio between any two consequtive notes is constant so that we hear a melody as always the same melody even if the melody is started with a different note. Right? The 12 notes on the keyboard are (w = white, b = black): w b w b w w b w b w b w C D E F G A B The note sheets has the melodies marked on five-string system. -------------------------f---- e ---------------------d-------- c -----------------B------------ A -------------G---------------- F ---------E-------------------- D -C- So, only white keys have some good meaning. Why? Why black keys are discriminated?
always) modulating up or down by a fifth (eg C major to G major). If pop songs modulate, they usually do so for the last time the chorus is sung, usually moving up by a single note (a 'major second') (eg C major to D major) (which is effectively the same as moving up by a fifth, twice - C-d-e-f-G then G-a-b-c-D)
Moving up by a fifth twice means up slightly over octave, but then the thing is brought down by octave, leaving the end result: one white key up -- two notes actually? What is fifth? Does it come from the fact that one has to step five notes down (and one octave up) before reaching the destination? I notice that both C-d-e-f-G and G-a-b-c-D majors steps over the blacks the same way: 2 notes up, 2 notes up, 1 note up, 2 notes up. That is why the melody played on C major sounds the same as in G major, right? But D major (steps 2-2-1-2) would mean notes 0 2 4 5 7 D E ? G A where ? is a *black* key between white keys F and G
(a 'sharp' note (#) is higher by a small step, a 'flat' note (b) is lower by a small step).
Does # and b always mean that we stay at white and black keys? For example, E# would be just F because there is no black key between E and F. The note 4 above would be F# or Gb, right?
What Yello appears to do is more complicated.
Planet Dada starts out in a particular key - let's call it C (the tune doesn't use a typical major or minor scale, the scale I've worked out (using C as the tonic note) is C-Db-Eb-F#-G-Ab-Bb-B-C).
The steps would be 1-2-3-1-1-2-1-1.
At 1:32 the melody is played in a different key, a major second higher (let's call it 'D'). Note that D is not in the original scale (Db was).
0 1 2 3 1 1 2 1 1 D Eb F Ab A Bb C Db D
At 1:39 the second half of the tune is played, this time it has moved up another major second (this is now a 'major third' above the original key) - 'E'. Note that E is not in the original scale, or in the scale used from 1:32 to 1:39.
0 1 2 3 1 1 2 1 1 E F G Bb B C D Eb E I have no idea what to do with these. I would just stick to 12 note system and think about MIDI numbers. If I write a melody starting at C, then I could easily get the same melody transposed to other keys by moving the melody up "as is" in the piano roll editor, right? I'm still quite confused. Why white and black keys if musicians has to use both of them in any case? What are "minor key", "minor chord" and "major chord"? I guess there are two things I want to do for Yello stuff: 1. Write down melodies -- note sequences. 2. Write down the chords -- multiple notes playing at the same time. Both tasks comes easier if there are some rules in how good sounding melodies and chords are formed. Regards, Juhana