- Hi, well as you can see, in this video,
I've organised a melody on the board,
and the task is to name the key.
So, you may want to pause for a moment
and see if you can do just that.
If you want to stick
with me without pausing
that's absolutely fine,
and if you've just rejoined me,
because you've had a think about it,
I wonder what conclusions you've come to.
Well, obviously, here's a melody in which
the flats all appear in the text itself,
rather than in the key signature.
It's a kind of theory exercise
that we sometimes meet in theory exams,
but it's a good thing
just to get the brain
engaged with musically anyway,
because, how would we go about the task,
not having the key signature?
Well, the first thing to note is that
we're certainly dealing in flats,
there's not a sharp in sight.
If you had a mixture of accidentals,
so a mixture of sharps
and flats, or maybe,
a few naturals and flats
affecting the same note, for example,
that would probably be indicating
that we're in a minor key.
If you've got a consistent
picture of flats,
or a consistent picture of sharps,
it's more likely that
you're in a major key.
So, that might be our first clue.
But, if we know our order of flats,
because we know our way
round the circle of fifths,
or we've got some other way of remembering
the order in which flats come,
obviously the most logical thing to do
in this particular case, is
to start ticking off the flats
in the order in which they appear.
So, the first flat is B-flat.
Have we got a B-flat in this melody?
Yes, there's one here, there's
one there, there's one there,
so B-flats, we can tick the box.
The next flat is E-flat, so do
we see E-flat anywhere here?
Well, I can see an
E-flat right at the end,
so we've got an E-flat.
The third flat is A-flat.
Have we got some A-flats?
Well, yes, there's one
there, there's one there,
there's one there,
so we can tick the
A-flat box quite happily.
Well, the fourth flat is D-flat.
Can we see some D-flats?
Well, there's one here,
there's another there,
there's one here, and
there's one just by the end,
so quite a few D-flats around.
The fifth flat is G-flat,
so let's have a look through,
can we see any G-flats anywhere?
Actually, no we can't.
So, you might have concluded that
this piece contains four flats,
B-flat, E-flat, A-flat, D-flat,
and therefore it must be
in the key of A-flat major.
And if that's what you concluded,
it's entirely logical
that you would come up
with that as the answer.
Sadly, it isn't the correct answer,
and that's what I'm
trying to explore here.
We said that the fifth
flat would be G-flat,
and we looked through the melody,
and we couldn't see any G-flats,
but there's one thing we need to notice.
We can't actually see any G's.
We could have G's on this line,
but there are none in the melody,
maybe up here, well
there are none up there.
So, there are no G's in the melody,
which begs the question,
if there were to be G's in the melody,
would those G's be G-natural,
or might they be G-flats?
They're not really seriously
going to be G sharps,
in the context of all these flats.
But, we don't really know if
it's a G-natural or a G-flat.
That's why it's logical if you concluded
this is in A-flat major.
But, it's always worth thinking,
what is the next flat or the next sharp,
and is that note present in the extract
that we're looking at,
because if it isn't present,
we've then got to do a
bit of detective work,
and consider if it were there,
would it be a G-flat in this case,
or would it be a G-natural.
Well, how do we know how to do that?
Just think for a moment,
if G happened to be G-flat,
that would make the key D-flat major.
One thing we've already noticed
is how many D-flats there are.
We've got a D-flat at the beginning,
we've got these octave
D-flats at the midway point,
we've got another D-flat there,
so quite a few D-flats lurking around.
If you look at the first bar,
you might also notice the
melody begins on D-flat.
Well, just because it begins on D-flat,
doesn't mean it's
necessarily in D-flat major,
but it might be an indicator.
If you're thinking four flats,
and therefore you concluded that
this is in the key of A-flat major,
it's slightly unusual that the first note
might be the fourth degree of the scale.
You might have a dominant note starting,
particularly if you're
starting before the first bar,
with an upbeat or what
we call an anacrusis.
If you're starting on the
first beat of the bar,
you may not have the
first degree of the scale,
or the tonic as we know it,
but you might look to see
if you've got anything
that is spelling out the tonic chord.
Now, if we were in D-flat
major, D-flat, F, A-flat,
are our first three notes,
and that's spelling out a tonic chord,
a chord I in D-flat major.
So, that's a little bit of an indicator.
At the end of the second
bar, as I say about this
halfway point in the melody,
we've got octave D-flats, a top D-flat,
followed by a bottom
D-flat, then just before it,
a run-up from the dominant
of D-flat, the A-flat,
running up to D-flat,
and that's been confirmed
by the bottom D-flat,
so there's a lot of
homing in on this D-flat.
It's partly about how many D-flats,
it's partly about the
tonic chord of D-flat
being present at the beginning,
the root, the third and
the fifth of a chord.
And in the second bar,
the way we're running up to the tonic,
and back down again,
so it's confirming D-flat as our tonic.
Now, the thing that I've
purposely thrown in to put you off
is the last note,
because you might say,
"Well, hang on a minute,
"that's all very well, but
the last note's E-flat."
Well, E-flat could actually
belong to a tonic chord
of A-flat major, so how
are we so sure we're not
in A-flat major.
Notice though, that of
course an A-flat major chord,
would also be chord V,
or a dominant chord,
in D-flat major, so it's still possible,
and this little thing I've put on the end,
et cetera, suggests that we're
not at the end of the piece,
this is just one phrase that's
going on somewhere else,
so we may not be finishing on something
that belongs to the
tonic chord at the end.
You might expect most pieces to finish
on a chord I, a tonic chord,
but it could well finish on a chord V,
and then be some kind
of imperfect cadence.
So, there's the theoretical reasoning
for the fact that this
is actually a melody
in D-flat major, because
if you did have G's,
they would actually have to be G-flat.
Now, that's all very well theoretically,
but now let's listen to
it and see if we can hear
why this might be in D-flat major.
So, I've purposely not
played the melody until now,
although it's a very interesting
thing just to consider
can you look at that
melody and try to sing it,
can you hear those notes in your head,
because that is such an important
musical skill to develop.
To be able to look at
something on the page,
and be able to hear it in your head.
So, you might try pausing it,
singing it aloud if you want to,
It's slightly different from sight reading
on your instrument,
you could do that if you wanted to,
but when you sing it, or hum it,
whatever you're going to do,
produce it vocally, you've
really got to think about,
what are these notes?
How do I get from the first
note to the second note?
Very useful skill to develop.
Here's the melody, anyway,
it sounds like this.
Can you hear that last note doesn't sound
like the end of anything, does it?
But one thing is if you
can hear the melody,
just think where is the homing-in note,
where is that tonic note?
So, have a think,
there's D-flat, so it
starting on something
that feels really solid.
And you hear those first three notes?
Spelling out the chord of D-flat major,
that's really helping me to
feel D-flat as the tonic.
I'm not really thinking,
A-flat is the tonic.
A-flat is the dominant isn't it.
And there hear how it goes on,
so there's your tonic chord,
and then a bit of scale movement,
running up to the D-flat.
When you get to the D-flat,
it feels as if we've gone home,
and then we come down an octave,
and that confirms that homing-in note.
And then it moves around a bit.
And then this doesn't feel
like the tonic does it,
it doesn't feel as if we've
gone home to anything,
so you can see and begin to hear,
how we're homing in on
D-flat as our tonic.
And if I put some chords under it,
it would be even clearer.
You can hear that now.
And I can hear that this,
D-flat, is the tonic.
So, just an interesting
little challenge there,
in looking at a melody that
may have a missing note in it,
that is critical to your decision
about which key the piece is in.
