Q. Im trying to find a way that can change guitar chords to piano keys or vice versa
A. No need for a formula. You can play a guitar chord on the piano as well. I'm assuming you don't know any music theory so this might sound dumb but here goes -
when you press a key on the piano, that is one NOTE
a CHORD is made up of two or more notes played at the same time.
So, for e.g. a C chord is made up of the notes C, E and G. so if you play these three notes on the piano, then you're playing a C chord. Similarly if you're playing these three notes on the guitar together then that's a C chord.
If you want to learn more, pick up a Music Theory for Dummies or any other basic book. It will explain the different notes and how chords are formed. I can give you formulas but it will confuse you because there are many different chords and each has a different 'formula'.
Just remember, a piano chord is same as a guitar chord. So if you want to find out how to play G chord on the piano, google for it.
Is the music written for some instruments usually in a particular key?
Q. As a guitarist, I know the majority of music written for classical guitar is in the major keys of C, G, D, A and E, and minor keys of Dm, Am, Em, and Bm. This is due to the tuning of the open strings, making chords in those keys easier to play.
What other instruments have characteristics that make them better suited to certain keys?
A. There are basically three reasons for many instruments seeming to be 'limited' to certain keys.
[i] As Delicio says, most modern instruments have few physical limitations to the keys that are available to them, but this key preponderance still applies.
[a]Custom. Key preponderance can often be mainly due to 'tradition'... Players inherit a preference from their forebears, perhaps.
[b] Laziness. e.g.Guitarists seem to love the key of E, their bottom note (I think). It is apparently 'easier' to play in this basic tonality? Pianists seem to adore C major or A Minor, as they find these keys 'easy' to read. etc.
[c] Facility. Although, since the advent of equal temperament, there is little musical justification for a preference for only a few keys, some keys are somehow much easier to play in. (I'm not sure that this is always completely true in many cases, and that the real reason is really [b])
[d] Mood. e.g. as the chief character of the Organ is one of 'majesty', the use of the lowest pitched pipes on the pedal best achieves this mood. Thus, the keys close to the bottom note (C) are more popular for 'grand' music for that instrument. The same idea, perhaps, applies in similar ways to instruments such as the Guitar, the Cello, the Bassoon, etc.
[e] It is perhaps sad that the vast majority of art music we hear is by dead composers. These composers, so often, lived when there WERE physical limitations to the keys available.
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[ii] Some widely used instruments actually have severe physical reasons for avoiding certain keys.
[a]The most obvious are the Bugle and the Bagpipes, perhaps.
[b]However, many other 'old' instruments, such as the Recorder or the Krummhorn, apparently have physical limitations which almost preclude certain keys.
[c]Fretted instruments, always hard to play 'in tune', may have certain reasons for the avoidance of certain keys apart from those in [i] (I'm not sure of this).
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[iii] Practicality.
[a] If an instrument is found to 'sound better' in some keys than in others, for any reason, it is easy to see why certain keys are rarely used. The reasons, of course, are often due to the limitations of the performers, as in [i]
[b] Brass instruments, theoretically completely equal tempered, have a 'better sound', it is claimed, if the key is related to the actual length of their tube. At one time, it was rare to come across a work for Trumpet in any key other than D Major! The use of valves to alter the fundamental length of the tube [gradually] removed this limit. ( The most pitch-flexible modern brass instrument, the Trombone, still is said to sound 'better' in some keys than in others.)
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The present situation.
Imagine trying to accompany the bugle with a piano. It is to the credit of performers (and composers) that the extreme pitch limitations of the bugle or the bagpipes have been disguised so adroitly. [By all rights, neither instrument 'belongs' to the contemporary music environment.]
With the advent of atonal music (over 100 years ago!), several of the above instruments were reeling. (Imagine, e.g., the bagpipes trying to play Webern.)
It also exposed the illusion that we had actually achieved 'equal temperament'. Our old ideas about preferred keys had persisted, it seems.
As we are exposed so much to 'rock' and 'pop' music, where notes are frequently (and painfully!) as much as a quarter-tone out of tune, our communal sensitivity to pitch accuracy simply has to have fallen. Perhaps, in the end, this insensitivity to intonation precision will even begin to extinguish the preferences for certain keys?
Interesting question.
music composing, How do I apply F#, G# in a natural way.When does it fit in when composing in Cmajor.?
Q. I've been making songs all my life, but I find myself doing what most people do, use chords within the key signature.. Like in C I would use chords as, F, G, Am, Dm etc without touching the black notes on the piano. Take for instance Hotel California, In the verse it clearly goes behond the Gkey.
A. I think I get what you mean-- basically, you're asking when it would be appropriate to incorporate accidentals into a key that's in C Major.
I see this happening in a number of ways. The most common one is something known as the secondary dominant, in which you would temporarily "move" to a different key. For example, you might play C, then a D7 (D, F#, A, C) and then a G. This is a secondary dominant because D is the fifth scale degree of G; thus, we need to incorporate the key signature of G Major.
Another time that might be appropriate is in transitioning between chords. For example, C Major chord, then an F# which leads into a G Major chord. This is mostly just for ornamentation.
In another sense, if you're asking how to incorporate chords that aren't in the key signature, you probably won't most of the time. This is because the key signature already creates enough variation in chord type that you usually don't have to deviate from it.
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