# Do you care what key a work is in?



## vavaving (Apr 20, 2009)

Aside from being used to identify a piece of music, do you otherwise rely on this information as a listener?


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

Yes and no.

The idea of the different keys evoking different feelings always seemed a bit airy-fairy to me for equal temperament or common practice music. It made a lot more sense in modal music. Usually I just need to know if it's major or minor (or pentatonic, atonal, or whatever) and I can tell that by listening.

But it IS sort of important to know the home key so you can follow along with composers' modulations during the development in a movement and it's interesting to know how remote a key is being used. I usually can't tell where the modulation is going exactly without annotations or liner notes or a score to look at. I can certainly tell when the home key returns though.

I don't like the use of keys for identification, or opus numbers either. If you talk to me about Bach's _Concerto for harpsichord No. 5 in F minor, BWV 1056 _, I won't be able to place the piece in my head however much I may like and remember it on hearing. But if you mention Rameau's _Les Indes Galantes _I'll know exactly what you are talking about just because it has a proper name instead of a key.


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## Tapkaara (Apr 18, 2006)

Hahaha, no!


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## R-F (Feb 12, 2008)

I think the key is very important. For example, I found some sheet music for Debussy's Claire De Lune a while back, which was in the key of G Major as opposed to D flat Major, which Debussy wrote it in. I just couldn't stand it. To me, it had lost all of its warmth and just sounded too bright. I don't have Perfect Pitch, but it irritates me when I hear a piece I know well put into a different key, for some absurd reason.


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## TresPicos (Mar 21, 2009)

For the listening experience, I don't really care that much about the key of specific works, but I do wonder why a certain composer chose a certain key for a certain work. Did every key mean different things to them, like it did for old Schubart (http://www.rollingball.com/A01c.htm), or was it just "hm, long time since I wrote something in G sharp"?

Composers with synesthesia, like Scriabin and Rimsky-Korsakov, probably picked keys for reasons that are lost on most of us.

Also, a lot of the music I listen to doesn't really have a key. But I guess I would still notice if it was transposed a third or so.


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## Herzeleide (Feb 25, 2008)

vavaving said:


> Aside from being used to identify a piece of music, do you otherwise rely on this information as a listener?


If a piece of music with which I'm intimately familiar is transposed, I would certainly notice and be very irritated.

I am, however, used to hearing pieces like the St Matthew Passion performed in different keys, since some performances of it are in Baroque pitch (i.e. a semitone or so lower).


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## vavaving (Apr 20, 2009)

Interesting.

I agree that keys aren't great for identification, especially if one is searching for all versions of a recorded work. Neither are opus numbers for that matter. A unique name or musicology number will narrow it all down though.


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## PostMinimalist (May 14, 2008)

As a player, the key absolutely matters especially in difficult scores! Listen to Barbers adagio played by a youth string orchestra in B minor as opposed to B flat minor and you'll understand immediately. The B minor is bright and zingy but easy as pie to play, and the B flat minor is dark and sombre but much more difficult. The work is actually in B fat minor because the composer was intersed in getting that sombre sound from the strings and avoiding the zinginess of the sharper keys.


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## woodwind_fan (Sep 9, 2008)

This is such an interesting topic. Instinctively I'd think why does a key matter - surely the music is about relative pitches creating harmonies etc?

But then I heard that a study was done playing Beethoven's moonlight sonata to people who didn't know it, in both C# minor (the original) and C minor, and it left the people in significantly different moods. If you do know it, have a play in C minor, it sounds totally different to what you are used to.

Also, 4 out of my 5 favourite symphonies are in E Minor (and I can't think of any symphonies in E Minor that I haven't been impressed by) but that might possibly just be coincidence...


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## PostMinimalist (May 14, 2008)

How about this game? Guess woodwind fans favourite symphonies! Really fast, no googling!

Dvorak 9
Sibelius 1
Brahms 4
Haydn 44 (I think)
RVW 5

How am I doing?
FC


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## David C Coleman (Nov 23, 2007)

This would apply to live concerts where the ear picks up the perfect pitch of the ensemble...Have you heard the discrepancies that different audio and hi-fi equipment produce? It's quite amazing sometimes..It also affects the speed of the piece..


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## PostMinimalist (May 14, 2008)

David C Coleman said:


> It also affects the speed of the piece..


It sure does! I tried playing Bottesini's a minor bass concerto in e flat minor, it took me about 3 hours!!!


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## Edmond-Dantes (Mar 20, 2009)

DEFINITELY I think the key matters. I don't think I can add much to what's said here, so I'll agree with what Post-Minimalist said, as it mirrors my thoughts pretty much to a tea.


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