What Key Are We In?

Is there a right and wrong way to name keys?

As a sideman bassist and keyboardist for various artists and church music ministries, I have come across this very thing many times. A band leader will call out a song in the key of C# Major instead of Db Major. Or Db Minor instead of Db Major. When you are playing a support role to a band leader, worship leader, artist, or music director you have to learn their language, so to speak. You have to account for varying degrees of education levels and real world music experience and be able to adapt to each situation. It is not my intention to belittle anyone's musical ability or knowledge, but everyone learns differently depending on their surroundings, especially during the young, musical learning years. But is there truly a "right and wrong" way of naming a key? The answer to that question is yes. And I will explain why.

Happy Accidentals.

That's right. You have to have happy accidentals, as I like to call them. A happy accidental is one that doesn't need to be used. In other words, the rule of thumb should be - the less amount of accidental notes on the staff, the better. It makes things a lot easier to read. There is only one key out of the twelve major keys that we use in western music where it is optional to call the key by either name. This key is F# / Gb. This key has the same number of accidental notes (six) both ways. So, it is really up to you, depending on which you are more comfortable with. All the other eleven keys have a proper name that should be used, based primarily on the number of accidentals that are in the key. The key (pun intended) to understanding accidentals and how to minimize their use is to remember that the distance between the notes B and C and similarly, E and F is only a half-step. When you are trying to figure out the proper name for the key you want to be in, you should try your best to avoid the diatonic use of B# when you can use C instead, or Cb when you can use a B instead, and so on.

Examples.

The key of Db Major has five flat notes in it: Db, Eb, Gb, Ab, and Bb. If you were to call this key by it's other name, C# Major, you would have seven sharps: C#, D#, E#, F#, G#, A#, and B#. You cannot call the E# note by its other name of F because then there would be no note that corresponds to the third scale degree in the key of C#. You would be going, essentially from D# to F. Where's the E? It is a major scale, and notes are supposed to follow a sequential order. And you shouldn't have two different versions of the same note in the same scale, like F as the third scale degree followed by F# as the fourth scale degree (At least not in the major scale. This situation does come up in more complex scales, such as the Modes of the Melodic Minor as well as the Diminished scales). Therefore, in this case, Db Major is the proper name for this key, and not C# Major.

On the other hand, C# Minor works better than Db Minor. The reason for this is the same. I also like to relate minor keys to their relative majors. So, in this case, the relative major key is E Major. In the key of E Major, the sixth note is C#. Therefore, the relative minor key is C# Minor. To call this key Db Minor would imply that the relative major key is Fb Major, which, doesn't make sense when you think of all the accidentals in that key. You will actually get into double-flats if you try to think about this as Fb Major. We don't want that if it's not necessary. The key of C# Minor has four sharp notes: C#, D#, F#, and G#. If you thought about this as Db Minor, you would have seven flat notes: Db, Eb, Fb, Gb, Ab, Bbb, and Cb. Imagine having that seven-flatted key signature at the front end of your sheet and having to remember that every time you play a note on the "B" line, you are actually playing an "A" note. It's physically doable, but not the best situation.

Then there is the case of Eb Minor. This key's relative major scale is Gb Major. This was the one key where I said, we had the freedom to choose it's name, since there were the same number of flat notes as sharp notes. If we call this scale Eb Minor, there are seven flat notes: Eb, Fb, Gb, Ab, Bb, Cb, and Db. But if we call this key D# Minor, there are equally, seven sharp notes: D#, E#, F#, G#, A#, B#, and C#. So, the key of Eb Minor / D# Minor, just like its relative major scale of Gb Major / F# Major is up to your preference. Personally, I think a lot better in flat keys, so my preference would be to call these keys Gb Major and Eb Minor. But that's just me, and I am a product of my early surroundings in the church. EVERYTHING was done in flat keys!

I could go on and on about this! So, if there are particular cases that you would like to discuss, please contact me by email at peterrpowers@gmail.com or use the contact page on this site.