What is tonality?

Find out today what tonality is. Impatient readers say immediately: key - this is the consolidation of the position of the musical mode for the musical tones defined by the pitch of the sound, binding to a specific section of the musical scale. Then do not be too lazy to understand thoroughly.

The word "key"You probably already heard, right? Singers sometimes complain about an uncomfortable tone, asking them to raise or lower the height of the song. Well, someone may have heard this word from car drivers, who call the sound of a working engine a tonality. Let's say we pick up speed , and immediately we feel that the engine noise becomes more piercing - it changes its tonality.Finally, I’ll mention what exactly each of you came up with - this is a conversation on heightened tones (the person just started yelling and changed the "tonality" of his speech and the effect immediately felt tweeted).

Now we will return with you to our definition. So, we call tonality altitude of music. The fact that such frets and their device is described in detail in the article "What is the fret." Let me remind you that the most common frets in music are major and minor, they consist of seven steps, the main of which is the first (the so-called tonic).

Tonic and harmony are the two most important dimensions of tonality

You get the idea of ​​what tonality is, now let's move to the components of tonality. For any key, two properties are crucial - her tonic and her mode. I recommend to remember the following position: tonality is equal to tonic plus fret.

This rule can be correlated, for example, with the name of the keys, which appear in this form: in F major, in A flat major, B minor, C sharp minor, etc.. That is, the name of the tonality reflects that some of the sounds became the center, the tonic (first step) of one of the frets (major or minor).

Key characters in keys

The choice of a particular key for recording a piece of music determines which marks will be displayed at the key. The appearance of key marks — sharps and flatons — is due to the fact that, on the basis of a given tonic, a fret grows that regulates the distance between the steps (the distance in semitones and tones) and which causes some steps to decrease, while others, on the contrary, increase.

For comparison, I suggest you 7 major and 7 minor keys, the main steps of which are taken as tonic (according to the white keys). Compare, for example, the key C major and C minorhow many characters are in d major and what are the key signs in D minor etc.

So you see that the key marks in in A major - these are three sharp (fa, do and salt), and in A minor no signs; E major - tonality with four sharps (fa, do, salt and re), and in mi minor just one sharp at the key. All this is because in minor compared to major low, the third, sixth and seventh steps are a kind of indicators of the fret.

To remember which key characters in the keys and never get confused in them, you need to master a couple of simple principles. Read more about this in the article "How to remember key characters." Read it and find out, for example, that sharps and flat with the key are not recorded as horrible, but in a definite, easily remembered order, and also that this very order helps to instantly orient in all the variety of tonalities ...

Parallel and like keys

It's time to find out what parallel is and what are similar keys. We have already encountered the same keys, just when we compared the major and minor keys.

Similar tonalities - these are tones, in which the same tonic, but a different mode. For example, B major and B minor, G major and G minor, etc.

Parallel key - These are key, in which the same key signs, but different tonic. Such we also saw: for example, tonality C major no signs and La Minor too, or, G major with one sharp and E minor also with one sharp, in in F major one flat (s) and in D minor also one sign - B-flat.

Eponymous and parallel tonalities always exist in a pair of "major minor". For any of the tonalities can be called the same name and parallel major or minor. With the same name, everything is clear, but with the parallel we will now understand.

How to find a parallel key?

The tonic of the parallel minor is on the sixth step of the major key, and the tonic of the same major is on the third step of the minor. For example, we are looking for a parallel key for E major: sixth step in in E major - note C sharpmeans tonality parallel in E Major - C Sharp Minor. Another example: looking for a parallel for fa minor - we count three steps and we receive parallel A flat major.

There is another way to find parallel tonality. The rule is: a tonic of parallel tonality is a minor third down (if we are looking for a parallel minor), or a minor third up (if we are looking for a parallel major). What is the third, how to build it and all other issues related to the intervals, understand the article "Musical intervals".

Summarize

The article dealt with the following questions: what is tonality, what are parallel and identical keys, what role does tonic and mode play, and how do key signs appear in keys.

In conclusion, another interesting fact. There is one musical and psychological phenomenon - the so-called color hearing. What is color hearing? This is a form of absolute hearing, when a person associates each key with any color. Composers N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov and A.N. Scriabin Perhaps you will find in yourself this amazing ability.

I wish you success in the further study of music. Leave your questions in the comments. Now I propose to relax a bit and watch a video from the film “Rewriting Beethoven” with brilliant music of the composer’s 9th symphony, the key of which, by the way, is already familiar to you D minor.