Remembering the Key youre in!

[peterb20]

How do you guys remember what key youre in? Say were playing a song in the key of F (stated at the start of the song), im concentrating so hard on playing the right notes that unless the notes specifically say sharp/flat, then I dont remember!

Is it just a mindset thing - I should 'know' that the song is in the key of F, and therefore whenever I play a B i should flatten it? In which case I need to practise more knowing which note my fingers are on and which notes are flat in each key! Or is there another way?

[eldergeek]

It will certainly come with lots of practice, that you just automatically play f# and c# when you see that you are playing a piece in D major, but there are a couple of things you can do which really help:

Practice scales and practice arpeggios!

If you are trying to learn a piece of music in F major, before tackling the piece, spend a little while practicing scales and arpeggios in F major. When you get to the stage when you can play parallel and contrary motion scales in the key (and even scales a third or sixth apart), you should start to find that remembering which keys have to be sharp or flat will just happen on auto-pilot.

[pianocat3]

I think this gets sort of automatic after awhile.

I do the scales thing as eldergeek suggests, and it works for me, although i still forget at times. After awhile, it seems the mind recognzes what key a piece is in, by the chords etc, and it gets easier to not zone out and forget. It has gotten somewhat automatic for me, just a little bit. I dont have to try quite so hard, until i get a new key to play in that I've never done.

On a related note, I notice I have trouble when I switch keys too. I'm doing a piece that changes key partway through and I forget what I'm doing. My teacher says practice the transitions a lot. At Christmas when I played through a bunch of songs at once, or when I practice my nursing home gig stuff (that's been delayed, need a background check, titer tests for vaccination proof! Wth?!) the constantly changing keys mess me up.  I zone out an instant and oh no! What key am I in?! Train wreck ensues as I look to see, and lose my place in the music.

[piulento]

I think there are 2 ways to help this:
- Like people here already said, it just takes a while to get used to the scale, but if you work on it a bit (and maybe do some scales) you'll do it automatically over time.
- How are you with theory? Maybe the reason you get lost is because you don't think about the different functions of the notes you're playing. It's not that simple at first, but try to understand exactly what role each note/chord/whatever serves in the key, and things will eventually flow by themselves.

[quantum]

It is something that comes with experience. The more your are familiar with the basic building blocks of a mode (a key), the more you will start to recognize them in your mind, in your ear, and through your hands.  Things like scales, chords, arpeggios, primary chord progressions, cadences, voice leading, and harmony, help give modes an identifiable signature.  You might not be completely familiar with how all these things work, but that's okay, just keep working with these things in your sight lines. 

Some things you can do to work at a particular key: play a lot of easy pieces in that key, transpose music into that key, sight read easy music in that key, improvise in that key. 

[ted]

I find this question curious because broadly speaking I haven't a clue what key I am in. Of course this could be because I don't play in keys when improvising. I do have a partially conscious realisation of the harmonic flow, but only in terms of momentary combinatorics or changes, never as part of an overall set of immutable instructions. Theory has never been any good to me because I cannot grasp why one combination should be followed by any particular other. Different changes have different effects to be sure, but no hierarchy based on their quality has ever existed for me.

Unless the original poster simply meant keeping a key signature in mind when learning a piece, which is a different thing, and seems to be just a matter of visual and haptic memory.

[timothy42b]

I think you are not listening to your playing.

You should hear what note will fit.

You are not alone.  Really learning how to listen to your playing is a difficult skill that comes slowly to most (and is part of how the prodigy gets so good so fast).  But you need to work on it. 

[outin]

I think you are not listening to your playing.

You should hear what note will fit.

Hearing is only part of it. For me knowing which sound fits is not the hard part...the hard part is to know which of the 88 buttons to press to make that sound you need. I don't seem to be able to develope a consistent memory of the keyboard or the physical intervals, even though I hear them correctly in my head and theoretically know how things work...

[adodd81802]

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[kawai_cs]

When I read your question I realized that there is one simple thing I always do before playing a piece. I look at one octave on the keyboard and make a mental map of the given key. You can imagine it as marking the keys that belong to given tonality green and leaving out the rest. It is a moment of focus on given key signature and it works better for me than playing thru a scale. Maybe it helps you.

[briansaddleback]

I actually don't care what key I'm in. I recognize the key signature it is in but almost all pieces change keys throughout the piece anyways. Not like your going to be hitting those seven notes only in that key sig piece. I just learn my scales know how to move about in any key w scale work and learn a piece in my normal fashion.

[louispodesta]

I actually don't care what key I'm in. I recognize the key signature it is in but almost all pieces change keys throughout the piece anyways. Not like your going to be hitting those seven notes only in that key sig piece. I just learn my scales know how to move about in any key w scale work and learn a piece in my normal fashion.

Finally, someone who plays like my late father, who could transpose at sight in all twelve keys.  It was spooky to see him do this.

However, as this particular post can tell you:  when you walk around your neighborhood for a few years then you can pretty much map out your steps by memory.  The piano is the same way. 

And, a good way to start is to write out the chord symbols (A, a, A augmented 7th, A Diminished 7th, et al) above every primary chord in any particular piece you play.

For all you teachers out there, the best piece to do this with is the Mendelssohn Spring Song OP. 62. No. 6.  It has 66 measures of chord changes from beginning to end, and the only way to play it is to memorize the changes.

In my opinion the following Horowitz' rendition is superb, enjoy:

[kuska]

I don't care about the key I'm in unless I need to transpose it or do any kind of (re-)arrangement. I just look at the sharps or flats next to the clefs. Well, one thing that probably helps me remembering: I know the order (the circle of fifths), so when I see three flats, I just know that b♭ comes first and e♭ second, then a♭. It's really enough.

[adodd81802]

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[kuska]

I think that's what the OP is struggling with though as they mentioned, when it comes to playing the next B, E, A, they forget that they are supposed to be flat.

This is a big deal for sight reading and actually really helps remembering.

Then, from my perspective, the best althought quite boring way is to work with structure a bit, like making transcriptions or a translation when learning a language.

[adodd81802]

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[kuska]

I admit for children it may be less exciting, but a real understanding of why you do something at the piano, can make it a lot more rewarding, and a better performance.

Yeah what I meant is that people usually hate learning grammar when it comes to language and they're less willing to do some writing stuff when learning to play. Scales is more practical approach that just writing, so yes, I agree it can do a lot as well. I remember when I started musical education my friends had had problems with the basic rules, they'd hated learning it but then they just had to agree it was rewarding.

[adodd81802]

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[briansaddleback]

Polish. Hmmm.
Intriguing.
Good on you. But intriguing to me for a different reason.






 

[adodd81802]

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[louispodesta]

I don't care about the key I'm in unless I need to transpose it or do any kind of (re-)arrangement. I just look at the sharps or flats next to the clefs. Well, one thing that probably helps me remembering: I know the order (the circle of fifths), so when I see three flats, I just know that b♭ comes first and e♭ second, then a♭. It's really enough.

As I said:  "when you walk around your neighborhood for a few years then you can pretty much map out your steps by memory.  The piano is the same way."

Thanks for your real life playing experience, which 99% of those who come out of most music schools don't have.  Think about that.

Every University Education Major is required to finish a real world student teaching internship.  To my knowledge (with the exception of Penn State), there is no NASM accredited university music school that requires a non-ed major to be able to earn a living as a performer when they graduate.