Do You Have Favorite Keys To Play In?

[Edendude]

Just curious if I'm alone on this one...

 

The band I'm with now plays a lot of stuff in odd concert keys, because the two guitarists play with dropped tunings for a beefier blues guitar sound. So this means I play a lot of stuff in keys that you don't often hear in a lot of pop, rock, and blues bands.

 

For some reason I have developed a real penchant for playing songs in the keys of F# abd Ab. Not only does the 'colour' of these keys seem to really appeal to me now, but I like the feel of playing a lot of fretted notes, as opposed to open strings.

 

Anyone else have 'favorite' keys, for any reason?

[Gord -B]

C major

[Edendude]

Who let the keyboard players out?!

 

[davebrownbass]

Keys are not an issue to my personal playing. However, I often find they are with other musicians, who are often capoing all over the place.

 

One of my friends, Rick Stitzel (now a writer for Hal Leonard, as well as his own publishing and other stuff) like to tell the story about his early influence, the trumpet player Freddie Hubbard.

 

Rick and an bunch of his buddys (while in college many years ago) caught "The Hub" at a club one time. He was in top form, playing jaw dropping solos. On break, Rick and his trumpet playing pals cornered Freddie and asked him about his solos.

 

Rick said, "Mr. Hubbard. I noticed that when you are playing in easy keys, all your solos are kinda laid back. Then, when you get to the hard keys, you really play the most tough stuff."

 

Mr. Hubbard said, "Hey. They ain't no hard keys."

[davebrownbass]

And, on a recent listening to Patty Loveless roots album "Mountain Soul," where you'd expect a lot of G, C, D and A....the entire album is in Keys like Bb, Eb and other equally remote keys for guitar.

 

Go figure.

[jeremy c]

Doesn't matter to me.

 

And one of these days I'm going to strangle a particular guitar owner with her capo.

[tnb]

Ab is my least favorite key, unless it's Ab minor. This is a recent discovery for me. It is no harder to play in than any other key, but just bugs me sonically. I don't why, but it feels inconveinient.

[g.]

When I first started playing bass I was surprised how many pop, rock, and blues tunes I was finding in Ab or whatever. But then, there were a lot in Eb/Ebm too - which made me realize that more often than not people were playing instruments tuned down half a step.

[willerichey]

I usually like to play in the same key as the song. I have "experimented" here and there to my band members dismay.

[g.]

I don't use open strings that much anyway.

[...]

Let's see... C major, A minor, and F lydian...

 

I seriously have no preference. Key is the key and go. Break the rules whenever possible.

[g.]

I plan on breaking the rules more and more as time goes by. I have to get the right kind of band together (or find like minded souls to join) in order to do that in front of audiences ; }

[ClarkW]

I don't much care for the key of Ab when I'm playing jazz, as I like to use open strings and only the G-string is in the key. I haven't figured out how to properly integrate E, A, and D in as chromatic leading tones and make it not sound yucky.

 

Most of the other keys I can deal with.

[zeronyne]

I dislike D minor, the saddest of all keys.

[Yogi]

Originally posted by davebrownbass:

And, on a recent listening to Patty Loveless roots album "Mountain Soul," where you'd expect a lot of G, C, D and A....the entire album is in Keys like Bb, Eb and other equally remote keys for guitar.

Are you sure the guitars aren't tuned down a half step? Guitar people do that a lot.

 

Right, Mr. Bumper?

[g.]

Yogi, sure - since Hendrix at least. It's hard to find electric Hendrix-inspired blues artists who DON'T tune to Eb, and I'm sure that's prevalent elsewhere as well, and in D also.

[Edendude]

I guess only 'zeronyne' touched on what I was really getting at...

 

It has nothing to do with how 'easy' or 'hard' a particular key is to play for me. Personally, that aspect matters not to me at all. I can play any key just as easily as another.

 

What I'm talking about is the 'emotional' or 'psychological' side of how the sound or colour or texture of different keys affect the way you feel, regardless of the other qualities of the music you are playing. And how it feels to play that key with respect to the physical 'feel' of it in your hands, too.

 

As 'zeronyne' suggested certain keys are known to evoke certain emotions, like the old addage that the key of Dm is the saddest of keys.

 

The really odd thing is, I even have a visual colour association with various keys and chords. I have met other musicians who share this kind of cross-referencing of the senses, but only about 10% of all musicians whom I have spoken with about it.

 

Psycho-acoustics has always been something I have been fascinated with, as esoteric as it may be.

[g.]

Let's see: is that with the red pill or the blue pill?

 

...yeah, I've read a lot of studies about this, wondered about it before that, wondered about it after reading them too. Gave it some credence maybe, but when you play in bands where routinely compositions/tunes get transposed to accomodate different vocalists, or to set up certain technical possibilities for guitarists, it maybe doen't mean that much that something might exists in such small quantities as to be dismissed for all these reasons.

 

Actually a lot of stuff gets played in the key it is in because it sounds lower or higher on some instrument or voice, and THAT is why certain keys get chosen. Since keys are relational systems I don't think I can give much credence to absolutism of any strong definite value.

 

But I could be wrong.

[davebrownbass]

Are you sure the guitars aren't tuned down a half step? Guitar people do that a lot

Not absolutely sure...I was listening while driving, and checking keys with a Korg tuner all the while!

 

Producer, bassist and Husband Emory Gordy Jr is playing URB on many tracks, and he was playing in standard tuning in all those keys (as far as I can tell.)

[g.]

That said, when I actually write a batch of songs, I explore a lot of key sigs.

[jeremy c]

If you have some sort of color association with various keys, then you have some form of perfect pitch.

 

I don't have perfect pitch but open strings do sound different to me than fretted strings. And I suppose I'd rather play a one chord funk tune in E than in Eb or F so I could use my open string and jump around the neck a little. But sometimes the other keys will provide an interesting challenge and force me to play something new.

 

In the 1600's, the keys actually did sound different because equal temperament had not been invented. So every key had its own characteristic out of tune quality. People began to associate emotional qualities to various keys.

 

But nowadays they all sound the same, especially when we are talking about music that modulates all over the place.

[Edendude]

This may sound completely whacky, but since I know other musicians who share a similar kind of associative response, I don't mind sharing...

 

When I play an Em chord on my acoustic guitar, fr example, it has a very distinct bright gold colour association for me, but only if it's in concert pitch. If it's down a quarter tone, it has a faded quality and immediately evokes a different shade in my mind's eye.

 

As nutty as it sounds...here are some of the other very distinct colour associations I have with concert pitch chords...

 

Fmaj-grey

Gmaj-red

Amaj-dark green

Am-light green

Dmaj-orange

Cmaj-white

 

Etc.

 

Must have been the brown acid!

 

 

But seriously, this association exists for me.

 

I may have some form of perfect pitch, because sometimes I'll pick up my bass after it's been in it's case for say 48 hours, and I can instantly tell whether it's still tuned perfectly to concert pitch or not. Which of course sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn't, depending on temperature differences and how it's been handled during travel.

[_Sweet Willie_]

Originally posted by Edendude:

As 'zeronyne' suggested certain keys are known to evoke certain emotions, like the old addage that the key of Dm is the saddest of keys.

 

Old addage?

 

Spinal Tap lines count as "old addages" already?

 

I don't think I have particular associations with particular keys -- emotive, etc.

 

Unfortunately I have attachments to certain keys based on how they're located on the fingerboard, but this isn't necessarily a "harder" or "easier" thing, and it's not what you are trying to get at E-d. Sorry.

[jeremy c]

You might want to read:

This article about the characteristics of keys.

 

This stuff has been talked about since the original Stonehenge was built, long before Spinal Tap built theirs.

[g.]

The key of Em makes me think that I really really really have to piss bad - because usually it is associated with 10 minute pentatonic guitar solos just before the set ends.

 

Is that yellow?

[Edendude]

Ha!

 

Yep...I hear that, too!!!

 

[R.S.M]

As edendude stated i can tune my bass without a tuner but the only colors i see are from the par cans

[g.]

Seems to me that Paul Winter ran into teachings that Db was they key of the Earth. I checked it out among a lot of the stuff J's link is pointing to. And then there's a WIRED article I pointed to a couple years ago that says 33 Hz is the happy clit frequency. And more recently everybody has probably read of deep space freqencies. I forget what the exact stuff was.

 

But surely there is a unified field theory that's way beyond our simplistic [mis]understanding.

[g.]

And of course Eddie Van Halen missapropriated a term from military sonic weapon research for his guitar tone - the so-called brown sound.

 

Later some bassists have tried to abscond with the term themselves. But perhaps only those playing extended low basses with F# and C# strings with Accugroove Whappo Grandes or other true subwoofers, and scads of wattage, can truly wield the brown sound with their synth keyboard bretheren.

 

The rest are merely pretenders.

[shakedownstreet]

Serialism is going to take over music. Keys will become as obsolete as comments.