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an incredibly beginners question

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(@almann1979)
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i am sure everybody here but me knows what the following term means, so i apologise for asking, but what does the term "tonal center" mean, and how do i achieve a tonal center of a particular note in a chord progression??

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Noel Gallagher (who took the words right out of my mouth)


   
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(@blutic1)
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To put it simply, it's the tone (or note) that is the "home base" of the song. Look at the sheet music or tab for a song. The most common note is the tonal center.

edit- I knew I was going to get nailed for such a simple response. :D I should have said the most common note is "usually" the tonal center.


   
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(@noteboat)
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The most common note is the tonal center.

Not true!

People often say the tonal center is the first note, or the last note, or the one most commonly used - but there are enough exceptions to each of those that they're pretty useless in determining the true center.

Sing "Happy Birthday". If you're singing in the key of C, G will be sung more often than any other note... about twice as often as the tonal center. (This song also disproves another common misconception, that the tonal center is the first note.)

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(@katmetal)
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Sing "Happy Birthday". If you're singing in the key of C, G will be sung more often than any other note... about twice as often as the tonal center. (This song also disproves another common misconception, that the tonal center is the first note.)
ARRGGG!!! Thanks for the "earworm", NoteBoat! I'll be hearing that one for weeks now! I just succeeded in purging "Jordan" by Buckethead from my brain, & now I've replaced it with "Happy Birthday"! :roll:


   
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 lars
(@lars)
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edit - sorry for hijacking the thread alman -it just made me think

Noteboat - is there anything meaningful, simple and general to say on the relation between the key of a song and its tonal center?

I would guess - in a simple melody - lets say uhm, happy birthday - its tonal center tend to equal the key. Obviously too there can be modulations (is that the word in english?) bringing the melody for a while to another key with another tonal center. But what about establishing a new tonal center different from the root within the same key?

Is there an objective way of determining a tonal center in a melody?

Just curious I guess.

BTW - My feeling is that the last note is a useful heuristic for establishing the key of a song - not always right but it performs far better than a random guess :-)

lars

...only thing I know how to do is to keep on keepin' on...

LARS kolberg http://www.facebook.com/sangerersomfolk


   
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(@hbriem)
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Determining the tonal centre or key of a song can be quite tricky. As mentioned there are two rules of thumb:

1 - Many songs begin on the home note.
2 - Most songs end on it.

These aren't really sufficient. The tonal centre is where the melody or chord progression feels "finished", at rest, complete.

Determining this point can be quite tricky, even for an expert. Many songs change key and it is very common for the verse and chorus to be in different keys, albeit usually related ones.

Try playing a melody or chord progression and stop on the various notes or chords. Does it feel complete and finished?

For example, try playing a C, then a G (chord or note). Does it feel finished? What if you play C, then G, then C again? What about C-Am? C-Am-Dm? C-Am-Dm-G? C-Am-Dm-G-C?

If a 7th chord (not a minor or major 7th) occurs, it tends to "dominate" or force the key to be a note a 4th higher. That's why it's called a dominant 7th. For example a D7 will pull the ear to want a G where it wants to finish.

--
Helgi Briem
hbriem AT gmail DOT com


   
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(@noteboat)
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I think Helgi's nailed it. A few years ago I surveyed a bunch of music in different styles, and found that about half started on the tonal center, and about 90% ended on it. I didn't try to evaluate the "most often used" note, because it takes some time to go through a score and identify the most frequent note... which means even if it was a good indicator, it's probably not a useful one - a 3:00 tune in 4/4 time with an average of just 6 notes per measure will have over 500 notes in it!

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 lars
(@lars)
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Thanks for the replies

But since you have been researching: What is the correlation between tonal center and key - it is obviously not 1,0 because then it would be easy enough todetermine the tonal center - but it has to be high - or?

lars

...only thing I know how to do is to keep on keepin' on...

LARS kolberg http://www.facebook.com/sangerersomfolk


   
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(@noteboat)
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Actually, the correlation is perfect - the tonal center IS the "key" of the song.

What mucks it up is that we've got just one fairly limited tool for expressing "key" - the key signature. One key signature can represent multiple "keys"... if you see no sharps or flats, you could be in C major or A minor (or D Dorian or whatever).

To confuse things further, when we make decisions on what key signature to use, our primary goal is readability. If you had a simple melody using an A blues scale (A, C, C#, D, E, G) you'd probably write it out with no sharps or flats and alter the C note as needed. Add a blues harmony using the I, IV, and V chords and you'd probably write it with three sharps. You'd be using C# and G# for the melody if you make the key signature A major... you'd need C#, F#, and G# in the chords if you write it in A minor. Less accidentals by altering the melody, and easier-to-read chords to boot.

But either way the tonal center (A) matches the "key" (A minor or A blues).

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(@kingpatzer)
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Actually, the correlation is perfect - the tonal center IS the "key" of the song.

What mucks it up is that we've got just one fairly limited tool for expressing "key" - the key signature. One key signature can represent multiple "keys"... if you see no sharps or flats, you could be in C major or A minor (or D Dorian or whatever).

...

But either way the tonal center (A) matches the "key" (A minor or A blues).

I don't really want to disagree with Noteboat here, because what he's saying is pretty much right. But I think it's a little simplistic.

I think where a lot of people go wrong is thinking about the key of a song. "Key" and tonal center are, in my humble view, most properly associated with phrases.

Most songs, even most Pop songs, have contrasting phrases where the "key of hte moment" shifts. Either from major to minor, or to another relative key.

In jazz and other more structurally complex music forms, the key can shift rather quickly and rather frequently.

The Key signature is a choice that is made about they easiest way to write the song's music. But it may well have several "keys," aurally.

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 lars
(@lars)
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That is interesting - and obvious when thinking about it - that the key signature is a post hoc approach to write things as simple as possible.

But - and I'm not giving up - even though I should possibly have started my own thread - at least your thread is kept alive Alman

anyway - the tonal center or key is where a phrase "feels" at home huh? Would a phrase always have a tonal center? In many (simple) cases it is easy to establish from say, looking at the cadence. But what about more complicated cases. I mean there is no magic involved, but could say, a computer program be used to establish the tonal center? Or can it sometimes be ambiguous or arbitrary or even absent.

I've no idea what I'm after here. Curiosity - kudos to you guys for constantly answering every sort of stupid questions :-)

lars

...only thing I know how to do is to keep on keepin' on...

LARS kolberg http://www.facebook.com/sangerersomfolk


   
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(@noteboat)
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Phrases don't have to have tonal centers... in fact, atonal music deliberately avoids the feeling of a "home base". But if we ignore atonal stuff, musical phrases in general either resolve, don't resolve, or just sort of wander around without being clear either way.

Phrases that resolve have a clear tonal center. When you're done with the phrase, it's at rest, and doesn't need to go anywhere else. There are some common ways melodies do this - a movement of a fourth or fifth up or down on the last notes, or a half-step movement up. But since there are so many possible variables - whether or not tones fall on beats, the spacing between tones, etc., you can't really generalize when phrases resolve or don't - you have to "feel" it.

Phrases that don't resolve leave you wanting more. Sing the first line of "Happy Birthday"... you're left hanging on the word "you". At this point you can't really define a tonal center in absolute terms, because you don't have enough information: your notes so far (in the key of C) are G, G, A, G, C, B. Since it doesn't resolve, all we can really say for sure is that B isnt' the tonal center.

As King said, sometimes you've got a "key of the moment". An individual phrase may seem to resolve, but in the entire composition some other phrase may resolve more strongly. The weaker phrase by itself has a tonal center, but in looking at the piece overall, we'd say it's a "temporary tonicization". (Which means by itself it seems to resolve, but in the big picture it isn't the tonal center - the less clear a musical concept is, the more likely theorists are to have a twenty-dollar word to describe it! :) )

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