Lesson 22: Key Signatures and Accidentals
Category: Lessons
Key signatures tell us which sharps and flats to play consistently in a piece of music. But just because a piece of music has a key signature, does not mean that no other sharps are flats are allowed. Often, a piece of music will have a combination of a key signature and ACCIDENTALS which are sharps, flats, and naturals that are located in the piece of music. An accidental is located in front of a note, and alters the pitch of the note for the remainder of the measure. (If you remember naturals in Lesson 21, all accidentals act much the same way.)
There are several particulars you should know about accidentals:
- Accidentals do not affect the same note in a different octave
- Accidentals are not repeated on tied notes.
- Accidentals affect the pitch of the note for the remainder of the measure
So you’ve learned the basics of accidentals – basically they are SHARPS, FLATS, and NATURALS that can be strewn throughout a piece of music (rather than being in the key signature).
But wait! There is more! We haven’t learned of every type of accidental. Soon we will learn about DOUBLE SHARPS, and DOUBLE FLATS, which alter the pitch of a note by 2 semitones instead of 1. I’m sure you are looking forward to learning about that, but I will leave that for the next lesson.
photo credit: oh_candy
Related Posts
Posted on May 9th, 2009 by sharlene
1 Comment
February 19th, 2010 at 10:16 pm
[...] is located WITHIN the piece of music. If you need to review how accidentals work, check back on Lesson 22: Key Signatures and Accidentals. So far we learned about 3 types of accidentals: SHARPS, FLATS, and NATURALS. Each of them has a [...]