Author: brycon
Date: 2017-06-20 04:14
Quote:
Right, but then why does the piano keyboard begin three half-steps below the C Major scale? I think it's a curious thing that the keyboard doesn't start with the first note of the natural (white key) major scale, which was called do long before it was called C. If what we call C had been the first note on the keyboard, we probably would call it A and go up alphabetically from there.
But earlier keyboards, of course, had a different range than the modern grand piano (harpsichords, if I remember correctly, begin on a low F).
Interestingly, the grand staff became more popular as a notational tool around the same time as the keyboard took off as an instrument. And in the late Renaissance, there was a shift in composition from part books to score format. The shift in thinking no doubt led to the change from polyphony to thorough-bass homophony; Claude le Jeune, for instance, was cited as working directly at the keyboard (perhaps consequently, his music was also criticized for bad counterpoint).
At any rate, what keyboard-oriented thinking, including the grand staff, does is orient the pitches around middle C; i.e. the treble staff is the notational mirror image of the bass. So I think composers and keyboardists conceive of the piano or harpsichord as moving outward in two directions from middle C, which makes sense with the divisions of parts into left and right hands. And additional pitches at the bottom and top of the instrument simply reflect a desire for more range and color, accommodated by advances in instrument making and technology.
But maybe more interestingly, harmony is notationally symmetrical around an A chord--because an A chord contains the pitch C as its middle pitch or third. So, for instance, if I write an A chord then turn my music upside down, it's still an A chord. And if I write a D chord or IV and flip my music, it becomes an E chord or V (and vice versa). This inherent feature of the grand staff allowed Schoenberg to write what he called "flip chorales"--four part chorales that made sense harmonically and syntactically rightside up and upside down.
Post Edited (2017-06-20 04:20)
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The Clarinet BBoard
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