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How to Understand the Piano Keyboard?

The keyboard provides a way of seeing the design of pitch related ideas, as they are created. Things like scales and chords are building blocks for the composition of music.

In order to understand the keyboard, some items should be identified.
Western music uses a 7 letter musical alphabet.	A B C D E F G
The white keys are given one consecutive letter name each. (i.e. A, B, C, D etc.) Their placement can remembered based upon the black keys pattern.
A black key can be named as the Sharp (#) of the white key to its’ left.
OR
a Flat (b) of the white key to its’ right.

A step is what the distance from one note to the next is called. These distances can either be identified as WHOLE or HALF steps. Movement from any key to an adjacent key is a Half Step.(i.e. A to A#; Bb to B; E to F) A Whole Step is therefore made up of two half steps. (i.e. C to D; G# to A#; E to F#) Different patterns of these steps are what create all of the different scales and chords.

Let's check and see if you understand how the names of the keys works. Below you will find a keyboard with out the letter names listed on it.

Can you....

1. Recreate this keyboard on paper
2. Name all of the keys, black & white
3. Identify 4 distances, as either whole or half steps

If you can, then you are ready to move on to the lessons on how to create scales on the main lessons page.

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