Unsung Key Signatures

[saxtromba]

Certain key signatures aren't very common, especially ones with lots of sharps or flats, and doubly especially the enharmonic key signatures (a-flat minor for g-sharp minor, and so on).  I'm wondering how many pieces (or at least movements) people can think of which use, as the foundational key signature, the four seven-accidental key signatures (a-flat minor, C-sharp Major, a-flat minor, and C-flat Major).

So far as I can tell, a-flat minor is the most common.  The slow movement of Beethoven's Op. 26 piano sonata is so signifies, as are several pieces by Janacek, Dmitri Cuclin's 13th symphony, and so on.  C-sharp Major was actually more common during the Baroque period than D-Flat Major, with the most famous example being the third Prelude and Fugue in The Well-Tempered Clavier; in modern times, D-Flat Major takes over, as in Prokofiev's seventh symphony, where the last movement should be in C-Sharp Major yet is notated in D-Flat.  But C-Flat Major and a-sharp minor?  Can anybody here think of such pieces?  (remember, I'm asking about whole movements or entire pieces, not sections within movements).

[JimL]

I don't know about those two, but Bruch's Concerto for Two Pianos is in the infrequently used key of A-flat minor, which may have been used for a movement here or there, but not for an entire work, so far as I know.

[eschiss1]

Actually, Cuclin's 9th (I think. that or the 11th. actually, I think the 9th is in Anat. minor. never mind. the 11th it is, then...) and of course Bax's 7th symphonies are in A-flat minor.

Also this piece of music btw, but it's unfinished

[eschiss1]

ooh. Wikipedia points to this incomplete but interesting page... I see...

[Revilod]

Ab minor would be preferable to G# minor because G# minor would require a double sharp on the leading note (Fx = G natural) which musicians are not keen on! In Ab minor the leading note would be notated as a  G natural.

C flat major is usually written as the more friendly B major but harp parts are often written in C flat major even when the rest of the orchestra is notated in B major because C flat is the pedal harp's home key.

I wouldn't say that certain keys are "unsung". It's just that, for practical reasons of notation, some keys are avoided when their more easily notated enharmonic equivalents can be used instead.

[albion]

I've just had to accompany What a Swell Party This Is with a ghastly section which lurched into C flat major (it was some cobbled up version printed on Sibelius I was handed at the last minute and had to sight-read  ) - what a nightmare! 

PS. I think I got away with it (if in doubt, vamp till ready .... ) 

[febnyc]

Erich Wolfgang Korngold - the greatest composer of film scores during the golden years of Hollywood - wrote the music for the 1941 movie "Kings Row."  According to the notes of a CD:

Korngold condensed enough material into the Main Title (of Kings Row) for an entire symphonic movement.  Two bars of wind and string trill lead to a five-bar brass fanfare (in 4/4, 3/4 and 2/4 time!) to a four-bar string melody of very unusual harmonic changes.  The music is in the rarely used and difficult key of B major, necessitating five sharps, the trumpets reading in D-Flat and the harps in C-Flat!

How's that for key signatures?

[Revilod]

Erich Wolfgang Korngold - the greatest composer of film scores during the golden years of Hollywood - wrote the music for the 1941 movie "Kings Row."  According to the notes of a CD:

Korngold condensed enough material into the Main Title (of Kings Row) for an entire symphonic movement.  Two bars of wind and string trill lead to a five-bar brass fanfare (in 4/4, 3/4 and 2/4 time!) to a four-bar string melody of very unusual harmonic changes.  The music is in the rarely used and difficult key of B major, necessitating five sharps, the trumpets reading in D-Flat and the harps in C-Flat!

How's that for key signatures?

Actually, as I said above, C flat is the pedal harp's most comfortable key so harpists don't mind at all when the music's in B major....though it's true that other players may be less keen!

One of the considerations when deciding, especially for young or inexperienced players, what key to use for a piece is the key signatures the transposing instruments will have to cope with. Ask anyone who coaches a young band or orchestra and he'll tell you that his favourite key is not C major but F major because it happens to be fairly easy for nearly everybody.

Still...this isn't a music theory forum!

[JimL]

D-flat isn't that difficult a key.  I don't know that much about trumpets, but they must be in B-flat, if they transpose down a whole step.  But if a piece is in D-flat, the trumpet part would therefore be in E-flat, not that hard at all, I would think.

[Lionel Harrsion]

There are no 'easy' or 'difficult' keys, just easy and difficult passages.  One might describe G major as an 'easy' key but ask any oboist if the solo at the start of Ravel's Le Tombeau de Couperin is easy, and be prepared for a volley of abuse!  As a genreal rule, string players tend to groan at keys with many sharps or flats but they'd far rather play music which is written with an understanding of what is effective on their instrument, albeit in a remote key, than stuff in 'easy' keys that disregards the technique of the instrument.

[eschiss1]

hrm. while A-flat minor is preferable to G-sharp minor, Myaskovsky's symphony no.17 in G-sharp minor is probably very very very marginally slightly more often recorded (...twice, anyhow, recorded, I think) than Cuclin's 11th (once at most). Etc. Though Bax's 7th (described as in A-flat without major or minor as I recall, without key-signature also if I recall, but definitely in A-flat minor of course) has done better - but then, it's by Bax

[mbhaub]

For well-trained, semi-pro and pro players, no key causes difficulty. Even something as simple sounding as "1812 Overture" ventures into some "difficult" keys. And as far as transposing instruments go, any clarinet player will have a B flat model and an A model since composers do try to make it as comfortable as possible. Trumpets are mostly, but not always in B flat. As already noted, the real problems are difficult passages. For bassoon players, Beethoven's 4th, Mozart's overture to Marriage of Figaro, neither of which is in a difficult key, present challenges that 200+ years after being written still vex players - even with modern instruments - and are on any audition list. As a hack pianist, though, I do have a mental block which never ceases to amuse me. I can play comfortable in B major (5 sharps) no problem. But C flat? Same enharmonic key, but oh my, is that tough. Seven flats shouldn't be a problem. Same finger positions, but there's just something about it.

[TerraEpon]

Yeah, the number of accidentals isn't always related to how easy it is, especially when mentality is concerned. I find I have a much easier time in Eb major than in D major on the clarinet. Though part of that is the 'lie' on the accidentals (Bb is the 'normal' fingering in the low register where B is the 'accidental' one), I just find it easier to remember which accidentals to play for some reason.

[dax]

Ab minor is a convenient key for pianists in terms of hand positions - or so it seems to me. Alkan is one composer who possibly prefers G# minor (last movement of Grande Sonate, 1st movement of solo Concerto etc.

[JimL]

Pianistically, A-flat minor and G-sharp minor are identical.  There is no variance in hand positions.