 Hi and welcome to lesson three of the linear theory curriculum for classical guitar and piano here at NCSSM this lesson deals with key signatures and It's the first introduction that you will have to a really useful tool in music theory called the circle of fifths So let's get right to work First of all, let's take a look at the staff and today. We're going to talk about key signatures now Key signatures are used to indicate sharps and flats that form a given scale quite honestly It makes scales a lot easier when you know how to do Sharps and flats in a key signature first. Let's start with the sharp key signature Now a lot of kids don't realize this But it's really important to know that whenever you see one sharp in a key signature that one sharp is always F-sharp Okay, so if you see one sharp in that key signature, it's always F-sharp and what that really indicates is no matter what what notes are written in on the staff every time you see a note written you'll play it as F-sharp the second sharp in the series is C-sharp and it is always second So if you see two sharps in the key signature, they are always F-sharp and C-sharp Okay now and then it goes on from there. The order is F C G D a E and B So if there are four sharps in a key signature those four sharps are always FC G and D so in this case it would be FC G and D and in this case it would be FC G and D If there are five sharps in the key signature, it's FC G D and a Hopefully you follow that and you understand what we're doing there if there's six FC G D a e and So then we would go ahead and add that e in the base and in the treble And then finally if there are seven we go ahead and add the B here And we go ahead and add the B here and that gives you your sharp key signatures Now Let me get rid of those sharps and let's go to flats and I should say that a lot of students like to remember that order of sharps by Using a mnemonic device. Let's just put a little reminder here FC G D a e B is the order now I'm not a mnemonic device guy But some people are and the mnemonic device people use for this is frogs can go dancing and eat Bananas so if you want to remember that little sentence frogs can go dancing and eat bananas that will always give you the order of sharps Flats have a different order the order for flats is B e a D G C F and the mnemonic device that some people use for that is Be ad good clean fun or bead good clean fun Again, not really the way I do it, but I totally understand if that helps you So if you see one flat in a key signature that flat is always be flat to B and e 3 B e and a Four flats B e a and D if there are five be a D G If there are six be ad G C and then the last one of course is f and there are your key signatures for flats be ad Good clean fun Okay, so that's your key signatures now the next thing I want to introduce to you is the concept of using something called the circle of Fifths the circle of fifths is a magnificent tool, and I recommend that you use it just like you would use a Calculator in a math course the way it works is this is it tends to give you the name of a key signature in this case we have a C and The number of sharps or flats that are in that key signature You'll notice here at the very top for C. There are no sharps or flats So what that really is saying that if you have a C major scale C D E F G a B C There will be no sharps or flats to get your whole whole half Whole whole whole half you don't need to add any sharps or flats to that C major is basically all white keys If you go to the right The circle of fifths helps you with your sharp key signatures a G major scale has one sharp now if we go back to our Sharps that one sharp when there's one sharp in a key signature. It's always F So for a G major scale G a B C D E F sharp G and I promise you if you go through and you do your whole half pattern whole whole half whole whole Whole half feel free to check me on that that will work every single time D major has two sharps We go back to this the two sharps are always the first two here F and C So if we do our D major scale then D E F sharp G a B C sharp D Promise you whole whole half whole whole whole half It'll work for all of these it will work for all of these So and you've got a circle of fifths on your theory assignment same deal with the flats it works the exact same way and The other thing is if I asked you to write the key signature for the key of let's say for the key of B flat then really to write a key signature in B flat it gets Two flats and those flats are B flat and E flat or in bass clef those flats would be B flat and E flat Okay, so that circle of fifths gives you a ton of information that you can use Okay, now I have One other thing that I want to show you on this circle of fifths down here on the bottom These three key signatures D flat major F sharp major and B major Also have an N harmonic spelling remember N harmonic means another name for the same thing B major has five sharps but C flat major Has seven Flats F sharp major has six sharps, but the N harmonic key G flat major has six Flats and Finally D flat major has five flats What's the N harmonic spelling of D flat? If you said C sharp you were correct and it has seven sharps So these three key signatures D flat F sharp and B Each have an N harmonic key signature that you need to consider as well And that is spelled out on your worksheet as well, and that's going to be important to today's assignment Let's go to the assignment if you take a look at the first Assignment you'll see something that looks like this It gives you a scale D E F sharp G a B C sharp and D and then it gives you a little double bar like this And it says study the sharps and flats used in the scale and write the collect correct key signature for each I want you to write the correct key signature here at the end of the line Recreate the treble or bass clef depending on the line, and then what are the sharps that are used an F sharp and A C sharp Don't write that F sharp down here That would be incorrect Okay, you want to write it on the absolute correct line And you can always refer back to the front page of your theory to know exactly where that line is Now in part two, it's a little tricky to understand what they're doing here in part two So follow me here. They give you a key signature, and I think this first one in part two is in bass clef So there's a key signature that looks something like this six flats right B E a D G and C and Says identify the given key signature will you do that down here? this is the key of sort of to identify that you want to go back here and How many flats was it again? It's six flats So six flats is down here on the bottom the key of G flat So let's get to that and we're going to identify that as G flat major and then Look across the page, and it gives you another bass clef and it says key of and you got a blank and it asks for the N harmonic key Well the N harmonic key of G flat There's our G flat the N harmonic key is I got another color here just to remind you again It's F sharp so Here over on the right The N harmonic key is F sharp, and then we want you to write The key signature for F sharp so we'd come back here and It's six sharps F C G D a E and then F sharp C sharp G sharp D a And that would be the correct answer for the N harmonic key signature for G flat major Hope that all makes sense Note that on part two there is another Third example of that up on the top of page 14 and then finally on At the end on part three Simply for each key indicated write the approach appropriate signature in both clefs, and I think that should be fairly Easy to understand and so really what we're looking for is like for instance on number one they ask for The key signature for B flat major to get that I go over here Look at my circle of fifths B flat major has two flats those two flats are B flat and E flat and so B flat E flat B flat E flat and that would be the correct answer for Number one of part three you can do all of those. I hope that all makes sense if you have any questions Don't hesitate to come and ask