What Chords Do You Need?

jefftk.com

8 pointsluu3 comments

Spinal tap got it right: d minor is the saddest key. I think Reiner was riffing on christian Schubart, from google:

“D minor, wrote Schubart, is a key of “melancholy womanliness, the spleen and humours brood.” He actually found D#minor to be sadder. It is the key, he wrote “of brooding despair, of blackest depresssion, of the most gloomy condition of the soul.”

In modern equal tempered music Dm isn't any sadder than the other minor keys. It's only in older tuning systems (ex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Well_temperament) the different keys had different feelings.

If nothing else instruments play differently in different keys. Horn players like certain b flat, guitarists love g, tuning a stringed instrument higher or lower changes the feel. But I am not convinced 440hz is the same as 500hz etc, on the physiological level.

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