Mon
Mon creator of notesmachine 🎵. moonlight pianist 🌙. balancing web realms and melodic dreams with merlot in hand. #notesmachine 🍷✨

Piano Module - Key Signatures: Major

Piano Module - Key Signatures: Major

A mini-lesson on how to read piano music major key signatures. 4 min read (~605 words)

The information provided in this blog post is for educational purposes only. Please review our Disclaimer.

Review clefs and sharps and flats before reading this!

Key Signatures

Key signatures in a piece of music tell the reader which piano keys (tones) sound right together. Not all keys sound right when played together, so key signatures help organize which keys sound right, which make up the base keys that create a song.

You can find out what the key signature is at the beginning of a piece, right beside the clefs and shown with accidentals either sharps or flats or none.

Piece by Notes Machine with a circle drawn indicating where a key signature would be.

The symbols for key signature accidentals are:

  • sharp ♯
  • flat ♭

Keys in key signatures

Key signatures can be tricky to understand. They are made up of 7 piano keys and these 7 notes are the base notes used to create a piece. 

Key signatures are easiest explained with scales. Scales are notes played in a row and usually made up of all the notes in a key signature. Scales and key signatures are named after the beginning note in the scale and with the words major or minor (depends on scale note pattern).

Let’s start with an easy key signature, C Major

Treble clef with a C major key signature and whole notes in a row starting from C then going up to B and linking each note to a keyboard below it with a line indicating where each note could be played.

The C major key signature consists of C, D, E, F, G, A and B notes and has no sharps or flats, therefore a piece in the key signature C major would show nothing next to the clef:

C Major Key Signature in Treble Clef is showing that there is no sharps or flats in C major key signature.

We start with C major because it has no sharps or flats in it’s key signature. 

The rest of the major scales have either sharps or flats and since each of the 7 white notes (C, D, E, F, G, A, B) can have a sharp or a flat.

Here are all the sharps and flats,

There are three different keyboards listed on the image. First one has the white keys with their names on them starting from C to B, second keyboard is listing all the sharps starting from C# to B# and last image is listing all the flats starting from D flat to C flat.

Circle of Fifths - All major key signatures

A common design to help students remember all the major key signatures are the circle of fifths.

This shows the C major, which has 0 flats or sharps and the 7 major key signatures with sharps and the 7 major key signatures with flats, 

The circle shows the relationship between major keys, progressing clockwise by fifths. Each key signature is labeled with the key name and the number of sharps or flats it contains. The key signatures are as follows: C major (0 sharps/flats), G major (1 sharp), D major (2 sharps), A major (3 sharps), E major (4 sharps), B major (5 sharps), F♯ major (6 sharps), C♯ major (7 sharps), F major (1 flat), B♭ major (2 flats), E♭ major (3 flats), A♭ major (4 flats), D♭ major (5 flats), G♭ major (6 flats), C♭ major (7 flats).

Major Key Signatures with Sharps

Easy way to remember the which sharp comes next: 

Father Charles Goes Down And Ends Battle

  • C major
  • G major - F#
  • D major - F# C#
  • A major - F# C# G#
  • E major - F# C# G# D#
  • B major - F# C# G# D# A#
  • F# major - F# C# G# D# A# E#
  • C# major - F# C# G# D# A# E# B#

Easy way to remember which major scale with a sharp comes next: 

Start from C and count up 5, G is the next. (Continue to count up 5 to find the next key signature)

Keyboard with the C note and the G note labelled and numbers underneath each note from C to G starting at 1 and ending at 5.

Major Key Signatures with Flats

Easy way to remember the which flat comes next:

Battle Ends And Down Goes Charles Father

  • C major
  • F major - B♭
  • B♭ major - B♭E♭
  • E♭ major - B♭E♭A♭
  • A♭ major - B♭E♭A♭D♭
  • D♭ major - B♭E♭A♭D♭G♭
  • G♭ major - B♭E♭A♭D♭G♭C♭
  • C♭ major - B♭E♭A♭D♭G♭C♭B♭

Easy way to remember which major scale with a flat comes next:

Start from C and count down 5, F is the next. (Continue to count down 5 to find the next key signature)

Keyboard with the F note and the C note labelled and numbers underneath each note from F to C starting at 5 and ending at 1.