Key Signatures and the Order of Sharps and Flats
Sharps arrive in the order F C G D A E B and flats in reverse. The order is the circle of fifths written out, one signature at a time.
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Articles
28 pieces on how music is built and how it is written down — with playable examples, tables you can check, and no filler.
Meantone and Well Temperament: Why Keys Used to Sound Different
Quarter-comma meantone, the wolf fifth and the well temperaments in between: what keyboard tuning did to each key before equal temperament settled the argument.
Meter, Beat Hierarchy and Hypermeter in Performance
Meter is a pattern of strong and weak positions, not a time signature: how it is built, how it stretches past the bar, and where performance contradicts it.
Modulation: How a Key Change Is Confirmed
A modulation is not a chromatic chord; it is a new key confirmed by cadence. The routes into one, and how to read them off the page.
After Tonality: What Composers Replaced It With
When chromatic harmony outgrew the tonal hierarchy, composers tried serial rules, rhythm, folk modes, and sound mass. What each method actually solved.
Polyrhythm and Cross-Rhythm: Counting the Distinction
Polyrhythm, cross-rhythm and polymeter are not interchangeable. Counting the ratios shows what separates a divided span from a pattern set against a metre.
Reading Intervals at Sight: Generic and Specific
Naming an interval at sight takes two passes: count the staff positions first, then judge what the accidental does to the size.
The Rise of Functional Tonality: From Modes to Keys
Around 1600 the bass became the foundation of harmony and the modal system narrowed to two keys. What changed in the documents, and what the change cost.
Romantic Chromaticism and the Expanding Tonic
Chromatic harmony widened a key without leaving it: the resources that do the work, the Tristan chord, and how to analyse it without over-labelling.
Scientific Pitch Notation: What C4 Actually Means
Middle C is C4 in scientific pitch notation, C3 on some manufacturers' labelling, and MIDI note 60 in every sequencer. The numbering is a convention.
Secondary Dominants and How Tonicization Works
A secondary dominant makes any chord a temporary tonic. How to spell one, where it turns up, and what cancels the effect.
Seventh Chords and How They Resolve in Tonal Harmony
The chordal seventh falls, the leading tone rises, and the tritone at the centre of V7 resolves by step. What each diatonic seventh chord is for.
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