When changing/modulating keys, we are relating one pitch set (a group of notes) to another pitch set. Rather than reinventing the wheel (of fifths? bad pun…) we'll start with exactly that. Musical brightness is often first explained to musicians with key modulations, otherwise known as key changes.

Rather than trying to convey exactly what it is with words, the best way to explain what brightness is is to take a musical scale or chord and either brighten it or darken it!

Darker means that notes have been lowered (flatted, diminished, etc.įor example, stating that “a major chord is bright” most likely means “a major chord is brighter than a minor chord.” The third is raised in a major triad.

Brighter means that notes have been raised (sharped, augmented, etc.).

So if we do say that a scale or chord is bright, we mean that it is brighter than some other scale or chord. A scale on its own is neither bright or dark either. I'll mention this as a primer now and point it out when needed as we get further into the article 🙂Ī note by itself is neither bright or dark. The famous Circle of Fifths will be an invaluable tool to help understand brightness and darkness.īefore we get deep into the conversation of brightness, I'll state that on the circle of fifths, clockwise is the bright direction and counter-clockwise is the dark direction. Please note that the brightness of timbre is definitely a musical quality! It's just not what we're discussing here. Rather, the idea of brightness has to do with pitch sets and their relativity to root notes and other pitch sets. This type of brightness has to do with the frequency spectrum rather than with musical notation. When talking about brightness/darkness applied to harmony, we're not describing the timbre of an instrument (a crash cymbal is brighter than a kick drum new acoustic guitar strings are brighter than old ones, etc.). In this article, we'll discuss the idea of musical light: brightness and darkness! The concept of brightness and darkness in music theory is applied to chords, scales, and harmony in general.

Brightness and darkness are relative ideas. I call it a spectrum, but it's actually cyclical and doesn't necessarily work with absolutes.

This idea of a ‘musical light spectrum' is really interesting. Musical brightness and darkness is something that has been on my mind lately.

Modulate a flat to g major