it's to do with the fact that the standard notes on a piano keyboard are actually an approximation, so in some keys, some of them are actually out of tune
fretless instruments don't suffer from this problem btw, so violins and so on can hit all the notes with perfect intonation for the relevant key, but other instruments have to use approximations
i mean i get what note it really is, but why call it that
A double sharp is when you need to sharp a note but it already has a sharp.
I don't know how it'd have to do with tuning the instrument, but I play the piano which is not typically tuned on the fly, but still the double-sharp would just be a note two half-steps up so I'm not sure what difference it makes.
Rather, it has to do with the fact that people are used to spelling major and minor keys/scales with seven letters, corresponding to the seven distinct notes in each octave.
So for example, if you're in A minor, whose natural minor scale is:
A B C D E F G A
...and you want to sharp the leading tone to get a harmonic minor scale, you have:
A B C D E F G# A
We can sharp the G because it's not already sharped.
But what if we were in G# minor? Its natural minor scale is already:
G# A# B C# D# E F# G#
So how do we sharp the F#? We could say F "double-sharp" is G natural, but then we'd have this spelling:
G# A# B C# D# E G G#
But if we do this, it becomes annoying to write music because if you ever use a G# and the G natural right below it in quick succession, you'll have to keep re-sharping and re-naturaling the G every time it changes, rather than maintaining the G sharped from the key signature and then only changing the F-whatever once per measure. So, instead, we write:
G# A# B C# D# E Fx G#
Problem solved.
So you'll see this generally only in keys that already have many sharps (G# minor's key signature already has 5 sharps). Similarly, you'll generally see double-flats only in keys that already have many flats.
yeah it's kind of silly that we don't just use 12 letters of the alphabet eh?
On one hand, yes.
On the other hand, though, all our generally-in-use keys consist of seven distinct notes per octave (with possible variants on the 6th and 7th notes in the case of minor keys), so the way notation works right now is that if you're in a key, then every note that's diatonic to that key has its own distinct letter. B major: B C# D# E F# G# A# B (enharmonic to C-flat major: Cb Db Eb Fb Gb Ab Bb Cb, but B major is more typical) C major: C D E F G A B Db major: Db Eb F Gb Ab Bb C Db (enharmonic to C-sharp major: C# D# E# F# G# A# B#, but Db major is more typical) D major: D E F# G A B C# D Eb major: Eb F G Ab Bb C D Eb And so on.
Imagine a 12-note notation: let's call the notes IJKLMNOPQRST, starting with what we normally call C (then C#/Db, then D, etc.). (I started on "I" because German uses "H" for B natural and "B" for B flat.) C major I major: I K M N P R T I Db major J major: J L N O Q S I J D major K major: K M O P R T J K Eb major L major: L N P Q S I K L ...and so on. The functional relationships between the notes -- highlighting which ones are more "important", for things like forming chords, are less obvious. What we know as a C major chord is I-M-P, what we know as a C minor chord is I-L-P, and what we know as a C7 chord is I-M-P-S; their relationships aren't as obvious as C-E-G, C-Eb-G, C-E-G-Bb. (A similar thing happens if you spell the chords funny, such as C-D#-G for C minor or C-E-G-A# for C7.)
(That's not to say it isn't workable; one could certainly get used to it.)
Quote from arkarian:
you can import from backloggery if you want!
I missed this post earlier, but thanks. Maybe I'll try it out just to see how badly it coughs in response to those things like romhacks or weirdly-named games.
I hate my job. A long time ago I was in a department that had incompetent people in it who were wasting tons of money, but I eventually left that department for a better job. Apparently the company has finally realized the depth and consequences of the incompetence in that department, and has asked me to return to it to train people. I TRIED to train those people before! No amount of training will help these people. Of course, I can't say that out loud since we have to have a positive, solutions-driven attitude about everything. So now I have to think of a politer way to say it? I need to get away from this place. /rant
I hate my job. A long time ago I was in a department that had incompetent people in it who were wasting tons of money, but I eventually left that department for a better job. Apparently the company has finally realized the depth and consequences of the incompetence in that department, and has asked me to return to it to train people. I TRIED to train those people before! No amount of training will help these people. Of course, I can't say that out loud since we have to have a positive, solutions-driven attitude about everything. So now I have to think of a politer way to say it? I need to get away from this place. /rant
On the upside, your story could become the plot of a movie (if it turns out to be an uplifting experience) or an anime series (if it turns out to be an "only sane person" situation). [/snerk]
Quote from arkarian:
that point where singing a song becomes harder than playing it
We haven't had power in the upstairs of our house for almost 3 weeks. I had reported a squirrel infestation in our attic multiple times, and the maintenance guy they kept sending would deny that there was a problem no matter how much evidence there was because he didn't want to do anything. Now the squirrels have eaten through the wires. They sent an electrician and he deemed the problem to be a fire hazard, and we have no smoke alarms upstairs now either, so he cut off the power upstairs. He said the repairs would be a big job, and it was too big for him. So a few days later another electrician was supposed to come, and he was a no-show. So the management company hired another electrician, and he has been a no-show THREE TIMES. We called him and were pissed off at him for no-showing on use three times, especially since we had planned for him coming by taking time off of work and telling my niece we couldn't come to her birthday party. And now he's saying he's not going to come at all because we have the nerve to be upset at him for not showing up 3 times. We're paying $1825 a month now, too! It gets so hot in here that we can't stand it, since we can't run the swamp cooler without power. We just keep getting the run-around from the management company. If I call the authorities, I'm afraid they will deem the house to be unsafe and then we won't have anywhere to go. Fuck life.