Why does the musical alphabet start with "C" ?

Hi everyone,

Been awhile since I last posted a message on this group. I've been
advancing my studies on JI and music theory and simply enjoy every
minute!

A question that I can't seem to find an answer to is why the diatonic
major scale in 12tET starts with or defaults to the letter "C" verses
the letter "A" which would seem to make more sense since "A" is the
beginning of the alphabet.

I've searched in vain for this answer and understand that other
topics are probably needed to be understood prior to this question
being answered.

I'm aware that the layout of the keyboard may have something to do
with my answer but feel that there may be other reasons.

The diatonic major scale in 12tET with no accidentals obviously is C,
D,E,F,G,A,B,C but why could it not be A,B,C,D,E,F,G,A,B ?? And also
why can't middle "C" on the piano be called middle "A".

The closest I've ever come to getting an answer was in a book which
simply stated, "there are historical reasons why the musical alphabet
starts with "C".

I found some links that are interesting with respect as to when
letters started to be used to identify frequencies. They are:
http://www.rubycliff.com/TheoryManual/Elements.html
http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0822090.html
http://stevenestrella.com/composers/composerfiles/guido1050.html
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Neil_Hawes/theory22.htm
http://www.ubmail.ubalt.edu/~pfitz/play/ref/notation.htm

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you
Wally NJ USA

Hi

I also noted that the different octaves are identified by number.
Although the musical alphabet goes from A to G the octave range
numbers change on the letter C (instead of A). Middle C is identified
as the C4, all the letter names above that tone until the next C are
in the 4th octave, i.e. D4, E4, F4, G4, A4, and B4. The next note
(third space) is C5. The fifth octave continues in similar fashion.

"C" seems to be the starting point for many theory topics. Why?

Thanks
Wally

--- In tuning@y..., "electricwally77" <earth7@o...> wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> Been awhile since I last posted a message on this group. I've been
> advancing my studies on JI and music theory and simply enjoy every
> minute!
>
> A question that I can't seem to find an answer to is why the
diatonic
> major scale in 12tET starts with or defaults to the letter "C"
verses
> the letter "A" which would seem to make more sense since "A" is the
> beginning of the alphabet.
>
> I've searched in vain for this answer and understand that other
> topics are probably needed to be understood prior to this question
> being answered.

it's pretty simple -- and has to do with the tonality/modality
question just asked.

the major scale is now considered the "main" or "default" mode of the
diatonic scale. this wasn't always the case. in ancient greece, and
in europe until 1680, all the modes were used -- at least most of
them got a significant amount of use. the one starting with C was not
even one of the more popular ones for much of our history. but the
letter names we have today were already ingrained quite some time
ago . . .

so the idea of "the scale starts with C" is a relatively recent one,
and since the letter names were already established prior to the
ascension of the major mode, it was too late to rename them and have
the major mode start from the beginning of the alphabet. musicians
already knew that the diatonic scale had a smaller step between E and
F and between B and C -- one couldn't just declare that "ok, now the
smaller steps will be between C and D and between G and A" -- even
the church wouldn't have had enough power to change european
convention that abruptly.

anyhow, none of this has anything to do with JI or with 12-equal. the
two tuning systems involved in the "history" above are pythagorean
and meantone . . .

study joe monzo's and margo schulter's web pages for more information
on your question, and good luck!

electricwally77 wrote:

> A question that I can't seem to find an answer to is why the diatonic > major scale in 12tET starts with or defaults to the letter "C" verses > the letter "A" which would seem to make more sense since "A" is the > beginning of the alphabet. And A was indeed the beginning the musical gamut when these names were first devised: In gregorian chant, you had four possible setups for the location of the smaller diatonic steps (and not seven as a renaissance "reconstruction" of the greek modes - ionian, dorian, ... (a far too popular system: why?) - postulated). For each of the four "tonics" ("finals" they called them, and thus they were defined) there were two possible tessituras: an octave above ("authentic"), or a fifth above and a fourth below ("plagal"). The overall sequence of whole and semitones was given by the pythagorean chain of fifths, and it just so happened that the four finals used in gregorian chant were adjacent. For the authentic modes (numbered as they actually were) the half steps were between steps

i: 2-3, 6-7
iii: 1-2, 5-6
v: 4-5, 7-8
vii: 3-4, 6-7

So of the four finals it was numero uno that lay lowest in the diatonic sequence.

The plagal modes had the upper authentic tetrachord below the final ("started on the fifth degree") and were given the even number following the authentic mode of the same final. So the lowest note in use was the fifth degree of the second mode, and this was named A.

Different octaves were differentiated by greek and latin, lower and upper case letters, and for the top range the were doubled. But of course all the octaves ran from A to G. I have no idea when that changed, but in place of blaming everything on the keyboard i have a hunch that the use of the right hand pinkie on woodwind instruments could have something to do with it.

klaus

At 16:08 2/07/02 -0400, you wrote:
>Hi David

Hi Wally.

> I posted this message on the tuning group as well.
>
>A question that I can't seem to find an answer to is why the diatonic
>major scale in 12tET starts with or defaults to the letter "C" verses
>the letter "A" which would seem to make more sense since "A" is the
>beginning of the alphabet.
>
>I've searched in vain for this answer and understand that other
>topics are probably needed to be understood prior to this question
>being answered.

Not really.

>I'm aware that the layout of the keyboard may have something to do
>with my answer but feel that there may be other reasons.

No. Nothing to do with it. The keyboard came much later.

>The diatonic major scale in 12tET with no accidentals obviously is C,
>D,E,F,G,A,B,C but why could it not be A,B,C,D,E,F,G,A,B ?? And also
>why can't middle "C" on the piano be called middle "A".
>
>The closest I've ever come to getting an answer was in a book which
>simply stated, "there are historical reasons why the musical alphabet
>starts with "C".

That is a good short answer. Here's my attempt to flesh it out a little. I wrote this before learning that Paul Erlich had kindly replied in a similar vein.

The scale we call the major diatonic scale, the white keys from C to C, has been the single most popular scale in the western world for some hundreds of years now. But this wasn't always so, and is still not so in some parts of the world, and on some instruments such as bagpipes.

At the time that letters were first used to refer to notes in the west, the time of the ancient Greeks and Romans, the major diatonic scale was just one undistinguished scale among many recognised possibilities. Some notes were considered fixed and others were considered movable within limits. Also, octave equivalence was not taken so much for granted as it is today, since the recognised span of pitches was only two octaves.

So it was natural to name the lowest note A and then just keep on going up the alphabet, never mind where the octaves occur. It is simply a historical accident that, at the time of the Roman writer Boethius who turned out to be most influential in the west in later centuries, the lowest recognised note happened to be at the beginning of a series of steps in pitch that went (in the first octave) LsLLsLL (where L stands for large and s for small).

A-BC-D-EF-G-A

The only way that the major diatonic (whose steps go LLsLLLs) can be made to agree with that sequence (when it is repeated at octaves) is to start on the third letter, C.

That note that got named "A" (simply because it was the lowest in use at the time) happened to be the most recent note to be added, and it was soon superceded by an even lower note a large step below it. So you see that the assigning of letter names in that specific way made sense only for a very short time in history, but once it was done we were stuck with them.

Incidentally that next even lower note was then named using the letter gamma from the Greek alphabet since the Roman alphabet was all used up. Around the same time, the practice of repeating the letters A to G in each octave, took hold.

Boethius and the Greeks before him had no way of knowing that the major diatonic scale was going to become so popular in the future. But why _did_ it become so popular? That, as they say, is a whole 'nother story.

>I found some links that are interesting with respect as to when
>letters started to be used to identify frequencies. They are:
>http://www.rubycliff.com/TheoryManual/Elements.html
>http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0822090.html
>http://stevenestrella.com/composers/composerfiles/guido1050.html
>http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Neil_Hawes/theory22.htm
>http://www.ubmail.ubalt.edu/~pfitz/play/ref/notation.htm

Thanks for those links. Here's another that takes us further back in time, but needs a lot of work to understand.

http://humanities.uchicago.edu/classes/zbikowski/week3sum.html

>I also noted that the different octaves are identified by number.

Yes. That's a very recent innovation.

>Although the musical alphabet goes from A to G the octave range
>numbers change on the letter C (instead of A). Middle C is identified
>as the C4, all the letter names above that tone until the next C are
>in the 4th octave, i.e. D4, E4, F4, G4, A4, and B4. The next note
>(third space) is C5. The fifth octave continues in similar fashion.
>
>"C" seems to be the starting point for many theory topics. Why?

Because the major diatonic is so popular.
-- Dave Keenan
Brisbane, Australia
http://dkeenan.com