# Why is so much sheet music in the wrong key? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 28, 2008, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572 "2008-02-28T23:50:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 11:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/61 "2008-03-07T11:31:30Z")
[QUOTE=Musicat] Lots of them. Why is that so unusual? That’s how I got my start doing takedowns. [/QUOTE] Sorry, I didn’t make myself clear there. I suspect (although may be wrong) that it’s a lot more common to do so on guitar than piano. ---
**Author:** ![Crisanto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce7236/32.png) [@Crisanto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crisanto)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2011, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/62 "2011-08-14T22:30:19Z")
Hello, I’m from Spain and this is my first post here. i apologize for my bad English language. I also apologize for resurrecting this thread after three years… I am interested in the subject of piano-vocal sheet music reductions extracted from pop recordings, mainly Beatles ones, and I also noticed that mostrar of them -the “original” ones published by Northern Songs in the sities- are not in the right key. Why?? Perhaps because sheet music with some flats in the key signature would be “better” for brass/woodwind instruments?? As I have read this thread in full, and as I have seen that some of the people posting here worked as arrangers for publishing companies, I would appreciate very much their opinion on this subject… Thanks in advance and best wishes from Spain!! 🙂 Crisanto ---
**Author:** ![Crisanto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce7236/32.png) [@Crisanto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crisanto)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2011, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/63 "2011-08-14T22:51:08Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > When I was doing takedowns, transcriptions, arrangements, etc., one problem that occasionally surfaced when given a tape (usually an open reel) was, “what speed should this be played at?” > > The studio recording equipment at the time was highly reliable as to speed _consistency_, but not speed _accuracy_. A change of pitch (wow, flutter, long-term drift) was considered intolerable, but if the tape machine was always 1% too fast, nobody seemed to care… > > Although studio engineers were scrupulous in preparing for a recording session by cleaning heads, checking frequency responses, levels, etc., I never remember an engineer calibrating the tape machine with a standard speed tape. > > And if the mixdown machine, usually a 1/4" stereo deck, was also a bit too fast or slow, you might have another accumulated error. By the time you get to the record pressing mastering lathe, the pitch might be 1/4 step high or low or more! > > So I sometimes got a vinyl master pressing, either made on the cutting lathe or a test pressing from the master stamper, where the pitch was frozen to the 33.3 RPM speed and the pitch on all the tracks was “in the cracks” on a calibrated piano. What shall I do? Go up or down? This wasn’t experimental music, it was standard pop fare, so I had every reason to believe that A should be 440, not 453 or 429. > > If I was lucky to have access to the musicians who recorded it, I could ask, but they were often off touring, stoned, or inaccessible and the publisher was in a hurry (I had to do the entire Eagles _Hotel California_ album takedown overnight once the day before it was released – price no object, but the publisher wanted it the next day, no ifs, no buts). > > I often tried to take a cue from the quirks of the instruments, but that was not always possible. In the long run, I wrote down what I though the pitch was. I had finely-tuned and calibrated equipment on my end that I built myself just for this purpose, and I could boost the pitch up or down as I wanted to match my standard piano. > > Once upon a time I did an entire Norton Buffalo album. A month later, the Buffalo himself got ahold of the lead sheets I had written, and angrily called me up and chewed me out for writing them ALL in the wrong key, and where did I learn to write music, etc., etc.! I played him back the master and showed him the problem. I even pointed out that the key I used worked better with the guitar (sharps instead of flats) and he said, “Shit – I used a capo.”… > > And then there were the times when no keyboards were involved, at least on the original tracks. Subsequent instruments tuned to previous tracks, and if the first guitarist didn’t tune to A=440, the following players had to tune to him. If a non-tunable keyboard was overdubbed to a bad tuning, the tape machine was adjusted slightly to make things work. > > So by the time an arranger gets something to work on for a piano-vocal sheet, the original pitch may be a big fucking mystery and nobody cares… Excellent… Thank YOU very much, Musicat!! 🙂 The sheet music edition for ‘And I Love Her’ (=I’m referring to the “official” edition, published by Northern Songs in 1964) is in the key of Eb (=3 flats on the key signature). The Beatles recorded -and played live- the song in E (=4 sharps in the key signature). So…, was the reel-tape played at a lower speed the very day that the transcriber at Northern Songs worked on the arrangement?? Crisanto ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/64 "2011-08-15T01:21:03Z")
Moving from General Questions to Cafe Society. Posters should note that this thread is more than three years old. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/65 "2011-08-15T03:12:47Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Moving from General Questions to Cafe Society. > > Posters should note that this thread is more than three years old. > > Colibri > General Questions Moderator But some things never get old, and most of us are still alive and kicking. Well, alive, anyway. > [@Crisanto](#): > > Excellent… Thank YOU very much, Musicat!! 🙂 Glad to be of service. 🙂 > [@](#): > > The sheet music edition for ‘And I Love Her’ (=I’m referring to the “official” edition, published by Northern Songs in 1964) is in the key of Eb (=3 flats on the key signature). The Beatles recorded -and played live- the song in E (=4 sharps in the key signature). So…, was the reel-tape played at a lower speed the very day that the transcriber at Northern Songs worked on the arrangement?? > > Crisanto Impossible to say. If I had been involved in that transcription, and the song appeared to be “in the cracks,” I’d probably lean towards E rather than E flat because of the guitars. It would be great to ask the musician who played it, but that is often not possible or practical in a short time frame. But some music publisher may have felt that the key of E was harder and less common for piano players than E flat. It’s similar to a song I arranged once for piano-vocal, a song that was clearly in 12/8 or 6/8, but the publisher said no one would buy a piece of sheet music in that “weird” time sig, and insisted on me rewriting it in 4/4, which of course required a forest of --3–'s over triplet figures. Publishers don’t always make the most musical decision, but one driven by maximizing profit. So there are a number of reasons why this happens, and impossible to say which one at this late date, unless SDMB has someone who worked with early Beatles. I can’t make that claim – they were a pond away. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/66 "2011-08-15T03:50:04Z")
Does anyone know why some arrangers think flat keys are easier on piano? It’s never seemed that way to me. What exactly makes it easier to play in, say, Db? ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/67 "2011-08-15T04:02:10Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Does anyone know why some arrangers think flat keys are easier on piano? It’s never seemed that way to me. What exactly makes it easier to play in, say, Db? As a keyboard man myself, I can play in any key equally and just fine, but I’ll admit some keys are not commonly found. The tendency towards flat keys might be from a church hymnal background, but that’s just a WAG. And why hymnals use more flats than sharps is a question for art historians; I can only guess it relates to the evolution of church music, where common church modes required lowering some pitches rather than raising them (to make a major scale F to F, you have to lower the 4th from a white keys scale). I think in the example given (key of E with 4 sharps or E flat with 3 flats), the number of sharps/flats might have been the determining factor (fewer=better). Certainly most publishers would avoid 5 or 6 flats or sharps in simple, popular music like the plague. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/68 "2011-08-15T04:41:28Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Does anyone know why some arrangers think flat keys are easier on piano? It’s never seemed that way to me. What exactly makes it easier to play in, say, Db? I have no clue, but I always wondered whether this was common or not. I, too, have always found sight reading flats and flatted keys on the piano much easier than sharps, for some reason. I have no idea why this is the case, but it’s interesting to see it’s a common conception. I don’t think it’s a matter of familiarity–I play far more in sharp keys, but flats I find easier to read instinctively. ETA: “Much easier” is a bit of an exaggeration. It’s just that I feel with sharps there’s an extra picosecond of forethought involved. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/69 "2011-08-15T04:47:07Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > I have no clue, but I always wondered whether this was common or not. I, too, have always found sight reading flats and flatted keys on the piano much easier than sharps, for some reason. I have no idea why this is the case, but it’s interesting to see it’s a common conception. I don’t think it’s a matter of familiarity–I play far more in sharp keys, but flats I find easier to read instinctively. I really think it is due to background rather than any inherent difference. My early keyboard experience was with church hymns, which are mostly in flat keys, but if I had been playing with guitar players and rock bands, I think I would have been more used to sharps. In any case, as a budding professional musician, early on, I set a goal to be able to play in any key at any time, and I found it easy to do so. As an exercise, I sometimes transpose a common song into some obscure key just to challenge myself. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/70 "2011-08-15T05:19:19Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > I really think it is due to background rather than any inherent difference. My early keyboard experience was with church hymns, which are mostly in flat keys, but if I had been playing with guitar players and rock bands, I think I would have been more used to sharps. That does make the most sense, but it just doesn’t explain why that’s the case for me. Must just be some quirk of my brain. ---
**Author:** ![Arrendajo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Arrendajo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrendajo)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/71 "2011-08-15T05:54:17Z")
Well I have to say I am glad this thread was resurrected because it’s one of the most interesting things I’ve read on SD. I am a performing songwriter myself - amateur - and I do almost all original material. I sight read very slowly and clumsily, so none of my songs’ music is written down, only the lyrics. I have always wondered how someone would go about making a lead sheet from one of my recorded songs. Who would I go to? How much would it cost? Most of my stuff is slightly jazzy pop music, so I would think a competent transcriber would be able to whip it out fairly quickly. I have sometimes completely forgotten the music to my own songs, and thought to myself jeez it would have been nice to have this written down. But I just don’t have the skill to do it myself and what with other things going on (aka “life”) I just don’t have the time nor interest in learning to do it myself. That means if I died tomorrow, only the few of my several hundred songs that I’ve bothered to record would survive me. No great loss to humanity, but still… If you had a moment, and could listen to one of my songs, would it be possible to tell me how hard this song would be to write up? It is called The New Nudist Me, and can be found here: [http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page\_songInfo.cfm?bandID=233843&songID=1619014](http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=233843&songID=1619014) The song is only 1:40 so love it or hate it, it’s not going to take much time out of your life. And if you don’t have time nor inclination to give me your opinion (not of the song, but how long it would take to note) I understand completely. I play all instruments, and of course it’s a lousy home recording. Some day by golly I’ll have a real band and a real studio and then look out world! You can PM me if you’d rather. Thanks for a great discussion. I had no idea that the writer and performer of a song might have nothing to do with the written score. I used to read music quite well, when my parents were paying for years and years of guitar lessons, so I might have used your work at some time. Did you meet any of The Eagles when you worked on their music? That’s my cuz plays bass for them. ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Rik](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mister_rik/32/491_2.png) [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/72 "2011-08-15T06:38:28Z")
> [@Mister\_Rik](#): > > I wonder if that’s the same book I have - brown cover with gold printing? Missing most of George Harrison’s songs, but including songs that McCartney wrote for Badfinger? > > Yeah, almost every song in that book is in the wrong key. I pretty much learned to play guitar as a teenager by playing along with Beatles records, and I had to go through and write in the correct chords on just about every song. I noticed this post of mine from when the thread was new, and thought I’d add that the differences in key on the bulk of the songs included in this book are big enough that they can’t be attributed to tape speed issues. I tried to find the book, but it’s buried in a box somewhere around here and I gave up. But I remember that a large number of the songs were as much as a 4th or 5th off from the recording. In the case of this particular book, I have to assume the intent was to put the songs in more “singable” keys for the average person. Or to put them in more “piano-friendly” keys. > [@pulykamell](#): > > I have no clue, but I always wondered whether this was common or not. I, too, have always found sight reading flats and flatted keys on the piano much easier than sharps, for some reason. I have no idea why this is the case, but it’s interesting to see it’s a common conception. I don’t think it’s a matter of familiarity–I play far more in sharp keys, but flats I find easier to read instinctively. I’ve encountered and played with pianists who practically panic at the sight of sharps. And as a bassist, one of the most maddening instances was playing with a church group doing contemporary music, getting sheet music in the key of “E”, and having the piano player say, “Oh, sharps. We’ll play this in E-flat instead.” Yes, thank you very much, Panicky Piano Player, for taking away the whole bottom end of my instrument (the lowest note on a 4-string bass being “E” — changing the key to Eb, for the bassist, means playing the song’s root a 7th higher, not a 1/2-step lower). Of course, this is exactly why every church bass player now plays a 5-string bass - so we can go that 1/2-step lower in those situations. ---
**Author:** ![installLSC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/54ee81/32.png) [@installLSC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/installLSC)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/73 "2011-08-15T08:39:27Z")
A couple of questions: –It was mentioned upthread that the legally copyrighted version of a song is rarely used by publishers. Why? Does it really save any money by having arrangers give their best guess at what keys a song is in rather than just publishing the copyrighted version or at least use it as a guide? –Do artists (such as the Cat Stevens story) give much guidance to arrangers? ---
**Author:** ![Crisanto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce7236/32.png) [@Crisanto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crisanto)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/74 "2011-08-15T09:55:29Z")
Hello Musicat, First: thanks A LOT for your reply and for all I learnt from your posts!!🙂 > [@Musicat](#): > > …Impossible to say. If I had been involved in that transcription, and the song appeared to be “in the cracks,” I’d probably lean towards E rather than E flat because of the guitars. It would be great to ask the musician who played it, but that is often not possible or practical in a short time frame. > > But some music publisher may have felt that the key of E was harder and less common for piano players than E flat. It’s similar to a song I arranged once for piano-vocal, a song that was clearly in 12/8 or 6/8, but the publisher said no one would buy a piece of sheet music in that “weird” time sig, and insisted on me rewriting it in 4/4, which of course required a forest of --3–'s over triplet figures. Publishers don’t always make the most musical decision, but one driven by maximizing profit. > > So there are a number of reasons why this happens, and impossible to say which one at this late date, unless SDMB has someone who worked with early Beatles. I can’t make that claim – they were a pond away. I see… Thank you!! 🙂 Although I would Love to, I don’t know who was the person engaged with the work of transcribing ‘And I Love Her’ for Northern Music in 1964. However, I think that the question of the reel-to-reel speed could be behind it. According to [**this site**](http://www.beatlesagain.com/barchive/tapes.html), the reel-to-reel for _A hard day’s night_ LP was 7 1/2 inches per second. So, as you have got a lot of experience in this subject…, could that 7 1/2 ips speed enough to lower the song down to a semitone?? (=half-step..) BTW, there is another very interesting question you posted on this same thread 3 years ago: > [@Musicat](#): > > … It wasn’t really _engraving,_ even in those days before graphic computers, but a combination of manual music typewriter, straightedges, curves and ink pen, but we called it engraving anyway… > > …Engraving, no matter how it’s done, with computer or by hand, is a relatively expensive part of preparation…i Could you, pelase, explain to me the different steps of the process of publishing a pop song in sheet music format, from the pen\_and\_paper stage to the music shop one?? i mean: you write down the song from the reel-to-reel, and them you tale your draft to the music published. After the corrections are done…, how did they write the music into engraving?? Photographs from your handwritten original?? Different typewrites with musical symbols?? Please: excuse me for so many questions and my bad Enhlish!! Best wishes!! 🙂 Crisanto ---
**Author:** ![amanset](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@amanset](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amanset)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/75 "2011-08-15T10:33:12Z")
> [@Crisanto](#): > > I also apologize for resurrecting this thread after three years… Well I for one missed it the first time round and found it fascinating reading it now, so thanks for reviving it! I’ve never really understood the hatred for “zombie” threads anyway… ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/76 "2011-08-15T12:48:37Z")
> [@Arrendajo](#): > > I have always wondered how someone would go about making a lead sheet from one of my recorded songs. Who would I go to? How much would it cost? Most of my stuff is slightly jazzy pop music, so I would think a competent transcriber would be able to whip it out fairly quickly. I have sometimes completely forgotten the music to my own songs, and thought to myself jeez it would have been nice to have this written down. But I just don’t have the skill to do it myself and what with other things going on (aka “life”) I just don’t have the time nor interest in learning to do it myself. That means if I died tomorrow, only the few of my several hundred songs that I’ve bothered to record would survive me. No great loss to humanity, but still… > If you had a moment, and could listen to one of my songs, would it be possible to tell me how hard this song would be to write up? It is called The New Nudist Me, and can be found here: [http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page\_songInfo.cfm?bandID=233843&songID=1619014](http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=233843&songID=1619014) I just listened to your song. Easy-peasy, in the key of A, with E and D chords. Other than the melody, I would probably notate that neat descending riff, since it is so distinctive. I got the idea by the first 16 bars, and I can write a rough sketch in two takes. I really don’t know where to send you to get this made into a lead sheet these days (I’m no longer in the biz, sorry!) For all I know, there is some place on the Internet, and there might be some automated transcriptions services. Otherwise, I can only suggest using the American Federation of Musicians (the union), finding a local near you, and ask for takedown artists. They call that music preparation, and I’m sure most output is done by computer now even tho a human is probably in the loop still. > [@](#): > > Did you meet any of The Eagles when you worked on their music? That’s my cuz plays bass for them. No, there was often a gulf between the musicians and my office, unless I had played with them in the studio. That might not have been the case with other copyists, who were often drawn from the musician community; ones that had an extra skill. Myself, I came from outside and found a specialty niche to fit into that most musicians didn’t want. My contacts were with the secretaries of the publishers, who were in charge of getting each song in the catalog copyrighted. In those days, the only was to do that was with written music. It was sad that that gulf existed, but most secretaries thought they could just hand a tape or disc to the copyist and get back a lead sheet for copyright (and other purposes). For simple pop music, say a country tune, that’s just fine, but I often wished I could have had access to the charts used to make the recording and the final product would have been much better. Speed and expediency often prevented that. An example would be when I was handed the John Williams soundtrack recording of _Star Wars_ and asked to make a lead sheet just from listening. It would have been much better if the publisher has merely xeroxed Williams’ score for deposit in the copyright office, but the publishers weren’t used to thinking in those terms. I recall I was able to get some publishers to file the actual score (which wouldn’t exist for most pop music, but would for John Williams), but then we ran into the problem of xeroxing the oversized manuscript with faint pencil marks. I even bought a large Toshiba copier and made 20th Century Fox 23 bound copies of the score, one for each of their worldwide offices, but it was quite expensive and slow. (I’m sure 20th C Fox could afford it!) > [@installLSC](#): > > A couple of questions: > –It was mentioned upthread that the legally copyrighted version of a song is rarely used by publishers. Why? Does it really save any money by having arrangers give their best guess at what keys a song is in rather than just publishing the copyrighted version or at least use it as a guide? It doesn’t save any money by using the copyrighted version, and there’s no reason to use it, except for purists who insist on the original key. Typically, if an arranger is handed the task of writing something for (print) publication, they take many things into consideration, especially the market. If they are arranging for “easy organ,” you can bet that there won’t be many sharps or flats in the key sig, and some chords may be simplified greatly. OTOH, such publications as the original _Time Out_ and _Time Further Out_ albums by Dave Brubeck were transcribed and arranged by Howard Brubeck, and are meticulously faithful to Dave’s recording, even to the nuances of the adlib solos, and of course the keys. If you like vintage Brubeck and can find these in print, I recommend them. > [@](#): > > –Do artists (such as the Cat Stevens story) give much guidance to arrangers? If you mean the arrangers who prepare stuff for _print_ publication, some do, and some don’t give a shit and never see the music until it is printed. It’s entirely up to the desires of the musicians, their managers and publishers. Hank Mancini was famous for putting his name on many charts (high school band, easy piano, combos, etc.) that I doubt he had any involvement in at all. He just turned over the task to arrangers who churned the stuff out and slapped his name on it. And I’m a great Mancini fan, so I don’t mean to denigrate his catalog, but there was a lot of it out there; he had a salable name, and he maximized his profit that way. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/77 "2011-08-15T12:50:37Z")
> [@Mister\_Rik](#): > > I’ve encountered and played with pianists who practically panic at the sight of sharps. And as a bassist, one of the most maddening instances was playing with a church group doing contemporary music, getting sheet music in the key of “E”, and having the piano player say, “Oh, sharps. We’ll play this in E-flat instead.” Yes, thank you very much, Panicky Piano Player, for taking away the whole bottom end of my instrument (the lowest note on a 4-string bass being “E” — changing the key to Eb, for the bassist, means playing the song’s root a 7th higher, not a 1/2-step lower). Of course, this is exactly why every church bass player now plays a 5-string bass - so we can go that 1/2-step lower in those situations. Is it not common to tune down to E flat for these sorts of things? That’s what is usually done in a rock context. Anyhow, it’s funny, as while I like reading in E flat more than E, I like playing in E more than E flat. One of the bands I played with tuned their guitars a half step down. I am somewhat ashamed to admit that rather than learning the songs a half step down (E-flat, A-flat, G-flat, etc.), I used my synth’s transpose function. There’s really no good reason for me not to have learned the tune in E-flat rather than E, but, for some reason, I was lazy. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/78 "2011-08-15T13:02:15Z")
You think historic music is confusing pitchwise? Try _pre_historic music. Those big brittle things called “78s” used to be cut at all kinds of different standards - 76.this, 78.that, even 80 rpm. The differences were enough to put a recording in the “piano cracks” or even a whole tone slow or fast. The consistency of a given studio setup was good, because the cutting tables ran on a counterweight system (and had to be rewound every time). But just as in the tape era, consistency _across_ setups wasn’t so good. You could fine-tune your turntable speed during the day of the wind-up phonograph. But that ended in the 1920s, when electric motors came in. Worse yet, the correct speed was usually a company secret. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/79 "2011-08-15T13:18:05Z")
> [@Crisanto](#): > > Although I would Love to, I don’t know who was the person engaged with the work of transcribing ‘And I Love Her’ for Northern Music in 1964. However, I think that the question of the reel-to-reel speed could be behind it. According to [**this site**](http://www.beatlesagain.com/barchive/tapes.html), the reel-to-reel for _A hard day’s night_ LP was 7 1/2 inches per second. So, as you have got a lot of experience in this subject…, could that 7 1/2 ips speed enough to lower the song down to a semitone?? (=half-step..) 7.5ips was the standard speed for consumer open reel tape releases, either half or quarter track. It is a “nominal” number, just like 45RPM was the standard for 7" single records. Playback equipment might be slightly off of either of these, and most consumer equipment didn’t have any way of adjusting it (Dual made some turntables that had a fine speed adjustment, but they were marketed to audiophiles, and other audiophile brands did not think this was important enough to build into their equipment). I’m surprised to see some recordings on your linked page at 3.75ips. That was never a serious speed; it was only used when the cost of the tape was more important than the fidelity (half speed is half cost). I can’t remember ever seeing commercial recordings release at 3.75ips, but my memory might be faulty. Studios used 15ips for most master recordings, even 30. Mixdowns to stereo to go to the cutting lathe were usually 15ips, full track (in the early 1950’s) or half track. > [@](#): > > Could you, pelase, explain to me the different steps of the process of publishing a pop song in sheet music format, from the pen\_and\_paper stage to the music shop one?? i mean: you write down the song from the reel-to-reel, and them you tale your draft to the music published. After the corrections are done…, how did they write the music into engraving?? Photographs from your handwritten original?? Different typewrites with musical symbols?? Remember that things are quite different nowdays, where the computer is involved in every step of the process. In the 1970’s, there was very limited use of the computer (that’s a topic for another thread). Then…an arranger would sketch out, in pencil, the piano-vocal chart. It would go to the “engraver,” who would prepare camera-ready copy for the printer to make plates from, print and fold or bind the final music. Oddly enough, sometimes the arranger never saw a draft of the engraving until it was printed, which explains the stupid mistakes I often see in commercial music. This is a “get it out the door” style of business, not a fine art style. To elaborate on the “engraving” process… Pre-1920 (?), the engraving was done with punch and scribe tools on a thin copper plate. Obviously, corrections were difficult. The copper plate was used to put ink to paper. Some kinds of music, like hymnals, actually tried to use a typefont with music staff lines and notes, one for each beat. Hymns are uniform enough that with a few hundred lead castings, you could put together a song. This explains why some of the oldest hymnals have such ragged staff lines; they were cobbled together from little pieces of staff lines, each piece with a note or two. I know of at least three kinds of “engraving” in use by the 1970’s. [ol][li]Using straightedges, templates and skill, the engraver makes a master with pen and ink on paper. This master is photo-reproduced to a printing plate.[_]Using a manual music typewriter, the symbols were laboriously typed on paper with preprinted staff lines. Some symbols could not be typed: slanted beams, slurs and ties. These were added later. The final copy was photo-reproduced to a printing plate.[_]As the computer came into the biz, there were some schemes that added a small amount of automation. (There may have been many such schemes, I only saw a few.) The Hal Leonard publishing house developed some kind of computer in-house, and I saw one engraving house in Oyster Bay, NY, that took a manual music typewriter, modified it, and was able to make a paper tape output. This was taken to a photo-compositor; the output was still short of tie, slurs and beams, which were added by hand. The final output was, again, photo-reproduced, etc.[_]I developed an all-computerized data entry system that printed on a dot-matrix, 60dpi, computer printer. Data entry was faster than a Hollywood copyist, but it took so long to develop that we ran out of money before we could market the invention. It was used for a few recording sessions, however.[_]Some colleges and universities were working on a fully-computerized process, but all the ones I saw were slow and clumsy to enter data, and took hours to render a page of music. From a Hollywood perspective, time is money, so these were totally impractical except as an academic exercise.[/ol][/li] > [@](#): > > Please: excuse me for so many questions and my bad Enhlish!! Your Enhlish, I mean English, is better than some people I know! Don’t be ashamed of it! ---
**Author:** ![Crisanto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce7236/32.png) [@Crisanto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crisanto)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2011, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572/80 "2011-08-15T13:58:47Z")
Once more, excellent… Superb info… thank YOU sou much!! 🙂 > [@Musicat](#): > > 7.5ips was the standard speed for consumer open reel tape releases, either half or quarter track. It is a “nominal” number, just like 45RPM was the standard for 7" single records. Playback equipment might be slightly off of either of these, and most consumer equipment didn’t have any way of adjusting it (Dual made some turntables that had a fine speed adjustment, but they were marketed to audiophiles, and other audiophile brands did not think this was important enough to build into their equipment)… So, if I have properly understood, Mr. X, working for Norhern Songs by Spring 1964, with a reel-to-reel tape 7.5 ips with The Beatles song ‘And I Love Her’ recorded on it, provided with a piano, a pencil and some blank sheet music paper, could “hear” that song played ca. E flat due to the reel player at his disposal…, correct?? > [@Musicat](#): > > …Then…an arranger would sketch out, in pencil, the piano-vocal chart. It would go to the “engraver,” who would prepare camera-ready copy for the printer to make plates from, print and fold or bind the final music… Aha… This would mean that the draft sent by the arrangers to the “engraver” should be “clean” enough, I mean, very accurate… Very “clean”… Very “well drawed” note shapes, clefs, accidentals, slurs, etc., for the “engraver” to do the “photographs” of all the pages…, right?? Maybe my questions sound stupid… 😕 > [@Musicat](#): > > …To elaborate on the “engraving” process… Very clear… Thank you!! 🙂 > [@Musicat](#): > > …Your Enhlish, I mean English, is better than some people I know! Don’t be ashamed of it! Thank you!! 😉 Crisanto [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-so-much-sheet-music-in-the-wrong-key/439572.md?page=5)