B minor explained
B minor
|
Relative: | D major |
Parallel: | B major |
Dominant: | F-sharp minor |
Subdominant: | E minor |
First Pitch: | B |
Second Pitch: | C |
Third Pitch: | D |
Fourth Pitch: | E |
Fifth Pitch: | F |
Sixth Pitch: | G |
Seventh Pitch: | A |
B minor is a minor scale based on B, consisting of the pitches B, C, D, E, F, G, and A. Its key signature has two sharps. Its relative major is D major and its parallel major is B major.
The B natural minor scale is:
Changes needed for the melodic and harmonic versions of the scale are written in with accidentals as necessary. The B harmonic minor and melodic minor scales are:
Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart (1739–1791) regarded B minor as a key expressing a quiet acceptance of fate and very gentle complaint, something commentators find to be in line with Bach's use of the key in his St John Passion. By the end of the Baroque era, however, conventional academic views of B minor had shifted: Composer-theorist Francesco Galeazzi (1758–1819) opined that B minor was not suitable for music in good taste. Beethoven labelled a B-minor melodic idea in one of his sketchbooks as a "black key".
Scale degree chords
Notable compositions in B minor
See also: List of symphonies in B minor.
- Johann Sebastian Bach
- Ludwig van Beethoven
- Bagatelle Op. 126/4
- Allegretto WoO 61 for piano
- Charles Auguste de Bériot
- Violin Concerto No. 2 in B Minor, Op. 32
- Alban Berg
- Johannes Brahms
- Alexander Borodin
- Frédéric Chopin
- Gaetano Donizetti
- Antonín Dvořák
- Edward Elgar
- César Franck
- Johann Nepomuk Hummel
- Jan Kalivoda
- Franz Liszt
- Felix Mendelssohn
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- Niccolò Paganini
- Sergei Rachmaninoff
- Camille Saint-Saëns
- Domenico Scarlatti
- 12 of his 555 piano sonatas: K 27, 87, 173, 197, 227, 293, 376, 377, 408, 409, 497, 498
- Franz Schubert
- Alexander Scriabin
- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
- Georg Philipp Telemann
- Antonio Vivaldi
See also
References
NotesSources