What does key mean?

Answer 1

I like to think of key (also called "key center" or "tonal center") as "home." That means that if you don't hear this at the end of the piece, you aren't convinced that the piece is over: you aren't "home" yet.

Try this experiment. Play "Mary Had a Little Lamb" in the key of C (melody starts on E). When you come to the last note, instead of playing C, play E-flat (or some other note). You are vastly dissatisfied because you wanted to hear C. C at the end is what the whole song was leading up to. That's because C is the key of this song (the way you started it here on E, that is; if you started on a different note, you'd be in a different key; starting a song on another note is called "transposition.")

If the composer goes into other keys, on the way back to C (or whatever the key is), these are just red herrings. Don't worry. The music will come back to the original key, and you'll be satisfied that it's the end of the piece. It's part of the composer's skill to see how far afield the music can range and still return smoothly to the original key.

There are exceptions, of course. There are some pieces which start in one key and end in another, but these account for about 2% of all music. In this case, I'm not counting pieces that start in, say, C Minor and end in C Major. I'm speaking of a piece that starts in C Major and ends, say, in A Major or B-flat Major. (A transformation from minor to the major, which is called a "parallel major" because both key names have the same letter, usually occurs on the last beat of the song and is called a "Picardy third." Bach does this all the time.

You didn't ask, but here it is, anyway: relative major and minor keys are keys which share the same key signatures and thus the same set of triads, such as A Minor and C Major. Composers love these sets of relative majors and minors; it's like the hidden passage way in the board game "Clue" where you can automatically be somewhere else with no effort.)

Another favorite composer device is to set up a big V - I cadence (the one that says "The End!") and then go V - vi instead. This is called a "deceptive cadence" (The....En- woops! Surprise!). A deceptive cadence is a key harmonic device of Mozart and Handel, to the point that it is chosen as a technique when the music of these composers is satirized.

It's basically a technique to extend the piece (not to modulate into another key). The composer then repeats the music, usually verbatim, and then gives you want you expected the first time: V - I, so you hear what you expected at the end: the I chord, the key name note..

Answer 2

Key means
Metal device shaped in such a way that when it is inserted into the appropriate lock the lock's mechanism can be rotated.

Something crucial for explaining

Answer 3

If it's written on a map, then it's like a scale or comparison or example.

It may say: Key = ----- railway track

or Key: ----- = 10 miles

Answer 4

It is a small piece of metal shaped so that it will move the bolt of a lock and so lock or unlock something.

Answer 5

to open all items