# Which is your favorite note?



## MartinH. (Jun 10, 2022)

Which is your favorite note? If you had to write a track (genre of your choice) that only uses one note (but you may use any octave of that one note - go nuts with your arpeggiators if you want), which would it be?

I know it's not an easy question to answer, I myself am torn between two notes that I like. Both are really good notes in my opinion and I've had a lot of fun with them. I'll be voting for the one that I believe I've used more often in the last few weeks. If you need a tiebreaker you'll have to decide yourself how to make up your mind. To be honest even randomly picking among your favorites would be fine as it should even out accross the number of replies. I'm deliberately setting up the poll results to be only visible once you voted and you can't change your vote later. I'm expecting to see some clusters forming on the graph. Not all notes are equal... 

Please vote before reading the rest of the thread. And if you have any theories about why people might prefer one note over another, lets hear them!


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## Noeticus (Jun 10, 2022)

I prefer intervals.


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## FireGS (Jun 10, 2022)

Why are there no half sharps and flats? What is this tyranny of equal tempermant?


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## Trash Panda (Jun 10, 2022)

No option for the Brown Note? Sham poll.


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## Technostica (Jun 10, 2022)

A Post-It note on a fridge door that reminds me not to spend all the food budget on sample libraries.


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## JimDiGritz (Jun 10, 2022)

G Major Neutral Zero, of course.


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## Double Helix (Jun 10, 2022)

Trash Panda said:


> No option for the Brown Note? Sham poll.


No "Blue Note" option, either?


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## MaxOctane (Jun 10, 2022)

Where’s Eb?? And please don’t say it’s the same as D# — that’s like comparing an imported italian tomato sauce to cheap ketchup.

Eb is widely regarded as the best note, and in fact wasn’t even affordable for most composers until the late 1960s.


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## Roger Newton (Jun 10, 2022)

£50 note.


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## Lionel Schmitt (Jun 10, 2022)

Silence


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## tressie5 (Jun 10, 2022)

I have a favourite chord - Ab maj - but not a favourite note.


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## MartinH. (Jun 10, 2022)

I'm very happy with how the poll is developing! There are two clear favorites so far and I'm not very surprised by which ones they are. One note I had expected to have a strong lead isn't getting quite as much love as I thought it would, perhaps because it's too mainstream and overused (not joking). I once saw it mentioned in a trailer music tutorial as the favorite note of the tutor, so I'm not that surprised if it's not as highly regarded around here.

Let's get some more votes in, and then lets discuss why there are actual preferences for certain notes. I think there are rational reasons for this and I'd like to seriously discuss this. I swear this thread isn't intended as a joke, but it's fine to have some fun with such a silly question of course.




tressie5 said:


> I have a favourite chord - Ab maj - but not a favourite note.


Do you have perfect pitch hearing? How comes you have a favorite chord but not a favorite note? Wouldn't the chord imply Ab as your favorite note?


P.S.: I might make a "what's your favorite frequency" thread too if there's interest for it. I have some thoughts on that too.


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## liquidlino (Jun 10, 2022)

Weird. I thought there would be a stochastic distribution, but instead there's a clear preference for D and its fifth A. Is this due to the preferred sub bass range being D to A for maximal body and head feel? Or just because d min is the saddest key?


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## chillbot (Jun 10, 2022)

More of a least-favorite note... G. Followed closely by F# and Ab. That's mostly to do with ranges of acoustic instruments.

I think if your favorite note is D (despite being in a range that I like) it says a lot about your personality. Ugh.


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## olvra (Jun 10, 2022)

Bb


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## FireGS (Jun 10, 2022)

LOL, poor E.


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## wunderflo (Jun 10, 2022)

if the E continues to not get any votes, I think we should all finally remove it from our keyboards. What a terrible note, completely unnecessary!


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## gyprock (Jun 10, 2022)

I’m particularly fond of the 4th note in the ET theme. Also the 4th note in Beethoven’s 5th. So my answer is the 4th note.


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## tressie5 (Jun 10, 2022)

I mentioned Ab because it seems my hands automatically play that chord whenever I'm trying out a new synth pad. BTW, I'd also like to see a "What's your favourite key?" poll. Don't some composers have a favourite, maybe Eb or something?

Addendum: Although I've been a musician many years hence, I'm not as accomplished as others on this forum. To wit: I rarely use G# or the scale that includes that. Ab is easier, you see.


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## kgdrum (Jun 10, 2022)

is this KVR?


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## Futchibon (Jun 10, 2022)

The one with Grover Cleveland.


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## givemenoughrope (Jun 10, 2022)

D, the saddest of all notes


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## dhmusic (Jun 10, 2022)

chillbot said:


> I think if your favorite note is D (despite being in a range that I like) it says a lot about your personality. Ugh.


Love it love it love it love it omfg YES


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## timbit2006 (Jun 10, 2022)

Brown


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## dzilizzi (Jun 10, 2022)

F# because when I sing, that's the key I tend to sing melodies in a capella. When I actually write the songs I usually change them to F or Dm, because eas9


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## LA68 (Jun 10, 2022)

All of the sharps. I heard somewhere that if you add the # they become pro-level notes.


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## PeterN (Jun 10, 2022)

dzilizzi said:


> F# because when I sing, that's the key I tend to sing melodies in a capella. When I actually write the songs I usually change them to F or Dm, because eas9


I chose same, but mainly bcs it sits nice on piano.


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## Cdnalsi (Jun 11, 2022)

No flats?


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## MartinH. (Jun 11, 2022)

What a crazy voting night! Some very unexpected changes have occurred. First of all with 52 votes NO ONE has chosen E yet, even though it's the standard tuning for guitars. I would argue maybe it is _because _of the standard tunings of guitars. It's soooo overused. It's not a bad note, but I just can't stand standard tuning on guitars anymore. 
I'm glad I set up the voting results to be invisible before you vote, I bet someone would have given E a pitty vote otherwise.

D is a clear winner, I should have seen this coming. I once wrote a track in D for Unleashed and was immidiately mocked in chat as a Zimmer-wannabe, so I guess Hans must like it too and that means culturally it's a very popular note with plenty of great tracks that feature it prominently. Was this the reason why I gravitated to it originally? I can't tell. I think the ease of D-minor on the keyboard may have had a role too because I was actually playing around with one at the time. When writing straight to DAW I'd assume this doesn't have an impact anymore, but maybe even then we'd gravitate towards keys we are used to hearing and we're used to hearing the ones we are used to playing, and that may be narrowed down by ease of access on the keyboard. Interesting food for thought I'd say.

Now lets talk about C... It used to be 3rd place and in a totally unexpected turn of events it overtook A's second place. Wow, what a thrilling race! I originally thought C would be a clear winner because it's a culturally very popular note and just sounds really great on its own. A lot of VI patches bottom out on C and noodling around with them I often thought "man, that C is a great note!". But of course it is also a very mainstream note. And in a guitar context drop-C feels too high for a modern sound. Djent has shifted the expected guitar tunings down to the point where you'd almost expect double drop-C over drop-C, meaning one octave lower. On a guitar with sufficient scale length that's doable and I have experimented a lot with that C and the A and B below it. Truth is, I like them all and currently have my lowest strings tuned to A B A E A or A C A E A, depending on whether I want to use B or C on the second open string. The lowest A is too low to really carry a riff in my opinion, it's lower than a 5-string bass on standard tuning after all. But it can be an interesting accent. I picked B as my sane lower limit for riffs that focus on double drop notes, just feels a bit tighter. Believe me, I didn't take this decision lightly, and part of it was just wanting to be contrarian because I don't know many bands that use double drop B. Maybe because drop-B is impractical to tune to on normal string gauges? You'd either need to go down too far or up 2 steps, which would be too tight. And soundwise between drop B and drop A I think I just prefer drop A. To give you the full picture, my 8-string guitar is tuned to A, (B or C), A, E, A, D, A, A# - so half of the open strings are A... it's just such a nice note . 

One day if I feel a need to do something less mainstream, I'll tune to A B C D E F G H. In Germany H is what y'all know as B and B is what y'all know as Bb. There was a historical reason for it, but I don't remember the details. Probably someone made a mistake reading a poorly written b as h and it stuck around for the rest of time... -_- 





tressie5 said:


> I mentioned Ab because it seems my hands automatically play that chord whenever I'm trying out a new synth pad. BTW, I'd also like to see a "What's your favourite key?" poll. Don't some composers have a favourite, maybe Eb or something?
> 
> Addendum: Although I've been a musician many years hence, I'm not as accomplished as others on this forum. To wit: I rarely use G# or the scale that includes that. Ab is easier, you see.



"What's your favorite key?" would be a good poll too, but I'd feel a need to clarify that this is to be voted purely on sound, not on how easy the keys/notes are to reach. I'm primarily a guitarist and I change the tuning all the time, so I didn't think to explicitely mention this here, but I want people to vote purely on sound, not on physical accessibility of the note.




dzilizzi said:


> F# because when I sing, that's the key I tend to sing melodies in a capella. When I actually write the songs I usually change them to F or Dm, because eas9



My favorites are A and C and I voted for A because I find drop-A more satisfying on guitar and double drop A seems to be more or less the limit for how low I can tune. A couple days ago I also measured what frequency I'd be singing in with a relaxed voice, and it was around G#. But somehow G# is one of the guitar tunings I almost never used, can't even say why. I expect my normal speaking voice is slightly higher, so maybe that ends up being an A?

I think there may be other emotional attachments to certain frequencies based on very familiar voices or sounds. I don't own a cat, but don't they purr on a mostly stable pitched frequency too? Can someone please record their purring cat and look at a frequency spectrum analyzer what the fundamental frequency is? I tried googling what frequency they purr at but the result was something like "between 25 and 150 Hertz" which seems like a crazy high range.


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## DCPImages (Jun 11, 2022)

The one my mum wrote to get me out of sport


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## GregSilver (Jun 11, 2022)

kgdrum said:


> is this KVR?


Not really, because nobody is claiming yet that REAPER has better notes than any other DAW


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## liquidlino (Jun 11, 2022)

dzilizzi said:


> F# because when I sing, that's the key I tend to sing melodies in a capella. When I actually write the songs I usually change them to F or Dm, because eas9


F sharp minor is the most common key for drum and bass, as the common bass notes really hit hard.


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## liquidlino (Jun 11, 2022)

GregSilver said:


> Not really, because nobody is claiming yet that REAPER has better notes than any other DAW


There's a custom script action in reaper that will select your favourite note automatically.


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## Roger Newton (Jun 11, 2022)

tressie5 said:


> I mentioned Ab because it seems my hands automatically play that chord whenever I'm trying out a new synth pad.


Ab is an interesting key. Scott Joplin was a definite fan.

BUT!!!!!! Can you give me a pop song in Ab? I can think of one.


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## Roger Newton (Jun 11, 2022)

wunderflo said:


> if the E continues to not get any votes, I think we should all finally remove it from our keyboards.


E is the most used letter in the English language (not much use to you if you're Japanese for example), but what is the most used note in the musical vocab?


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## GtrString (Jun 11, 2022)

Note sure, I will do a minor study, don’t have time for a major one, and take notes..


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## gamma-ut (Jun 11, 2022)

MartinH. said:


> P.S.: I might make a "what's your favorite frequency" thread too if there's interest for it. I have some thoughts on that too.



If it's not 400, I'm not comin' over.


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## tressie5 (Jun 11, 2022)

Songs in Ab major - Somebody To Love (Queen), Every Breath You Take (The Police), Higher Ground (Stevie Wonder), Man In The Mirror (Michael Jackson). Even better when they use my favourite progression - I VI IV V and its variations.


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## Roger Newton (Jun 11, 2022)

WOW. Impressive.

The only one I know is Celebration by Kool and the Gang.


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## Double Helix (Jun 11, 2022)

GtrString said:


> Note sure, I will do a minor study, don’t have time for a major one, and take notes..


But you have staff for that, no?
(Sorry, that post was accidental)


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## MartinH. (Jun 11, 2022)

@michalioz: you're the first one to vote for E out of 66 voters so far. What made you choose this note? And do you play guitar?


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## carlc (Jun 11, 2022)

MartinH. said:


> What a crazy voting night! Some very unexpected changes have occurred…
> 
> …D is a clear winner, I should have seen this coming…


I think a few of us did not take the assignment as seriously as you may have hoped  I am sure a few votes for D are because of this:


If you asked for “favorite key” you may have received more serious answers. By asking for “favorite note,” many (myself included) thought you were just having a bit of fun.

Having said that, I’ll try and give a serious answer here to make up for my Spinal Tap-influenced vote. Having played guitar for 35 years, I do tend to avoid the E/Em key due to an irrational bias against it. I feel self-conscious composing music for guitar in E/Em, as if someone might deem it too easy or obvious, like playing everything in C in a piano. It sounds great, with the opportunity to create lots of layered notes with open strings. Of course, you can achieve that in other keys with alternate tunings, which is why I bought a Variax 

For piano and orchestral music, I play most parts on keyboard and then edit where needed. Because of my limited piano skills, I tend to play everything in using C/Am or Dm. (I fear that I am wearing out all the white keys on my piano.) I then modulate to the desired final key/mode, which is almost too easy to do with MIDI editing or tools like Scaler 2. When I write music for myself, I often try to choose a key I have not used recently. This past year, I rotated through A - G, forcing myself to use each one with the only freedom being selection of the mode.


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## HCMarkus (Jun 11, 2022)

Silence. 

Doesn't matter what key you're in, the space between the notes gives each its significance.


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## dzilizzi (Jun 11, 2022)

Roger Newton said:


> E is the most used letter in the English language (not much use to you if you're Japanese for example), but what is the most used note in the musical vocab?


I want to say C. Because it is right in the middle of the keyboard and also the first an last note on my keyboard. Seems like a very good place to start.


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## Roger Newton (Jun 11, 2022)

dzilizzi said:


> I want to say C. Because it is right in the middle of the keyboard and also the first an last note on my keyboard. Seems like a very good place to start.


It's a good choice. Other than that, I have no idea.


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## Cdnalsi (Jun 11, 2022)

dzilizzi said:


> I want to say C. Because it is right in the middle of the keyboard and also the first an last note on my keyboard. Seems like a very good place to start.


Technically Ab is in the middle of the keyboard. It's symmetrical in both directions.


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## wolf (Jun 11, 2022)

I vote for H - it's courageous enough to stick out and be different.

P.S. the keyboard is also symmetrical from D - which is easier to precisely land a finger on than Ab; making D the clear winner for popular music. Ab is for art music.


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## NoamL (Jun 11, 2022)

Db best maj, F# best min.


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## markleake (Jun 12, 2022)

An end-note. Having notes in the middle just clutters things up.


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## Crowe (Jun 12, 2022)

My answer going in was OneNote.


My answer is still OneNote


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## MartinH. (Jun 12, 2022)

carlc said:


> I think a few of us did not take the assignment as seriously as you may have hoped  I am sure a few votes for D are because of this:


I am shocked and saddened to hear that. Would the people who voted for D please come clean whether they were just joking or whether they genuinely like D the most out of all notes?



carlc said:


> If you asked for “favorite key” you may have received more serious answers. By asking for “favorite note,” many (myself included) thought you were just having a bit of fun.


How so? I bet even more people would have said "D minor - it's the saddest of all keys" because of that video. And the other half would be strongly influenced by what is easiest to play on their instrument. Also I don't really care about popular keys, I want to look at the even more low level building blocks of music. After pitches, we can look at frequencies, and maybe at overtones in different timbres.




carlc said:


> Having played guitar for 35 years, I do tend to avoid the E/Em key due to an irrational bias against it. I feel self-conscious composing music for guitar in E/Em, as if someone might deem it too easy or obvious, like playing everything in C in a piano. It sounds great, with the opportunity to create lots of layered notes with open strings. Of course, you can achieve that in other keys with alternate tunings, which is why I bought a Variax



I used to think like that as well but at some point it tipped to the opposite and now I tune to make things the easiest they could be to play for me. 



carlc said:


> Because of my limited piano skills, I tend to play everything in using C/Am or Dm. (I fear that I am wearing out all the white keys on my piano.) I then modulate to the desired final key/mode, which is almost too easy to do with MIDI editing or tools like Scaler 2.


This is a great idea, I need to try that!


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## Emanuel Fróes (Dec 3, 2022)

G won many competitions.


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