I don’t quite get it from reading it on wikipedia. You make one note mean another note? Why?
I just got a lute and downloaded some tuners, and some ask for instrument transposition and I don’t know what I should put.
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In music, all instruments are made differently. Physics means that the construction, length of tubing, tension of strings etc means that many instruments pitch differently. “Concert Pitch” is the standard that instruments generally tune to and is measured in Hertz and the note of A is usually the tuning note measured as 440 Hz. The key of the instrument is measured by the lowest note the instrument can play, called the fundamental. So a flute will have a fundamental of C and C is generally concert pitch. As such, when a flute plays concert A, the pitch will be 440 Hz. A Trumpet, however, has a fundamental of Bb which puts it in a key of Bb. So, an A played on a Trumpet will sound different to an A played on the flute because the fundamentals are a different (one tone). This is where transpositions come in so the instruments can play together at the same pitch. For a Trumpet to play 440 Hz, it needs to play the note B, a whole tone higher than the A on the flute which gives it 440 Hz. Instruments with different fundamentals (French Horn – F, Alto Saxophone – Eb etc) will have different transpositions to get to 440 Hz.
I am not a string player, but my understanding is you would tune each string to the named note (eg G is tuned on a tuner to G). This allows you to play open at concert pitch. If you use a Capo, you will change the pitch by a semitone for each fret.
So there are seven notes: Do-Re-Mi-Fa-So-La-Ti and then the octave is completed with the next “Do” (I’ll annotate that as Do! To show it is high)
A key tells you what note is “Do” so, in the key of C-major, it is C-D-E-F-G-A-B, while the key of G the notes are G-A-B-C-D-E-F#
The reason you need to transpose between instruments is that if a song is written in “C” but your lute is tuned in “G” you can’t really play it correctly.
So, basically, you treat it like a unit conversion. The music is written in imperial units (C-Major) but your lute is in metric units (G-Major) so you convert the E-D-C of the song to Mi-Re-Do and then over to B-A-G.
C is considered the main key, but some instruments are built in a different key. And you can figure how how different they are by switching the notes that the keys are named after.
The most common ones are C, like a Flute or Piano. When they play a C, it’s a C.
Some are in Bb(B-Flat), like a Trumpet or Clarinet. When they play a C, it’s actually a Bb.
Some are in Eb(E-Flat) the main ones here are the Alto Saxophone or Baritone Saxophone. When they play a C, it’s actually an Eb.
The last one you’ll really see is F, which is mostly for French Horns(the super curly one that points backwards). When they play a C, it’s actually an F
The main points of transposition is to be able to have a common ground to work from, without having to redesign every instrument to be in C, and so some instruments have patterns so you can learn more easily
First thing you need to do is find out what notes you are going to tune your lute to. From a quick search it seems there are quite a few different tunings based on what time period. Then you need to find a tuner that will let you play every note and tell you if it’s in tune of not, and match each string to the tuning you are after. Don’t worry about the transpose.
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