Do you consider this cheating?

[istyle]

to each his own ,good or bad is up to you,the more you spend time at the keys,the more you can develop your skill,if you dont stop at that level,you'll learn something more and develop

[jancivil]

Do you consider yourself a musician or a composer?

My belief is that if you are a musician, it is absolutely 'cheating' because you are not playing the instrument. You are approximating it by using technology.

what a bizarre dichotomy, musician v composer. if you aren't a musician how does it follow you 'compose'? compose what again?

the cheating is a problem: already you have "I can now play blues in any key". No, you can play them in the couple of keys you were able to before and the machine forces them to sound in other keys. It might follow that your decisions are made in the keys you know rather than in the key of the piece which isn't a great result, and isn't furthering the toolbox of a composer but stopping its attainment at this point in favor of just doing less work.

I'll never be a keyboardist you can respect much, but in the piano roll I work in the key areas I'm actually working in as a matter of course, if only due to the clarity of it.

[sylfid]

I think that what matters for the ear is the ratio between notes, not the frequency of each note (except if you have an absolute pitch ear, which is rare) so transposing does not affect the quality of the music.

Also, the A=440Hz has changed: Mozart's piano was turned to A=417, and Beethoven's to A=463. Shouldn't we transpose to play as they intended it?

So no, you are absolutely not cheating.

[VicDiesel]

Different keys have a different feel because of the nonsymmetric distribution of black and white keys. In one key I play a different way than in another. If you're happy with the one way you're playing, then by all means, protect yourself from accidently discovering something new.

Victor.

[jancivil]

I think that what matters for the ear is the ratio between notes, not the frequency of each note (except if you have an absolute pitch ear, which is rare) so transposing does not affect the quality of the music.

Also, the A=440Hz has changed: Mozart's piano was turned to A=417, and Beethoven's to A=463. Shouldn't we transpose to play as they intended it?

WHY NOT? Do you think this is known because there is no reason to be interested in it? The very fact of early music proponents that insist on adhering to original tunings and original instruments works to refute your initial assertion, ironically enough.

transposing DEFINITELY affects the quality of the relationships.

[tapper mike]

How much of the music do you take as your own and how much of the music do you feel needs to retain the original form. It's a valid argument as you can line up ten conductors with the same orchestra and the same song and you'll get ten different results.

I'm totally with JC on this one transposition and tuning greatly affect the piece qualitatively.

[Mike777]

The person who wrote you are cheating yourself got it right. But it does depend on how serious a keyboard player you want to be.

three 'real world' examples why to not 'cheat':

1.
Beethoven wrote Moonlight Sonata in C# minor. To play that in C minor and hit a transpose button to make it sound in C# minor I think you loose something valuable- those piano notes are truly magical when played in real C# minor on a piano.

So it depends on your purpose. Serious music? or 3 chord loop trance?

2.
Say you are a keyboard player in a band and you learn a song in C. Then it's changed to key of E. They must relearn their fingering in new key, they can't push a button. You can just push a button to make it sound in E while you play in C. But what if they guitar player wants to know what chord you are playing say in the bridge? ah oh..you are playing chords in key of C, but sounding in E. Can you give your band members the new correct chords?

3.
sometimes a song modulates to a new key. It might be difficult to hit the transpose button at the exact right moment without making a goof, and have a smooth modulation. But, if you are already familiar with playing in any key, because over the years you did not 'cheat' by pushing a button, but learned how to play lots of songs in different keys, then your fingers already have a 'memory' of sorts of playing in different keys. If you 'cheat' over the years, then you do not develop that playing skill.

4. what if you have to play on an acoustic piano? they are still around. You might have to play an acoustic piano for a small recital, at church, etc.


Now a few real world examples that I think ok to use transpose button:

1. to speed up a band rehearsal where key is changed. I've done this to save time at rehearsal. We changed a key of a song, and I just use transpose on that one song.

2. to transpose music score (if keyboard playback is required), but this is usually done easily in the music score software.

3.

[Nystul]

At times I have done something where all parts are MIDI and felt like the piece would just sound better if it were a little higher or lower, and used transpose button in DAW to quickly achieve that result without having to redo the entire piece. It's very handy to have these kind of options.

But for keyboard playing, being able to play in all keys is a handy skill. There are a number of reasons for this. You may want to play some very strange chord progression or some odd modulations, and find yourself outside your comfort zone. And of course for serious piano playing, the playability of a piece may depend upon the key in which it is written. For an extreme example, Chopin liked to be a prick and write these chord where the thumb has to play something like Eb and Gb. Trying to play such chord in most keys would be physically impossible unless you are a genetic mutant. Perhaps more relevant here, if Chopin were not comfortable to play in any key, he would never conceive some of these chords and licks as possibilities, and his compositions would not come out the same. If you play 12 bar blues always in the same key, you may get stuck in playing the same licks over and over again forever. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

[tapper mike]

You know whats funny about all this talk of transposition. I'm one of the few guitarists who know all 12 keys and it makes all the difference. I'd always get called back for session work because I was an any key no problem guy

10 minutes a day is all you need if you practice rather then just mess around. It's not that hard practice slow and evenly. It won't pull away from what you are performing/playing.

[Loki Fuego]

I just found that my TV has remote control, and now instead of one TV channel I can watch as many TV channel as I want with a push of a button.

I see this as a major cheating scandal, but it also opens up many possibilities of which I otherwise would have been to lazy to ever accomplish.

[jancivil]

as has been pointed out, it closes off possibilities that won't have occurred to one.

I think watching tv is a truly poor analogy for making music.

[Loki Fuego]

I think watching tv is a truly poor analogy for making music.

The key word is 'lazy'.

[bmrzycki]

Are photoshop experts less artistic because they use layers and plugins than one that uses only pencils or oils?

Are carpenters that use power-tools and laser levels less artistic than quakers that only use hand tools?

Are industrial engineers less of an engineer when they rely on CAD software than the previous generation of designers that only used paper and slide rules?

It's up to you to decide.

[sjm]

You know whats funny about all this talk of transposition. I'm one of the few guitarists who know all 12 keys and it makes all the difference. I'd always get called back for session work because I was an any key no problem guy.

Personally I find this a weird analogy, because transposing on a guitar is just about sliding around the neck. You don't have different finger positions when moving from (say) A minor to Bb minor. You just shift your left hand (or right hand for some of you) up one fret. Transposing on the guitar should really be something anyone can do after playing the instrument for a bit. Of course I'm aware that there are different positions on the guitar that you can use for the same key, so you might not just slide linearly up the fretboard to switch keys, but if you know one position in one key, you can apply that position to any key anywhere on the fretboard with minimal fuss.

On a keyboard, it's a totally different kettle of fish. The way you hold your hands in A minor is completely different from Bb minor by virtue of the difference in the way you play black and white notes.

Or am I missing something (I play both keyboard and guitar btw)?

[jancivil]

I think watching tv is a truly poor analogy for making music.

The key word is 'lazy'.

I didn't miss that part. What I didn't get was your point of view. As far as I knew you could have been in favor of his method of 'discoveries'.