Double Flats and Double Sharps

Good morning! This is Duane and today I would like to address a question that came up just recently from a student about double flats and double sharps.

Here is a transcript of the video if you would like to follow along:

First of all, let’s talk about sharps and flats. This note is D, so where would D sharp be? That’s right. Sharps mean you go up a half a step from the note that’s modified. Now if in sheet music you see a sharp in front of D, then you’d play D sharp. If you saw a flat in front of D, then you’d play a D flat.

So, there are notes called double sharps and double flats, and it’s very simple. In a double sharp you go up two half steps not one half step. Like here’s a half step to D sharp, but the double sharp would be there. So, a double sharp is in harmonic with E. D double sharp is in harmonic with E. The same sound but written differently. For D flat, D double flat would be two half steps below D, okay? So, there is D flat and there’s D double Flat which is in harmonic with C.

Now this is puzzling for a lot of people because sometimes you’ll see an F flat. What would F flat be? It would be in harmonic with E, wouldn’t it, because there’s no black key to the left of F, so that would be : F flat would be E. F double flat would be, if you ever saw such a thing and I don’t think you ever will, would be the equivalent of E flat. Where would E sharp be? It would be F, wouldn’t it? How about, where’s C flat? A half step below C is, that’s C flat, in harmonic with B. How about B sharp? Half step above B is, C. That would be B sharp in harmonic with C.

Okay, A very simple lesson, but I just thought I’d answer that for people that had a little question about double flats and double sharps. Thanks. See you tomorrow with another tip in piano playing and music. Bye-bye for now.

Here is the video on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itMDroiGHOc

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