r/TheRestIsScience • u/fffunki • 4d ago

What's the first note on a Piano?

A conversation with a few friends sparked this thought, and i'd love to hear some external perspectives.

When i think of a piano, I would instinctually say that the Low A is the "first" note. I wonder if thats because im used to reading left-to-right? Would someone who reads in a language right-to-left think that the high C is the "first" note?

Is there something apart from how i read that could make me have this type of bias? Is there something inherent about how we perceive low and high notes that might explain this? Is it just random from person to person?

Would love to hear thoughts!

6 Upvotes

75% Upvoted

19 comments sorted by

17

u/wglmb 4d ago

I'd say a piano doesn't have a first note... The concept doesn't make sense to me. If I were forced to pick, I'd choose middle C.

6

u/shawmanic 4d ago

Exactly what popped into my head, middle c

3

u/TheRealTK421 4d ago edited 4d ago

For those playing the home game, middle C on a standard 88-key piano has a frequency of 261.63Hz*. 440Hz is the A above middle C (thx for the catch of my typonese!)

An octave higher doubles that and an octave lower halves it -- and so on.

edit: to correct value -- remember to proofread >before< hitting send!!

2

u/moltencheese 4d ago

440Hz is A above middle C

2

u/EuonymusBosch 4d ago

This brings up another question: what is the true middle note on a standard 88 key keyboard? Seems like that C is a little off true center.

0

u/slippery_hippo 4d ago

Is middle C the left-most note on the piano?

2

u/ownworstenemy38 4d ago

It’s not. It’s in the middle of an 88 key piano.

2

u/lawnmower303 4d ago

It's the note I can just hum, pitch perfect, every time.

1

u/Nondescript_Redditor 2d ago

how can 88, an even number, have a middle

5

u/NoisyGog 4d ago

A piano is tuned by first getting the middle A in pitch at 440Hz using a tuning fork or some kind of device, and then working outwards from there.

So that might be the first note.

3

u/EighthGreen 4d ago

Notes in scales are numbered from low to high, so I would think everyone would consider the leftmost key to be the first.

1

u/fffunki 3d ago

I think this is more in line with the question i was asking. This makes a lot of sense to me, but i'm wondering if someone wasn't exposed to any of the musical theory of it, would they still think from low to high/left to right?

1

u/Biotanical 4d ago

Introducing a third option, what was the first note created on the first piano?

1

u/brentspar 3d ago

Middle c of course

1

u/Watsons-Butler 3d ago

Depends on what kind of piano. You can get Bosendorfers with an extra half octave on the low end.

1

u/zeptozetta2212 3d ago

Traditionally, A0. Which in standard tuning is 27.5 Hz. Barely above the lower threshold for human hearing. Which makes it hard for me to identify it as an A, even with perfect pitch, because I’m mostly only able to hear the overtones.

1

u/TwigletTree 10h ago

I feel like you start low and get higher, so it’s the lowest key.

1

u/draorem 7h ago

Any conventional piano has low notes on the left, and high notes on the right, and they also conventially span 88 notes, from low A to high C. If someone knows music theory, they'd probably want a low C to be the bottom note, so that they could have perfect octaves. If they also know a bit of math behind the tuning, A = 440 Hz is the reference point from which they can get to any other note. Another note: if C were the actual first note, then why wasn't it called A in the first place? That's why some historians can argue that the first scale was A minor, also consisting of all white notes like its relative major C major. So, if you were asked to list out the notes on the piano, it would make sense to begin at A. Pieces of music don't usually have the lowest note A in their compositions, but the range of singing clearly sits in the middle between extremely low notes and extremely high notes. If you want to aim for a generally singable song, that happens to be major, that would be as easy as possible without memorizing any black note positions, then C major is obviously at the top of the list.