F-sharp Major & Minor Pentascales

Hello and welcome back! I'm Joseph Hoffman.
Today we're going to learn another black
key pentascale: F-sharp major.
Or should I say G-flat?
It's all the same because they're enharmonic.
Let's come check it out at the piano.
All right here on the piano we have an F-sharp
to start us off with DO.
Now let's try to build the F-sharp major pentascale together.
Here's DO, so where do you think RE would be?
Remember RE is a whole step above DO.
Well, we know this would be a half step, then if we go one more half step that equals a whole step.
So we have RE right here.
So we have DO RE, then MI is another whole step up.
Can you find where that would be? Point to it.
If you're pointing right here you're correct.
So now we have DO RE MI.
Hey, that's the original three notes that we used for ♫Hot cross buns♫
You didn't know it at the time, but back in lesson one you were actually using the F-sharp major pentascale.
Now in that lesson we only used DO RE and MI, but now we're going to keeping going up to FA and SO.
You'll recall that MI and FA are best friends, so now we only need to go up a half step.
Point to the note that's a half step above this black key.
If you're pointing here you're correct.
A-sharp goes up to B for MI,
sorry I mean FA, and now Fah needs to go up to SO, which is one more whole step.
So we're going to pass by this note, and go all the way up to C-sharp.
Now we have the F-sharp major pentascale.
It's kind of like a deformed Oreo cookie I guess.
We've got this really fat
cookie down here, the cream in the middle,
and a skinny cookie on top.
Let's point and name each note.
Ready? Try it with me.
F-sharp, G-sharp, A-sharp, B, C-sharp
Now
let's see what that would look like on the staff.
Here's the F-sharp major pentascale on the staff.
F-sharp, G-sharp, A-sharp, B, C-sharp.
Now how would we name these notes enharmonically using flat names?
Let's give it a try. What do we call this key using a flat name?
If you said G-flat you're
correct. Now let's try naming all of them. Here we go.
G-flat A-flat B-flat, now pause a second.
Some of you may want to say B right here,
but we already used up the letter B on this B-flat, so it would be better to go on to the letter C.
Is there enharmonic name for this key that
uses a C?
That's right we could call this note C-flat.
That's the enharmonic name
for this key. It's normally called B,
but since we already used up B on the B-flat,
we'll call it C-flat,
and then we'll finish with D-flat.
Now let's try it one
more time. Say all of the names using flats, go:
G-flat, A-flat, B-flat, C-flat, D-flat. Great job.
Now let's take a look at that on the staff.
And you can tell by looking at the staff that now every single note has a flat in this position.
Now let's try our stepping and skipping exercise. Let's start with the right hand.
Cover up the F-sharp or G-flat major pentascale.
And we'll do stepping and
skipping with the right hand, ready go:
♫Stepping up, and stepping down, and skipping up and down♫
Now we need to figure out the I and V7 chord, so let's pause for a moment.
Our I chord will have a DO Mi
and SO from our pentascale.
What you'll notice this time is all black keys,
so there's our I chord.
For the V7 chord, remember DO steps down a half step to TI,
MI steps up a half step to FA.
So we'll have two white keys down here,
and
for finger 4 to reach this comfortably, you're actually going to be playing up inside the white keys
near where the black keys are. Here's your
V7 chord, I chord.
So as we get to the end of the 'Stepping and Skipping'
exercise, we'll finish with I chord,
V7 chord, I chord.
Alright, now let's try it with the left hand.
cover up the F-sharp/G-flat major pentascale,
and here we go: ♫Stepping up, and stepping down, and skipping up and down♫ Now play a I chord.
Now try the V7 chord,
and then back to the I chord.
Good, now let's try both hands together.
Cover up F-sharp major hands together,
ready go:
♫Stepping up, and stepping down, and skipping up and down♫
I chord, find the V7 chord,
and the I chord.
Good, now for fun
let's try that with a staccato articulation.
Ready, go: ♫Stepping up, and stepping down, and skipping up and down♫
You can do the chords staccato too like that.
Alright, now let's try turning this into minor.
To turn any major pentascale into a minor pentascale, we take the third note down a half step.
Now this would be called F-sharp minor.
So now we have F-sharp G-sharp A B C-sharp.
Let's try playing our 'Stepping and Skipping' exercise in
F-sharp minor now.
This time wit ...