Determine the Key of a song

[PrestoGen]

OK, this may be an extremely stupid question, but how do I determine the key of a song?

Lets say I got some strings playing chords, and some keys:

I know all individual keys in this section, but how do I know the key for the whole song? haha

 

[lostnthesound]

The rule of thumb is the first note/chord that is played sets the key of tune.

 

[PrestoGen]

Yeah thank you, I figured it might be something like that

 

[RevTech]

Find the tonic note, the note that is the pedal point, like everything is resolved by that one note. Open up a pitch analyzer and voila it's done. Or used mixedinkey software

 

[RUSSLA]

Mixed in Key is the one, or just use a Tuner plugin and take the root note as the key of the track

 

[Nydus]

Find the tonic note, the note that is the pedal point, like everything is resolved by that one note. Open up a pitch analyzer and voila it's done. Or used mixedinkey software

Not a bad idea but this only determining the root note of the key, not the keys played after it. In order to do so you need to read up on music theory in defining key signatures. For example, an instrument playing two sharps F & C could potentially be in D Major.

Circle of fifths:

 

[RevTech]

Pitch is logarithmic, circle of fifth is made by adding a perfect fifth (7 semitones/3 white keys in between) each time,

 

[Innovine]

just hum one long, unchanging note that fits with the whole song. that's the key.

some music, especially clasical, will change keys, but that's pretty rare in drum n bass.