Chromatic facts for kids

A chromatic scale is like a musical ladder where every single step is used. It's a special musical scale that moves up or down using every possible semitone (which is also called a half-step). Think of a piano: when you play a chromatic scale, you hit every white and black key in a row, like C, C sharp, D, D sharp, E, F, and so on. You can start a chromatic scale on any note.

What Does "Chromatic" Mean?

The word "chromatic" comes from the Greek word chromos, which means "color". This name was given to these scales because they sounded very "colorful" to musicians long ago.

In the 16th and 17th centuries, composers like Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck wrote pieces called "Chromatic Fantasias". These pieces used many notes from the chromatic scale. Back then, the way instruments were tuned meant that not all the half-steps were exactly the same size. This made chromatic scales sound even more unique and "colorful," which is why they got their name.

Understanding Chromatic Harmony

Chromatic harmony happens when music uses notes or chords that are not usually found in the main key of the song. Imagine a song is in the key of C major, which uses only white keys on a piano. If the composer suddenly adds a C sharp or a D sharp, those are chromatic notes.

Even though Bach used some chromatic harmony in the 18th century, it became much more popular with composers in the 19th century. Wagner, for example, wrote very chromatic music. His pieces often had many sharps and flats, and the music would frequently shift to different keys.

A famous example is the very first chord in his opera Tristan and Isolde. This chord is so well-known that it's called the Tristan chord. It's very chromatic and creates a lot of tension because it makes listeners wonder which key the music is in.

Related pages

• Scale (music)
• Tonality
• Serialism

Images for kids

• 

  Melodies can use many notes from the chromatic scale, even if they are based on a simpler scale. For example, the start of Henry Purcell's Thy Hand, Belinda (1689) uses eleven of the twelve possible notes!

• 

  Tetrachord genera of the four-string lyre, from The History of the Arts and Sciences of the Antients, Charles Rollin (1768). The text gives a typically fanciful account of the term chromatic.

• 

  Gamut as defined by George William Lemon, English Etymology, 1783.

• 

  The diatonic scale notes (above) and the non-scale chromatic notes (below)

• 

  Bernhard Ziehn's 1907 list of, "diatonic triads", diatonic seventh-chords," and two examples of, "diatonic ninth-chords," the "large" and "small" ninth chords; all from the C major or the C harmonic minor scale

• 

  Wagner, Die Walküre, act 3, magic sleep music

• 

  Chromatic (rear) and diatonic harmonicas

See also

In Spanish: Diatónico y cromático para niños