Piano Keyboard Layout

A full keyboard has 88 keys altogether, 36 black ones and 52 white ones.

Here’s a piano keyboard diagram. Take a look at the white keys. The white keys are all labeled. If you look closely, you will realize that the same note names are being repeated over and over. These notes are A, B, C, D, E, F and G - the musical alphabet.

Now take a look at the black keys. You will notice that they all have two note names. Think about the words house and home, both mean the same thing but in some situations you might use the word house and in other situations you might use the word home. This is the same with sharps and flats.

♯ - This is a sharp, it raises the note that comes before it by a half step.
♭ - This is a flat, it lowers the note that comes before it by half a step.

To help you better understand sharps (♯) and flats (♭), let’s find out what a semitone is. A semitone is also called a half step or half tone and is the smallest interval used in Western music. It is the distance between two notes which are next to one another in pitch. So the distance between C and C-Sharp is one semitone, the distance between D and D-Sharp is one semitone and the same can be said for the distance between A and A-flat.

What is the note that is one semitone higher than C? The answer is C-Sharp. What is the note that is one semitone higher than D? The answer is D-Sharp. Let’s go the other way around. What is the note that is one semitone lower than D? The answer is D-Flat. One semitone lower than E? It’s E-Flat.