Press Up to hear a minor second, then try the quiz!
Intervals · m2 ·
Minor second
A minor second is one semitone, the distance from C up to D♭. You hear it going up in the very first notes of Scott Joplin's "The Entertainer."
Listen: C4 and D♭4
Quiz
Wormy plays one of these, up or down, from a different note each time. Can you tell which: minor second, major second, minor third?
What it sounds like
The smallest step on the piano: one key apart, like E to F. It sounds tense and leaning, a note that wants to slide into the next one. Played together, the two notes rub and buzz.
In music theory
Ti up to do in a major scale is a minor second, and that tiny gap is why ti sounds like it has to resolve. A chromatic run is a string of minor seconds. At ten bits wide, it is the yardstick for every other interval.
Where you've heard it
- The Entertainer: the opening run, D to D♯, going up.Published 1902. Scott Joplin, "The Entertainer" (St. Louis: John Stark & Son, 1902).
- Für Elise: the first two notes, E to D♯, going down.Published 1867. Ludwig van Beethoven, Bagatelle in A minor, WoO 59, first published by Ludwig Nohl, 1867.
Every tune named here is public domain in the US or traditional. Wormy names the spot; it never plays the song.