That’s the fastest way to transpose music from one key to another. But it doesn’t address the issue of sharps and flats (or as the bass player in my band would say, the little b and the tic-tac-toe sign). How do we know whether to play an E or an Eb?

Let’s go back to our second problem in the example because it fits here: the sheet music includes easily recognizable chords (G, C, Em, D), but when you try to sing along the melody is way to high or way too low. While I wouldn’t usually choose to transpose a song from G to D#, the process works the same no matter what key you land on.

Let’s write out the alphabet again. Only this time we’ll add the sharps.

This paragraph explains sharps and flats. You can skip it if you already know this, or simply don’t care. Think about a piano. There are white keys and black keys. The black keys are the sharps and flats. But a sharp or flat don’t always appear between two notes. If you look at a piano, you’ll see two black keys, a space, three black keys, and another space. You can use this visual to know when to add a sharp or flat and when to add a space (or you can take my word for it).

Now we’ll add the sharps, so every note on the piano is on our list. Remember that there is no black note for a B# or an E#.

A  A# B  C  C# D  D# E  F  F# G  G#

Now we can scoot over this alphabet line with sharps to transpose music from one key to another key. Let’s say the first chord in our song is a G, but we want to transpose it to D# (for some odd, insane reason). So we’ll write the new chord, D#, directly under the old chord G, like this:

A  A# B  C  C# D  D# E  F  F# G  G#
                              D#

Then we fill in the rest of the second line, following the pattern of the first line.

A  A# B  C  C# D  D# E  F  F# G  G#
F  F# G  G# A  A# B  C  C# D  D# E

Now we’re ready to transpose from G to D#. If using the key of G was too high for singing the melody, lowering the song down to D# should help. We start with this music...

G                              C2
This is my super awesome song, I sing it all day long.
Em9                Dsus                G      Dsus     G
And when I sing it loud and clear, you know I can't go wrong.

...and end up with this...

D#                             G#2
This is my super awesome song, I sing it all day long.
Cm9                A#sus               D#     A#sus    D#
And when I sing it loud and clear, you know I can't go wrong.

And we can do the same thing with flats. Write out your alphabet with flats, like this:

A  Bb B  C  Db D  Eb E  F  Gb G  Ab

Now we can repeat the first exercise, transposing from Bb to G. Write a G beneath the Bb in your alphabet line. Then add the rest of the second alphabet line, with the flats.

A  Bb B  C  Db D  Eb E  F  Gb G  Ab
Gb G  Ab A  Bb B  C  Db D  Eb E  F

Use these two lines to transpose the song below.

Bb                               Eb2
This is my super awesome song, I sing it all day long.
Gm9                Fsus                Bb     Fsus     Bb
And when I sing it loud and clear, you know I can't go wrong.

...becomes...

G                              C2
This is my super awesome song, I sing it all day long.
Em9                Dsus                G      Dsus     G
And when I sing it loud and clear, you know I can't go wrong.

Now you have all the tools you need to transpose with or without sharps or flats. But you ask, What if I have a song with a sharp and a flat? Then your music is amazing, because music doesn’t work that way. At least it shouldn’t.

How does this work? you ask. The reason it works is a little more complicated. So if you want to stick with easy and fast, skip this paragraph. Notes and chords work in relationship with each other. Think about the notes in a C scale: C D E F G A B and another C. If we assign a number to each of these notes we would write: C=1, D=2, E=3, F=4, G=5, A=6, B=7, and another C=8. Western music often uses the first, fourth, fifth, and minor sixth notes for chords. So which chords would a song in C commonly use? (Answer: C=1, F=4, G=5, Am=6). Now let’s identify the first, fourth, fifth, and minor sixth notes from a G scale. The scale includes these notes: G A B C D E F# and another G. So which chords would a song in G commonly use? (Answer: G=1, C=4, D=5, and Em=6). Ah, you probably recognize this group of chords, don’t you? The distance between the first note in the C scale (C) and the fourth note in a C scale (F) is equal to the distance to the first and fourth notes in any other scale (they will always be 4 apart). So if you can add equal movements to all chords, you can sing the song with new chords. You can add two half-steps to a song with G C D and Em to make it A D E and F#m.