Originally Posted by: GramboIf there was a Tone instead of a half tone between B and C and like wise between E and F - and you still wanted to keep the black Keys sharps/flats.
You would have to totally re - design a piano keyboard.

Sorry if i'm harping on a bit, but the relationship between B and C and like wise E and F has always puzzled me ?....?

Because there are a series of whole and half-steps in each scale, the scales with no sharps or flats, ie C major and A minor, go directly from B to C and E to F in a half step. Yes, if there were a whole-step between E and F or B and C, you would have to re-design the keyboard, but there is not a whole-step between these notes.

In the west, our music's smallest intervalic unit (typically) is the half-step. Our eight-note scales must consist of more than simply whole steps. 12 half steps between each octave gives you only 6 notes.