Music written in all major or minor keys

Examples include Johann Sebastian Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier and Frédéric Chopin's 24 Preludes, Op. 28.

In yet another type, a single piece may progressively modulate through a set of tonalities, as occurs in Ludwig van Beethoven's Two Preludes through all twelve major keys, Op.

There are examples of attempts to write full sets that, for one reason or another, were never completed (Josef Rheinberger's organ sonatas, Dmitri Shostakovich's string quartets, César Franck's L'Organiste).

A number of composers have written multiple sets of works covering all the keys of the scale.

8 from Anton Reicha's Trente six Fugues pour le Piano-Forté composées d'après un nouveau systême (subtitled Cercle harmonique) modulates through all keys.

Charles-Valentin Alkan composed Petits préludes sur les huit gammes du plain-chant, for organ (1859, no opus number), a sequence of eight organ preludes covering each of the church modes.

In the music of the Eastern Orthodox Church, the doxasticon for Vespers of the Dormition is notable as a single hymn that includes passages in all eight tones of the Byzantine Octoechos.

One might suppose that Chopin considered writing the études in all the tonalities but eventually came to the conclusion that it wasn't practical, and turned back to it later, for the 24 Preludes, Op.

10 is made of arpeggios in C major draws a connection to Bach's first book of The Well-Tempered Clavier and makes it clear that Chopin had the tradition on his mind.

Angelo Michele Bartolotti used this approach as early as 1640, and it was also adopted by such later composers as Rode, Hummel, Chopin, Heller, Busoni, Scriabin, Shostakovich, Kabalevsky and Kapustin.

Johann Sebastian Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier, two complete sets of 24 Preludes and Fugues written for keyboard in 1722 and 1742, and often known as "the 48", is generally considered the greatest example of music traversing all 24 keys.

It was long believed that Bach had taken the title The Well-Tempered Clavier from a similarly named set of 24 Preludes and Fugues in all the keys, for which a manuscript dated 1689 was found in the library of the Brussels Conservatoire.

[9][10] While Bach can safely claim the title The Well-Tempered Clavier, he was not the earliest composer to write sets of pieces in all the keys: As early as 1567, Giacomo Gorzanis [it; de; ca; fr] (c.1520–c.1577) composed twelve settings of the passamezzo antico and passamezzo moderno, each followed by a saltarello, in all 24 keys.

[citation needed] In 1640, Angelo Michele Bartolotti wrote Libro primo di chitarra spagnola, a cycle of passacaglias that moves through all 24 major and minor keys according to the circle of fifths.

[13] Also in 1640, Antonio Carbonchi wrote Sonate di chitarra spagnola con intavolatura franzese for guitar.

[14] In 1702, Johann Caspar Ferdinand Fischer wrote a cycle of 20 organ pieces all in different keys in his Ariadne musica.

[3] In 1735, between Bach's two sets, Johann Christian Schickhardt wrote his L'alphabet de la musique, Op.

Bach's Goldberg Variations, wrote his own 24 polonaises for keyboard, one in each of the major and minor keys.