I heard one of these programmes. I started by gnashing my teeth and progressed to thinking seriously about hurling the radio against the wall. And/or writing a terse letter to the producers.

They should have asked some folkies about this - as the well-informed comments above attest.

Anyone who has ever used digital tuning, or who plays a range of manually divergent instruments, or who has even just used a capo, will know that keys have no intrinsic mood in themselves. The fall of the hand to the instrument is the 'key' issue.

Pitch matters, the shape of the music within the pitch matters, but the key per se makes no difference. It's all about composition and performance, not key.

You can make A major desperately mournful, or Dm or Bm as chipper and happy as you like.

Yes, if you shift the pitch of the whole piece up, it will get brighter (not necessarily happier though) and if down - a little darker. But this is only a minor effect (sorry).

I'd not heard such pompous twaddle since I last read one of my own mudcat posts

Tom Bliss