B-Flat Meaning Ordinary

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Rachel. I’m calling from Harrogate, Tennessee. How are you all?

We’re doing great, Rachel. Thanks for calling.

Doing great, Rachel.

Listen, I’ve got a question for you all. I originally grew up in the Cincinnati area, and my friends and all of the people I sort of grew up with were the arty-farty types, musicians and whatnot. And around them, we always use the term B flat to mean ordinary or normal everyday average. And I think it has something to do with the fact that in jazz band and Dixieland music, B flat is sort of the key that a lot of those songs are played in. But it’s just once I got to high school and into college, I realized that that wasn’t a normal thing to say. And I was curious. I know we have a lot of terms that have come from the jazz age. And I just wanted to know if you all knew anything about this term B flat.

So you’re saying everybody that worked in the music that you knew in Cincinnati used it, but not anywhere else? I’m finding that that’s the case. I moved away. And even when I talk to musicians, you know, as an adult, I still play music. If I’m talking to even classically trained musicians, nobody really seems to know that term at all. And I know that Cincinnati has a long music history. Even the first musicians union was in Cincinnati. So I guess I was just curious if it was just a local colloquialism or if it was one of those things that was more widespread, but maybe just from the jazz era.

I have something for you, Rachel. I know one source from 1938 that has B-flat with that meaning.

I love it. What is it?

It’s called New York Panorama. This was a guidebook to New York State put out by the Works Progress Administration after the Great Depression. It was written for part of the Federal Writers Project. And there’s a section about jazz in New York City. And there’s a section in that about the language of jazz. And in there is a very brief part that says B-flat means dull and G-flat means brilliant.

G-flat as in George?

Yeah.

Yeah.

That’s the closest I can find.

Now, there are other meanings of B-flat that we can talk about in a minute in other slang dictionaries that have nothing to do with music.

Yeah.

But that’s the closest I can find to what you’re talking about. But what you’re saying about it being kind of like the one key that everyone learns or the one that’s so common in those certain traditions of music, that makes a lot of sense to me. I could see how that would become generalized as a slang term for ordinary or plain.

What’s interesting is the key of G flat or that would be the key of F sharp. It’s super unusual.

Yeah.

It’s interesting that it would mean brilliant.

Okay, I see.

So the other terms, the other meanings for B flat, the most common one that I know is bet bug going back to 1836 because B sometimes is an abbreviation for bug. And also it’s a joke about what you do to a bug. You make it flat because you smack it. And, of course, there’s that goofy joke about if you don’t see sharp, you’ll be flat.

Terrible.

I’m sure you know lots of those musician jokes, Rachel, right?

I do.

I’m proud, but that’s not one that I know.

My speculation is, Rachel, that your community came up with that B-flat meaning on its own, and it was separately coined from those people in New York in the 1930s. Because it just seems like, you know, once you’ve got this community of people all doing the same thing, it just seems like your explanation makes a lot of sense. And people would just naturally come up with that a couple of times, right?

I see.

It makes a lot of sense that it would come up again, and somebody else would have recoined that.

I see.

Okay.

Yeah, I don’t think it traveled to Cincinnati. But thank you if we find out more from our listeners we’ll share for sure.

We certainly will. I would love to learn more. All right, take care all for the work you do.

Okay, thank you. All right, you’re welcome. Be well. Bye.