Talk:D major

RFV

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D major

E major

F major

G major

RFV of the adjective section. I think this is only a usually-uncountable noun. Note that phrases like "the piece was D major" don't verify that "D major" is an adjective, just as "the chair was metal" doesn't mean "metal" is an adjective. Tests of adjectivity include:

1. modification by adverbs: can you say "it was very D major"? "it's too D major"?
2. gradation: can one thing be "more D major" than another?

- -sche (discuss) 17:54, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

These two tests of adjectivity are too stringent, as not all adjectives are gradable. The phrase "the chair was metal" does not seem to be idiomatic English, but if it were, it would suggest to me that "metal" is used as an adjective in there. --Dan Polansky (talk) 19:30, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

No. In both cases (the piece and the chair) are nouns. Prepositions are implied. "the piece in D major", "the chair was of metal" (and a bit cold:). Adjective section should be trimmed--Pierpao (talk) 20:27, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

"chair was metal" is at least an attested sequence of words; "piece was {B|D|E|F|G} major" gets no hits, and "piece was C major" only turns up copies of a book that uses the phrase "key of the piece was D major", where "D major" is a noun. - -sche (discuss) 20:38, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

@Dan Polansky, "The chair was metal" is idiomatic (maybe colloquial?) English.

@Pierpao, I disagree that metal is used as a noun in "The chair was metal." I would say it's an adjective. But D Major and friends are nouns in that case.

@-sche, try "is" instead of "was", it seems more probable.

--WikiTiki89 20:43, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

It does seem like the present tense would get more hits, but "piece is {B|C|D} major" doesn't actually get more hits, just things like "scale of this piece is D major". - -sche (discuss) 00:22, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Well I've heard people use it that way and it gets a large number of hits on Google Web search. So it is used that way; it's just a matter of finding the citations (maybe Usenet?). Anyway, I would maintain that it is being used as a metonymic noun. --WikiTiki89 00:27, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

If we agree it's a noun in those cases, we don't need to bother finding citations of those cases, since this is a RFV to determine whether or not the term can also be an adjective. :) - -sche (discuss) 01:05, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

I've removed the adjective POS (RFV-failed). - -sche (discuss) 07:14, 7 February 2013 (UTC)