Circle of Fifths: Everything You Need to Know

the

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fifths

everything

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to not fail music class in 11 minutes there are 12 different musical tones in western music theory and each one can be assigned a letter name here they are on the piano keyboard up or down the pattern simply repeats the notes sound basically the same just higher or lower, in addition to looking and thinking about the names of the letters chromatically as they appear on the piano, we can also arrange them in this special pattern called a

circle

of

fifths

, it is not So. It seems like a lot, but this is an incredibly powerful reference tool with a number of useful properties and patterns.

You'll commonly see versions of the circle of fifths with information about major key signatures and relative minor keys, but you can also use the circle to get a better understanding of harmony interval transposition chord structure and probably much more honestly, the circle looks like having ideas that keep on giving is almost like a reference table of useful mathematical equations and the periodic table of elements and a color wheel all in one, but musical like a magical musical device but to understand how it works it is useful to

know

how it is constructed The structure of the circle of fifths is a bit like those drawings of impossible stairs where you keep going up or down but in the end you end up arriving at the same place but instead of going up or down a staircase as you go through the notes, go up a fifth in the clockwise and go down a fifth counterclockwise and if you continue you will end up where you started.

This is not possible on the physical plane. world, but it is possible in music, let's see how this is played on the piano, we will start on C and go up to a perfect fifth, which could be considered as the fifth note of a major scale or as seven semitones if we go up. another perfect fifth we get d and above a perfect fifth from d is a continuation of the pattern the fifth note of a major is e the fifth note of e major is if a perfect fifth above b major is f sharp and seven more semitones take us to d flat followed by a flat, then e flat and b flat followed by f and could you notice that we go back to c?

Note that it is the name of the letter that is important rather than any specific note in a specific octave if we were to write the notes. We just looked at the piano, it would look like this, but there's no reason you couldn't use a high or low version of a note when it's more convenient, these two versions of the circle notes have slightly different shapes, but the names of the notes. They are the same and they return to the beginning as a circle next to this circle that we just made, it is missing a small detail.

These three at the bottom actually have two names because each note in the circle of fifths corresponds to a major scale that has a unique key signature and according to the rules of major scales there are three with n harmonic equivalents, those scales can be written in two different ways but they actually sound the same and when we look at the key signatures of all these scales we see another interesting property of the circle that starts at the top of the C major circle it has no sharps or flats, but as we go through the cycle in clockwise we start adding sharps g major has one sharp d major has two sharps a has three e has four b has five f sharp has six and c sharp major has seven sharps going in the opposite direction adds flats the key signature for F major has one flat B flat has two flats E flat has three A flat has four D flat has five G flat has six and C flat major has seven flats, so all the sharp keys are on this side and the number of sharps increases clockwise and all the flat keys are on this side and the number of flats increases counterclockwise and all the ones that have two versions are here on the bottom and the Sharp flat shapes overlap perfectly and since each major key shares a key signature with a relative minor key, you may also see some versions of the circle of fifths with the minor keys aligned with the relative major keys and keen observers will also see that the order of sharps and flats is right here on the circle clockwise for sharps and counterclockwise for flats, so it's pretty obvious that the circle of fifths is A useful reference tool as it shows all the major and minor key signatures, but why not keep all of that? information in a list or a graph why it has to be a circle other than the fact that it is quite orderly the reason has to do with all the other patterns that emerge in the circle that we mentioned earlier let's start with harmony harmony is a complex topic that can be broadly understood as the study of what chords are used in a piece of music and how those chords relate to each other.

Three of the most ubiquitous chords are those built on the first fourth and fifth notes of any given note. key in C major referring to chords built on c f and g are found in almost every piece of music you can imagine these chords can appear in quite a few different versions, but each one is still based on the same root note of 1 4 and 5 of c or c f and g now notice that f and g are right next to c on the circle for any key, the iv chord is one step back on the circle and the v chord is one step forward in E major, the iv chord is a and the v chord is b in B flat major, the iv chord is E flat and the v chord is f, so in addition to the major and minor key signatures, the circle is also a great reference tool for quickly finding related chords in any key and It's not just for show, you can hear how well these chords fit together.

Listen as we move between C and its adjacent chords, we can hear how well they fit and how much they ground us in C major, even moving to the A minor chord. works pretty well generally speaking, if you only move one step in the circle the chords will sound quite related to each other, even a single two step jump can sound a little surprising compared to adjacent chords, each jump will have a unique character which could sound pretty good or pretty strange depending on the context. For the most part as we go through musical history, the more comfortable composers and listeners would have been with bigger leaps, a lot of these sounds are interesting today, but they would have been rare or unheard of at different times.

Points in musical history moving directly across the circle are a pretty strange sound, but it is possible to prepare your ear for that key by approaching it step by step and then, if you normalize that key by staying around it for a while, the key original actually sounds nice. weird, but by moving step by step you can head to pretty much any chord you like, even around the circle, and no chord changes sounded particularly weird and you can certainly do this in any direction to get a different flavor, as it's weird do it. around the circle in a piece of music, but it's actually quite common while practicing, many musicians practice chord scales and patterns throughout the cycle, like this C pattern followed by this F pattern, then B flat, etc., and It is helpful to practice going in the other direction as well, that way all the common movements around the circle from any point will be familiar on your instrument.

The next step is the intervals. Think of the circle as a clock. We already know that moving one step clockwise is a perfect fifth up. one step counterclockwise is a perfect fifth down other intervals are mirrored clockwise and counterclockwise also two steps in the circle are a major second down up or down and three steps are a major sixth up or down each interval in the circle is reflected going in the opposite direction here is a table for all intervals in the circle clockwise increases the interval and counterclockwise the interval decreases. This idea is useful for a couple of reasons.

First, you can use this as a calculator to transpose a note or clef. Musicians who play transposing instruments

need

to do this all the time, for example most trumpets and clarinets are in B flat, so they need to play a major second from concert pitch. They are usually given music that has been prepared for them, but they say that "They have been asked to play a specific scale, they can simply move two steps clockwise in the circle. If they are asked to play a scale concert in E flat, they simply move two steps clockwise and know that they need to play instruments in an F major E flat scale like the alto and baritone saxophone would need to move three steps clockwise. clockwise and instruments like trumpets would need to move just one step clockwise.

Many musicians will find this a useful tool for transposing anything for their instrument quickly and accurately. This idea of ​​intervals arises. The circle of fifths is useful because it provides a little information about interval inversions and how and why they work. For example, we know that the major third and the minor sixth are inversions of each other. major third and e to c is a minor sixth, they have the same note names, but in reverse, if we look at those intervals in the circle, we see that the major third has four steps and the minor sixth has eight steps and together they close the circle, you will find that Each interval and its inversion will close the circle and add up to 12 steps.

Continuing with this visualization, we can analyze the structure of chords by looking at how each specific note of a chord falls on the circle to get some pretty revealing patterns. This is a major chord. only a perfect fifth and a major third played at the same time the major chord always has this shape in the circle. You can move the shape anywhere and get a major chord because every major chord is a perfect fifth and a major third from the root. Comparing the shape of the major chord and in the parallel minor chord like C major and C minor you will see that the shape is actually a perfect reflection of the major chord in the circle, two notes remain the same c and g and only one note Interestingly, the third changes from E to E flat, although the major and minor third are next to each other on the keyboard, they are almost directly across from each other on the circle, this may give some insight into why the two chords look similar but are not.

So different in sound and function, there are also four note versions of these chords, such as the major seventh chord which is two perfect fifths between c and g and e and b and there is the minor seventh chord which is also two perfect fifths between c and g and E flat and B flat, The two forms are not the same perfect reflection as the major and minor triads we just looked at, but they are pretty close, but probably the most important four-note chord is the dominant seventh chord, that interval between the third. and the seventh that directly crosses the circle is known as a tritone and that is what gives tension to a dominant chord that usually wants to resolve into this chord.

A closely related chord is the frighteningly named minor seven-flat-five chord, it's just a reflection of the dominant. chord in the circle, but it works similarly because it maintains the same tritone between E and Bflat, yet another reflection of the dominant 7th chord is the equally terrifying tritone substitution, which is just another dominant chord one tritone away, similar to the minor seventh flat five. the third and seventh remain while the root and fifth change so the function is the same but the tonal color is quite different here is the sound of a standard cadence and here is with a tritone substitution some chords have patterns which are not spaced at all and have their notes next to each other in the circle, a suspended iv chord looks like this and a suspended ii chord is quite similar but with a different flavor, the six nine chord pretty much just takes over one side of the circle and the other chords have notes as far away from each other in the circle as possible, the diminished triad sounds kind of creepy and makes this shape and the diminished seventh chord fills the last side of the circle, finally the augmented chord trisects the circle alike with three notes that simply can't move further from each other, whether you're using the circle of fifths to learn and remember parallel minor key signatures, exploring interesting colors and properties of chords, or calculating intervals and transpositions, it's clear that the circle of fifths is an incredibly useful tool.

Reference and visualization tool that almost all musicians can use. Remember to like, comment, share,Subscribe and check the description for links to more videos. Thanks for seeing you.