The Circle of 5ths EXPLAINED! Video Lecture - Guitar Become a Pro (English)

the circle of fifths aside from sounding
like a Harry Potter fan fiction novel is
actually one of the more confusing music
theory terms out there so today we're
going to understand what it is and we're
going to learn three ways in how you can
use it compositionally like if you want
to like maybe write something that has a
key change or something like that
practically to help you memorize chord
progressions and educationally if maybe
you're taking a music theory class and
you want to learn how to quickly
identify key signatures but first we
need to understand what a fifth is aside
from being my uncle's beverage volume of
choice is a distance an interval in
music right a space between two notes so
if we have one note for instance this is
a G on a guitar a v you might think that
a v is just five notes away like one two
three four five actually not the case is
five notes away in the major scale so if
you take the G Major scale G a b c d
that distance the space between a g and
a d is a v you go five notes away in a
major scale now on a guitar there's the
easy way to find a v no matter where you
are you don't even have to know what the
note is like let's take this note right
here the third fret on the a string this
is a C if we go one two three four five
it's always going to bring us if you
read it on one of the lower strings it's
going to bring us down a string back two
frets so a 1 and a 5 creates a power
chord which you probably already know
another way to find a fifth below is to
just go up a string on the same fret so
C 2 G C 2 G ok now what is a circle of
fifths and why is it a circle now the
cool thing about this musically is that
if you take a fifth away from any single
note and we're going to take again in
music they are just 12 notes total right
we've got C we've got seven like letters
c d e f g a b and in between some of
those are sharps or flats now a and B
don't have sharps so we've got 12 total
notes right the cool thing about the
circle of fifths is it shows you the
relationship between all these and keys
and stuff like that so we're going to
demonstrate this if we just do a linear
thing where we go C and we take its 5th
cdefg
we get to it
now if we start ng make G the want to
take its v we go to ADEA now if we go to
D take its v we go to an A and then
after a it goes to ink a v from E is be
a v from B is f sharp from F sharp its D
flat you can see this is C sharp or D
flat we're going to call it D flat then
after that it's a flat or G sharp we're
gonna call it a flat a v from there is a
flat a v from there is B flat a v from
there is f & v from there is back at C
so the interesting thing about all this
is if you move through all the notes in
fifths you end up not repeating any of
them you end up hitting every single
note in the chromatic scale which is
just all twelve notes right now linearly
this might not make a lot of sense but
once you populate this as a circle it
becomes a little easier to handle I
think right because you can kind of go
forward or backwards in fact another
thing you may have heard is the circle
of fourths it's the exact same circles
too depending on which direction you
move so if we start at the top we start
with the C right if we go a fifth from
there it's a G as we second said right
and then we go from C to G to D to a and
it kind of goes in the circle now if you
go backwards right if you go from a C
down a fourth you get a F so the
interesting thing is like is it fourths
or fist it just spends on which
direction you're traveling you can see f
is being a fourth of C or you can see C
is being a fifth of F okay so now we see
that this is a it makes a little more
sense as a circle because it can go
either direction if you just think about
it linearly I think it's a little harder
to understand but also do if you just
look at the circle without any kind of
context it can seem overwhelming like
what's the difference between all this
stuff right so we're going to kind of
pause from the circle for a second and
just talk about how you can use this
practically okay the number one thing
that I use it for is compositionally and
this comes in you know if you're playing
or if you're writing your own song or
something like that and you want to make
something sound a little bit different
you want to go outside of the key you
want to borrow chords
from another key now the the most
obvious place to borrow a corn from is
going to be the key of the note this is
2/5 away from where you're starting
right so if we take that see the key of
C the notes our c d e f g a b and c it
there's no they're all naturals there's
no sharps or flats or anything like that
the key that is most like C it's only
one note away is going to be a v from
that so it's G the the notes of G major
are g a b c d e f sharp and then g again
so the difference between the key of c
and the key of g is just that one note
it's an F or an f-sharp in G's case so
by adding that F sharp to the key of C
you unlock the chords from the key of G
for instance like a D major chord is the
5th chord in the key of G so a D major
chord has an F sharp
we're in C's key the D chord is a d
minor so one really common progression
you might see is like a C major to a G
to an F major to a D to a see so with
that that D doesn't technically the D
major doesn't technically belong in the
key of C we're taking it from another
key usually the key of G now when I say
that the key of G is the one that's most
like the key of C a it's actually tied
for being most likely because if you go
backwards in that circle you find the
key of F now the only difference between
the key of F major and the key of C
major is the B and the key of C there's
a B and the key of F is a b-flat that's
the only difference so you could also
borrow a chord from the key of F if you
wanted to you can take like the the four
chord in F which is a b-flat major so if
you're doing something in the key of C
right like a see it to a minor to
Incheon to a nap
go to that b-flat and it sounds a little
bit different but it doesn't sound too
far removed because it's so close on
that circle in the key that you're using
so it is a great way to maybe find a way
to make a transition to a different key
if you're writing a song compositionally
now the farther you get away on that
circle the more different that song is
going to sound or that progression is
going to sound because you're using a
almost an entirely different set of
notes the farther away if you get on the
circle from one key to another so it's
just a good way to kind of populate
chords from different keys and kind of
see which Keys work well with each other
now a practical way to use the circle of
fifths is to just think of intervals as
fifth in fifths in general to kind of
help you memorize chord progressions so
we're going to take one of the most
chord program one of the most famous
chord progressions of all time and that
is Hotel California and the way it goes
the source with the B minor to an
f-sharp to an a major to an E
- a G - a D - an E minor - an f-sharp
fine right so that seems like a lot of
chords for a chord progression and it
could be kind of hard especially like
maybe when you're first starting out to
memorize a group of chords that long I
think that was like eight different
chords 78 of course something like that
alright so what knowing fifths and
knowing that the relationship between
chords can do is you can kind of cut
down on some of that memorization so if
you know if you think of eight chords
and most of these going traveling from
one chord like a B minor right instead
of thinking okay I need to memorize B
minor F sharp a you can cut that down
because this song travels in fifths for
the most part so we start with a chord B
minor and just like a note can travel in
a fifth from a be a fifth of B if you
remember is an F sharp so there's a B
there's a half sharp so a chord can
travel in a fifth just like a note so a
B minor chord if you go a fifth higher
goes to F sharp right and then let's
start with the new chord let's move this
down to minor third so you go to a now
we just had to remember that we're going
to an a and then remember that you're
going a fifth from a ABCDE from a a
major to an e let's go - or down from
there G major you know I don't even
after know the next chord I know that
I'm going a fifth above G so G ABCD goes
to D okay so right there we've kind of
cut back on some of the memorization
because I know I got this chord and then
I go up on it
and then I get this corn and then I go
up a bit and then I get this forward and
then I go up a bit and then you get to
an E minor and a half sharp minor so you
kind of have to know how that goes but
even the chorus is the same way it's
just a gia and it's v and then an E and
it's alright so this is an example of a
song that uses the circle of fifths or
just fifths in general as a way to
advance through a chord progression
because not all these chords are in the
same key we're kind of borrowing chords
from other keys so you can think of it
as borrowing chords you can think of it
as modulating or just changing the key
of one chord however you want to do it
but I think for me specifically thinking
in intervals fifths specifically has
helped me kind of just have a feel for
chord progressions and train my ear to
how they're kind of moving differently
right now the next way we're going to
learn to use the circle of fifths is
educationally and maybe for taking a
music theory class and I would say in my
experience this is where I hear people
use it most often is to find key
signatures right like if you if you've
ever read music before you'll know that
the key signature is denoted by the
certain number of sharps or flats in it
right like if you just see like a staff
and empty staff it means there's no
sharps or flats that means you're in the
key see you
if you see one sharp it's like okay what
is that you have to kind of search for
where it is on the line it's like okay
the F the F is a F sharp so that must
mean I'm in the key of G and that kind
of can be daunting at first remembering
which keys have which sharps and which
flats and stuff like that - the
beautiful thing about the circle of
fifths is moving through that circle
you're adding a sharp each time right so
like we said we started off in the key
of C and when I first said the the key
most like C is G G is essentially the
key of C but with one sharp and it's F
now you don't necessarily need to
remember that right away it's good to
know but if you just know if that at the
top of the circle we have zero sharps
the first spot and the cool thing is
it's kind of like a clock because
there's 12 notes just like twelve
numbers on a clock so at twelve o'clock
we have zero sharps at one o'clock we
have one sharp which is the key of G and
this stuff will become second nature the
more you do it
the next slot spot so G's v is D D has 2
sharps ok and again it doesn't write
right now as far as just memorizing it
if you see a piece of sheet music with 2
sharps on it to begin you can just think
ok C 2 G 2 D this is in the key of D and
then you can kind of keep going so on
and so forth right so the next DS then
would be a a has three sharps is fifth
would be e he has four right so on and
so forth and eventually we end up
getting two flats and we kind of come
backwards to where we started it kind of
like how I said you could like look at
this clockwise or counterclockwise
depending on if you want to go through
fifths or fourths the same thing with
that C 2 and F so C has zero sharps or
flats if we go backwards to F F has one
flat if we go backwards again to where F
is the 5th right then you have two flats
etc so musically if you you know even if
you're like a piano player and you're
reading sheet music and you just want to
kind of identify the key signature of
something it's a really useful tool to
be like ok like this has this has two
flats I have to go backwards instead of
trying to think of like okay well F has
a B flat what's like that you can kind
of just think in the circle of fifths
count forwards or backwards and
eventually you can kind of just put all
together so I think it's a really
valuable songwriting tool above all else
because it kind of shows you how you can
unlock chords and which chords are going
to be the most commonly used between two
different keys so it can be kind of
daunting at first to kind of think of
all these sharps and flats and have to
know all seven notes in a scale but
again that stuff just comes with time
and just kind of being more thoughtful
about what you're playing especially if
you're learning to play songs
I think being thoughtful about the cores
in a song and how they relate to each
other
is such an important thing and it will
make you such a better musician once you
kind of see the patterns and stuff like
this and the circle of fifths is a
fantastic tool in being able to
recognize those patterns