Using the Circle of Fifths To Understand Key Signatures and Learn the Fretboard

Intro: 

• Learning the fretboard
  • When learning guitar, many people learn chords, their favorite riffs, or even scale boxes and shapes, but continue to struggle with being able to name the notes that they are playing.
  • Why does this matter? Shapes, chords, and riffs will take you a long way, but without knowing the name of the note you are on, you are limited to those shapes, chords, and riffs. Learning music theory enables you to better understand how each note fits into the context around it. BUT, in order for this to be helpful you need to know what note you are actually playing before you can understand how it fits into the context surrounding it. Therefore, learning the fretboard is one of the most crucial, yet daunting tasks a guitarist must tackle.

• Why Circle of Fifths, and Key Signatures.
  • Kill two (or several) birds with one stone
    • Learn key signatures, therefore major scales.
      • A major scale is a series of notes and is the foundation for all of Western music theory.
      • Understanding the major scale will be helpful in and of itself for everything you do, ever.
    • Learn the names of the notes in first positions (or ‘learning the fretboard’) (easier than memorizing them because it provides context)

Into the lesson:

• First, we need to understand the musical alphabet. (if you are familiar feel free to skip ahead)
  • Show a keyboard. Uses letters A-G, then repeats instead of continuing on to “H”. However, there are “Sharps” and “Flats” (or accidentals) in between every note except for in two places. B to C and E to F. This is why there is no black key in between those notes on the keyboard.
  • Each fret is one “half step” or the smallest amount of distance you can travel in Western music. This is equivalent to one key on the piano.
  • Start on each string and count up half steps: E F F#(Gb) G G#(Ab), then A string: A A#(Bb) B C C#(Db) etc.
• Circle of Fifths
  • Travels to the right, (left is the circle of fourths)
  • C:  The first key is “C”. This is because C contains no sharps or flats. Each key represents a major scale. Each major scale ascends the musical alphabet starting on the pitch after which it is named until it repeats and arrives at the same letter. You just add in whatever sharps and flats are in the key signature for that particular key. Because the C scale has no sharps or flats, it is spelled: C D E F G A B C. Now find those notes on the guitar. You can use the exercise we learned to understand the musical alphabet to help you.
  • G (1 sharp): The next key is the key of  “G”; this can be determined by counting up 5 letters from “C”, hence the Circle of Fifths.
    • As you go each key to the right on the wheel, you add one “sharp”. There is an easy trick to remember which sharp note you add. It is always the letter before the key you are in. We are in the key of “G” so it will have an “F#”. Therefore it is spelled like so: G A B C D E F# G.
  • D  (2 sharps): Count up five more letters from “G” and here we are. For each key, you keep the sharp from the previous key, so you are accumulating sharps. We keep F# and add C# (because C comes right before D in the alphabet) so we have 2 sharps in the key: F# and C#. Therefore, it is spelled like so: D E F# G A B C# D
  • A (3 sharps): Count up five letters from “D” to reach “A”. We keep the F#, and the C#, and add G#. The A scale is spelled: A B C# D E F# G# A
  • E (4 sharps): Count up five letters from “A” to reach “E”. We keep the F#, C#, and G# and add D#. The E scale is spelled: E F# G# A B C# D# E
  • B (5 sharps) We keep the F# C# G# D# and add an “A#”. The B scale is spelled: B C# D# E F# G# A# B
  • F# (6 sharps) We keep the F# C# G# D# A# and add an “E#”
    • This may be thinking “Wait a minute, I thought E didn’t have a sharp!” and you would be correct in the sense that E and F do not have another pitch in between them. However, the pitch “F” can be referred to as “E#” in this context because adding a sharp raises the pitch by one half-step, which would be “F”. They sound the same but have different names. This phenomenon is called “Enharmonic”. This concept also applies to any other sharp being referred to as its equivalent flat. Ex: C# and Db are the same pitch.
    • The reason we use E# instead of F even though they sound the same is that a major scale is supposed to ascend straight up by letter without repeating or skipping any.
    • The F# scale is spelled F# G# A# B C# D# E#
  • C# (7 sharps) This is the last key we will do going in this direction. We already have 7 sharps, and there are only 7 notes in a major scale, so if we continue past this point it gets ugly and we have to use “double sharps” which nobody wants to have to do! We keep the F# C# G# D# A# E# and add “B#” (which would be the same as the pitch “C”) The C#  scale is spelled C# D# E# F# G# A# B#

Circle of Fourths and Enharmonic keys:

Since we aren’t continuing in the same direction anymore, we go back to C and start looking at the keys to the left instead (the flat keys). Going in this direction gives us the circle of Fourths instead of the Circle of Fifths. This can be understood in the same way that counting up 5 letters gave us the next key for the circle of fifths, but now counting up 4 gives us the next key for the circle of fourths. The first key is F, which is 4 letters above “C”. instead of adding sharps, we will add flats. The shortcut is a little different to determine which flat is being added. It will always be the same as the name of the following key on the wheel.

• F: We know we have to add one flat because it is the first key on the wheel in this direction. To determine which flat we add, look to the next key. The next key is Bb, so F will contain a Bb. Therefore it is spelled: F G A Bb C D E F
• Bb: We keep the “Bb” from the key of F and again look to the next key on the wheel, which is Eb. Therefore the key of Bb contains a “Bb” and “Eb”. It is spelled: Bb C D Eb F G A Bb.
• Eb: 3 flats: Bb, Eb, and Ab. (Eb, F, G, Ab, Bb, C, D, Eb)
• Ab: 4 flats: Bb, Eb, Ab, and Db. (Ab, Bb, C, Db, Eb, F, G, Ab).
• Db: 5 flats: Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, and Gb. (Db, Eb, F, Gb, Ab, Bb, C, Db)
• Gb: 6 flats: Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, Gb, and Cb. (Gb, Ab, Bb, Cb, Db, Eb, F, Gb)

And that covers the circle of fourths and fifths, and each of the key signatures in both directions!