What The Heck Can I Do With It?

The Circle of Fourths/Fifths, is the order of the sharps (♯) and flats (♭) that are the 15 major and their relative minor keys that comprise the majority of songs and chord progressions that we encounter. Giving us a way to memorize the order of the 18 major scales and their derived modes. If there is a secret decoder ring for remembering some of the principles of music — this is one of them.

Here are a few ways to tackle memorizing this order of keys.

First

And this is something you already know. Music uses the first seven letters of the alphabet: A B C D E F G. It then just starts over at A and keeps going over this A B C D E F G cycle.

Order of Sharps (♯) Keys

• C G D A E B F♯ C♯

Order of Sharps (♯) in the major/relative minor keys: F♯ C♯ G♯ D♯ A♯ E♯ B♯ C♯. It goes from no sharps for the key of C Major to all seven notes sharped for the key of C♯ Major .

Order of Flats (♯)

• B E A D G C F

Order of Flats (♭) in the major/relative minor keys: B♭ E♭ A♭ D♭ G♭ C♭ F♭. It goes from no flats for the key of C Major to all seven notes flatted for the key of C♭ Major .

Notice the word Bead. Not many words are available if you where to create a word search with just A B C D E F and G.

So three keys are relatively simple to memorize: C, C♯, and C♭.

Memorize Fourths first: C F B♭ E♭ A♭ D♭ G♭ C♭, There is the works Bead in there.

Then go the other way with fifths: C G D A E B F♯/C♯. There is bead(deab) again, but backwards.

Memorize the three Enharmonic Equivalent keys: C♯/D♭, F♯/G♭, B, C♭.

Beyond this it's off to Harmonic Analysis for Scale Selection and Chord Substitution – where this information is a valuable tool.