Charts! Charts! And MORE Charts!

So Gabz, what have you been doing this week?
Well, I'm glad you asked. I have been taking a MUSIC THEORY class. An advanced one, actually, because this class is all about arranging music.

That's right, suddenly I'm Miss Composition, 24-7.
It means (among other things) that I take a lot of notes. All this week, I have been reviewing what I learned in all my previous theory classes and have written brand new notes. I'm practically writing my own theory book (not really).

The Mysterious Circle of Fifths

This is a chart showing the Circle of Fifths.  This bad boy has haunted my dreams and crushed my weak, theory-deficient soul for more years than I care to admit. It is the reason I am back in music school at my age.  This small, unassuming chart is primarily responsible for my  FOUR failed attempts at music theory and at least ONE nervous breakdown.

I know, I know, it gives me a headache too. 

Look at it. Glaring like some baleful Eye of Sauron, mocking my pathetic attempts to understand. It is the gold standard of chord progression references and oh, don't think it isn't aware.  But why does it even exist?

Following along, you can see that all the major chords (the green ring) are arranged so that the last note in the chord (the 5th), becomes the first note in the next chord (the root). Do that for every chord in the scale and you circle back around to your very first chord again, like a clock. Thus, The Circle. Of 5ths. Get it?

The inner blue ring shows those green chords, spelled out. The orange circle represents the same chords in minor keys  and the white middle? Uh...it you how many accidentals exist in each chord scale. The peacock tail sticking out off the bottom? Enharmonics. Those are chords that sound exactly like the chords they're closest to in green ring (e.g., C# sounds like Db). Why does one chord have two different names? Because Theory, that's why.

My Lord, I Have A CUNNING PLAN!

I do not say that centuries of clever music composers got it wrong, but I have trouble keeping the above chart in my head without getting hopelessly confused. To make it easier to learn (and finally pass my theory classes) I decided to make my own version of the Circle of 5ths. I started by writing out the middle circle and creating an accidentals chart for both major and minor chords:

How many sharps in the key of Dmaj? 2! what notes are sharp? F and C.

Pretty, isn't it?
What you're looking at is a chart that shows:

• The number of accidentals (i.e. sharps or flats) in a major key
• The key in question
• What the specific sharps or flats are and
• Whether that key has a little  enharmonic friend. 

Minor keys are much the same, only with different notes and FAR too many variations. I'll spare you the long version, but just to give you an idea, all that charting explains why key signatures are so very, very confusing. They look like THIS:

Knowing that two sharps = the key of D is so much easier than reading all those lines. 

Know The Code of the Romans

 So my plan worked and I PASSED Music Theory I and II. And if all you want to do is identify key signature, the chart above works great!  But I'm in Music Arranging and Composition now, and all the things I didn't understand but kind of skated on--like knowing how each key, with all its accidentals, look on a scale, understanding the deliciously silky evil that is the 7th chord and it's variations and being able to write all this down so other people can follow my scores...Well I have to nail those concepts down or die trying.

And then there's that little matter of the ROMAN NUMERAL code.

Roman numerals (like the Circle of 5ths) are a handy musical device--a set of structural rules that give shape and meaning to music beyond the basic notes. Whilst improvising with musicians you may not have worked with before, having a common playbook helps.

Roman numerals are particularly special because, while they direct the action, they don't change with the key. So (for example) if your playing a song in the key of G and your frontman calls out, "Switch to C at the bridge!" you, and everybody else in the band, will know how to modify what you're playing so the notes come out right.  Using Roman Numerals also allows for bands like Axis of Awesome to create this:

 But I digress.  I couldn't visualize the the wonder of the roman numeral code in all it's glory without writing out each and every scale and it's chords. [Did you know each scale set (major, minor or their variations) contains roughly 15 scales? I kid you not.]

If One Chart Is Good, Two Must Be Twice As Good, Right?

Here's the chart I did for just the basic major scales. Note that the scale key is marked in red and reads from left to right. The root chord for that key is marked in blue and (for you jazz 7th chord people) in purple. I added a quick reference chart to make it easier to read and identify chord triads on the fly.

What? You don't know what a chord triad is? Check out that box at your lower left.


Here's where it gets fun: A Cmaj chord sounds the same no matter what key you're playing in, but it may look entirely different, depending on the key you're playing in (example, a C in the scale of C would be written without accidentals--C, E, G. Write the same chord in the key of Ab and you have to designate your E as a natural).

Are you lost yet? Ahh, then you understand my dilemma, and why I've made these charts. Music is a written, technical language, like BASIC or SQL.  And like English, it's easy to learn, but difficult to comprehend.  I am getting better, but until I can put the basics in a format I can understand, I won't get too far.


If you find any of these charts useful to you, feel free to download a copy.  If you're hopelessly lost in all the technical jargon, don't worry. I'll talk about something more approachable next post.
And if you want clarification (or want to offer me clarification, Please! Message or leave me a comment.

Later, Revelers!

--Gabz