THE CIRCLE OF FOURTHS (and FIFTHS)

Many songs have chord progressions that use this movement in creating chord
progressions that move up in intervals of fourths:

C-F-Bb-Eb or down C-G-D-A-E

This is used in my piece Cristofori¹s Dream. The chord progression used in
the chorus moves up in intervals of fourths and looks like this:

D Major - g minor - C Major - F Major - Bb Major

Exercise: Try playing a Major chord then move a fourth up and play a minor
chord and continue this pattern moving through all 12 notes.

Starting with C Major it will look like this:

C Maj - f min - Bb Maj - eb min - Ab Maj - db min - Gb Maj - b min -

E maj - a minor - D Maj - g minor - C Maj


Here it is starting on the relative minor:

a min- D Maj - g min - C Maj - f min - Bb Maj - eb min -

Ab Maj - db min - Gb Maj - b min - E Maj - a minor -


Also try this with all Major chords and try going the other direction as well:

C- G- D- A- E- B- F#- C#- G#- D#- A#- F- C

This info works in combination with the Minor Chord info...

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In the material on chords...I want to make sure you know how to make a diminished or
augmented chord. The diminished chord is a series of minor thirds (one on top of another) i.e.

A-C-Eb-Gb (this is the A diminished chord)

G-Bb-Db-E (this is the G diminished chord)
or.... augmented chords are built with major intervals stacked one on another i.e.

C-E-G# (C augmented)

D-F#-A# (D augmented)


Another handy, more practical chord is the half diminished i.e.

d- f- a flat- c- (d- half diminished...or also known as d minor 7 flat 5)

These chords are prevalent in jazz chord progressions...especially in what is known as the 2-5-turn around. (Usually resolving on the 1 chord)

In C Major, that would be:

(2) dm7-5 (5) G7 (1) C Major...the numbers relate to the

position in the scale the note occupies:

d is the second note in C Major... g is the fifth note in C Maj etc...