It begins on the sixth note of the G major scale and resolves after eight notes – or an octave. The notes that fall within the red rectangle is a box shape of the E minor scale:
The second diagram, however, illustrates how the E minor scale overlaps with its relative major. The first is a G major scale in the first position, with its sixth note, an E, marked out. To give you a clearer picture of how this looks like on the fretboard, take a look at these two diagrams below. Here’s the G major scale and its relative minor, an E minor scale, as an example:Īs you can see, the E minor scale starts on the sixth note of the G major scale. So while the notes of a major scale and its relative minor are identical, the scales start and resolve on different notes. Now that you know about relative keys, it’s time to get down to the fun stuff: applying them on your guitar.Įarlier, we mentioned that relative scales share the same incidentals but have different tonics. As explained, a perfect fifth from C major is a G major (clockwise), but a perfect fourth from C major is an F major (anti-clockwise). It’s important to note that no matter which direction you’re reading the chart, the perfect fourth or perfect fifth ‘movements’ are always going forwards from the root note, never back. Taking B♭ as a reference, a perfect fourth up would be E♭. In the Circle of Fifths, every step in the clockwise direction represents a perfect fifth ‘movement.’ So for example, starting from the top, the distance between C major to G major is seven semitones – a perfect fifth.Īnd here’s why the diagram is also known as the “Circle of Fourths”: Every step in the anti-clockwise direction represents a perfect fourth ‘movement’, which is a distance of five semitones. This type of fifth lies seven semitones above its root. The ‘fifths’ in the name refers to the perfect fifth, which we introduced in our lesson on basic chords. Here’s a simplified explainer on how the Circle of Fifths works: The outer ring denotes their key signature, which is two flats (both scales have B♭ and E♭ notes). The corresponding key on the inner ring – which in this case is G minor – is its relative minor. So if you’re looking for B♭ major’s relative minor, simply locate the major scale on the middle ring. The inner ring depicts minor keys, the middle ring major keys and the outer ring key signatures. The Circle of Fifths diagram is a cheat sheet that sorts the major and minor scales according to their key signatures: We mentioned earlier that scales that share key signatures are related. The Circle of Fifths is a handy tool that you can use to derive a scale’s relative key. It’s an abstract concept that’s largely based on mathematical ratios, but we’ll only be looking at its practical application here. Simply put, it’s a diagram that illustrates the relationship between all 12 ‘basic’ notes of Western music theory. The Circle of Fifths, which, confusingly, is also dubbed the “Circle of Fourths”, is one of the cornerstones of Western music theory. The more familiar you are with this concept, the more confident you’ll be at improvising with key changes. Try this exercise with a few scales, and don’t be afraid to venture into sharps and flats. And this works the other way around, too: the A major scale is the relative major of the F♯ minor scale. So, the A major scale’s relative minor is the F♯ minor scale.
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