The “circle of fifths” is shown above and has the note of C located at the uppermost position. This C note represents the C major scale:
Key of C: C • D • E • F • G • A • B • C
Each musical note in this scale can be assigned a number as follows:
Key of C: C1 • D2 • E3 • F4 • G5 • A6 • B7 • C8
The key of C is the only musical key that has no sharps or flats. As we go around the circle in a clockwise direction, the number of sharps increases by one. As we go in the counter clockwise direction, the number of flats increases by one. The circle therefore helps us to define a song’s key signature by observing the number of sharps or the number of flats.
As we go around the circle in the clockwise direction, the increment for each step is “five”; hence the term circle of fifths. Therefore starting at the key of C at the top, we can find the key signature that has one sharp and that occurs next in the circle of fifths by counting five notes ahead in the C scale. C1 • D2 • E3 • F4 • G5; therefore the next note in the circle of fifths is the G note and the G scale has one sharp. We now count five in the scale of G to find the next note in the circle that will also be the key signature that has two sharps. G1 • A2 • B3 • C4 • D5; therefore the next note in the circle of fifths is the D note and the D scale has two sharps. This process continues until you get to the key of B which has five sharps.
As we go around the circle in the counter clockwise direction, use four as your increment instead of five. Therefore starting at the key of C at the top, we can find the key signature that has one flat and that occurs next in the circle of fifths by counting four notes ahead in the C scale. C1 • D2 • E3 • F4 ; therefore the next note in the circle of fifths in the CCW direction is the F note and the F scale has one flat. This process continues until you get to the key of D flat which has five flats.
The graphic at the top of this post also includes the minor keys inside the circle of fifths. As you go around the minor circle of fifths, you will note that the lettering sequence is identical but that it has been shifted counterclockwise by three.
From the circle of fifths, we can see the following:
C Major & A minor have ALL naturals
G Major & E minor have 1 sharp: F#
D Major & B minor have 2 sharps: F# and C#
A Major & F# minor have 3 sharps: F#, C# and G#
E Major & C# minor have 4 sharps: F#, C#, G# and D#
B Major & G# minor have 5 sharps: F#, C#, G#, D# and A#
F# Major & D# minor have 6 sharps: F# • C# • G# • D#• A# • E#
As a guitarist, you can improvise along a song in the key of Am by using a C major scale. Likewise, a song in Em can be enhanced by improvising over the G major scale and so forth. From the circle of fifths, you can see that keys are related to each other not by their relative position in the chromatic scale but by their relative position on the circle of fifths.
So the circle of fifths helps us to identify key signatures and also to find related keys, particularly in comparing minor and major keys.
Now apply what you’ve learned. Using your right hand, five fingers, count off each key signature and identify the number of sharps and flats. It’s easy. Here goes:
Key of C – no sharps or flats by definition.
CDEFG – key of G has 1 sharp.
GABCD – key of D has 2 sharps.
DEFGA – key of A has 3 sharps.
ABCDE – key of E has 4 sharps.
EFGAB – key of B has 5 sharps.
Now count in fourths to find the flat signatures:
Key of C – no sharps or flats by definition.
CDEF – key of F has 1 flat.
FGAB – key of Bb has 2 flats.
BCDE – key of Eb has 3 flats.
EFGA – key of Ab has 4 flats.
ABCD – key of Db has 5 flats.
I chose music for our blended worship services about two months in advance. If the song is new, there is a process that I follow to learn it. Up until now, this was an unwritten process and I suppose most of it is intuitively obvious; but if this helps just one person reading this BLOG, then it will have been worthwhile.
Pastor Johnold Strey has written a new Children’s Christmas Worship program that is available at NPH. You might want to check this out if you are looking for Christmas materials as his writings and worship pieces are always nicely done. You can view samples of the service and listen to sound clips here:
For our blended worship service on 9/13, we will be combining the song “Thy Word” by Amy Grant & Michael W. Smith with Psalm 119 as the Psalm of the Day. Here is the script that we will follow:
Miracle Maker
September 29, 2009 at 7:30 am · Filed under Delirious? ·Tagged Delirious?, John 5:1-18, Miracle Maker
There’s a haunting song called “Miracle Maker” by the band known as “Delirious?”. That’s a statement not a question, as the question mark is really part of their name.
The song is about Jesus healing a crippled man at the pool in Bethesda (John 5:1-18). This is an incredible story and it’s an incredible song. It’s one of the healings by Jesus that was not a result of the patient’s faith. All too often, we hear Jesus say “your faith has healed you.” Not this time. In fact, it seems that Jesus healed him out of pure mercy and compassion. The man could not get into this pool quick enough on his own to be healed and he had been this way for 38 years. It’s also of note that this man did not seek out Jesus to be healed; Jesus sought him out. When Jesus asked him if he wanted to be healed, the man did not even answer “yes”, he just described his pitiful situation (Vs 7).
You can hear the song and learn to play it on the guitar here:
Note – This is not a congregational song. It is a great song for a Praise Band to play during the Offering if your Pastor has just preached on John 5:1-18.
There is one thing peculiar about the scripture text. Namely, where is verse 4 (see below)?
The Healing at the Pool
1Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for a feast of the Jews. 2Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. 5One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”
7″Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”
8Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” 9At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, 10and so the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.”
11But he replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ”
12So they asked him, “Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?”
13The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.
14Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” 15The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.
Life Through the Son
16So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jews persecuted him. 17Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working.” 18For this reason the Jews tried all the harder to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
Here is verse 4, omitted in the NIV, from the King James version:
4For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had.
Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, Copyright© 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of International Bible Society
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