Harmony: Circles

These circles move through all the keys. You can start on any of the keys in a circle, and you can either move forward or backward.

Circle of Fifths

Each key is a perfect fifth below the previous key when moving forward and a perfect fifth above the previous key when moving backward.

Chromatic Circle

Each key is a half tone below the previous key when moving forward and a half tone above the previous key when moving backward.

Circle of Major Thirds

While the circle of fifths and the chromatic circle are perfect in the sense that all keys are evenly distanced, the remaining circles consist of multiple segments connected by a half tone. This means that there are multiple transpositions of these circles.

The circle of major thirds consists of four segments of three keys each, connected by a descending half-tone step.

Circle of Minor Thirds

The circle of minor thirds consists of three segments of four keys each, connected by an ascending half-tone step.

Whole Tone Circle

The whole tone circle consists of two segments. You move in whole tones down for six keys, then start the second segment a half tone below where you ended.

As you can see, this circle is not entirely symmetric, as you need to move a minor third down to get back to the beginning instead of a half tone. If you want to keep it symmetrically consistent, you need to string together 12 six-note segments connected by a descending half step to get back to the beginning.