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What Is the Circle of Fifths? (Circle of Fifths Explained)
The Circle of Fifths shows the key signature for each key—the sharps or flats that belong to the key. The key signature shows you which notes to sharpen or flatten when you play in a key, so that you maintain the diatonic interval order for the key (e.g., tone, tone, semitone, tone, tone, tone, semitone—the diatonic order for all major keys).
Looking at the top of the Circle of Fifths, you can see that the keys of C major and A minor have no sharps or flats, so there’s just a treble clef with no sharps or flats. As you move down each side of the Circle of Fifths, the number of sharps and flats increases by one, for each successive key.
For any key in the circle, the adjacent keys (major or minor modes) are the keys most closely related. For example, look at the key of A major on the right side of the Circle of Fifths. The adjacent keys, D major and E major, are the keys most closely related to A major. That means D major and E major share six out of seven of the same notes as A major. To confirm this, have another look at Table 24.
Is the Circle of Fifths useful if you don’t read music?
In a word, yes.