Unlocking Musical Creativity With The Circle Of Fifths

The Circle of Fifths is a great tool for composing, chord progressions and modulating keys.
As I’ve delved into the world of music theory, I’ve discovered the power of this tool to inspire / guide my improvising process. In this video, I share my learning experience and the ideas that have sprung from it, hoping to help others.

[@petejandrell4512]

Highlight the chords as they are played it would make understanding a lot easier

[@scaledtuna]

Thankyou for the feedback, good point!

[@malte7031]

I agree with most comments. I liked your ideas, and how you showed them. I think the speed was spot on, keeping interest but not too overwhelming. 2 Things: Maybe you could add the chord name & function for better understanding. And you could try to eliminate the high hiss sound on your voice, it’s rather distracting (at least for me). Interested in how you progress! Keep it up :)

[@scaledtuna]

I am glad you liked the ideas, apologies about the high frequency noise which I only noticed after publishing, a bit of a learning curve on that one. Adding the chords seems to be a common thread in the comments, useful feedback. Thanks for commenting.

[@Ketoswammy]

I’m getting pretty familiar with theory, but it is still hard to keep up with someone playing or illustrating it in real time. Yes, highlighting the wheel or the chord progression boxes would be helpful, or just slowing down a bit might help, but then we can play the video more slowly in settings. Speaking the chord name as you play would be another way to help us keep up. You’re doing well if you’ve not played very long.

[@scaledtuna]

Thankyou for commenting, I will take those comments on board for any subsequent videos. It is hard to find that balance between slowing down and keeping interest. Speaking the chord names is a good idea.

[@chequemiel]

hi, what type of app piano are you using in your video please, best regards

[@scaledtuna]

Hi @chequemiel, its called MIDITrail and is available for Windows and MacOS. Thanks for watching.

[@darkbloomvivian1087]

i think your voice is a bit soft compared to the notes :) but otherwise this demonstration was very clear and helpful! thank you :D

[@scaledtuna]

Glad you found it helpful!. I get your point about the levels, thankyou for the feedback it helps improve future videos.

[@markwindsor914]

Very confused due to the seed you went through without indicating what you were playing clearly.

[@scaledtuna]

Hi thanks for the feed back, just to let you know I addressed this in the newest videos. I may remake this video when I get time.

[@StephenSecretSSmith0007]

Enjoyed it and have Subbed. Must be Honest though. You didn't Quite Make the circle look to USER FRIENDLY! I was everywhere trying to follow you. HMMM! 🤔🤔

[@scaledtuna]

Thankyou for subbing and taking time to comment, I need honest feedback to make better videos.. I really need to do a "remake" of this video as it was my first tutorial video and have learnt a bit since creating it. Please take a look at my newer videos as a lot of feedback from this has gone into the newer videos. I hope you like them, any feedback is welcome.

[@markwindsor914]

The red lines coming down to the red keys is not helpful.

[@scaledtuna]

Hi, I record my piano into logic pro and feed the midi input into a piece of software called MidiTrail to produce the nice looking 3d keyboard which is green screened onto the presentation slides. I quite like it but agree the red lines are a bit annoying something for me to think about , do you have any suggestions? As regards to your other comment about indicating what I am playing, it seems to be a common thread of feedback and something I will add to videos moving forward. Thankyou for taking the time to comment, it will help me to make better videos in the future.

[@abc456f]

Totally lost on what you're doing. I understand the circle of fifths, but what you're playing and the speed you're talking makes this video useless other than showing the dim 7th's.

[@scaledtuna]

Hello, thank you for taking the time to comment, sorry to hear that you didn't get much from the video due to the pace. I have taken many of the comments on board from this video, to help with the newer videos I have just released. More time has been spent visualising and highlighting the chords as I am playing them and making the audio more clear. Speed wise, Its hard to find the balance between keeping interest for some and going to quickly for others. I think moving forward I will try to make the illustrations as clear as I can.. All feedback is very much appreciated as this is a bit of a learning curve for me also :).

[@abc456f]

@@scaledtuna 👍

[@geoffwatson]

This looks really useful but unfortunately I struggle to see what you did! Unless I change the playback speed to 0.75 and take copious notes. See comment from @petejandrell4512 amongst many others below. What a pity. - repost with an update by any chance?

[@scaledtuna]

Thank you for your feedback @geoffwatson, this video is the first attempt before feedback :) . Please take a look at the newer videos I have posted titled (Adding color/colour to music part 1 and 2) where a lot of feedback from this video has gone into creating them, I really hope you like them and see the improvements. I spent a fair amount of time in the newer videos writing software from scratch to display the COF and highlight the chords as I am playing them as there was not a product out there I liked. I am currently writing my next video about passing chords thanks to @jorgeellesmenmusic for the suggestion, where I plan to make further enhancements to visualisations. I do plan to remake this video at some point in the future, there are quite a few changes I want to make and will take some time between the day job. Shame I cant just overwrite this video, I will need to upload a new video so want to get a bit more content in first.. I hope you stay around and see the improvements.

[@geoffwatson]

@@scaledtuna Thank you - keep up the good work 👍🎹