Suspended Chords

Suspended chords leave you hanging in mid air. They create suspense or anticipation. They sound and feel as though they should be resolved.

A suspended chord (or a chord suspension) is usually made by holding one of the tones of a chord a tone higher, then resolving it to its resting place. This can be done with any tones of a chord, but one of the more common suspensions is to manipulate the third of the chord, by first playing the fourth, and resolving it to the third. So a C suspended chord has the tones of the root, the fourth and the fifth:

The Circle of Fifths - Why is it so important to learn Circle of Fifth?

Circle of fifths... or Circle of Fourths... Why is it so important to learn the Circle of Fifths?

The circle of fifths is commonly used in gospel music as a turnaround or passing tone. It is a dynamic set of chords that you can play in various ways. Many musicians have heard of the circle of fifths but may not know how to play it. You are probably seeing this page because you would like to learn how to play the circle of fifths.

How to Play The Circle of Fifths (or Circle of Fourths)

Now I will show you the basic principles you need to play the circle of fifths. Before I show you, I would like to let you know that the circle of fifths is called what it is because it is all about playing a first note and then playing the fifth of that note and so on. You could literally play the circle of fifths forever and it would keep making sense because it is a circle.

The Circle of Fifths Movement

Now this is it. I am going to now show you an example of how the circle of fifths is used. If you are a gospel musician, you will understand this.
On the key of C, a circle of fifths usually goes this way
A > D > G > C

If you look at the keyboard above, you can see that the distance between A & D is five notes (on the key of C). The circle of fifths is what it is if you play the notes backwards. That is... A, D, G, C.
It becomes circle of fourths if you play them forward. If you want to keep play more than four chords then you can do A > D > G > C > F > B > E.... Then it goes back to the A

Circle of Fifths Chord Examples

As a gospel musician you can play the circle of fifths in a number of ways. The basic gospel way is this... This example is on the key of C
A / G B C E
D / Gb B C E
G / F A A# D
C / E A A# D
F / E G A C
B Eb / A D F
E / Ab C D G

Circle of Fifths Guitar

As a guitarist you can also play the circle of fifths but you would play it differently from a pianist. To learn how to play circle of fifths guitar, JOIN THIS WEBSITE for over 11,000 GUITAR LESSONS


Visit this page to get the circle of fifths: Chord Progressions