Developing Your Musicianship II

Lesson 3 Study Guide

The Key of G Major

The key of G Major has one sharp – F#:

W W H W W W H

F#

G A B C D E

The Relative Minor of G Major: E Minor

Related Major and Minor keys share the same key signature and the same notes. To
find the relative minor of a Major key, start on the tonic and go down 3 half steps. For
example, the relative minor of G Major and E Minor:

G Gb F E
1H 2H 3H

G Major and E Minor share the same key signature and the same notes:

E Minor

G Major

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Diatonic Chords in the key of G Major
The definition of Diatonic is “in the key of.” For example in the key of G Major, the
following notes are diatonic because they are part of the scale:

A note other than the notes in the G Major scale is considered not diatonic to the key of
G Major.

To identify whether a chord is diatonic to a certain key or not, you must identify
whether each of the notes that make up that chord are diatonic. Here are the diatonic
triads in the key of G Major:

Notice that all of the notes in each chord are diatonic to the key of G Major, which
means that all of the chords are also diatonic. The pattern of major and minor triads in a
major scale is always the same:

I II- III- IV V VI- VII-

When you add 7ths to each of the chords, you get the following:

Notice that all of the notes in each chord are diatonic to the key of G Major, which
means that all of the chords are also diatonic. The pattern of 7th chords in a major scale
is always the same:

IMaj7 II-7 III-7 IVMaj7 V7 VI-7 VII-7b5

2
Popular Chord Progressions in the key of G Major using 7th
Chords

There are four main popular chord progressions we learned this week:

IMaj7 IVMaj7 V7 IMaj7

IVMaj7 III-7 II-7 IMaj7

IMaj7 VI-7 IMaj7

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IVMaj7 V7 VI-7

Tritone
A tritone interval is one half step smaller than a Perfect 5th and one half step larger than
a Perfect 4th. The triton is comprised of 3 whole steps and it cuts the octave in half.
Below are a few examples of tritones:

C to Gb G to Db E to Bb D to Ab

Gb Db Bb Ab
Gb

C G E D

4
Half Diminished/Minor7b5 Chords
Adding the flat 7th interval to a minor triad will produce a minor7b5 chord. The
minor7b5 chord is built by stacking minor 3rds on top of one another:

• A Minor 3rd between the root and the 3rd

• A Minor 3rd between the 3rd and the 5th
• A Major 3rd between the 5th and the 7th

For example, when we add an E to an F# minor triad, we get an F#-7b5 (the diatonic VII
chord in the key of G Major). Note the intervals between each chord tone:

Minor 3rd Minor 3rd Major 3rd

F#-7b5
E (b7)
C (b5)
A (3)
F# (1)

F#

A C E

Minor Minor Major

3rd 3rd 3rd