Using Chord Tones

This is a preview of the educational program A Jazz Improvisation Almanac which is under development for the Outside Shore Music Online School. Feel free to browse this preview and learn what you can from it. For a more completed product, though, check out the original freely browsable jazz textbook, A Jazz Improvisation Primer.

A melody is not generally heard in isolation. Each note of the melody is heard not only with the other notes in the melody but relative to the underlying harmony as well. When improvising over chord progression a jazz musician tries to keep this in mind. This section attempts to explain why some notes tend to sound more or less dissonant than others in a given situation and how a musician can use this information to create tension and release.

Each note of the chromatic scale can be analyzed with respect to any chord. The note will be either the root, third, fifth, seventh, ninth, eleventh, or thirteenth of the chord, or it will be one of those pitches altered. This holds regardless of the chord and note.

Here is how each note of the chromatic scale relates to a major seventh chord:

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Here is how each note of the chromatic scale relates to the dominant seventh chord:

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And here is how each note of the chromatic scale relates to the minor seventh chord:

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Note that the half-diminished seventh chord is a minor seventh with a lowered fifth, so the same relationships hold for it as for the minor seventh chord:

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The tonic minor chord may be considered as a minor seventh with a raised seventh, so again the same relationships hold:

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The various augmented chords may similarly be considered as major seventh or dominant seventh chords with raised fifths. The fully diminished chord is something of an exception, and will be discussed later.

Note that in all of the above chords, the eleventh and thirteenth are often referred to as the fourth and sixth respectively. Thus, an F played over a C chord may be called the either fourth or the eleventh, and an A may be called the sixth or the thirteenth:

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One can analyze an entire melody in terms of the relationships of its notes to the underlying chord progression:

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Each note in the chromatic scale has a particular sound and feel with respect to each chord. Some notes will be more dissonant, others more consonant. It is important to keep in mind that dissonance is not bad in itself. The principle of tension and release suggests that dissonance can be an important component of creating interest in tonal music, provided it is eventually resolved in some manner.

The two most harmonically important and melodically interesting notes in most chords are the third and the seventh. This holds regardless of the quality of the chord. The third of a chord usually provides melodic release, whether the chord is major, minor, or a dominant seventh. The third always harmonizes well with the root, which is probably being played by another instrument. These two notes alone are enough to suggest whether the chord is major or minor:

[EXAMPLE]

The seventh, on the other hand, creates tension. It is dissonant with the root when these two notes are considered in isolation:

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The third and seventh have an interesting relationship with each other. One of the most common ways for dissonant notes to resolve, as will be discussed in the section on voice leading, is downward by step. In ii-V-I sequences, this results in the seventh of the ii chord resolving to the third of the V chord, and the seventh of the V chord resolving to the third of the I chord:

[EXAMPLE]

This simple melodic device provides tension and release in itself, and tends to be used quite often. Note also that third of the ii chord becomes the seventh of the V chord, and the third of the V chord becomes the seventh of the I chord:

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When practicing improvisation over a new progression, a useful technique is to play the third and seventh of each chord to get the feeling of the progression:

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The other unaltered notes are generally more neutral with respect to a corresponding unaltered chord. With one exception, they are reasonably stable, meaning they do not have a strong tendency to resolve anywhere in particular. This is one of the defining characteristics of jazz harmony - the sixth and ninth are not necessarily considered more dissonant or in need of resolution than the root and fifth.

[EXAMPLE]

The one exception is the fourth in a major or dominant seventh chord, which is strongly dissonant against the third:

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This note is often called an "avoid" note, but this terminology is a bit strong. The note provides tension, just as the seventh does, and like the seventh, it can be resolved to provide release. This is discussed further in the section on voice leading.

Note that neither inversions nor unaltered extensions specified in a chord affect the perception of the melody very much. For instance, the note D is the ninth of a Cmaj7 chord:

[EXAMPLE]

It is no more or less dissonant against a Cmaj7/E (first inversion) or Cmaj9 chord:

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For this reason, jazz musicians often tend to ignore the specific inversions or extensions called for in a chord and base their melodies on the basic chord.

Any notes that represent alterations to a chord generally provide melodic tension. The flat ninth, for instance, is dissonant against the root:

[EXAMPLE]

The raised ninth in a major or dominant seventh chord is dissonant against the third:

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On the other hand, if any particular alterations are explicitly called for in the chord, then the corresponding unaltered extensions will often be more dissonant than the altered ones. For instance, the unaltered ninth G is dissonant against an F7b9 chord:

[EXAMPLE]

This is in fact more dissonant than the flat ninth Gb, which is explicitly called for in the chord:

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When an altered chord of any kind is specified in a progression, this is usually a hint to the improvisor that the corresponding altered notes should be used melodically as well:

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Whereas when a simpler chord is specified, this is usually a hint to the improvisor that melodic alterations should be used more sparingly:

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The extent to which these non-diatonic alterations are used in a chord or melody is often discussed in terms of color - a melody that uses many alterations may be deemed more colorful than one that is mostly diatonic.

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Musicians generally strive to achieve a balance between tension and release in their melodies. Considering the relationships of notes to chords is one way to do this. Most interesting melodies will therefore tend to contain a balance of dissonant and consonant notes and achieve a variety of tonal colors. However, a strong melody may be heard on its own terms as well, independently of its relationship to the chord progression. For example, the following melody bears only an accidental relationship to the chords it is played over, containing very few apparent consonances. The melody itself is solid enough to stand on its own, however, so the ear tends to accept it:

[EXAMPLE]

This is sometimes called playing "outside", whereas keeping closer to the chord tones is considered "inside". Techniques for creating strong melodies, both inside and outside, are discussed in the following sections.

Before doing so, however, we return to the fully diminished seventh chord, which we skipped over previously. Since there is no major or minor scale that contains this chord, it does not make sense to speak of diatonic extensions or of alterations. Instead, we note that it is symmetric, meaning that a fully diminished seventh chord built on any of the notes of the chord yields the same result. For example, a B diminished seventh chord contains B, D, F, and Ab. A fully diminished chord build on D contains D, F, Ab, and Cb, which is enharmonic with B:

[EXAMPLE]

Note also that the intervals in the chord are all minor thirds. If we add another minor third, we return to a note that is diatonic with the root:

[EXAMPLE]

Because of these properties, there are only three different fully diminished seventh chords:

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A fully diminished seventh chord built on any other note of the chromatic scale will be enharmonic with one of the above chords. Conversely, when we hear a fully diminished seventh chord, the root is ambiguous. When relating a note to a fully diminished chord, there are only three choices to consider - the note is either in the chord, a half step above a note in the chord, or a whole step above a note in the chord:

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Generally speaking, the notes in the chord or a whole step above the chord are consonant:

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While the notes a half step above the chord are dissonant:

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Copyright 2000 Outside Shore Music
Authored by Marc Sabatella

Using Chord Tones