- This topic has 17 replies, 10 voices, and was last updated 7 years, 7 months ago by .
-
Topic
-
I’ve mentioned before that I might share some of what I know about chord substitutions. And I think I will do it here as a series. I will mostly be laying out some general principles and rules. The application of these rules is pretty much endless.
First, What is Chord Substitution good for?
A. It helps to add some variety when you are accompanying someone.
B. It can liven up an arrangement.
C. It is indispensable for making chord melodies (an arrangement where each melody note, or most of them, have their own chord.Second, What types of chords are there?
Major, Minor, Dominant
For our purposes, which is basically jazz and blues, there are three colors of chords that we will be dealing with: Major, Minor, and Dominant. Major and Minor chords are defined by the thirds. A dominant7 chord is a major chord with a lowered seventh. It is the foundation of blues. In other music, the dominant 7 chord is the natural chord (meaning the chord that has all of its tones in the major scale), which has the most tension, and thus most “wants” to resolve to the tonic or 1 chord. Most songs will end with a cadence, which means a resolution from a five chord to a one chord. (The end of a 12 bar blues, for example, is on a V7 chord, which leads back to the I chord in the head.
These are the only types of chords that I will be dealing with in this series, since it makes up about 99% of all popular music, and probably everything that any of us are likely to play.
Rule I – Even if a substitution is theoretically correct, it is no good if it doesn’t sound good.
Lots of jazz players forget this. A corollary to this rule is that what sounds good, is what sounds good to you or to your audience. Most of us will not need to pander to an audience, so it means what sounds good to you. This will develop over time.
Most of the time, the limitation on what will sound good depends on the melody of the song. You don’t want the top note of your chord to clash with the melody.
Rule 2 – Substitutions are reciprocal.
If chord x can be substituted for chord y, then chord y can be substituted for chord x. Usually, people use chord substitutions to make things more complex, so that is generally the direction that things will go in. But there are times when chord substitutions will simplify things. Doc Watson would do this pretty regularly to make jazz standards more suitable to country playing, and he did it brilliantly with tunes like The Sheik of Araby.
Rule 3 – For any chord, major, minor or dominant, you can substitute any of the chord’s exentsions.
An extension is typically the next third above what you already have in the chord triad. And you can keep going up thirds.
Thus for a C major chord, you can substitute C major 7, C major 9, C major 11, C6, C 6/9, etc…
For a C minor chord, you can substitute, C minor 7, C minor 9, C minor 11, C minor 6, C minor 6/9 etc…
And for a CDom chord (which is in a blues or resolves to an F), you can substitute C7, C9, C7b9, C7#9, C11, C13, and a host of others. Dominant chords tend to be more flexible in how you mess with them than major or minor chords.
For a simple 8 bar blues like Keys to the Highway in A is:
A / E / D / D
A / E / A / Einstead you could play
A A7 / E7 E9 / D7 D13 / D7 D13
A9 A7 / E7 E9 / A6 A7 / E E7#5The E7#5 will lead into the first topic for a next post. I will be happy to field questions.
The credit for just about all of what I know here goes to two of my teachers: Dom Minasi, and Ted Greene. Dom is a great, but bizarre, jazz player who is in New York. Ted Greene was absolutely brilliant, and one of the best tele players ever. His knowledge of chord voicings was encyclopedic, and his taste impeccable.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.