Fourth Patterns with Altered Dominants

This post builds upon a jazz improvisation post I wrote a month ago titled Fourth Patterns: Three Exercises to Build Your Technique. That post gave you some quartal patterns to practice that took you around the cycle of fifths. While I pointed at the harmonic possibilities, I left you to sort them out for yourself. In this post, I’m providing a specific application by applying fourth groupings to altered dominant chords (V+7#9).

fourth-pattern-with-altered-dominant
Click on the image to your left to enlarge it. The first thing you’ll encounter is a brief exercise that takes you through a fourth pattern moving by whole steps, first down, then back up. It’s a simple exercise. Once you’ve got it down, practice it starting on the note F instead of Eb; you’ll be using the same notes you’ve already practiced, but you’ll reverse the direction of the patterns.

From there, play the same exercise starting on the note E. You’ll now have a different set of notes. Finally, start on the note F#. Once you’ve worked that into your fingers, you’ll have covered all the possibilities.

Moving On to Application

The material you’ve just practiced is designed to help you develop technique specific to the application that follows. Now we’ll move on to that application, as indicated by the chords.

For each chord, you’ll find two groupings of the fourth pattern spaced a major second apart. Together, the two patterns contain the following chord tones: #9, b9, b7, +5, +4*. The patterns are arranged in eighth notes that resolve to a consonant chord tone, thus:

    •  In the first two bars, the b9 resolves to a whole note on the chord root.
    •  In the second two bars, the #9 resolves to a whole note on the major third of the chord.

I’ve written down the applications for six keys. I’m sure you can figure out the remaining six on your own, and you should. Don’t be lazy! You need to become familiar with all twelve chords. Moreover, I encourage you to experiment with variations on these patterns. This exercise will open up your technique for altered dominants–and other harmonic applications–but you should view it as a springboard for further exploration.

As is so often the case, the material I’m sharing comes to you fresh from my own practice sessions. It’s a chronicle of my personal learning curve, and I hope it assists you in yours.

If you found this article helpful, you’ll find many more like it on my Jazz Theory, Technique & Solo Transcriptions sub-page.

Practice hard, practice with focus–and, as always, have fun!

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* If you add two more tones–the chord root and the major third–you’ll get a complete diminished whole tone scale. In this application exercise, the whole notes use those two missing tones as resolutions.

September 17, 2011 by
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Diminished Whole Tone Scale Exercise with Pentatonic

The diminished whole tone scale (aka super locrian or Pomeroy scale) has been around for a long time, but it’s still a foreign sound to ears that are steeped in basic major and minor scales. For as many years as I’ve been playing it, it’s still not something I find myself idly humming. Nevertheless, it’s an extremely useful scale, full of colors and possibilities for chord superimpositions.

Think of the diminished whole tone scale as a mode built upon the seventh degree of the ascending melodic minor scale. For instance, a C melodic minor scale contains these notes: C, D, Eb, F, G, A, B, C. Start on B as the scale root rather than C and you’ve got a B diminished whole tone scale.

The scale’s primary use is with the altered dominant seventh chord, which it fits like a glove. The diminished whole tone scale contains virtually every common alteration of the dominant chord you can conceive of: b9, #9, +5, and +11. So when you see, for instance, an A+7#9, the A diminished whole tone is a scale option that should come instantly to mind. Like any scale, you can conceive of it as simply a linear repository of tones, all of which relate perfectly to the altered dominant chord.

dim-wt-w-pentatonic-exercise
The exercise on this page explores three of the many harmonic possibilities contained within the diminished whole tone scale. Click on the image to enlarge it. Each four-bar line sets a given scale against its respective altered dominant chord.

  • The first two bars use four-note cells to outline the seventh, raised fifth, third, and root of the chord. The chord tone is the last note of each cluster.
  • The third bar is a mode four pentatonic scale built on the b9 of the chord.
  • The last bar concludes with a simple lick that expresses the major quality of the chord, then hits two of its tension tone (#9 and b9) before resolving to the root.

    • .
    The purpose of this exercise isn’t so much to give you a great lick as to help you dig inside the diminished whole tone scale to see what it has to offer. There’s plenty more to discover, so consider this a springboard to further exploration. You’d do well to use some kind of harmonic accompaniment as you play this exercise, so you’re training not just your fingers but also your ears.

    Practice hard and have fun! And be sure to visit my jazz page for a large selection of other informative articles, exercises, and solo transcriptions that can help you develop as a jazz improviser. They’re all free, so dig in, learn, and grow with me musically.

    June 29, 2011 by
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    Altered Major Scales for Secondary Dominant Chords

    Some months ago I shared a table of non-diatonic tones and their common uses. This morning I found myself thinking once again about non-diatonic tones, and specifically about an effective way to practice them, one that could quickly translate to actual jazz improvisation.

    The standard bebop scales came to mind. The insertion of one extra note into a scale–typically a raised fifth in a major scale, and a raised seventh in a dominant (Mixolydian) scale–does more than allow a soloist to move through a scale with ease and land on an octave. It also creates new harmonic possibilities. That principle can be exploited by inserting other tones that also suggest secondary harmonies.

    secondary-dominant-scale
    Click on the image to your right to enlarge it. You’ll see three scales. The first two contain a single added note. Scale #1 includes a raised first, and scale #2, a raised fourth. The interpolation of these notes adapts a basic major scale for use with two commonly encountered secondary dominant chords: the V7/ii (or VI7) and the V7 of V (or II7). In the key of C, which these scales are written in, those chords are A7 and D7.

    These scales are as fresh to me as they are to you at the time of this writing. Not that I’ve never played them before; I just haven’t made a conscious point of focusing on them as actual scales to invest my time in practicing. I see two benefits to doing do. The first is, obviously, developing technical facility. The second is raising one’s awareness of the added notes as harmonic devices, with an eye on the secondary chords that they apply to.

    Each added note serves as the major third–a critical identifying tone–of its secondary dominant chord. So when you play scale #1, remember that it works readily with the VI7; and likewise, scale #2 pairs with the II7. Many playing situations feature both of those secondary dominants, and often the VI7 moves directly to the II7, which in turn moves to the V7–in essence, coasting around a segment of the cycle of fifths.

    The third scale incorporates both the raised first and the raised fourth, making it a kind of granddaddy scale that accommodates both secondary dominants.

    Now, don’t look at these scales as magic harmonic bullets.. Rather, look at them as resources that allow you to judiciously select certain tones when you need them as well as furnishing you with good linear resources. It’s not all about your fingers mastering the technique of the scales. It’s also very much about applying your mind to grasp the uses of the introduced tones.

    In other words, build harmonic awareness, not just digital dexterity. To assist you, I’ve included an exercise for each scale that will help you hear how each added note implies a certain harmony. Play these exercises on the piano so you can chord along with the melody line, or else get a keyboard player or guitarist to comp for you while you play the different lines.

    Have fun! And if you enjoyed this post, drop in on my Jazz page and check out the many other exercises, articles, and solo transcriptions.

    May 5, 2011 by
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