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7ALT chord?


patd

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Yes, that is one way of spelling a dom7alt chord.

 

An altered dominant refers to a dominant 7th chord with either a #5, b5, #9, or b9, or any combination thereof. So you could have:

 

R 3 b5 b7 b9

 

R 3 #5 b7 b9

 

R 3 b5 #5 b7 b9 #9

 

etc... any combination of those four alterations to the 5th and 9th.

 

 

Perhaps a better way of looking at it is a shell voicing (R 3 b7) plus whatever altered 5th or 9th you want to use.

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i wouldn't play a chord that has a b9 and a #9 or a b5 and a #5 in it (unless it's a request!)

 

you don't usually find both in the same chord

 

apart from the root, third and flat seventh, you can have any one of the following...

 

#5

b5

#9

b9

#5 #9

#5 b9

b5 #9

b5 b9

 

cheers

 

sim

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I personally play a lot of voicings with both types of 9ths or both kinds of 5ths. To my jazz influenced ears, altered chords imply the altered scale (melodic minor, seventh mode). That particular scale has both 9ths and 5th in it, so any combination for voicings fits with that.

 

Here are some voicings I use:

 

G7 (b9 b5 #5) or Db9

xx6647

 

G7 (b5 #5) or Db9

9x986x

 

G7 (#5 b9) or Db9(#11)

x 8 11 8 8 x

 

 

Pretty much anytime you use a tritone sub (ex. some sort of unaltered Db7 chord to function as an altered G7 chord) you're going to have both 5ths, and occasionally both 9ths.

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yup - good point about tritone subs

 

having both in the same chord sounds a bit strange to my ears, but i'm not a big fan of altered dominants anyway (i always try to substitute them) - i guess it's diff'rent strokes for diff'rent folks!

 

sim

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yeah - they make more "sense" that way, i guess...

 

still hate them though - as an excersie, try substituting them with another chord from the same altered scale (but not the tritone sub) - you can get some beautiful sequences that way...

 

cheers!

 

sim

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Originally posted by edeltorus

Those altered chords sound horrible to my ears when you play them on their own.


They start to make sense and sound great where you alter them to get a nice voice leading within a chain of chords.

 

 

Try this to get the sound: Over a ii-V-I in C (Dm7-G7-Cmaj7) you can alter the G7 even though it's not written or played that way by the rhythm section.

 

The altered notes make sense when you can hear the direction they have. One way to create direction is to play in chromatic sequences.

 

So, play C major pentatonic over the Dm7 chord, C# major pentatonic over G7 (that's a lot of altered notes and a tritone sub), and finally D major pentatonic over the Cmaj7 (gives you a Lydian sound).

 

Play one little phrase and repeat it a half-step up, and then once more. This can make it easier to hear the direction of the altered notes.

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Originally posted by SeattleRuss

Sometimes when I'm soloing, I don't want to have a lot of altered tensions in the chords behind me, I like to have the freedom to turn it on / off myself....it just depends.



Russ

 

 

I can understand that. Usually when I comp for soloists, I go pretty spare. Sometimes I'll just play the 3rd and 7th. But some guys like to be fed harmonic ideas. (Not that I'm playing much straight jazz these days.) In my own music, I love to play the altered chords.

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