Dominant Chord Voicings Part 2
In this lesson we are going to explore some of the different option you have available to you for voicing dominant chords.
This tutorial is broken into 2 parts and we will be revisiting theory on UST, suspended harmony and inner voice movement over dominant chords.
We follow the same format as the lessons on major and minor chord voicing options. The idea behind these videos is to cover the melody notes that you are most likely to come across for major, minor and dominant chords.
For major chords, the melody will more than likely be one of the notes of the Lydian mode. So if you are playing a C major chord, the melody note will probably be one of the notes from the C Lydian mode.
For minor chords, the melody note will more than likely be from the Dorian mode and also the b6th from the Aeolian mode.
For dominant chords however, you can come across virtually any note in the melody. The only exception is the major 7th. If we think of the mixolydian mode, that gives us…. We then have the alterations that are b9, #9, #11 and #5 and so that only leaves this one note out.
Because of this, you have many more options when voicing dominant chords. We are now going to work through all of the potential melody notes you could come across using actual examples from jazz standards we have covered. In part 1 we work from Root up to major 3rd and in part 2 we start at the 4th and work up to the b7.
Lesson Downloads
-
Dominant Chord Voicings Lesson Supplement File Type: pdf
Related Lessons
In this lesson we explore some advanced applications of upper structure triads in context of jazz standards we have c...
We start the lesson by recapping the basic theory behind sus chords and then explore them in context of major and min...
Learning and memorising all of the upper structure triads is a daunting task! This lesson introduces the upper struct...
Practice Tips
Part 2 of this dominant chord voicing lesson covers the following jazz standards.
- The Nearness Of You
- Tenderly Part 1
- These Foolish Things
- When I Fall In Love
- Easy To Love
- What Are You Doing The Rest Of Your Life
If you would like to learn these standards, check out the full tutorials.
Hi Hayden,
So if I’m following correctly, once I familiarize myself with major, minor, and dominant voicings that I can play over all 7 notes in all 12 keys, I can apply them onto any song in the major key to cover the I, IV (maj7), II, III, VI (minor), and V (dominant) chords. That leaves the VII chord (often a diminished 7th). What voicings can I play over them?
Paul
Hi Paul 👋🏻
Good question!
Yes that’s correct, by memorising voicings that work under each scale degree of the chord, it equips us with. a selection of voicings that we can use when playing jazz standards.
For diminished chords, they can be viewed as ‘dominant b9 chords in disguise’ – check out my lesson here for more information: https://pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/understanding-diminished-chords/ – Understanding this relationship is useful for choosing voicings for diminished chords.
Here are 2 lessons from Jovino and Tuomo where they talk about diminished theory and application:
– https://pianogroove.com/bossa-nova-lessons/useful-diminished-trick-for-any-251/
and
– https://pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/diminished-patterns-licks-improvisation/
Hope that helps and let me know if you have any further questions.
Cheers,
Hayden
Hi Hayden – at 13.15 in the video you’re talking about a G maj triad over F7 and describing this as #9. and then a D major triad (b9). Is this correct? – just want to make sure I’m not misunderstanding something!
Hi Chris,
Yes exactly these are upper structure triads voicings.
If we play a G Triad over F7, that triad gives us the tones 9-#11-13 of F7.
If we play a D Triad over F7, that triad gives us the tones 13-b9-3 of F7.
We have many lessons on Upper Structure Triads, I’d recommend to start with the following ones:
Here’s a quick introduction video on the topic:
https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/what-are-upper-structure-triads/
I also created a series of 4 in-depth seminars on UST theory:
https://community.pianogroove.com/t/upper-structure-triads-for-beginners-beyond/12629 – these are the most recent lessons I have created on the topic. Click the 4 links at the top of the forum thread and that will take you to the seminar pages. Work through them in the order they are presented on the forum page, and those seminars will teach you everything you need to know about Upper Structure Triad Voicings.
—-
Upper Structure Triads (USTs) are certainly one of the most important chord voicing concepts for jazz piano. These voicings will take your jazz piano playing from sounding okay, to sounding professional and sophisticated.
Check out the links above and if you have any questions along the way don’t hesitate to ask.
Cheers,
Hayden
Correction – I think you describe the 1st as #11…
Yes that’s correct.
For that voicing (G triad over F7) we think “major triad built off the 2nd or 9th degree of the scale”. The 2nd/9th degree of the F7 scale is the note “G” and so we play a G Triad.
That UST voicing is called “UST-2” or “UST-13#11”.
But all we need to think is “major triad built off the 2nd or 9th degree of the scale” and that way we have the formula to find that voicing in all 12 keys (considering that we know our major scales numerically, and than we know our 12 major triads).
Check out the seminars that I reference above where we go into much more detail on how to build, memorise, and apply these voicings to jazz standards.
Have fun exploring this topic!
Cheers,
Hayden