Targeting Individual Alterations
Welcome to lesson 6 in our cocktail piano improvisation module. In this lesson we will create interesting colours and tensions in our improvised melody lines by targeting and isolating the individual chord alterations.
Targeting chord tones and utilising arpeggios are 2 of the most fundamental improvisation principles. Targeting single alterations will now add a different dimension to our improvised lines.
Diatonic Approaches, Enclosures, & Chromaticism
In the same way that we targeted the 3rds and 7ths in the earlier lessons we will now use the same approach patterns to target the individual alterations over the dominant chords.
Focusing on the 251 progression in Ab Major which takes us into bar 3 we can target the different alterations of the Eb7 chord. For each alteration we will find a way to approach chromatically and then via an arpeggio.
- Target the b9 with either descending arpeggio or enclosure
- Target the #5 or b13 with ascending arpeggio or chromaticism
- Target the #11 with ascending arpeggio or enclosure
We can repeat this process for the 3625 progressions. Revisit our lessons on the whole step 251 drills where we isolate the individual alterations from a chordal standpoint.
In the next lesson we will explore blues licks and vocabulary that we can apply throughout the A Section of “Misty”.
Lesson Downloads
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Targeting Chord Alterations File Type: pdf
Related Lessons
Tuomo shows us 3 different altered dominant 251 lines and then shows how we can create our own melodies over altered dominant chords.
In this lesson Hayden explored the altered tensions over dominant chords and how to resolve these tensions into the Imaj7 Chord.
In a minor 251, the 5 chord will be an altered dominant chord. In this lesson we apply altered dominant chords to the major 251 progression.
Practice Tips
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Experiment with repeating the alteration up 1 octave to accentuate the sound and to let it linger above the harmony.
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Notice that each alterations is just a half step away from a resolution note of the proceeding chord. Always keep the point of resolution in mind.
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Remember that targeting alterations is a single component of improvisation and should be balanced with the other elements that we cover in this module.
Hello Hayden,
Thanks for your courses, I learn so much !
I have a question about the notation Eb7+7 ?
It means Eb7#5 ?
Kind regards
Véronique
Hey Véronique 👋
Great question and I’m glad you are enjoying the course.
Yes when we have a chord symbol such as C+7 or F+7 or Eb+7 – it means a 7th chord with the sharp 5 added.
C+, F+, or Eb+ would just be a triad with the sharp/raised 5th (also referred to as the augmented 5th).
We would never have Eb7+7 or C7+7 (with two “7”s in the chord symbol), and the + is always placed before the 7.
It’s also worth noting that different musicians can notate chords differently. Our transcriber who creates the PDF files uses Eb+7, whereas I would personally write this as Eb7#5 – so I appreciate it can be confusing but I suppose it’s a good example that there are different ways to refer to the same chord.
I hope that helps and please let me know if you have any further questions.
Best,
Hayden
OK Thanks a lot Hayden.
Have a nice day.
Best regards
Veronique