-
As we know, G7 can be substituted with various chords. I’ve found that most of them are quite usable—except for one: Bm6. It outlines the 3rd, 5th, major 7th, and b9 of G7, but that major 7th sounds very strange to me. Can someone explain or give examples of how to use it convincingly? These tensions appear in the G double harmonic major scale (or C Hungarian minor), which so far is the only source I've found for this sound.
Last edited by rodolfoguitarra; 07-01-2025 at 03:25 PM.
-
07-01-2025 02:21 PM
-
Actually b9.and 9th of G7
G7 can be subbed by Dm, Fm, Abm and Bm. That is, in ascending minor 3rds, the notes of the D F Ab B diminished chord. Usually the melodic minor scale is used which makes them m6 chords rather than m7s.
Bm6 gives you the notes B D F# G#(Ab) which make up a G7b9 except for the F#. However, a lot of players don't mind using the F# because it's momentary and can be used effectively in bebop lines.
-
That is the red headed step child, so to speak, of the family. Mostly good for getting into relative minor
Originally Posted by rodolfoguitarra
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
-
Or the ugly duckling? Originally Posted by Christian Miller
-
Indeed, the raised 7th is part of the dominant bebop scale (G A B C D E F F# G). Or perhaps, more accurately, one of the dominant bebop scales as there are multiple ways to wash that dog. Originally Posted by ragman1
-
Charlie Christian loves using this to get back to A minor. He would spell out the entire chord (G#, B, D, F#, C#) then resolve it.
-
Sorry, but I didn't understand. Since the destination is A minor, the chord implied over E7 (the V) would be G#m6 (G#, B, D#, E#) as far as I understand. Originally Posted by brent.h
EDIT: G#, B, D, F#, C# is Bm6(9), which is related to E7. Correct?Last edited by rodolfoguitarra; 07-02-2025 at 05:06 AM.
-
rodolfoguitarra -
You've acknowledged my previous post but not replied to it. Did you understand it? I'm fairly sure that's how the Bm6 is derived. The 'top' of a G7b9 is a diminished chord D F Ab B and any of those minors can be used to solo over G7b9 or G7alt.
The Dm, Fm and Abm are commonly used but the Bm less so because it contains a lot of similar notes to the G7b9 and sounds quite diatonic but also because the odd note out is the maj7 F# which clashes with the nat 7 of the chord.
Nevertheless it can be used, you just have to try it. It's far easier to resolve it to a C minor than a C major but it can certainly be done. Coltrane in particular used lines over dominants that contained the maj7 note.
Try it out yourself, there's no better way. Here are some examples I did earlier. All the notes over G7alt here contain F# and no F naturals.
-
The only substitutions that can sound good are the ones that you play with conviction or intention.
Play that note at the wrong moment and people will hate you. I included it "by accident" by running a B dorian (amongst lots of other stuff) over a static G dom that came up as a topic in a thread here and it didn't sound too shabby; it all depends on what I said above. And placement.
-
Originally Posted by ragman1
There's something I'm missing or not understanding. G7, Bb7, Db7, and E7 all come from the G half-whole diminished scale, and applying this scale over a dominant chord makes sense. On the other hand, Abm6, Bm6, Dm6, and Fm6 are found in the Ab half-whole diminished scale. What I don't get is how, in one way or another, the Ab half-whole diminished scale can be applied over G7.
-
Ah! Originally Posted by rodolfoguitarra
You'll notice that Dm, Fm, Abm and Bm are also the ii chords of their respective V's: G7, Bb7, Db7 and E7.
The Dm (as Dm7) is synonymous with G7. The Bb7 serves as the backdoor to CM7. The Db7 is the tritone of G7. And the E7... is a bit strange. It leads to Am, the relative minor of C maj, but it still doesn't quite fit. But it can be arpeggiated over a G7 as a 13b9 sound and resolved to C quite nicely.
The odd thing here is that, whereas the minors are derived from the DFAbB dim chord, the doms correspond to another one, GBbDbE dim. Which is quite interesting but only if you're in the key of F. Then the ii is Gm and the others are Bbm, Dbm and Em.
Anyway, such is the world of theory which personally I quite happily ignore when playing :-)
Neither do I. Ab HW dim is for Ab7, I'd say. So it's possible that although the dim chords are found in the Ab HW they're not derived from it. You were talking about dom chords before in G7 but here you've gone back to minors. In other words we're not comparing like with like. (See the bit above about the two types of dim chords).What I don't get is how the Ab half-whole diminished scale can be applied over G7
Does that make sense? I think it does but it may not explain it satisfactorily.
-
I haven't thought about it, makes sense. Originally Posted by ragman1
Thinking again about the 'brothers and sisters' concept, I think my problem is that I keep thinking the origin is the diminished scale, instead of the brothers and sisters themselves.
So:
G7,Bb7,Db7, E7 came from Bdim7+C#dim7
Fm6,Abm6,Bm6,Dm6 came from Bdim7+Cdim7
Ab6,B6,D6,F6,came from Bdim7+Cdim7
D7b5,F7b5,Ab7b5,B7b5 came from Bdim7+Cdim7
Something that comes to mind: why haven’t they combined Cdim7 and C#dim7?Last edited by rodolfoguitarra; 07-02-2025 at 11:01 AM.
-
No, one set, one dim. Originally Posted by rodolfoguitarra
They haven't. I know what you're saying but they haven't, they're two separate chords.Something that comes to mind: why haven’t they combined Cdim7 and C#dim7?
What it means is that the minors DFAbB can be played over a G7 but the doms GBbDbE must be substituted for it. Bearing in mind that not all substitutions work musically even if technically correct.
Take the first line of All The Things You Are:
Fm7 - Bbm7 - Eb7 - AbM7
Now try it with these substitutions. You're not playing them over the Eb7, you're replacing the Eb7 with them.
Fm7 - Bbm7 - Gb7 - AbM7
Fm7 - Bbm7 - A7 - AbM7
Fm7 - Bbm7 - C7 - AbM7
See what you think. They all work very nicely except maybe the C7 which is a bit weird. But the others are pretty good. I hope you found that too.
-
Fm6 = Dm7b5, Abm6 = Fm7b5, etc. They are the respective IIm7(b5) chords of the V7 chords you mentioned - Dm7(b5)/G7; Fm7b5/Bb7, etc. Originally Posted by rodolfoguitarra
-
You’re talking about a separate way of deriving the chords.
The dominant chords are related by way of the diminished.
Then for each dominant you have the important chords — I7, iiim7b5, vm7, bVIImaj7
So those are all related to the extended dominant chords too.
So G7 is related to E7 and G#m7b5 (Bm6) is related to G7 by way of the E7.
The diminished scales aren’t really part of the universe yet.
It’s a super out sound but very cool. And as others have mentioned it’s a good one just for getting to relative minor
-
[QUOTE=rodolfoguitarra;1415657]I haven't thought about it, makes sense.
Thinking again about the 'brothers and sisters' concept, I think my problem is that I keep thinking the origin is the diminished scale, instead of the brothers and sisters themselves.
So:
G7,Bb7,Db7, E7 came from Bdim7+C#dim7
Fm6,Abm6,Bm6,Dm6 came from Bdim7+Cdim7
Ab6,B6,D6,F6,came from Bdim7+Cdim7
D7b5,F7b5,Ab7b5,B7b5 came from Bdim7+Cdim7
your making it very difficult for yourself...
A tip from Joe Diorio--and many others..
There are ONLY Three diminished scales-- C Db and D
The Half whole step scales are diminished WH scales a half step higher--
so
B Half Whole dim is the C diminished scale starting on the B note of C diminished
The diminished scale has 25+ chords embedded in it.
It takes awhile to apply this thinking into practice..but well worth the effort.
-
G7/Bb7/Db7/E7 are all derived from the same diminished scale = G-Ab-Bb-B-Db-D-E-F. Originally Posted by pamosmusic
"So G7 is related to E7 and G#m7b5 (Bm6) is related to G7 by way of the E7."
I think of Abm7b5(G#m7b5) as being the relative IIm7(b5) chord of Db7, which is the b5 substitute of G7. So we have the mutual b5 sub chord pairs: G7/Db7 and E7/Bb7.
Bm6 is not the relative IIm7 chord of E7, it's the IIm7b5 (as Abm7b5) of C#7/Db7, so you'd be associating it with the wrong pair of dom.7th chords, i.e., with E7/Bb7 rather than G7/Db7.
They are all derived from the same diminished scale, as I just said, so that's the simplest way to think about it - for me anyway, one can complicate it as much as one wants. And they are also 7b9 chords a minor third apart: G7b9, Bb7b9, Db7 & E7 (again from the diminished scale). Originally Posted by rodolfoguitarra
-
Hes asking about Barry Harris though Originally Posted by Mick-7
-
When the theory predicts that F# is a good note to play over G7 I start to think that the theory is getting a little too flexible. Originally Posted by pamosmusic
Or, stated another way, is this really more helpful than saying, "you can play any note over any chord, if you put it in a good line"?
I guess it must be useful at least for some players, but I prefer to think (at my desk) about chord tones and tonal centers while dividing non-chord tones into consonant extensions and more challenging extensions. And, at the end of that road is an F# over a G7.
-
I don’t know. I feel like we’ve asked this question before. Generally you can’t just play any note over anything … that note needs to be doing something. A passing note between root and seventh or part of some strong melody or larger harmonic context that gives the note some weight. Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar
The theory does that and think of it as a miscellaneous extension doesn’t. You could obviously get to that place from think of it as a miscellaneous extension or some totally different theoretical framework. But it’s the existence of the framework that ends of giving the note some context that makes it work. Not really the specifics of the framework.
-
I'm unclear about how the Bm6 is suggested to be used.
What is being suggested? How do you employ these notes?
Stated a less obvious way -- what is the theory suggesting you shouldn't do? I'd assume that a good theory would be suggesting that some things are better than others.
So, I went through the chromatic scale. I get R, b9, 9, #9, 3 11 #11 5 b13 13 b7 and, finally, 7. There are two notes that aren't commonly used to adjust a G7. The 11th changes the usage -- you aren't often going to play Dm7 G7sus Cmaj7, well maybe you would. The other troublesome note is the 7. My ear doesn't accept a nice long F# against G7. And, if it's a quick passing note, so could be any other.
If the 11 and the 7 are good then one scrap of theory or another is predicting virtually every possibility.
So, I don't get it.
Maybe it's very advanced material. Like, you've mastered all but one of the notes of the chromatic scale against G7 and now it's time to address the F#. I don't expect to get so far up the mountain that I need the F# as something other than an ordinary passing note.
-
Theory 'predicts' a lot of things that aren't very palatable musically. They're either changed or ignored. I'm quite sure that 'any note in a good line' is fine. If it works, it works. Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar
In any case the dom bebop scale has the descending root-maj7-b7 line, it's what makes it the bebop scale. Same with the major and minor scales and their added note. We all know this. All the Bm6 over G7b9 idea does is place the F# somewhere else, that's all. All the other notes are diatonic.
Storm in a teacup in my view.
-
Not to be difficult but it’s suggesting you play a Bm6 into a Cmaj7. Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar
B goes to B or C.
D goes to C or E
F# goes to E or G
G# goes to A or G
It’s not super uncommon to see these avoid notes against dominant chords. That major seven being prominent is maybe something you find more in George Benson than in Charlie Parker but the idea of the 11 being tricky is and always has been bunk.
Bird loves a Dm7 or Fmaj7 over G7. And he wasn’t the first.
Transcribing anything at all and that’ll be everywhere
-
A lot of confusion about this stuff is generated by people taking their presuppositions from one area into another.
Barry didn’t really look at lines as extensions over the chord of the moment. He looked at the harmony of lines as being generated by substitutions.
So to think about this stuff in terms of mainstream jazz theory - for which Barry had very little respect anyway - is kind of unhelpful, you sort of have to go with it and come in tabula rasa.
That’s a big ask for many, but I’d argue many worry about things like F#’s on G7 and so on far more than the people who actually wrote the theory books. Mark Levine’s ‘do/don’t’ prescriptions aside, most of this stuff is meant to resources for making music.
It’s more that a lot of students are looking for a system that makes music always sound good. If the music adds up according to theory it must be good jazz and that good notes and bad notes can be classified in binary terms.
I’m both sad and happy to report there is no such thing. But Barry can suggest many beautiful things to play, if you like that.
Anyway, there’s a point where you have to start making one’s own judgements about what you like. That’s a fun journey to do in dialogue with the music itself.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
-
I might have been confused by the title of the thread. Originally Posted by pamosmusic
Reply With Quote
“Shearing style”
Today, 05:26 PM in Comping, Chords & Chord Progressions