The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #1

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    Hey guys.


    I am looking for an answer to a very basic question but it is ambiguous (different sources state differently) and everything is probably relative. But I wanted to know your opinion or someone has researched this topic and found out what I am looking for.
    Generally chromatics. But more specifically, chromatic enclosures (I mean different kinds of 2,3 or 4 chromatic notes, approach notes) with different configurations and layouts. The question - does chord tones have to fall on the 1st and 3rd beat, or on 1,2,3,4 or it doesn't matter (only the last note of the phrase is important - chord tone/target note)?


    I found a thread in this forum:
    Chord Tones on the Down Beat? and here it ended an interesting discussion by admitting that chord tones on the strong beats.


    But ... in this movie

    Matt Warnock shows enslosures and finally adds that the most important thing is to end the phrase well (meaning the last note is the key). Nothing says 1 and 3 or 1,2,3,4.


    That is why I have mixed feelings, because the two sources say something completely different. I wanted to finally understand how it works. Can anybody help?

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  3. #2

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    When I use chromatics I use them to get someplace. So I’ll hit the b5 on my way to the 5th.

    I don’t have the mental capacity to keep track of which beat I’m on. It’s hard enough trying to keep track of the chords while I’m improvising. In some subconscious way I’m counting, I’m just not thinking about it.

  4. #3

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    Being able to place chord tones on beat 1 can be important and is a great skill to have but if you do this on every chord change or every bar than it will begin to sound monotonous and robotic. I feel like it is one of those things that is very necessary to practice and be able to do, but then use as needed.

    However - when playing solo guitar or accompanying a singer or horn in a duo it can be needed when you solo to make sure the changes are clear and keep everyone on the same page. If you play a really strong chromatic line resolving to the third of the chord but it put it on beat 2 or something it can throw the time as that can feel strongly like beat one. With a band this is less important because the bass, drums or comping instruments can help enforce where the beat is. I might aim for them on downbeats or any other place when soloing with a group, just letting your ears guide you.

    I think Allan nailed it, the most important thing with chromatics is having them go somewhere. The end note and target is the most important thing.

  5. #4

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    It's hard to listen to yourself play in real time -- I think there's unconscious processing going on. Record yourself and play it back to listen.

    What I find, listening to myself play over a backing track, is that if I nail that chord tone on 1, it sounds like I nailed that chord tone on 1.

    On the other hand, if I play a non-chromatic tone on 1 and resolve it to a chord tone on the and-of-1 and accent it like a meant to do that, it still sounds like I nailed it!

    But maybe I'm being too easy on myself.

  6. #5

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    Chord tones sounds most inside on the beat.
    Scale tones also sound strong on the beat.
    Chromatic tones sound good on the beat if they are resolved afterward.

    On a Bb chord play the notes F, Eb and D. This sounds strong when starting on 1 and playing eighth notes.

    Now play F, Eb, C#, Eb, D. This time I enclosed the D with the C# below and Eb above. The C# fell on the beat but sounds good because we resolve it using an enclosure.

    Chromatic notes falling on the beat are the trickiest to master but produce some of the most interesting color.

  7. #6

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    Quote Originally Posted by freud

    That is why I have mixed feelings, because the two sources say something completely different. I wanted to finally understand how it works. Can anybody help?
    I'm inclined to say trust your ear. Try them all out and keep the one/s you like.

  8. #7

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    1. What often seems to be missing from “resolving on the downbeat” discussions is the effect on melodic line that is engendered by the rhythmic and harmonic musical environment created by what the other musicians are playing. Not all mathematical downbeats are equal.

    2. The difference between what is a passing tone and an extended chord tone is based on how the same note is presented.
    When a note is played on a path to another note, it is a passing tone. When the same note is played as the destination it is an extended chord tone. The differential between these two is based on musical sentence structure more than what the notes are.

    3. Suspensions (delayed resolutions) and anticipations (advance resolutions) are common effective musical possibles.

  9. #8

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    I would add... chromatics have harmonic implications.... even if you are unaware or don't hear. Which leads to having a bigger picture musical organization going on besides thinking or hearing as chromatics.

    Rhythm can always make things seem right of feel right. But eventually, or maybe not... you'll start playing and hearing chromatics as tonal and harmonic.

    Try voicing the notes you use as chromatics.

  10. #9

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    My playing tends to be very chromatic, so always looking for new ways to bring out the chord tones, extensions and alterations amongst the liberal use of all 12 tones. It's pretty easy to find info about the common ways to enclose, but even easier to roll your own by varying the way you eventually land on your target tone- by combos of half and whole steps. Listen to straight ahead players using bop language as much as you can, and you'll simply just know what sounds right and what doesn't within the broader idiom. Just think of it as copying an accent (to use the language analogy).

    One thing I'll add is that you don't always have to land the chord tones on down beats. If you are enclosing, but the chromatic note is on the down beat, it often still sounds good because when you land the target note, it has been "highlighted" by way of the enclosure, so it often doesn't matter whether the target notes land on the on or off beat. Mind you, I think it gets a bit messy if you don't land chord tones on the beat most of the time, whether it's 95% or 65%. If you analyse the greats they mostly fall in that range, I think...

    Appoggiaturas are your friends!

  11. #10
    Good question. Chromatic enclosures can be played and end on any beat, even on ‘off’ beats or anticipating beat one of a final bar, ie on beat ‘4 and’. I’m not aware of any rules that say a chord tone following a chromatic enclosure needs to end on beat 1 at the end of a phrase. However, there is something more final about it. It’s a bit like a full stop in speech, whereas landing on an off beat could be taken as a comma, ie you haven’t quite finished yet. If you listen to finishing phrases (often chromatic in nature) that are tagged onto the end a tune, when the head is being played for the last time, they sound just as effective to me landing ‘on’, or ‘off’ the beat. I don’t think they even need to land on or close to beat one, as long as everyone is together, and it clearly signals the end of a tune. Just my tuppence (now thruppence with inflation) worth.

  12. #11

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    Quote Originally Posted by Victor Saumarez
    Good question. Chromatic enclosures can be played and end on any beat, even on ‘off’ beats or anticipating beat one of a final bar, ie on beat ‘4 and’. I’m not aware of any rules that say a no chord tone following a chromatic enclosure needs to end on beat 1 at the end of a phrase. However, there is something more final about it. It’s a bit like a full stop in speech, whereas landing on an off beat could be taken as a comma, ie you haven’t quite finished yet. If you listen to finishing phrases (often chromatic in nature) that are tagged onto the end a tune, when the head is being played for the last time, they sound just as effective to me landing ‘on’, or ‘off’ the beat. I don’t think they even need to land on or close to beat one, as long as everyone is together, and it clearly signals the end of a tune. Just my tuppence (now thruppence with inflation) worth.
    I think jazz people could usefully take a look at the classification of different dissonances (passing, appoggiatura, suspension etc) in classical theory. Mike Longo talks about this in one of his books iirc, it’s pretty straight up classical theory.

    it’s quite a Mozart/classical era move to place a unprepared chromatic lower neighbour on the beat for example, resolving on the weak side of the bar (an appoggiatura or leaning dissonance). b3 to 3 is common, often as a passing tone. In jazz we would think of this as a blue note. In the romantic era this kind of thing became more and more de rigeur until we end up with things like Wagner’s Tristan.

    This stuff is I would say up to half to two thirds of basic meat’n’potatoes jazz language (depending on the player), along with blues and what I call colouristic harmony (which is influenced by 20th century French music, sub Saharan harmonic practices and so on£. But often there’s more what gets called ‘blues’ in jazz circles in romantic harmony than i would have thought. The resolution of the Tristan chord is a good example. bVI7 V7, and the first chord has a b3 appoggiatura even.

    Lage Lund has an interesting thing where he delays the resolution of neighbour tones to breaking point… which starts to edge us towards the early Schoenberg sort of world

    enclosures that start on the dissonance on the beat are common in both classical music and the recorded history of jazz.

  13. #12
    Christian, I’m sure you’re right. I’m neither classically trained, nor much of a theorist. On the topic of the ‘Blues’, I was reading a book on English idioms and came across the expression ‘blue devils’, which means depressed feelings, sometimes shortened to ‘the blues’. It can also refer to delirium tremens. It’s interesting the word devil is part of the original full expression, because we often refer to the blue note as the devil’s note. I had assumed the expression had originated out of early African American lexicon, but it looks like it may have had it’s origins elsewhere (Old Blighty?). According to Merriam’s it was first used in 1756, so around the beginnings of slavery in the US, and pre-dates the blues music by 100 years. Why the colour blue? Who knows? Early depictions as having a blue pigment? Just guessing. Perhaps Old Nick himself could shed some light on that for us. Anyone have his email address? I tried Oldnick@hell.org, but it bounced back.

  14. #13

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    Quote Originally Posted by Victor Saumarez
    Christian, I’m sure you’re right. I’m neither classically trained, nor much of a theorist.
    I'm not classically trained either lol (at least not as a guitarist or a theorist/composer). But I am interested in that stuff.

    But if anyone called me a theorist I would regard that as a deadly insult haha.

    All of this stuff can be applied. And the theory is only important in so much as you use it to make music. For instance that Tristan chord I mentioned earlier created loads of arguments in the theory world - but Wagner wrote it because he thought it sounded good.

    So, for a less high faulting example, example, I mix up the classifications of the types of dissonances all the time, because I use them intuitively now that I can hear them. It's not so important after a while, but that's not to say they might not be useful to start off with.

    On the topic of the ‘Blues’, I was reading a book on English idioms and came across the expression ‘blue devils’, which means depressed feelings, sometimes shortened to ‘the blues’. It can also refer to delirium tremens. It’s interesting the word devil is part of the original full expression, because we often refer to the blue note as the devil’s note. I had assumed the expression had originated out of early African American lexicon, but it looks like it may have had it’s origins elsewhere (Old Blighty?). According to Merriam’s it was first used in 1756, so around the beginnings of slavery in the US, and pre-dates the blues music by 100 years. Why the colour blue? Who knows? Early depictions as having a blue pigment? Just guessing. Perhaps Old Nick himself could shed some light on that for us. Anyone have his email address? I tried Oldnick@hell.org, but it bounced back.
    That's really interesting. I note that one of the bluesiest songs of the early jazz repertoire - St James Infirmary - is also modelled on an old English song. Things are more complex than they seem.

    (Real delta blues is of course microtonal and highly non-European in tonality, form and so on. This does feature in jazz, but not much after the bop revolution when improvisation became much more linear and harmonic. Arguably, it took free jazz (and maybe fusion guitar players influenced by Hendrix etc) to bring it back into that zone.)

  15. #14

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    From Geoffrey Chaucer's The compleynt of Mars, circa 1385:

    Ye lovers, that lye in any drede,
    Fleeth, lest wikked tonges yow espye.
    Lo, yond the sunne, the candel of jelosye!
    Wyth teres blewe and with a wounded herte
    Taketh your leve.


    From John Dryden's All for love; or, The world well lost, 1678:

    Now, my best Lord, in Honor’s name, I ask you,
    For Manhood’s sake, and for your own dear safety,
    Touch not these poison’d Gifts,
    Infected by the Sender, touch ’em not,
    Miriads of bluest Plagues lye underneath ’em

    From a letter dated 11th July 1741 written by David Garrick:

    The Town is exceeding hot & Sultry & I am far from being quite well, tho not troubled wth ye Blews as I have been, I design taking a Country Jaunt or two for a few Days when Our Engines are finish’d, for I found great Benefits from ye last I took.


  16. #15
    The Satan Of The Byzantine Empire Was Blue, Not Red




    Modern depictions of Satan often show a red demon with hooves, but the oldest known image of Satan is actually blue. Dating back to the 6th century, this depiction is part of the intricate Byzantine mosaics in the Basilica of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna, Italy.
    In the mosaic, Jesus appears in royal purple robes to separate the saved from the damned in the Last Judgment. The saved, depicted as sheep, stand with a red angel. The damned, shown as goats, stand with a blue figure who likely represents Satan.
    Satan appears as a fallen angel rather than the recognizable demonic, hooved creature. The color red didn't become linked with Satan and other demons until centuries later.


    How Artwork Of Satan Has Visually Changed Over Time

  17. #16

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    Tip: Practice Barry Harris type half step rules until they become intuitive.

  18. #17

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    Quote Originally Posted by setemupjoe
    Chord tones sounds most inside on the beat.
    Scale tones also sound strong on the beat.
    Chromatic tones sound good on the beat if they are resolved afterward.

    On a Bb chord play the notes F, Eb and D. This sounds strong when starting on 1 and playing eighth notes.

    Now play F, Eb, C#, Eb, D. This time I enclosed the D with the C# below and Eb above. The C# fell on the beat but sounds good because we resolve it using an enclosure.

    Chromatic notes falling on the beat are the trickiest to master but produce some of the most interesting color.
    You can't beat a definitive example. Thank you

  19. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by rintincop
    Tip: Practice Barry Harris type half step rules until they become intuitive.
    Hey Man. How do you understand half step rules of BH in this context?

  20. #19

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    The way I understand most bebop scales, they use chromatic notes in order to place chord tones on the first eighth note of every beat, and the rest on second eighth notes.

    So you can practice deriving licks and phrases from them, starting on various degrees of the scale, and on different beats of the measure, always keeping chord tones on upbeats. Eventually it gets into your playing and hearing. It's one of the things that make bebop era solos really make sense (meaning they are everywhere!).

  21. #20

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    Quote Originally Posted by Alter
    The way I understand most bebop scales, they use chromatic notes in order to place chord tones on the first eighth note of every beat, and the rest on second eighth notes.

    So you can practice deriving licks and phrases from them, starting on various degrees of the scale, and on different beats of the measure, always keeping chord tones on upbeats. Eventually it gets into your playing and hearing. It's one of the things that make bebop era solos really make sense (meaning they are everywhere!).
    Depending on the application of the Barry harris added note rules you can come out with scales that have every note of the chromatic scale and yet clearly outline a G7 or whatever.

  22. #21

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    I love this 9-note descending chromatic line by Pat Martino from his ‘Just Friends’ solo (starts on the 3rd beat of the 2nd bar). Or 10 notes if you include the preceding Bb.

    Chromatic Puzzles-320aef4a-de47-4796-bc07-d8fb5b16d5d0-jpeg

  23. #22
    Hey guys.


    Thanks for all valuable tips. It turns out that there is no "golden" formula or recipe or pattern. This fact opened my eyes and helped me understand one thing.
    The point is that by surrounding a target note (let's say it's a chord tone) with chromatic notes, it brings out the kind of melodic weight of that note. This greatly develops the ear and hearing the given note (interval) above the chord. And lets you hear the meaning of each note. This is really amazing, I didn't understand it before! Has anyone had that too? : D

  24. #23

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    Quote Originally Posted by freud
    Hey guys.


    Thanks for all valuable tips. It turns out that there is no "golden" formula or recipe or pattern. This fact opened my eyes and helped me understand one thing.
    The point is that by surrounding a target note (let's say it's a chord tone) with chromatic notes, it brings out the kind of melodic weight of that note. This greatly develops the ear and hearing the given note (interval) above the chord. And lets you hear the meaning of each note. This is really amazing, I didn't understand it before! Has anyone had that too? : D
    You could do worse than start with the Barry Harris added note rules. They are pretty golden.

  25. #24

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    The word bebop comes from ending phrases on the “and” of a beat (“be-bop”).

    If you listen to jazz you will find a lot of examples for that. But the Barry Harris half-step stuff is a good exercise to get used to the relationship between chord tones and passing tones. Later you can break out of the habit of putting chord tones only on beats. Learning bebop heads is a good practice for that. Those themes are often derived from improvisation, “frozen improvisation” so to speak. Guitarist and teacher Ted Dunbar assigned his students a lists of ca. 50 bebop tunes with the goal to play through all of them everyday. Each one should teach the student a lesson — which one he/she had to find out him-/herself. One of the lessons probably all of the those tunes can teach is how to build good lines and how to use chromaticism.

    As someone already has said above a chomatic note on a beat should be resolved.

    You can also look at altered dominants from their tritone’s perspective. Then you have different chord tones.