Guide tones
The third and seventh define each chord; on the neck they form lines that move by step from one chord to the next.
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Content under musical review. It may contain inaccuracies.
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The third and seventh define each chord; on the neck they form lines that move by step from one chord to the next.
Advanced
In a seventh chord, the 3 tells you whether it's major or minor, and the 7 tells you which kind of seventh it has. That's why they're called guide tones: with just those two notes the ear recognises the chord. The bass usually covers the root, and the fifth adds little colour.
The progression Dm7 – G7 – Cmaj7 reduced to its guide tones. Notice how little the voices move:
C falls to B, which stays; F stays and then falls to E. Every move is a half step or a common tone.
The degrees of G7 on the neck. Look for the 3 and the ♭7: they're always three whole steps apart, a tritone.
String 6, Fret 1: F2 · ♭7 · Seventh
The same chords as shell voicings (root, third and seventh) on three strings:
Step 1 of 3 · First chord
String 5, Fret 5: D3 · 1 · Root
Show an arpeggio by degree and find just the third and seventh in each area of the neck:
Degrees of the dominant chord Minor seventh arpeggio Ear & improvisationTarget tonesImprovise over a backing track aiming at a specific tone of each chord.Play a long progression on just two neighbouring strings (4th and 3rd, or 3rd and 2nd), choosing for each chord the third or seventh closest to the previous note. You'll get two lines that move by half steps or stay put. Then play one of those lines on its own: it's already a guide melody for improvising.
Scales, arpeggios & fretboardArpeggios over a progressionArpeggiate each chord of a progression with as little hand movement as possible.The third and seventh of a dominant chord form a tritone, and the tritone splits the octave exactly in half: the dominant a tritone away contains the same pair of notes with their roles swapped. G7 has B and F; D♭7 has F and C♭, which sounds the same as B. That's why a dominant can be replaced by the one a tritone away: the guide tones stay and the bass moves by half steps. The substitutions topic develops this idea.