Jazz
Swing, seventh chords and extensions, the ii–V–I, comping with small voicings and improvising over changes.
Advanced
Content under musical review. It may contain inaccuracies.
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Swing, seventh chords and extensions, the ii–V–I, comping with small voicings and improvising over changes.
Advanced
Jazz was born in the early twentieth century in New Orleans and other US cities, and grew into many styles: swing, bebop, cool, hard bop, modal, fusion. What they share is improvisation at the centre, a harmony rich in seventh chords and tensions, and a rhythm that swings.
The most important progression in jazz is the ii–V–I. In C major:
An original line that runs through those chords using chord tones and chromatic approaches:
Jazz guitar relies heavily on three-note shell voicings: root, third and seventh. They're small, clear and leave room for the bass and the soloist:
String 6, Fret 3: G2 · 1 · Root
Loop the ii–V–I. First comp with three-note voicings; then improvise, aiming for thirds and sevenths:
ii–V–I in C major Scales, arpeggios & fretboardArpeggios over a progressionArpeggiate each chord of a progression with as little hand movement as possible.Play only the third and seventh of each chord, on the fourth and third strings. Going from ii to V, one note stays and the other falls a half step. That's the minimal motion that defines the progression and the basis of almost every jazz voicing.
The bebop dominant scale adds a passing major seventh to Mixolydian, so when you descend in eighths from a chord tone on a strong beat, the chord tones keep falling on the beats. Tritone substitution swaps a V7 for the dominant a tritone away: both share the same third and seventh, swapped, and the bass moves down by half steps to the tonic.
G bebop dominant scale