The dominant 7th chord has the ability to take all kinds of disonance. You can pretty much play a half step wrong and still get some acceptable sounds in certain situations, but let’s look at a more systematic way to play out on the dominant chord. The symbol for an C altered chord is: C7(b9, […]

Just as the standard major pentatonic scale can be used to create the sounds of major modes, the major pentatonic b6 scale can be used to create the sounds of melodic minor modes. The major pentatonic b6 scale is, well, a major pentatonic scale with a b6 instead of a major 6th. In C, it […]

The II V I in the key of C is normally expressed as Dmin, G7, Cmaj7. What you’ll find is, that the dominant chord’s ability to take disonance is much greater than any other chord. The first simple trick to get yourself some more outside notes is the tritone substitution. The way this works, is […]

Another way to look at II V I progressions is to treat the I chord as lydian. So, back in the user friendly key of C, we have Dmin G7 and Cmaj7. This makes our choices: F C and G major pent over the Dmin, F C and G major pent over the G7 and […]