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Whatever... I will say it a final time, Jobim wrote B7, Hal Leonard writes B7 ...

Maybe some of you folks have heard of Thelonious - umm - can't remember his last name. Of course, I don't believe he was very strong on theory and such. He wasn't a horn player, though, as I recall - maybe one of those rhythm instruments. This guy is reported to have written a couple of jazz tunes in his time, maybe even in Eb minor. But, I'm probably wrong - my writing is misleading AND nonsense.

Where else are we going to get a discussion like this? Many of us have a pix of the chart Jobim wrote out on a napkin in the restaurant. I like taking all this stuff apart and putting it back together. I'd much rather bat this around than discuss it with civilians.

I could not agree more. For me it's not about a right answer but about considering something that, on the surface, may seem cut and dried, obvious, but may not be. I had to really think this through, because I have never really worried about playing Ipanema in any key but the standard one.

The elephant in the room is getting to keys like Ab and Db, where a switch to minor means switching to sharps. Ab to G#m, Db to C#m. But the key of Gb is a special case. Both Gb and F# average out to equally messy, depending on whether modulations or movements push to the sharp or flat side. In the case of Girl from Ipanema, I would choose F#maj7 to B7, because Gbmaj7 is fine, but Cb7 uses a Bbb. I avoid chords with double flats or double sharps IF POSSIBLE, and in Ipanmena putting the bridge in sharps at the beginning seems like a more elegant solution, notationally.

In the key of G, for the bridge, I would use: Abmaj7 to Db7, G#m7 to E7 (and so on). I would avoid using G#maj7 to C#7, though it would not bother me. My logic would be the same. I don't like using G# B# D# Fx IF I can avoid it.

But this is ONLY for Girl from Ipanema, and it is a personal choice.

I would not argue with anyone who chose different solutions.

Let me see if I understand you:

You are arguing for B7, not Cb7, in Ipanema. (I would too.)

But aren't you also concentrating on lead sheets, specifically?

I would only say this: Cb7, both tradionally, but also in tonal, popular music (jazz, etc.) is going to be the V7 of Fb.

I'd avoid going there IF POSSIBLE, and usually it can be avoided.

If it is used as a IV7, just for an example, if you are in something that is set in a key, you are going to end up with Gb7, Cb7 and Db7. I can't think why a simple blues tune would end up in that key, but if it did, I would pick F#7, B7 and C#7. As a brass player I would not want to be in such a key in the first place, and with so many instruments like sax, trumpet, and so on, there may be a very good reason why keys that are a pain to write in also do not appear much in arrangements.

For solo piano it would be a different matter.

I think we have to make sure we are not mixed up about whether we are limited to the chord symbol itself or the chord as notated in music that doesn't settle easily into any key. I'm used to dealing with things like A#7, not as symbols, but as a chord that suddenly pops up in a quick modulation right in the middle of something in sharps. Some composers do not like flipping from sharps to flats when there is a lot of chromatic stuff going on.

There can be quite a clash between chord charts and written out arrangements, for instance.

Which opens another interesting point. In commercial/jazz playing we rarely play the notation literally, we use it as a road-map that shows where the music is going, then play the music. Correct spelling (rather than what may be superficially "easier" spelling) makes life much easier. If music has strayed into a lot of flats, the odd Fb chord is easier to take in than an E. Of course, if the music stays in that area for too long, a complete enharmonic shift into sharps may be indicated!

But be careful! Most music is on computer, in Sibelius or Finale, these days. Running off a transposed copy to suit a particular singer is common. Say we're going from E to Eb. No problem choosing the transposition of an augmented unison rather than a minor second - no-one wants to read D# major! (Actually, the software lets you choose a key rather than messing with augmented unisions, but it's good to understand the mechanism.) But if the logic of the music has been broken by the odd "easier" enharmonic, chaos can ensue!

(And then - I'm picturing that woman in "The Simpsons" who runs around wailing "Think of the children!" Think of the Eb sax players! Each age of music has its own practicalities, problems and solutions :-)

I think Miles said it originally (not using “darn”), and Gary was quoting him. Or, maybe Gary was quoting someone else who was quoting Miles. Or . . .

Explorers and Sea Captains have realized for ages that “the map [chart] is not the territory”. So if we are setting out to do something inventive, like improvise, or write an arrangement, we are going to use the harmonic structure “as a guide”, just as Mr. Wombat writes. But even here, we have two drastically different cases:

If I am improvising, and I hear in my “mind’s ear” a certain pitch, I am going to simply play that pitch (hopefully accurately!). It might be an Eb, it might be a D#, it could well be Fbb, it might serve as the flatted 5th on A, or the augmented 5th on G. There is a good chance that it is the suspended 4th above Bb, and it could even be the flatted 9th of a D7. I really do not care! Nor do I want to know! I hear, and I play it - end of story. But that is playing -- the territory. Now, let us turn to the map . . .

Once we analyze the playing, to preserve the sound, or to be able to reproduce it; once we systematize what a player did, in order to teach it; once we set out to create an arrangement for others to play; we have a new situation. Suddenly we are forced to treat each sound “in context”. I stated very early in this thread that once we write it down (create the map), a whole new set of rules apply. The sound no longer simply exists “in air”. We now must name it as D#, for instance, because of the key in which the piece “is written”, because of the underlying harmony, or because of the notes preceding or following. Equally with chords -- once we take that cluster of pitches out of the aural realm, and place them on the map, we are obliged to make them fit within the context of the surrounding elements on a theoretical level. To help with this, we often refer back to the sounds themselves. Is the sound in question "acting" as the augmented fifth, or as the flatted sixth?

Just as Mr.Wombat states, if we are deep into the “flat keys”, anywhere near Gary’s “point of equalization” with Gb or F# majors, but on the flat side of the dividing line (Ab, Db, Gb, Bb minor, Eb minor), an X-flat chord is going to “fit in” much better than an X-sharp chord, UNLESS the chord in question is intended as a “shocker” to the harmonic flow. Then, maybe!

Ed

I was just thinking of how I approach things, but now that you mention it someone here has used that quote, maybe in a sig. But what I said has to do with what I teach. Get the sound first, worry about names later. I have some kids who get the names for basic note values screwed up because I do not teach using fractions. They may say a "white circle that usually lasts for the whole measure" but forget the name "whole". If I have someone who plays the music well, it is easy to add names. If I have a student who is a young "Mr. Peabody", who knows the names of everything but who can't (yet?) make music, I don't think anything important has happened yet.

What happens when we play is different for each player. It is easy to overlook the importance of this. Even when I am reading music, the music goes from the page to my fingers. I hear what is on the page, and that translates to a mental picture of my fingers pressing the keys. The mental process of pushing the keys produces the sound. I exist totally in a world of black and white patterns, the keys and fingers in my mind. There are no names. Because of this, when I read about Cb9 vs B9, I simply saw the chord. I had to take a few mintues last night to write out the bridge of Ipanema before I had an opinion. When the bridge starts in F# major, the melody spins out in a very readable and logical way, and the chords look clean to me. In Gb major, switching to F# minor, the lead line looks clean until the "mode" changes (major to minor), but the way the melody then jolts up a 4th (from D# to G#) becomes Eb to G#, and I did not like the look of that. Then, with Cb Eb Gb Bbb in the Cb7 chord, it got ugly. Not a total no-go, but it just looked so much better to me starting in F#. But in the key of G, simply transposing everything in the bridge up a major 2nd, the resulting G#maj7 to C#7 to G#m7 to E7 looked horrendous.

My number one musical interest is arranging, so when I am writing music, my black-and-white keys emphasis has to switch, since now it has to look right. I've run into countless thousand snafus over a few decades, and sometimes no matter how you write something, there are simply pros and cons. One measure looks better, the next looks worse.

I agree. I am interested in the practical side of it, but notation is full of choices. Notation is one person's attempt to communicate to another what to play, and how to play it, and to me it is a lot like writing a play. One person, for instance, may attempt to describe in great detail what each "player" should be doing, tone of voice, mood, body language. There may be a lot of micro-managing in the text. Does it work? I tend to think not.

Another playwright may write little more than the words to the play itself, leaving it up to a director and talented players to get the rest. I often think we have come full circle, because when we go back to Bach, for the most part there is just the music. He makes decisions about notation concerning stems up and down, ties, shows lines in contrapuntal music, but there is next to no phrasing, no fingering, very few dynamics, and so on. It is as if he is saying: "Play my music well. If you know your craft, you will do it justice. If you do not, nothing I add is going to help."

In the 19th century that changed. By the time you get to Chopin, or Debussy, there are so many markings that I feel they drive me AWAY from the music. In fact, you will hear great player after great player obviously NOT following some of the indications, because they don't work. This to me is micro-managing.

In the 20th century, and moving into the 21st, it seems to me that simplicity has returned, especially in jazz. The idea, again, is to get the ideas down, somehow, then trust that people who know their "stuff" will get it right. To me jazz and "pop" is/are incredibly practical. If someone writes a great tune, it's going to be used, but very seldom exactly as it was written, and since the emphasis is on turning something on paper (if it even GETS there) into something living, no one cares too much about now it is notated so long as nothing really confusing is going on.

This is what I tell my students: "When you see something that looks needlessly complicated written by a fine composer or arranger, if you think it is just silly, you probably have not played/written enough music yet, because sooner or later that 'weird' solution is going to end up to be the only one that works. And that is a matter of experience."

I accompanied some old Music Hall songs this evening. There was a Cb chord in the printed copy of some song about a "German Band". It wasn't being a German 6th though.

Just thought I'd mention it :-)

Yes.


This is a superb description! Because I am not a pianist, and because I play primarily from lead sheets, each of my hands “acts” differently. My RH behaves as you say, as long as there is a single melody line: See the notes and rhythm >> hear the notes and rhythm in my head >> my fingers press MOSTLY the correct keys. On the other “hand” (yes! I know . . .), my LH “thinks” in blocks of notes, even if I am rolling or arpeggiating the chords: See the chord symbol >> hear the “color” of the chord in my head >> HAND makes fingers press all notes, usually correct.

So here is an interesting nuance -

Being a real pianist, you see the composite notes of the chord notated on the staff, and translate that directly to fingers on piano keys. When you say you “simply saw the chord”, I am certain you mean notes of the chord ON THE PIANO KEYS. I, however, have a couple of inversions of B9 set in my HAND - my eye sees the chord symbol, and my HAND forms one of the inversions. Because the Cb(9) is not used enough to be “set” in my LH, I have to either quickly “transpose” Cb(9) = B9, or quickly spell the chord, and intentionally get my fingers over the correct notes. It is simply not as automatic for me.

And, to the point make repeatedly on this thread, once I had figured out that enharmonic relationship, I would thereafter “think of the Cb(9)” as my B9 that is already “in my LH” - but for PLAYING PURPOSES ONLY. Just because I am going to be expeditious or lazy in playing does not excuse me from knowing the proper name that should appear “on the MAP”.


Exactly. We can no longer be in our own little worlds of sound, but now must make it so others can duplicate that world.

As you can tell, I am starting to enjoy this topic, too.

Oompah! Oompah!

Cb chords, with or without extensions, abound. I am still wracking the old brain for that elusive Fb(7). Although it contradicts everything we know about string players' key preferences, I am certain that Charles Mingus used it several times, and the tune Good Bye, Pork Pie Hat simply comes to mind. (Eb minor BLUES, covering all the bases!(basses?)) I have been unable to find any definitive "original" showing a sketch or his notation.

Ed

Gary D. - Your description of playing music off the page is true - that is the way it seems to me. I feel like I am in the score - it's a little world. No names just the blur of notation turned into sound that teems with ideas. I love that sensation. and it's funny when I play pieces I know pretty well, I focus mainly on the bass clef - it's like my right hand just handles its business on its own. The experience of playing classical pieces off the page is a unique thing for me. I am mainly working on sight reading and reeling in some pieces that I once knew, or should have known. I love doing it. Just my experience with it. So far as the blues R&B and rock stuff, I really never practice it at home, only when the bands have a rehearsal (except I need to work up a part for "FM"). I play that stuff just out of my head at the time - again very neat experience - that is the ultimate living in the moment. I can't get along without either experience - makes life worth living. To communicate the information we are discussing to the bands, I have to demonstrate what I want them to do in a way they'll understand. Bass player in one band was a woodwinds player in an Air Force band - the rest of them take some finesse. That's what is so interesting about this thread- I love theory discussions, but I also know that the main thing is to get the sound that works whatever you call it. Since I resigned from work and retired I can practice with enough time and energy. Life is good.

I see that you have mostly intepreted this as Fb(9). What about F(b9)? Do b9 chords get used? I just read something which said that a minor ninth is the most dissonant of dissonant intervals. (Not sure why it's more dissonant than a minor second, but maybe they were just considering large intervals.)

Hey PianoStudent88,

I wondered how long it would take you to check-in on one of your favorite subjects . . .

The missing-in-action Mr. Tango starts by asking how to spell, and construct an “Fb9” chord.

Immediately, Custard Apple and Studio Joe just ASSume the F(b9), and answer based on that ASSumption, and leave it at that.

JasperKeys is the first to recognize the ambiguity.

Daviel jumps in with one way of thinking about Fb (9).

I ask for clarification:

As it turns out, I should not have bothered, but that is another story . . . . .

Tango, still watching his own thread at that point, responds:

It is obvious that he is referring to Fb(9) for the following reasons:
[1] The key (Ab major), and the surrounding chords.
[2] It is a “down home” style blues. If it were a 1950s or 1960s rock-and-roll piece, then the F (b9) COULD work.
[3] The chromatically descending ninth chord a common structure in blue and jazz.
[4] Subsequent posts confirm the harmony and the style. Also that it might be common to tune the guitars a step or two lower for various reasons, which would have the effect of making “foreign” chords (like F9 in the key of A major) even MORE foreign.

I am certain your question about flatted ninth chords is, at least in part, a rhetorical one. The most common occurance is the dominant seventh chord with ninth in harmonic minor, where it occurs naturally.

As far as dissonance, as you know, it ALL depends on the surroundings. There may be a scientific reason for that position, involving the overtone series where the “beats” are more violent in a minor ninth - I really have no idea.
One of the most beautiful suspensions in the universe is 6 resolving to 5 in a minor key, with either tonic or the dominant in the bass! Key: {F minor}. Dominant flatted ninth chord{C + E + G + Bb + Db) >> resolving to Tonic chord {F + Ab + C }! Try it - you’ll like it!
Ed

Are you serious? :-)

Assuming you are, yes, the b9 chord is extremely common in all styles of music.

As well as the standard chord, every diminished 7th chord is essentially a dominant 7th(b9) chord with the root missing. There's a good one near the beginning of Bach's famous D minor toccata. C#, , G, Bb over a D root - now THERE's an interesting bunch of dissonances!

I am serious. Well informed in some areas, and massively naive in others. And there I had only just finished reading this week about diminished and half-diminished chords and how to consider them as rootless ninths. In one ear and out the other, I guess. But what about flat ninth chords that include the root?

I've only just started to really grapple with extended chords and rootless chords, and it's all still really foreign to me.

Very common, both as a melody note and as colour within a dom7 type chord.

Thanks, Exalted Wombat. I think if I've met these before, I've glazed over them as "note not in the harmony." Will have to start paying attention and naming them by interval.

Pianostudent88: In jazs, one of the most common uses of the b9 on a dominant chord is what we call the minor II-V-I. If you are playing a II-V-I sequence that will end on a minor chord, the norm is to play the flat 5 in the II (a half dimished chord)and the flat 9 on the dominant chord (it's the same note).

In addition, if you are playing with a bass player (or even not), you can do this with rootless chords. Here is a rootless voicing for a II-V-I to C minor, for left handed rootless chords that would accompnay your right handed improvisation.

From bottom up:
II: F Ab C D
V: F Ab B D#
I: Eb G A D (if you want the I to be a minor 6)

I suppose it is not really my place to say, here, but I am not certain you are helping CLARIFY things by throwing in an AUGMENTED dominant with flatted ninth. With full and total respect to PianoStudent88, it is unlikely she will be playing with a bass and drummer in the next few weeks. She is asking about a flatted ninth chord, and about a minor ninth interval - not rootless chords and shells and dilutions. Those topics can, and should, all come much later.