Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum G 7over4 (b9) piano chord notes

What are the notes of the chord G 7over4(b9) piano chord?The 7 is over the 4.It is not 7/4.I could not duplicate the 7 over a 4 chord on my keyboard.It is a chord from the song "Corcodova".It is over the lyrics "sea,how love-ly".

G7 over 4 is not a chord.

G7 over b9 is not a chord.

G7(b9) chord notes are F, Ab, B, D over a G bass.

Alternate bass notes (if any) are named in the chord. It is common to switch out 1 for 5. So G/D for example. Uncommon to switch out the bass note for some obscure chord extension. I've never seen a G7/Ab, which is the G7 over the flat 9th bass. The dominant chord loses all it's thunder if it isn't over the root.

Could you please clarify what specifically the arrangement is requesting?

In addition to what Greener said, the 4, which would be C natural, would never be included in a G7 chord, bass note or otherwise.

You'll hear quite few alternatives for this chord in recorded versions but the chart here is probably suggesting G7sus4b9 (aka G7s4b9).

Try (reading from low note upwards)
LH: G,F
RH: Ab,C,D


G7sus4 and variants are common - maybe less often seen in jazz but how about H. Hancocks Maiden Voyage?

- just a little afterthought; the writer (of your lead sheet, I don't mean Jobim) might have meant that the chord should be played 'over4' which could reasonably be interpreted as using the 4th as a bass note, thus:

LH: C,F
RH: Ab,C,D (same as before)

..and this moves nicely to a frequently used first chord for the second 16 bars, D9/A

LH: A, F#
RH: C E

Note that the chord in question (first chord above) is Fm6/C (the note G wouldn't affect the colour here). I'd be quite happy to see that on a chord chart or lead sheet as an instantly readable alternative.

What does all this amount to?
G7sus4b9/C = Fm6/C give or take.

Dire tonic: You could be right, but I've never seen a sus chord noted as a slash chord with 4 in the bass. Certainly not in any Jobim charts I've ever seen. I think that a sus4b9 chord is sometimes referred to as a Phrygian chord, although who really cares if that's true!? A good example of that is one of my favorite ballads, Infant Eyes by Wayne Shorter (see the bridge). Maiden Voyage is surely almost all sus chords, but flat nine? I've not played it that way, but it might work!

- jjo, definitely no b9 in Maiden Voyage. It's the pure and simple sus4 and variants like the 11 which would often include the 9 as in MV. There's a lot of that in later jazz (maybe not so much in bebop?).