Chord theory books

adampeter

Been listening to a fair bit of Steely Dan recently, realized there is a huge gap in my chord knowledge.
Can anyone recommend a book or 2 to take me through the basics?
Don't want to learn to read music, just learn about how to construct and substitute chords
Thanks  

beed84

Mickey Baker's Complete Course in Jazz Guitar is a nice, no nonsense approach to understanding chords and substitutions:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mickey-Bakers-Complete-Course-Guitar/dp/0825652804

Grangousier

Ted Greene was the master of this. His books Chord Chemistry and Modern Chord Progressions were my introduction to insane jazz chord stuff. Lots of lesson notes and stuff on his website - http://www.tedgreene.com and check out some of the (often very lo-fi) videos on YouTube, for example:


It probably doesn't answer your question, but I think he's fun to watch, and it shows that he's not thinking in terms of this chord or that chord, but about moving notes through different harmonies.

Grangousier

Actually, I just watched that through and as much as I enjoyed it, I realise it doesn't answer the original question. I think the thing with a lot of jazz chord stuff and Steely Dan stuff is that they don't think in terms of chords as these discrete things you jump between but as cross-sections through harmony that moves around. The best thing to do for that is to take three notes you know is in a particular key and move it up and down the scale - for example, C-E-A on the top three strings at the fifth fret are in Cmajor. So take them up one step of the scale to D-F-B, then up to E-G-C and so forth. Alternatively if you want to be in F major, it goes up to D-F-Bb and so on. You'd be playing chords, and you could give them names, but it's actually just moving notes through the scales and the chord names are just convenient labels for one or another configuration of notes. That seems to be the way piano players think about it and also jazz guitarists, or at least the ones I like. It's clear from watching Greene that that's how he thinks about it, too. I'm not there myself, but trying to think like that was very liberating. 

If you like the Dan, btw, you probably need the Mu Major chord: http://www.jazzguitar.be/blog/steely-dan-chords/ ;

Brad

@adampeter where exactly are you at with your chord knowledge? Be careful with what books you go for because you don't want to be left frustrated with a book you may not be ready for yet...

If you're after basics, personally I'd probably avoid the Ted Greene stuff for now (I didn't get on with Chord Chemistry but Modern Chord Progressions is great!).

Check out the chord sections on Justinguitar.com and Guthrie Govan's book Creative Guitar 1 talks about chords and theory in a very accessible way.

If you get a good working knowledge of the following types of chords you'll be well on your way.

Triads - major, minor, diminished and augmented.

7ths - maj7, min7, dom7, m7b5 and dim7

9ths - maj9, min9, dom9

Altered Dominants - 7#9, 7b9, 7#5

notanon

^^^ yep this is what makes TFB the place to be :-)

adampeter

@Brad , just had my eureka moment on how chords are constructed, the importance of thinking about chords rather than scales when soloing and harmonized scales.
before i just was learning progressions and solos parrot fashion.
So i guess i'm at the beginning.
Next is to get my head around substitutions and when to use them

Brad

adampeter said:

@Brad , just had my eureka moment on how chords are constructed, the importance of thinking about chords rather than scales when soloing and harmonized scales.
before i just was learning progressions and solos parrot fashion.
So i guess i'm at the beginning.
Next is to get my head around substitutions and when to use them

You can't beat those eureka moments! 

How comfortable are you with knowing how the intervals are stacked, within any given voicing you play? I.e can you comfortably locate the 5th in every Maj7 shape you know? Or the 3rd etc... Knowing this will allow you to see how maj7 changes to dom7. What changes from dom7 to get a min7 and so on rather than just learning shapes parrot fashion. 

Regarding substitutions, that's about replacing one chord with another. Take the chord progression Dm7 - G7 - Cmaj7 (or ii V I if you're cool with the numbers system).  

Just as a starting point, have you any idea what you can substitute the G7(V) chord for and why?

adampeter

Brad said:

adampeter said:

@Brad , just had my eureka moment on how chords are constructed, the importance of thinking about chords rather than scales when soloing and harmonized scales.
before i just was learning progressions and solos parrot fashion.
So i guess i'm at the beginning.
Next is to get my head around substitutions and when to use them

You can't beat those eureka moments! 

How comfortable are you with knowing how the intervals are stacked, within any given voicing you play? I.e can you comfortably locate the 5th in every Maj7 shape you know? Or the 3rd etc... Knowing this will allow you to see how maj7 changes to dom7. What changes from dom7 to get a min7 and so on rather than just learning shapes parrot fashion. 

Regarding substitutions, that's about replacing one chord with another. Take the chord progression Dm7 - G7 - Cmaj7 (or ii V I if you're cool with the numbers system).  

Just as a starting point, have you any idea what you can substitute the G7(V) chord for and why?

Hi @Brad ;

I can work out how the intervals are stacked, that is I can look at a chord and work out where the root/third/fifth/seventh/etc are.
And I suppose if someone asked me to play a fancy chord and its parent scale I could work out how to play it (probably!!)
As for substitutions I have no idea what I can use instead of any given chord, this I assume is tied in with going beyond triads?

Brad

@adampeter Ok that's a good starting point, also when you're playing chords try and only play each voice once (don't have two 5ths etc) if you can help it. I'm assuming you know how chords are constructed as in a G7 is 1 3 5 b7 (G B D F)?

For substitution all this knowledge comes in handy. It can get pretty wild but for a basic starting point you can substitute a chord for another that shares many or some, of the same notes. I'll give you this one for nowt  

Taking that ii V I (D-7 G7 Cmaj7) chord progression we're going to substitute the V (G7) chord for something else. 

We are going to use Db7. Why? Lets do some analysis...

The formula for G7 is 1 3 5 b7 or the notes G B D F

The formula is the same for Db7 but with these notes Db F Ab B (well Cb to be pedantic)

Notice how the 3rd of G (B) is the 7th of Db (B/Cb) and the 7th of G (F) is the 3rd of Db?

Because they share these really important notes (3rd and 7th) we can substitute them for one another. This instance is called Tritone Substitution. A tritone is the middle point of the octave, so Db is the middle note between a G octave or a #4/b5 away from the root. This means any dom7 chord can be substituted with another dom7 this is a tritone away. 

Now instead of D-7 G7 Cmaj7 you can play D-7 Db7 Cmaj7.

What about this E-7 A7 D-7 G7 Cmaj7? You could go E-7 Eb7 D-7 Db7 Cmaj7 because Eb7 is the tritone sub of A7.

All this can get pretty full-on and it's a lot of work, but as an introduction to it I hope this helps in some way.

adampeter

Brad said:

@adampeter Ok that's a good starting point, also when you're playing chords try and only play each voice once (don't have two 5ths etc) if you can help it. I'm assuming you know how chords are constructed as in a G7 is 1 3 5 b7 (G B D F)?

For substitution all this knowledge comes in handy. It can get pretty wild but for a basic starting point you can substitute a chord for another that shares many or some, of the same notes. I'll give you this one for nowt  

Taking that ii V I (D-7 G7 Cmaj7) chord progression we're going to substitute the V (G7) chord for something else. 

We are going to use Db7. Why? Lets do some analysis...

The formula for G7 is 1 3 5 b7 or the notes G B D F

The formula is the same for Db7 but with these notes Db F Ab B (well Cb to be pedantic)

Notice how the 3rd of G (B) is the 7th of Db (B/Cb) and the 7th of G (F) is the 3rd of Db?

Because they share these really important notes (3rd and 7th) we can substitute them for one another. This instance is called Tritone Substitution. A tritone is the middle point of the octave, so Db is the middle note between a G octave or a #4/b5 away from the root. This means any dom7 chord can be substituted with another dom7 this is a tritone away. 

Now instead of D-7 G7 Cmaj7 you can play D-7 Db7 Cmaj7.

What about this E-7 A7 D-7 G7 Cmaj7? You could go E-7 Eb7 D-7 Db7 Cmaj7 because Eb7 is the tritone sub of A7.

All this can get pretty full-on and it's a lot of work, but as an introduction to it I hope this helps in some way.

You may have heard a small explosion from the cambridge area....that was the sound of my head exploding....i wont pretend that i fully followed that but at least i can see the direction that i need to focus my study on 

Brad

Oh dear, sorry about that!  

Lets look at it a different way. Take the same progression D-7 G7 Cmaj7. You could play this D-7 G7 A-7. Why does that work?

Cmaj7 is 1 3 5 7 (C E G B )

A-7 is 1 b3 5 b7 (A C E G)

Notice how these chords share the notes C E and G? These chords are related, as in Am is the relative minor of C. It's a very important relationship.  

If all the above seems like a mountain to climb that's because it is, but you'll get there  

Maybe leave the chord substitution stuff for the time being though and concentrate on really learning your chord theory and how it applies to the guitar up to scratch. These foundations need to be in place for the more advanced stuff to make any sense. 

Have you been working on any Steely Dan tunes?

CarpeDiem

I've found the chord substitution knowledge helpful @Brad - wis awarded.

adampeter

Thanks @Brad , i do kinda see where you're coming from, i guess because i'm new to chord theory its making my brain hurt.
What set me on this path was working on Peg and Josie, some lovely chords, so i thought it was time to understand wtf was going on

bigjon

As part of Chord Of The Week I did a mini-series of 6 on harmonising Twinkle Twinkle Little Star jazz-style which you may find helpful, the first one is at 
http://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/64757/chord-of-the-week-2-1-16-twinklejazz1-jazz-imaj7-3rd-7th-chord-frags
and the second post on that link has an index for the rest of the series.

adampeter

bigjon said:

As part of Chord Of The Week I did a mini-series of 6 on harmonising Twinkle Twinkle Little Star jazz-style which you may find helpful, the first one is at 
http://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/64757/chord-of-the-week-2-1-16-twinklejazz1-jazz-imaj7-3rd-7th-chord-frags
and the second post on that link has an index for the rest of the series.

Thanks for the heads up @bigjon , that's something to get my teeth into

blobb

can heartily recommend these. A brilliant ground up explanation of how this 'music' thing works without blowing your brains out. Written by Dave Stewart, he makes the complicated easy to understand. Dave is well known for his engaging and entertaining writing style and has the provenance to back up what he says.

Should answer all of your question.

http://tinyurl.com/ybso5lmx


http://tinyurl.com/y9vcvfyc