Can We Even Agree On What ALTERED DOMINANT Chords Are?

hello internets and I see you today we talk about ultra dominant courts and I personally think ultra dominant courts are great and can do thing that no other court can do now the problem if we can talk about a problem is that when you encounter them for the first time you typically hear them in a jazz situation so what happens is that if you do like jazz which is great you typically like those chords immediately because they are part of your language but if you don't like jazz and you're into different kinds of music at the beginning you don't understand ultra dominant chords because they sound too jazzy for you but as we've seen a minute does chord work in many other different size and they provide you sounds you would not get otherwise and those sounds definitely do not sound jazz so what do you like jazz or not let's see how all those chord can sound so again when you first meet them yet it typically here the standard classic five to one in a jazz situation something like that he seven flat nine to a minor seven [Music] isse Evan sharp nine to a minor seven [Music] g7 shop 5c major nine [Music] but I promise you that who sound different so here's another couple of examples where they sound completely different [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Applause] so at this point I'd like to give you a definition of what are three dominant chords are so that we can start using them and making some music with them but it appears that we can't agree exactly on what ultra dominant chords are as an example let's take these chord these chord is a slash c7 this is a poly corn and it contains the note of the c7 chord and the north of the a major chord the root of this chord is C and the note of the a major chord are reinterpreted in the light of the sea route so the a note is a six or a 13 if you prefer and the C sharp is heard as a D flat that is as a flat 9 this course sounds this way so we could also spell this chord as c7 flat 9 13 so here's the problem for some musician this is obviously an ultra dominant chord and for some other musician is obviously not an ad for a dominant chord so what is the problem here we're going to see in a minute that understanding why there is this difference of opinion as actual consequences in the music that you've write and it does really make an audible difference so let's see what happens the problem is in the word Alfred and in fact in music we use this word to mean two different things which are related but not exactly the same and again the difference is important so some musician understand the word altered in ultra dominant chord with the first meaning being some notes of the chord have been changed dramatically so if we take a dominant chord like c7 see e G B flat or c9 c eg B flat D altering those chords means that some notes have been changed a half-step up or a half step down now we have to pay attention because we have to keep those chord dominant otherwise that wouldn't be altered dominant chord so we cannot really touch the root we cannot touch the third and we cannot touch the seventh because we need those three note to make it a dominant chord so we are left with the fifth and the ninth of the chord so if we take this definition we can change either the ninth or the fifth freely up or down so we can have a c7 with a flat five a c7 with a sharp five a c7 with a flat nine as a seven with a sharp nine and any combination there off like a c7 with a flat five and a sharp nine or c7 with a sharp nine and a flat five etc etc if now I take a c-13 which is made by the note C E G B flat D a I could alter just a ninth making it a flat nine and I will get the poly code have seen before a over c7 so based on this definition that cord will be an altered chord but here's the thing some other musician understand the word altered in ultra dominant chord as in the chord is derived from the alt red scale so what is the ultra scale the other the scale is made by the note C D flat d sharp e G flat G sharp B flat and yes I know I'm using the D note twice and the G note twice when I spell in this scale and I'm not using any F or any a but this is not a mistake the altered scale is an exception in the normal way of spelling a scale because this D flat is perceived as a flat 9 and his d sharp is perceived as a sharp 9 the East perceives a major 3rd of course the G flat as a flat 5 the G sharp as a shop five and the B flat is a seventh this scale sound wise has no fort and no 6th I must say that this scale with deserve a much more tour of treatment what I'm doing right now but the thing is I just need the scale right now to show you what happens because here's the thing if you take a core that contains the C the E and the B flat note in this scale this chord is going to be a dominant chord then you're going to supply it with one or more of the other notes D flat D sharp G flat G sharp so you see if I take the note from this scale I still get my c7 chopped 5 my c7 flat 5 my c7 flat 9 and my c7 sharp 9 so as long as we limit ourself to those chords there is no problem but let's say that I have a chord that has the notes see eg B flat D flat as you can see this code as a flat 9 but it also has a natural 5 so by the first definition of the word alt red meaning some notes are changed dramatically this is an ultra dominant chord but by the second definition of the word altered that is coming from the altered scale this is not an ultra dominant chord because the 5th is not altered now why is this important because if you are working with a musician that understand altered as coming from the Altran scale well when they tell you they are playing an alt red chord you automatically know that you can improvise over it using an altered scale but if you are working with a musician that understands the word altered as in some notes our chromatically changed then you cannot automatically use the altered scale when they are telling you that they are playing an altered chord because some of the notes in the chord may conflict with the altered scale now with these C seven flat nine with a natural 5 example it's typically not a big problem because most of the time when we play a flat nine chord on a guitar or even another instrument we don't play the five at all so there is no real conflict but let's take again the poly chord we have seen before the a over c7 which is made by the note C eg B flat D flat E again maybe we don't play the fifth so the natural five is not a big problem but now we have the D flat note which is a flat nine which is a note from the altered scale or an altered note if you want but we also have the natural a which is not in the altered scale so if somebody play's this chord and calls it an altered chord and we use the altered scale on top of it to improvise we're gonna have a problem instead the scale that is most commonly used over this chord is the diminished scale C D flat D sharp e F sharp G a B flat this scale as eighth notes it sounds very interesting and as you can see it fits this chord perfectly it contains the flat nine and it contains the natural sixth now with this video I'm just showing you that when people say Ultra dominant chords they can mean two different things and the interesting thing is that most musicians are oblivious to this difference that is if you are a musician who has been taught that the ultra dominant chord are any dominant chord in which you change some notes grammatically then these is clearly the obviously right definition for an ultra dominant court while if you've been taught that the alt red court come from the altered scale this other is clearly the only and correct definition and so when you miss somebody who has the opposite opinion as yours you will be very tempted to label them as simply wrong now in my opinion both those musicians are right they're just talking about different thing some people are focusing on the chord and now some notes are changing and some of the people are focusing on what scale the court come from it's just unfortunate that those musicians use the same name to indicate two different things but it's not a problem of who's right and who's wrong it's just a problem of using the same name and not agreeing on how to call things we all agree on what to do in practice that is that when you improvise on the poly chord a over c7 you are going to use a diminished scale and not the altered scale the only thing we disagree on is if this chord is called ultra dominant or not so my recommendation is whenever you encounter an ultra dominant chord ask the other musicians in your band exactly what knows they are playing so that you know what scared to use and it don't just rely on an imprecise definition that would be different depending on the musicians you're working with either way what do you call them alternate dominant chords or you call them something different those chords sound gorgeous and you can and should use more of them in your music yes at the beginning they may sound strange but your ear will get used to it really fast and you'll find some great expressive way of using them if you need help knowing how to use those chord in your music and how to fit them in a chord progressions that they sound good I do recommend you check out my course complete chord mastery this is not a book it's not even a series of book it's a complete video course studied for guitar players that explain everything that is to know about chord harmonic chord progression etc to guitar players and we do all the theory is straight on the fretboard we don't use piano we don't use other instruments we do everything straight on the fretboard that it's practical for any working guitar players you can use everything you learn immediately and you can actually understand everything you do straight on your instrument if you have a minute click on the link and check it out if you like these videos mention that like button and don't forget to subscribe and click on notification otherwise YouTube will not tell you when I put up a new video and if you have any comment feedback observation etc just write a comment below I read all my comment and I love hearing from you this is the Mozilla Ami's did I forget calm and at the next time enjoy

Channel: MusicTheoryForGuitar

Views: 46,081

Keywords: altered chords, altered dominant chords, altered dominant scale, altered dominant guitar, music theory for guitar, tommaso zillio

Id: Ew-M9-6PE6s

Length: 12min 30sec (750 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 02 2020