ii v I question

[simonjandrews]

Hi guys,

Have been working my way through the Abersold ii v i book along with my alto sax. I have down the major ii vi i in all keys fairly well now ( its took me well over 9 months to crack it) I am now looking at the ii7-5 v+9 I progression. The sound of this progression has not yet sunk into me if you know what I mean. Abersold stipulates the scales half dim to diminished wholetone and then to the tonic.

That being said could you please confirm or not as the case may be-

taking the chords Bm7b5 E7+9 A-7.

Can the dominant chord E7+9 take the 7th mode of F melodic minor (acending) ? is this the same scale as E diminished whole tone scale?

Your help with this will be greatly appreciated.

Simon Andrews.

[jazz oud]

Originally Posted by simonjandrews

Can the dominant chord E7+9 take the 7th mode of F melodic minor (acending) ? is this the same scale as E diminished whole tone scale?

Yes. "Diminished Whole Tone" is another name for the "altered" scale, which is the same as mode 7 of melodic minor.

Abersold's approach to ii-V's in that volume leaves a lot to be desired, IMO.
Check out Burt Ligon's "connecting chords with linear harmony" for a more meaningful approach.

Things to be aware of:
From a voice leading (and therefore melodic) standpoint, the main event in a II-V-I (major or minor) is the b7 of II moving to the 3rd of the V, and the b7 of the V moving to the 3rd of I.

There are other ways to negotiate the changes, of course, but that is the basic one (alternate option: 9 moving to 5, especially on the V-I part).

Practicing targeting the chord tones will be more fruitful than trying to switch between 3 different scales. II-V's often happen too quickly for a scale-based approach to make sense. The main chord tones to target are 3, 5, 7, and 1 (in order of importance).

Before dealing with a bunch of different scales, it's worth noting that there are diatonic ways to deal with these changes that work just fine and often sound less forced, especially coming from a novice.
ii7-V7-Imaj7: major scale of the key, targeting the chord tones of each chord.
iiø7-V7b9-i6: minor scale of the key, just altering the 6th and 7th: natural minor (iiø7), harmonic minor (V7b9), melodic minor (i6). You can have all the chromatic tones from b6 to 7 available at any time as well (b6, 6, b7, 7).

I would advise getting very very familiar with these and being able to melodically target the chord tones before trying to switch between scales.

[meritonemusic]

Originally Posted by simonjandrews

Hi guys,

Have been working my way through the Abersold ii v i book along with my alto sax. I have down the major ii vi i in all keys fairly well now ( its took me well over 9 months to crack it) I am now looking at the ii7-5 v+9 I progression. The sound of this progression has not yet sunk into me if you know what I mean. Abersold stipulates the scales half dim to diminished wholetone and then to the tonic.

That being said could you please confirm or not as the case may be-

taking the chords Bm7b5 E7+9 A-7.

Can the dominant chord E7+9 take the 7th mode of F melodic minor (acending) ? is this the same scale as E diminished whole tone scale?

Your help with this will be greatly appreciated.

Simon Andrews.

Yep, F melodic minor works great on E7 - also goes by the name of the "altered scale".

Here are some bossa style play along jam tracks for minor 2-5-1 progressions you might also find helpful...

C Minor 2-5-1 jam track

A Minor 2-5-1 Jam track

F Minor 2-5-1 jam track

Enjoy..

[JonR]

Originally Posted by simonjandrews

Hi guys,

Have been working my way through the Abersold ii v i book along with my alto sax. I have down the major ii vi i in all keys fairly well now ( its took me well over 9 months to crack it) I am now looking at the ii7-5 v+9 I progression. The sound of this progression has not yet sunk into me if you know what I mean. Abersold stipulates the scales half dim to diminished wholetone and then to the tonic.

That being said could you please confirm or not as the case may be-

taking the chords Bm7b5 E7+9 A-7.

Can the dominant chord E7+9 take the 7th mode of F melodic minor (acending) ? is this the same scale as E diminished whole tone scale?

Your help with this will be greatly appreciated.

Simon Andrews.

To illustrate some of what jazzoud was talking about: targeting chord tones, and voice-leading from chord to chord. Starting with a root position Bm7b5, here's how each note might lead via E7#9 to Am7:

Bm7b5      E7alt        Am7
 
 A (7) \    G# (3) /     A (R) 
 A     \    G#     \     G (7)
 A     \\   G (#9) \     F# (6)

 F (5)  \   E (R)  =     E (5)
 F     =    F (b9) \     E
 F     =    F      /     F#

 D (3) =    D (7)  \\    C (3)
 D     =    D      //    E (5)
 D     \\   C (b13)  =   C
 D     \\   C        =   B (9)

 B (R) \    Bb (b5)  \   A 
 B     \    Bb (b5)  /   B
 B     /    C        =   C
 B     /    C        \   B

\ - half-step down (strong move)
/ - half-step up (strong move)
\\ - whole step down (weak)
// - whole step up (weak)
= - shared tone

Every note in the first chord has two optional moves to nearest chord tones or alterations on the E7alt. Those tones themselves then have various leading options on to the tonic, or its consonant extensions.
(F# would not be a common choice on Am7, but would be on a standard minor key tonic, which could have 6, maj7 or 9 extensions - ie an A melodic minor chord.).
Every note of the E altered scale is in play above, and you can see all the half-step leading options.
You can regard this as the purpose of an altered dominant - to maximise the chromatic voice-leading from V7 to I. (You get an additional half-step move to a major tonic, the traditional 4-3 move; eg D>C# in A major.)
IOW, don't think of the scale as a stack of cool tensions on E7 (which it is, of course) but as various ways of getting to good notes on the Am.

Think linear, like jazzoud said (and Bert Ligon and various others). Most jazz changes are too quick to get much sensible mileage out of exploring a whole scale on each chord. You need to assess the significant notes (ie chord tones) and what their functional role is.
Guide tones (3rds and 7ths) will show you the way (3 > 7 > 3, etc, through the sequence), and other extensions and alterations can lead in similar ways.

But "targeting" chord tones also means planning phrases to land on a chosen chord tone on the next chord (or the one after). How you shape the phrase before the target can vary a lot, and may not always need to adhere to chord tones or even a recommended scale - but of course the further you deviate from chord tones, the stronger your phrase needs to be in itself (melodically and rhythmically).
IOW, there is no need to always follow smooth voice-leading (half-step and whole step moves between chords), but that's the way to get an understanding of how the chords work. (It will also improve your comping skills.)

[simonjandrews]

Cheers guys, that makes it a lot clearer. Like was said earlier there is a lot left out of the abersold ii v i book. I will have a rum over the backing tracks. Cheers.

[PowerOfSoul]

Originally Posted by jazz oud

[...]
Check out Burt Ligon's "connecting chords with linear harmony" for a more meaningful approach.

I strongly second this suggestion, I've found it extremely helpful. The most helpful part of the book is the short Chapter II where he defines three main outlines. I find it helpful to think of six main outlines: Ligon's division into three concerns what you do on the ii chord; he subdivides each of these outlines depending on what you do on the V7 chord, but there's basically two possibilities there that he considers (he also points out you can pop up or down an octave while in the middle of executing one of these two choices, i.e. go up a 7th instead of down a 2nd, that kind of thing, which I've so far not practiced).

Ligon's three options for the ii chord are (degrees those of the chord relative to the chord root, i.e. 1 is root of the ii chord here):

1) ascending arpeggio 1 3 5 7

2) descending scale 3 2 1 7

3) descending triad followed by whole step: 5 3 1 7


You'll note all of these end on the 7th. The two choices for followup over the V7 chord and first beat of I (or i) are (barline denoted "|", notes before it relative to V7, notes after relative to I (or i):

1) scalar descent: 3 2 1 7 | 3

2) arpeggio-wise ascent: 3 5 7 9 | 5

You can combine these to get six overall outlines. All have the strong 7 ---> 3 voiceleading from ii to V7, and depending which of the two choices
you use over V7, you get the 7 --> 3 or 9 ---> 5 voiceleading to the i. (See jazz oud's further discussion quoted below.)

For actually using in an improv, these sound best with a harmonic rhythm not of full 4/4 measures, with the line played in quarter notes (as my "barline" suggests), but with a harmonic rhythm of half-measures (a chord held over two beats, in 4/4) and the line played in eighths. You can also play them in 8th notes even with the slower harmonic rhythm, if you pick the right place... but you might need some other stuff to fill in...

Just playing these helps me get in my ear where the important chord tones are, and the feel of the scale with good voice-leading... then I find it relatively easy to extend them, to insert "delaying" bits (e.g. going back up the scale a little ways and down again, or inserting chromaticism into the diatonic scalar descent, or diatonics notes between arpeggiated ones...) into the outline. Delay is useful, for example, if you want to play 8ths but the changes occur every measure. A common extension if you were descending to hit the tonic on 3, is to continue down the scale, or drop to 1, or drop to 1 and then 7 (playing the 1 and 7 as quarter notes).... I think some places I may substitute a note from the bebop scale... Ligon talks about some of this stuff, and it's fun and probably useful to read the lines he's lifted from major players, but I find rather than think about those suggestions, I just make it happen naturally. If you do buy the book, you might want to just pick one line that sounds particularly good that illustrates a particular concept, and run it through the keys. Anyway, I find the three possibilities for the ii chord can tend to lead into natural stuff that I just make up over the V7 chord...they provide a way of "getting into " the ii V7 and then either ear and fingers take over, or you can continue a la Ligon. The goal isn't necessarily to use exactly these licks over all ii V7 I/i's, but it's a good way to practice and get into it, systematically doing one and then another over an Aebersold track or something similar.

For using them in tunes, I find it helpful to write the 3 and 5 degree, in order, in the chart above the root over the ii chord of each ii V7 I want to target for using the licks... then I decide ahead of time which outline I'm going to use, and I have the triad of posible start notes displayed already. Eventually you can end up picking which outline to use as you go along, etc... It's a good way to learn to hear where the ii V7's are, and to get your fingers used to hitting them.

If I get a chance, perhaps I'll post a select few useful minor ii V7's that don't fit these patterns.

I agree with jazz oud that consciously thinking about scale-switching is probably not a great idea at first. If you want to try out certain scales over certain chords, find a great-sounding ii-V7-I (or i) pattern that uses notes from particular scales and practice it, get it in your ear and fingers. Then you'll really have the sound and feel of it ... E.g. I found a lot of the lines written in Aebersold's volume 3 kind of meh, but there was one, I think it was 15, that points out it the use of the dim scale over V7, and that was really helpful for me. Then I made up some other ways of using the dim scale there.

When it starts sounding right, it's really fun...

Howard

Originally Posted by jazz oud

Things to be aware of:
From a voice leading (and therefore melodic) standpoint, the main event in a II-V-I (major or minor) is the b7 of II moving to the 3rd of the V, and the b7 of the V moving to the 3rd of I.


There are other ways to negotiate the changes, of course, but that is the basic one (alternate option: 9 moving to 5, especially on the V-I part).


ii7-V7-Imaj7: major scale of the key, targeting the chord tones of each chord.
iiø7-V7b9-i6: minor scale of the key, just altering the 6th and 7th: natural minor (iiø7), harmonic minor (V7b9), melodic minor (i6). You can have all the chromatic tones from b6 to 7 available at any time as well (b6, 6, b7, 7).

I would advise getting very very familiar with these and being able to melodically target the chord tones before trying to switch between scales.

[PowerOfSoul]

Thanks for the voiceleading examples, JonR, very illuminating to play through on piano (useful to do even for non-piano players to see what's going on, I think). I have a few more comments below the quote, including one more voice-leading suggestion based on #11 of V7 and related to using the 7th mode of melodic minor based on V.

Originally Posted by JonR

To illustrate some of what jazzoud was talking about: targeting chord tones, and voice-leading from chord to chord. Starting with a root position Bm7b5, here's how each note might lead via E7#9 to Am7:

Bm7b5      E7alt        Am7
 
 A (7) \    G# (3) /     A (R) 
 A     \    G#     \     G (7)
 A     \\   G (#9) \     F# (6)

 F (5)  \   E (R)  =     E (5)
 F     =    F (b9) \     E
 F     =    F      /     F#

 D (3) =    D (7)  \\    C (3)
 D     =    D      //    E (5)
 D     \\   C (b13)  =   C
 D     \\   C        =   B (9)

 B (R) \    Bb (b5)  \   A 
 B     \    Bb (b5)  /   B
 B     /    C        =   C
 B     /    C        \   B

Good to remember of course that the tones can lead to each other in various ways, e.g. being directly next to each other as in the basic Ligon outlines, or if they are held through the whole measure, or by being emphasized in the melody but possibly with intervening material.

One thing to add, particularly if the "diminshed whole-tone scale" (7th mode melodic minor) is used over V7, as the OP wondered about, is that perhaps the weirdest thing about that scale is that relative to the minor tonic chord, the root is avoided, but there's a b2 (not to be confused with the b2 relative to V, which it also has). If we try to find a mode of it starting on the tonic, the closest we can get is b2 b3 4 5 b6 b7 7. The b2 relative to the tonic is a #11 relative to V, another "altered" note. So it's nice to think about the voice-leading we can get with this note, A# (or if you prefer, Bb) in the key of A. There is of course A# to A, the minor tonic itself, which sounds OK. But A# to B, the 9th of the tonic, is very pretty. I think that's one to remember, too. It's perhaps the most characteristic and "out" part of the diminished whole-tone sound over V7, since all the other notes of that scale appear in standard minor scales relative to the tonic... the b2 (=b9) and minor 3rd (= #9) relative to V are just the good old b6 and b7 relative to the tonic, the b13 of V7 is just the tonic's minor 3rd...

I guess the business of having the b2 relative to the tonic suggests that the diminished WT scale on V7 might also go with the tritone sub of V7 (which I think I've also read is so), but I haven't worked out what the scale is relative to that V7, or played the combination on the piano yet...

[JonR]

Originally Posted by PowerOfSoul

I guess the business of having the b2 relative to the tonic suggests that the diminished WT scale on V7 might also go with the tritone sub of V7 (which I think I've also read is so), but I haven't worked out what the scale is relative to that V7, or played the combination on the piano yet...

The scale is the same, but goes by a different name if you spell it from the root of the tritone sub.
Eg, in A minor, the altered scale on E7 is enharmonic with F melodic minor.
The exact same set of pitches works on E7's tritone sub, Bb7, where it's known as "lydian dominant".
"E altered" = E F G G# Bb C D (arbitrary enharmonics, but those are probably the ones we'd choose)
"Bb lydian dominant" = Bb C D E F G Ab. All the same notes.

When you start extending these chords, you realise the only real difference between them is whether the bass is E or Bb. (Compare Bb13#11 with E7b5#9...)
In fact, IMO, the tritone sub (bII7 and its obvious set of half-step moves to I) is what explains the altered V7. IOW, it's as if we get the altered V7 (its various alterations) from the bII7 chord, not vice versa.

[Mr BC]

Originally Posted by jazz oud

Yes. "Diminished Whole Tone" is another name for the "altered" scale, which is the same as mode 7 of melodic minor.

Abersold's approach to ii-V's in that volume leaves a lot to be desired, IMO.
Check out Burt Ligon's "connecting chords with linear harmony" for a more meaningful approach.

Things to be aware of:
From a voice leading (and therefore melodic) standpoint, the main event in a II-V-I (major or minor) is the b7 of II moving to the 3rd of the V, and the b7 of the V moving to the 3rd of I.

There are other ways to negotiate the changes, of course, but that is the basic one (alternate option: 9 moving to 5, especially on the V-I part).

Practicing targeting the chord tones will be more fruitful than trying to switch between 3 different scales. II-V's often happen too quickly for a scale-based approach to make sense. The main chord tones to target are 3, 5, 7, and 1 (in order of importance).

Before dealing with a bunch of different scales, it's worth noting that there are diatonic ways to deal with these changes that work just fine and often sound less forced, especially coming from a novice.
ii7-V7-Imaj7: major scale of the key, targeting the chord tones of each chord.
iiø7-V7b9-i6: minor scale of the key, just altering the 6th and 7th: natural minor (iiø7), harmonic minor (V7b9), melodic minor (i6). You can have all the chromatic tones from b6 to 7 available at any time as well (b6, 6, b7, 7).

I would advise getting very very familiar with these and being able to melodically target the chord tones before trying to switch between scales.

What a great, concise response JO. Your essential point, I feel, applies to improvising in general as much as ii-V-I's. We have all read and participated in discussions about pros and cons of the chord-scale method, vs. chord tone targeting/voice leading. Your post is one I'd love for beginning players to read early on and save time slogging through CST-inspired approaches, only to find they need to re-tool their approach later. I can count myself in that rank.

[JonR]

Originally Posted by Mr BC

What a great, concise response JO. Your essential point, I feel, applies to improvising in general as much as ii-V-I's. We have all read and participated in discussions about pros and cons of the chord-scale method, vs. chord tone targeting/voice leading. Your post is one I'd love for beginning players to read early on and save time slogging through CST-inspired approaches, only to find they need to re-tool their approach later. I can count myself in that rank.

Fully agreed.

[jazz oud]

Thanks for the support, guys.

Your post is one I'd love for beginning players to read early on and save time slogging through CST-inspired approaches, only to find they need to re-tool their approach later. I can count myself in that rank.

I count myself in that rank, too, and that's why I try to share some of the things I had to figure out on my own that I wish someone had told me when I was coming up. I stumbled around in the dark in many ways for years, with teachers who weren't able to explain things much beyond basic CST (and CST in those days was much less sophisticated than the more nuanced version being taught today ala Nettles and Graf).

To some extent, I think we all need to figure stuff out on our own and will always have to re-tool and refine our approach as our musical conception and ears mature. But it helps to have someone pointing you in the right direction!

I still think that CST is a valuable tool, especially with modern non-functional/non-tonal tunes, but it is pretty useless, IMO, with respect to improvising over functional harmony in the manner of the great jazz of 1920-1960. Unless you are so talented and your harmonic sensibility so strong that you are really improvising by mostly by ear and not really using CST anyway.