JAZZ PIANO CHORDS - UPPER STRUCTURES

[pnojazz]

There are 9 functional upper structures:

II, bIII, bV, bVI, VI, I minor, bI minor, bIII minor, #IV minor each covering the following chords in the same order:

C7+11, C7+9, C7b9+11, C7alt, C7b9, C7=9, C7b9+5, C7+9+11, C7b9+11.

Don't forget to invert each of your triads played over each tritone (3rd and b7th). Also take them around the cycle of 5ths to get them into your hands:

C F Bb Eb Ab Db F# B E A D G

Great post!

[pnojazz]

Mark Levine's 'Jazz Piano Book' lists 9 upper structure triads to be played over a Dominant 7th 'TRiTONE' played in the left hand:

Exp: C7 = E Bb under a simple D triad, DF#A.

The 9 are: II, bIII, bV, bVI, VI, I minor, bII minor, bIII minor, #IV minor

for chords in the same order below:

C7+11, C7+9, C7b9+11, C7alt, C7b9, C7+9, C7+5b9, C7+11+9, C7+11b9

sample them around the cycle of 5ths: CFBbEbAbDbGbBEADG.

Don't forget to play all 3 inversions of each triad over each tritone (3rd and b7th)

[dylannoble92]

thank you sooooo freakin much. finally a good youtube vid with alternate scalings and the opposite tritone over the inverse on the left hand. This is exactly what i was looking for.

Thanks brah.

[PIANOisAMAZING99]

Man you are just plain incredible...I really appreciate your videos. EXTREMELY helpful and you are a very talented player.

[bpankowski]

Eye-opening tutorial! It's so difficult to understand jazz harmony tidily...

[afrankus]

how many types of upper structures do we have? can you make a video on that as well pls? thanks for the tution.

[jazztutorial]

@afrankus @jazztutorial

over a C dominant 7 tritone in the left hand (E and Bb) you can play the following triads to outline various scales:

Dmaj = C7 sharp 11

Eb maj, Eb min, F#maj, F# min, A maj, A min = all fit with C diminished scale (notes: C, Db, D#, E, F#, G, A, Bb)

Ab maj, F# maj = both fit with C altered scale (notes C, Db, Eb, E, F#, Ab, Bb)

Those are all the useful ones

[whistlingboy]

you are a good teacher. I hope you do more because you are easy to understand. Thanks for the inspiration.

[GRADIENTE34]

THAKS A LOT !!

[afrankus]

thanks for the tution, can you demonstrate that in a song like:"Amazing Grace"?

[jazztutorial]

@afrankus Yeah sure, good idea. In my next video I will go through a jazz standard with examples.