Justifying Your Melodic Choices Over Chord-sounds

Okay! This one has some interesting choices in it! The first four notes are all contained in the D minor triad. The spice here comes from string skipping. I'll jump at any chance I get to add some larger intervals into my lines, and triads while skipping notes is an easy way to do that.

The next four notes are essentially to set up the resolution to the first beat of the G7 chord. To me, D C# and C are all consonant notes over the D minor sound. When played in succession, that chromatic sound is something you hear all the time in jazz. The odd note out here is that Bb. It's found in the D minor or D harmonic minor scales, not D dorian or D melodic minor, which I would typically use over a minor chord with a ii function. So you can justify the note as fine over the D minor sound, but in my mind, it's just voice leading to the 3rd of the G7 chord, on beat 1 of bar 2. You could almost look at this four note grouping as one long enclosure. Side note, I try to explain my choices in multiple ways, in the hopes that one of them makes the concept click for you.

The line I played over the G7 chord starts on the 3rd, B, as the first note of a descending augmented triad (B G Eb). The Eb leads to a C#, which could change the chord to Ebaug7 or G7#5#11, but that's just semantics. Really, the 3rd and 4th notes of bar 2 are an enclosure to the D note. I like enclosures. I like to think less about where I am, and more about where I'm going.

From there it's just a simple diatonic line that resolves nicely on the 3rd of C major. As we saw with the lick from today, there are many of ways you can name the chords, chord sounds or scales you're using in your lines. Explore this when you're coming up with your own lines.

Get familiar. Happy Practicing.