When there is a chord progression like D C C7 and I want to accentuate the change from the C to the C7 are there some 'accepted methods' of doing this. I find playing the seventh over the seventh chord is often too much and kind of looses the original harmony although I understand that it is one way of accentuating the seventh aspect.

You talking about a bassline or a solo.

Playing the 7th over which chord the C or the C7? If that is just a C triad I would not play a 7th on it a 6th would fit better like a major pentonic scale. Then you could lay for the 7th on the C7 chord to establish the chord change. If a bassline you could pedel the 5th through both and let the chordal instrument handle the change. Also you didn't say where the C7 is going. Is is a functoning dominant (going to a F of some sort.) If it is functioning then lots of choices lots of color tones in a solo could be used. If it is not functioning then a common scale choice would be the Lydian b7 scale (fourth mode of melodic minor.) It gives you a dominant sound and handles the avoid note for you.

Your post was very thought provoking and helpful, I'm gonna throw a bunch of thoughts and questions out there now, hope you don't mind.

I was originally thinking of a bassline underneath a chordal instrument making a straight change.

The first C is simply a triad and I was at first thinking of what to play only over the 7th chord, but you make a very good point that what I play over the CMaj chord is also very important. Notes out of context don't make much sense.

When you talk about pedaling the fifth, I am interested why pedal the fifth and not the third or tonic even? Is it somewhat a matter of preference or is a fifth preferred because of it's strength but allows the 7th change to be more apparent (since you wouldn't be playing a half tone away from the new note)?

Functioning Dominant...I'm very interested.
First off I know what a dominant is but I don't know what a 'functioning' chord is. If you could elaborate a little bit it would be sweet.

Lydian b7 of C? So an F Lydian b7?

on an aside: ever notice that bassline is flagged as 'misspelled'? seems like we should somehow edit the spellchecker to tailor to the site.

My approach could be dependant on the following chord.

D, C, C7 implies decending movement to me (on the surface at least).

Ok for kicks lets say the progression goes D, C, C7, F

Your post was very thought provoking and helpful, I'm gonna throw a bunch of thoughts and questions out there now, hope you don't mind.

I was originally thinking of a bassline underneath a chordal instrument making a straight change.

The first C is simply a triad and I was at first thinking of what to play only over the 7th chord, but you make a very good point that what I play over the CMaj chord is also very important. Notes out of context don't make much sense.

When you talk about pedaling the fifth, I am interested why pedal the fifth and not the third or tonic even? Is it somewhat a matter of preference or is a fifth preferred because of it's strength but allows the 7th change to be more apparent (since you wouldn't be playing a half tone away from the new note)?

Functioning Dominant...I'm very interested.
First off I know what a dominant is but I don't know what a 'functioning' chord is. If you could elaborate a little bit it would be sweet.

Lydian b7 of C? So an F Lydian b7?

on an aside: ever notice that bassline is flagged as 'misspelled'? seems like we should somehow edit the spellchecker to tailor to the site.

As for pedaling you can pedal any common tone you want. Fifths are used a lot and so are roots. If me I might try setting up the C7 by playing the Bb on last eight or sixteenth of the C bar and hitting the root on one. I'm just guessing because I don't know the song, your ears are going to be the best judge of what works.

Functioning Dominant. Is the term for dominants resolving down a fifth, like you see in turn around's of progressions all the time V7->I. That is because the tritone (3rd and 7th) of the V7 resolve in I chord (tension/resolution.) This is what the whole Circle of Fifths is about. Non-functioning dominants are when the V7 goes anywhere except down a fifth.

The Lydian b7 is a commonly used and most consider the default scale for dominant chords. So for a C7 you would play a C Lydian b7 scale. It is used because its like a mixolydian. the normal mode for dominants, but takes the avoid note of F in this case and makes it F# so it works. Lydian b7 is the recommend scale for non-functioning dominants and safe on any dominant.

So if the chord after your C7 is an F of some kind it is a functioning dominant and you have lots of choices for scales depending on style of music. So C mixolydian, C Lydian b7, C Blues scale. In a Jazz tune more scales might be picked depending on the melody and actually chord going to.

Remember you are talking a bass-line so you will probably be sticking to chord tones especially if Rock. If you were soloing then all the scales would come into play, but again depending on style of music.

chords: D C C7 F
bass: D E C Bb A F


w/o hearing the style, etc, my first "visual" attempt would be something like this....

chords: D C C7 F
bass: D E C Bb F
or
bass: D C G A Bb F

Just bassing it off of common chord tones, etc... You could do a lot more with it, but I think this would accentuate the C-C7change

Steve Barnette
The Dojo of Cool
------------------------------------------
Jazz is the teacher, Funk is the Preacher.


+1, Fima is awesome.... sorry for the sidetrack...

Alright I've gleaned some good information from all of your posts, 'specially DocBop. I'll go mess around with these ideas and see what happens. Thanks a bunch guys.

A tad late but I'll throw this out there anyhow...

Taking the example of C7 to F, and obviously as stated above this all depends on the context of the song and bassline........

......It's not always so musical to play the Bb(the 7th of the C7 chord), particularly on or near the last beat of the measure. The Bb is "designed" to resolve to an A(the 3rd of the "F chord")and generally the bass player is going to want to play the root of the F chord. A bassline that moves from C to Bb in many contexts like this, particularly at the end of the measure, is a bit of a signal that the next chord is going to be an Amin.
It is very natural to want to accentuate the harmony of a Maj to Dom7 thing(Cmaj-C7-Fmaj), I often find that playing the next higher octave, playing a C up an octave when it goes from Maj to Dom7 for example, is very effective without "gumming-up" the harmony or sending any confusing musical signals. By playing the root in a higher octave it gives the perception of a different chord while also bringing your root note(C) closer to the Bb that the piano or guitar is voicing which increases the tension of the chord a bit.

Seems like a good place for a chromatic line to me:

D C C7 F
D Db C B Bb A F

... with Db and B as passing tones / major 7ths, and A as the major 3rd of F.

Seems like a good place for a chromatic line to me:

D C C7 F
D Db C B Bb A F

... with Db and B as passing tones / major 7ths, and A as the major 3rd of F.

And why would you want to play the Major 3rd on the first beat?

Just to be nutty... :rolleyes:

But no, yeah, that might be better like right before the one...


D C C7 F
D Db C B Bb A F

that way it's more like a 6th over the C7... yeah, that's the ticket. :p

Just to be nutty... :rolleyes:

But no, yeah, that might be better like right before the one...


D C C7 F
D Db C B Bb A F

that way it's more like a 6th over the C7... yeah, that's the ticket. :p

In Jazz as long as you have a chord tone on strong beat it will work (as long as there are other chordal instruments.) Then he has chromatic motif going so hitting the 3rd on one would work fine.

Don't forget the third...everyone's long-forgotten chord tone. :) C - C7 -F sounds like a perfect opportunity to ascend and use 'E' as both a chord tone and a passing tone to climb to F.

Tons of options, though - how about climbing to the seven and playing a descending Bb - G - E as quarter note triplets leading to the F chord?

No rules, but a commonality is when a line is acesnding chromatics work real nice. When decending sticking to scale tones work nice.

So with C7->F acending C, D, Eb, E F sounds cool. The strong beat 3 has a non-chord tone, but its a Blue note so people's ear dig it. The World LOVES Blue notes.

Again C7->F decending C, Bb, A, G, F. This time a chord extendion is on the strong beat 3. But its is a 13th and peoples ear recognized a scale fragment and are happy.

As I said these aren't ridged rules they are something you hear a lot when bass players are setting up a chord change.