Blues substitutions

[nonohmic]

Can someone help me to understand the substitutions in this chord progression.

Bar 6 is a diminished substitution, correct? Is this just a common thing in blues? Or what is its point?

But then also in the 1-6-2-5 bits why is the G dominant and not a minor? That I really don't get.

Thanks!

 

[SteveCS]

As far as I can see it's just a fancy (technically correct but musically pointless) way of writing Eb7 over a chromatic bass movement, i.e. Eb7/E.

 

[bass12]

Can someone help me to understand the substitutions in this chord progression.

Bar 6 is a diminished substitution, correct? Is this just a common thing in blues? Or what is its point?

But then also in the 1-6-2-5 bits why is the G dominant and not a minor? That I really don't get.

Thanks!

View attachment 4293228

What you’re seeing is the result of jazz players embellishing on (spicing up) a standard 12 bar blues progression. The E dim. 7 in the sixth bar is a passing chord. This #IV diminished chord is often used to go from the IV to the V chord but it’s also commonly used in jazz blues progressions to lead from the IV to the I. It’s adding motion and flavour to the progression.

Regarding the G in the eleventh bar being a dominant 7th chord rather than a minor 7th chord: this is very common with jazz blues. The turnaround is still functioning as a I-vi-ii-V but playing the vi as a dominant 7th changes the flavour and opens some doors. To quote Mark Levine (from The Jazz Theory Book): “Playing (G7) instead of (Gm7) gives the progression a stronger sense of resolution going to (Cm7), and there are far more opportunities to alter dominant 7th chords than there are to alter minor 7th chords”.

 

[Papageno]

This is a very common jazz blues progression. The ii7 V7 progression in bars 9 and 10 is generally used in jazz instead of the V7 IV7 used in blues.

 

[nonohmic]

What you’re seeing is the result of jazz players embellishing on (spicing up) a standard 12 bar blues progression. The E dim. 7 in the sixth bar is a passing chord. This #IV diminished chord is often used to go from the IV to the V chord but it’s also commonly used in jazz blues progressions to lead from the IV to the I. It’s adding motion and flavour to the progression.

Regarding the G in the eleventh bar being a dominant 7th chord rather than a minor 7th chord: this is very common with jazz blues. The turnaround is still functioning as a I-vi-ii-V but playing the vi as a dominant 7th changes the flavour and opens some doors. To quote Mark Levine (from The Jazz Theory Book): “Playing (G7) instead of (Gm7) gives the progression a stronger sense of resolution going to (Cm7), and there are far more opportunities to alter dominant 7th chords than there are to alter minor 7th chords”.

Brilliant, thanks!

 

[dreamadream99]

This is basically a common re-harmonization of bars five through seven to get you to the 6-2-5-1 turnaround in bars eight through eleven. It is very commonly played as a chromatic passing bassline – – in this case Eb-Edim-Bb/F-G.

 

[hihat]

@nonohmic

just out of curiosity what book is this from?

 

[nonohmic]

@nonohmic

just out of curiosity what book is this from?

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