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Double Bass Give me a name for this chord, please
- Thread starter TroyK
- Start date
F - Ab - B - D - Gb - A
It's a tone cluster, for sure. It sounds to me like what I call a compound chord, two chords played at the same time that still imply movement from one to the other. The F Ab B D is an F fully diminished seventh. The pivot note is the D which becomes the root of a D major (D F# A). Moving that to an Fm6/9 F Ab C D G resoves B to C, F# to G, and A to Ab.
I wouldn't call it anything if it were written out in notation. If I had to express it as a chord symbol, I'd give some musicians the Fdim and others the Dmaj. If I absolutely had to write one chord symbol for it, I'd write it as a Dmaj chord over an Fdim...and I'd put in a serious footnote.
I've played it in bluegrass, but not on purpose.
It's a tone cluster, for sure. It sounds to me like what I call a compound chord, two chords played at the same time that still imply movement from one to the other. The F Ab B D is an F fully diminished seventh. The pivot note is the D which becomes the root of a D major (D F# A). Moving that to an Fm6/9 F Ab C D G resoves B to C, F# to G, and A to Ab.
I wouldn't call it anything if it were written out in notation. If I had to express it as a chord symbol, I'd give some musicians the Fdim and others the Dmaj. If I absolutely had to write one chord symbol for it, I'd write it as a Dmaj chord over an Fdim...and I'd put in a serious footnote.
I've played it in bluegrass, but not on purpose.
You know, I think I'm going to go with "Cluster F", that actually describes it pretty much as I heard it. 
Hey good chart and I like the composer's corner.
Now that I see the tune and have played it, I understand the sounds better. I really see how this is a guitar inspired voicing. Your voicing in isolation, immediately evoked a sound and name in me, but I wanted to hear how it fit in with your tune first.
To me the tune is in some kind of F minor, like you said. At the end of minor tunes, I've heard many people finish with a final chord that's some kind of IV chord. Often the bassist plops in the 4th scale degree down below and the chord players play what they want. You've probably done this so many times on 'Autumn Leaves', 'Softly As a Morning Sunrise' , various minor blues tunes and so many others...
So this practice and this voicing makes me hear this as some kind of Bb7(#9) chord, in this case with an added 13, with an F in the root. (Even thought the Bb is not played, I hear it as the root)
Maybe it's called Bb13 (#9)/F . (If you don't want anyone to play an E-natural too, perhaps Bb7 (#9) add 13 / F ?)
The Fm6/9 add#5 works too...but I really hear this as some kind of IV chord after the tonic minor is sounded. The 'missing' Bb belongs a P4 above the bass F. That gives the super strong Dom7(#9) 4-note voicing that on guitar evokes 'Foxey Lady', to which you've added a G on top and an F on bottom.
So it's like you've hit the tonic, everyone else goes to the IV Dom13(#9), but you stay on the tonic pedal.
That's what it sounds like to me.
I obviously missed something here in the thread... The original question was for the above notes.. but the lead sheet PDF has F - Ab -C# - D - G...
I'm I looking at the wrong song? Did something change?
Something that I heard that wasn't mentioned here is hearing it in the key of Gb minor.
It sounds to me like part of a minor ii / V, either like an Ab dim with a dom 7th and a b9, or a Db7susb9b13 including the 3rd, maybe with the top two voices moving down through the suspension by half-step and then resolving to Gbmin. But as a resloved, final, ending chord, then I have no idea.
It sounds to me like part of a minor ii / V, either like an Ab dim with a dom 7th and a b9, or a Db7susb9b13 including the 3rd, maybe with the top two voices moving down through the suspension by half-step and then resolving to Gbmin. But as a resloved, final, ending chord, then I have no idea.
