David's Tip of the Day: Flat 7th - 3 Levels of Matching, Part 3 (Explained)

As you learned yesterday, context is everything… what you play relates... no, is dictated, by... what the band plays.

In the “Sounds Real Good” category, our flat-7th was matched by another instrument, still sounding bluesy (“bluesy” means slightly dissonant by the way), but since another instrument is playing it, it caries with it a message of uniformity.

In the “Sounds Okay, But Aggressive” category, you were the only one playing the flat-7th, so your note stood out as being more bluesy, lacking the doubling of another instrument. This means that the F will do a great job to stick your finger into the listener’s ribs… build some tension… and then resolve it for them as your lick continues, ultimately resolving to our home base root note G (2, 6+ and 9+).

In the “Sounds Real Bad” category, you were the only one playing the flat-7th AND someone is playing a note a half step away from you. Imagine a song where you need to use a C Harmonica and accidentally picked up a C# Harmonica… a harmonica that is a half step off… you can image the result, it sounds wrong… the band is playing C and you’re playing C#... fire the harp player. The flat-7th is a bluesy note, and by its nature should be dissonant, so technically the flat-7th still works, but in some cases it can be so dissonant that it just sounds plain wrong. This will be the case with a real light song, one that’s more in the major world (reference Major Scales in Theory Study 1) than bluesy or dark. You still have the option to use the note, it just needs to be presented with purposefulness... emphasized for dramatic effect... if it's just a another note in a haphazard run, it will sound bad.

To sum up, it’s a combination of how bluesy/dissonant/aggressive you want to be relative to what the other musicians are playing.

Tomorrow… the IV7 and V7 Chords…