Charts For Jovino's Triad Improv Session

New Lesson Updates Live Seminars
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Hey everyone :wave:

This Wednesday Jovino is hosting a follow up session on his triad harmonic/improvisation concepts. Jovino has prepared 2 annotated chord charts with his triad options; one jazz standard and one Brazilian standard.

Download the chord chart files here:

In the session on Wednesday we will work through these scores outlining how the triad options can be used to find creative voicing options and how to use these triad shapes in an improvisational context.

Jovino will walk you through the triad options process and the idea is that this approach can then be applied to any tunes that you are working on.

If you haven’t already, check out Jovino’s seminar recording from last month where the underlying concept is explained. This information will help you to get the most out of the upcoming session:

@richard18, @Humberto, & @edwin1 - I’m tagging you guys here as I know you were interested in the details of the follow up session.

Cheers,
Hayden

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Many thanks, @Hayden. I would also appreciate it if Jovino could include in the session a review of how he selects the triads.

Looking forward,

Richard

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Sure thing @richard18 - I will pass this onto Jovino.

In the interim, here is some information that you should find helpful to analyse the triad options.

Looking at the first 3 bars of “Alone Together” let’s examine where these triads come from:

Alone Together
Alone Together950Ă—348 312 KB

For the D-7, the triads are coming from the 7th chord and extended chord tones:

D-7 = D-F-A-C (notice the F triad is 3-5-7 of D-7)
D-9 = D-F-A-C-E (notice the A- triad is 5-7-9 of D-9)
D-11 = D-F-A-C-E-G (notice the C triad is 7-9-11 of D-11)

For the E-7b5, the triads are coming from the 7th chord and extended chord tones:

E-7b5 = E-G-Bb-D (notice the G- triad which is 3-b5-7 of E-7b5)
E-11b5 = E-G-Bb-D-F#-A (notice the D triad is the 7-9-11 of E-11b5)

For the A7, the triads annotated on the lead sheet are the upper structure triads of the chord.

F triad over A7 = A7#5#9 (major triad built from the #5)
Eb triad over A7 = A7b9#11 (major triad built from the #11)

On a related note, I highly recommend to learn and memorise the following 4 UST formulas. These are the most common UST shapes and knowing these formulas will greatly speed up your ability to choose and analyse triads for altered dominant chords:

Screenshot 2023-10-23 at 10.21.08
Screenshot 2023-10-23 at 10.21.081894Ă—632 182 KB

Perhaps you can try to complete this kind of analysis for some of the other chords in the form as a warm up for the seminar.

I’d recommend to pick one of major 251s and one of the minor 251s and write out the notes of the 7th, 9th, 11th, 13th chords, as well as the 4 UST options for the V7 chord.

It’s worth noting that the triad options for the dominant V7 chords don’t have to be USTs, for example you will see a C7 in bar 10 with a G-triad (5-7-9 of C7). This C7 is part of a major 251 in F major, and as we know, alterations are optional for the V7 chords in major 251s.

On the other side of the coin, remember that when dealing with minor 251s, the V7 chord is usually played as an altered V7 chord, in which case the USTs could be more appropriate choices to access the altered tones.

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@Hayden it was a pleasure to wake up in my time zone to your prompt and thorough response! Thanks for taking the time. I get the concept including the connection to the USTs. Also note the general guidance to avoid repeating the chord’s root in the triad

Trying to work out if the same principles could apply to a 251 where the triads are selected using the 1 chord and these triads are played throughout the progression …

Looking forward to the seminar,

Richard

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My pleasure @richard18 - this is just a little bit of background theory and I defer to Jovino’s teaching as he is the expert on this topic!