When it comes to learning tunes, expanding your repertoire, and improving the way you improvise over jazz standards, most players are taking the wrong approach…
You see, the secret to improving with standards doesn’t lie in making long lists, spending hours memorizing chord progressions, and then trying your best to conjure up melodic lines.
…because when it’s your turn to solo, a memorized set of chord symbols or knowing there’s a D7 chord in the sixth bar is not going to help you improvise.
What will however, is understanding how these chords fit together. Recognizing the important chord relationships present in all of these tunes and having the musical tools to navigate them.
Think of 100 popular jazz standards…if you analyzed each progression you’d find the same harmonic relationships over and over again. Understanding these relationships is key to creating musical solos!
Today we’re going to focus on one of these essential chord relationships – Major moving to parallel minor.
While it may seem like a simple theory exercise, mastering this important chord movement in all its forms will give you valuable musical tools that can be applied to any solo. In the PRO lesson below you’ll learn…
- The nuts and bolts of the Major to parallel minor relationship
- Where to find this harmonic progression in the jazz repertoire
- Nine Improvisation Techniques for navigating this harmonic relationship
- And study 25 transcribed examples from the solos of the masters
Let’s get started…
The Major to Parallel Minor Relationship
The movement from Major to minor is one of the most fundamental relationships in music…and the most basic form of this is a Major chord moving to its parallel minor:
This dichotomy between a Major and minor chord can be found in all styles of music and is even the source of the harmonic tension that fuels the Blues.
However, when it comes to the standards in the jazz repertoire, it’s also an important device that’s used to quickly change tonalities or move to a new key center in a progression.
As you’ll see below, this chord relationship pops up in many of the most common jazz standards, so if you’re serious about getting to the next level as a musician, it’s essential to ingrain this harmonic movement in your mind and your ears.
Here are a few preliminary exercises to master before you get started…
A good place to begin is by visualizing the major to parallel minor chord relationship in all keys:
As you visualize these chords make sure to focus on the chord tones as well, focusing on the change in the 3rd and 7th of the chords. Knowing these resolutions will be essential to creating melodic ideas later on.
However, this isn’t the only parallel minor motion you’ll find in the jazz repertoire. In many jazz tunes the dominant chord serves as the tonic or as a harmonic arrival point.
As a result, you’ll often find Dominant chords moving to their respective parallel minor chords…
Between these two sounds, there is only one difference – the 3rd. As you did with Major chords, visualize this chord relationship in all keys.
Keep in mind that it’s important to not only understand the theory behind this chord relationship, you must also ingrain the sound of it in your ear.
Intellectually understanding theory definitions and chord progressions is one thing, but knowing these sounds by ear is essential for improvisation.
After you have visualized this parallel movement in every key, ingrain the sound of the harmonic motion in your ear. Listen to the example below of Major moving to parallel minor:
Then ingrain the sound of Dominant 7 moving to parallel minor:
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