After you’ve been improvising jazz for a while, most chords are pretty familiar. You’re used to major, minor, dominant, and half diminished…but just as you thought you were getting a handle on things, a chord comes out of nowhere that makes you go “What is that?!?!” And not only do you have to figure out what the thing is, you somehow have to learn how to improvise over it…
This was my experience with Susb9 chords, also called sus7b9, Dominant 7 Sus4 b9, Phrygian Dominant, or just Phrygian chords.
I barely knew how to play over a Sus Chord and then all of a sudden this even weirder variation popped up out of nowhere. I was lost.
What does “Sus” mean? Why is there a b9? What notes do I play?!?!
These are just just a few of the thoughts that go through your head when you encounter an unknown chord like this. And, the temporary fix to dealing with a new chord usually comes in the form of a scale…
When you google it or ask a teacher, they’ll usually tell you something like, just play the 5th mode of the hyper-quantum-leap-do-deca-hedron scale…
and like that, you’re magically supposed to be totally fine with this foreign chord structure…As if the uber-special scale magically allows you to improvise over it…
But with the addition of this scalar approach, the problem becomes even worse…
At this point, not only are you mixing up random notes of a scale, trying to fake your way through a few bars of this chord, you’re still in the dark to what is actually happening musically – the chord sound, structure, and purpose.
Every chord has these three things:
A SOUND
A STRUCTURE
A PURPOSE
The sound of a chord is exactly that. What does it sound like? Is it happy? Sad? Haunting? Dark? Scary? Ethereal?
The structure is NOT a scale. It’s the chord-tones within the chord and how they’re expressed in the chord-voicing. Knowledge of the actual chord-structure and how the chord is voiced allows you to understand how scales can fit into the picture.
The purpose of a chord comes down to this: Why is that chord there? Is it used to push your ear to the next chord? Is it a place of rest and resolution? Is it creating extreme dissonance in order to lead your ear to a place of resolution?
Remember, with any foreign chord, start by asking yourself these questions – What’s the chord’s sound, structure, and purpose? Chords in a tune are not random. Each one is placed there consciously by the composer and it’s up to you to determine why.
Ok, so now that we have an idea of what we need to understand about a chord, let’s get back to this ultra confusing weird thing they call the susb9…
Sus Flat 9 theory unravelled
To best understand a Susb9 chord, you have to first understand a Sus chord. And not just what scale it takes, but what is actually happening with a Sus chord.
A Sus chord is a dominant chord that never quite made it there…
— Quick sidenote: Keep in mind that notation and naming can be confusing. Throughout this lesson you’ll learn many names and ways to denote a Susb9 chord so you’ll be ready for any way you may encounter it. Remember that it’s a type of dominant chord even though we’ll frequently refer to it as “susb9” and not “sus7b9” or when talking about “Sus” chords, we may say “Sus” but we’re still talking about a dominant chord —
Ok, let’s get back on track…
You see, in the key of G Major, when the ii minor 7 chord (A minor 7) moves to a V7 chord (D7), the 7th of the minor chord (“G”), moves down a half-step to the 3rd of the dominant chord (“F#”).
But, in the case of a Sus chord, the 7th of the minor chord (“G”) is “Suspended” (hence the term “Sus”) and remains the same, never moving a half-step down to the 3rd. This 7th (“G”) on the minor chord (A minor 7) is now the 4th (“G”) on the dominant chord (D7).
Once you wrap your head around that, it’s much easier to understand what a susb9 chord is…
Think about dominant chords for a minute. You can’t think of dominant chords without instantly thinking about altered notes. They just go hand-in-hand.
But in the case of Sus7b9 chords, people forget that they are a dominant chord. So, it makes perfect sense that we can add in altered chord-tones. It would be strange if we didn’t! And one of the most common alterations of a dominant chord is the b9.
In terms of chord voicings, this chord-tone is super accessible. Coming from a minor chord, the b9 of the dominant chord is a half-step below the 5th of the minor chord.
So, taking our minor chord (A minor 7) we’ll include the 5th (“E”) and as we move to the Susb9 dominant chord (D7susb9) we’ll move that chord-tone down a half-step to the b9 of the dominant chord (“Eb”).
Pretty easy right?
Understanding the voice leading from one chord to the next as we just did, is something you always want to do with every chord. Notice how before we even get to the full chord or mention a scale, we’re understanding the essential pieces of the chord and how/why they are there.
And before we look at scales, we’ll first look into how these essential pieces of the chord translate to a specific chord voicing and sound.
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