Integrating seventh chords into your music can add tension and depth. Explore their various inversions to see how they change the flow of your progressions.
There are five kinds of seventh chords commonly employed in tonal music: major seventh, minor seventh, dominant seventh, diminished seventh and half-diminished seventh chords. Each has its own set of notes.
First Inversion
Seventh chords can add depth, emotion, and complexity to a triad by adding an additional seventh above its root note. They are commonly found in many styles of music including Jazz, R & B, Blues and film score music.
To be able to recognize a seventh chord it is crucial that one learns chord symbols and figured bass notation. Chords can be analysed based on their quality (the interval between root note and note 7 above it) and position (note in bass).
When learning the first inversion of a seventh chord, practicing with closed-position chords will help ensure you hear and recognize it clearly as you play it. Furthermore, memorizing its constituent notes will enable you to quickly recognize it when playing other inversions – or creating your own voicings for any particular seventh chord!
Second Inversion
When a seventh chord is in second inversion, its chord tones above the bass are stacked two octaves lower on the staff. A triad in this position would read 5-3-2-4 while for a seventh chord it will simply read as 5-3-2-4
Order of upper chord members on the staff can vary. What matters is that fifth scale degree resides at its base while roots and third are somewhere above.
Be sure to closely analyze both the quality and inversions of seventh chords, and their resolution in any style of music. By doing this, you will gain an in-depth knowledge of every possible seventh chord option as well as being able to craft inversions that work for any song or piece you are creating.
Third Inversion
Just like regular triads, seventh chords may also display inversions. When its root becomes the bass note, this is known as its third inversion and indicated with an “/B”. For example, when writing C7 chords with their third inversions written out with no spacing in between.
Third inversion is less stable than root position and can have an effect on voice leading between chords within a progression. It is typically employed to approach tonic chords by creating tension that seeks resolution through second inversion-style approaches.
To create the third inversion of a seventh chord, start by inverting its root in the bass and moving upward. This will result in a figured bass with the chordal seventh appearing above it. A Gmi7/B chord could then be realized as Gm7/B and its order doesn’t matter; any combination can work. Note: Only its lowest note matters for inversion purposes.
Fourth Inversion
If you haven’t done so already, try playing familiar songs using inverted seventh chords – it will not only reinforce their shapes but will help develop your own variations on them as well!
Recall, since seventh chords contain four chord members, they can have four inversions based on where the lowest note appears in relation to its bass note.
Chords built on me and le (3 and 6) consist of a major triad and minor seventh, those on re have diminished triads with half-diminished sevenths, and those built on ti have fully-diminished triads with diminished sevenths; when rendered with figured bass they appear as M7, rem, and ti7 respectively; to indicate their inversion add / to each Roman numeral (such as M7/2 for G minor half-diminished seventh chord).