Seventh chords can add depth and character to all genres of music, often seen near the end of classical pieces or as the last chord in jazz pieces.
As with triads, seventh chords can also be classified by their quality. To assess one, evaluate its interval relationship to the root note in its major key signature.
Major Seventh
The major seventh chord has an elegant sound that makes it a popular choice in jazz and other forms of musical genres such as funk or pop music. Additionally, its less dissonant nature makes it ideal for ending pieces with.
An identifiable major seventh chord can be distinguished by its root, quality and inversion (see Inversion and Chord Identification chapter for more information). To create one from stacked thirds, just take your major triad and add one half step below your root; for instance Cmaj7 would consist of C-E-G-B as its elements.
Listening to Ella Fitzgerald perform the George Gershwin classic “Porgy and Bess,” you will witness how major seventh chords are used in jazz music. These chords can either be major, minor, or diminished in quality and this determines its flavor; each quality possesses its own sound signature.
Minor Seventh
Minor seventh chords can be an effective way to build tension while transitioning smoothly into dominant seventh chords.
Notation for these chords is quite straightforward; similarly to triads, their roots are represented by capital letters in the bass voice of the staff, with enharmonic equivalence used to indicate quality and seventh as explained in Intervals chapter.
Though seventh chords might appear intimidating at first glance, they’re really just tools for adding emotion and creating stories. Each seventh chord offers something different – from its cozy charm of a major seventh to the unnerving tension of half-diminished sevenths – so why not explore their potential by exploring them through Skoove tutorial “Au Claire De Lune” and discover how they can add life to your progressions!
Dominant Seventh
A dominant seventh chord consists of a major triad (comprising of the 1st, 3rd, and 5th notes of a scale) plus a flat 7th above its root; hence the presence of “b” (flat).
Jazz musicians regularly employ this chord as it serves as a powerful resolution to the tonic triad when played at the end of a phrase or section of music.
This chord makes an elegant base for more complex improvisations, adding crunchy tones such as (b9) or (#11) for a bluesier sound.
Another way of approaching the dominant seventh chord is as the fifth scale degree of any major diatonic scale; its Roman numeral analysis would be G7 (or V7 in Roman numerals). Furthermore, this chord can also be built upon its equivalent fifth scale degree from any natural minor scale.
Half-Diminished Seventh
Half diminished chords are another popular type of seventh chord in classical music, often written out as Cm7(b5) in shorthand (it may also be written as Bm7(b5) in certain places). They feature three triads with flattened fifths that form minor 7ths with a flat fifth; you could think of them as minor 7ths with flat fifths. They’re sometimes written shorthand using an open circle with an x through it to indicate this in shorthand (it may also be written as Bm7(b5)).
These chords are formed of stacked intervals; for example, an m3 runs from 1 to 3, an m5 from 3 to 5, and an m7 from 5 to 7. All these chords are composed from triads, so they can also be inverted as needed.
To invert a C half-diminished chord, for example, just move its lowest note up one octave (12 notes). This process is known as third inversion and works similarly in all other inversions to create chords which act both as dominants and subdominants simultaneously.