Study Guide
Week 8
[ Reading ] [ Textbook ] [ Review ] [ New Material ] [ What You Should Know ] [ Homework ]
Textbook
Reading: pp. 75 - 76
Review what the text has to say about secondary dominants. After studying the material below under "New Material", compare what is written in the text. In particular, notice that the secondary dominant functions (the V7 of X's underneath the bass clef) are in parenthesis. Use them for now instead of Roman numerals like "II", since at this point the only ii chord we have should be minor, and II is major. Also, the book says in figure 10 that the substitute dominant chord is stronger is you add a "minor seventh". Remember: the book presents dominant seventh chords as major triads with an added minor seventh. When the book says "minor seventh" it is talking about a lowered seventh, which a dominant seventh chord has, whether it is V7 of the tonic or V7 of some other chord in the key.
Review
Keep working with rhythmic patterns. The best place to study is with the Tap Machine.
Review the diatonically-related functions for triads and seventh chords:
The table below summarizes the three qualities of triads found in a scale, and what degree they are built on. This works for any scale, for example, F major.
major minor diminished I, IV, V ii, iii, vi vii The same thing can be done with seventh chords:
major seventh minor seventh dominant seventh minor seventh, flat five I, IV ii, iii, vi V vii New Material
Secondary dominant chords
So far we have seen that a dominant seventh chord, such as C7, is usually the V7 chord, since the 7 quality only appears with the V chord (see table above under "dominant seventh"). For example, the following progression in F major shows the C7 chord as V7:
Now we are ready to analyze a new type of dominant seventh chord. In the progression below we see a G7 chord in the second bar. Although this chord is built on the second degree of the F major scale, we cannot analyze it as ii7 because it is not a minor seventh chord. Nor can we analyze it as II7, since we are expecting the ii7 chord to be minor (see the table above under "minor seventh"). We would like to call it V7 since it is a dominant seventh chord, but it is not built on the fifth note of the scale. The V7 chord in the key of F major is C7, and it appears in the third bar. A warning sign that something new is happening any time you have an accidental--you don't have any when chords are all diatonically-related, since all the notes should come from the key signature.
We expect the dominant seventh chord to be built on the fifth degree, so we ask, "G7 is the V7 chord of what key?" The answer is C major. We could temporarily analyze the G7 chord then as V7 of C, written as V7/C ("V7 of C major"). However, we do not mix letters with Roman numerals in our functions, so we look through the chords related to F major and find that C major is the V chord. We then analyze G7 as V7/V, with the "/" being read as the word "of".
You can precede most chords with their own dominant seventh. We are so used to hearing V7 going to I that we will accept just about any dominant seventh chord as long as it resolves to the chord we expect to hear afterwards.
V7/X...X
We refer to secondary dominants in general as V7 / X, that is, V7 of some chord other than the tonic (the I chord). We feel justified in our analysis if the other chord (symbolized by the X) follows the secondary dominant chord shortly afterwards, ideally as the next chord or at most the second chord after it. If we don't see the X chord within a couple of chords we have to wonder if the chord we are calling V7/X is really a secondary dominant after all, since it doesn't appear to be functioning as one.
Example:
The following progression from "Satin Doll" has a secondary dominant that does not immediately resolve.
D7 Dm7 G7 C C:
V7 ii7 V7 I To be a secondary dominant, the D7 chord should resolve to G. Instead, Billy Strayhorn went to the ii7 chord, but then the next chord is G, so the condition V7/X...X is satisfied.
Jazz forms: themes and improvisation
Most pop music songs have verses with lyrics that change and choruses with the same lyrics each time. Jazz tunes usually are analyzed in different ways--they usually don't have verses and choruses and often have bridges. Sometimes you analyze them with letters to represent the sections instead.
Moon River is a song in "ABAC" form. The "A" section section lasts for 8 bars. The "B" section is the next 8 bars and has a different melody. The following 8 bars returns to the "A" melody. The last 8 bars has a different melody, represented by "C". Often times sections are in multiples of 4 or 8 bars, and many jazz standards last 32 bars.
"AABA" form is very common, for example, the song "Take the 'A' Train". You can hear an 8 bar "A" theme that repeats, then a contrasting 8 bar "B" section (in this case called the "bridge"), followed by a return to the original 8 bar "A". Satin Doll is another 32-bar long song in AABA form.
The song as written is referred to as the "head" among jazz players. Usually the way jazz standards are played is with an (optional) introduction, once or twice through the head with the melody as written, then one or more times through the form of the song using the same chord progression but with people taking improvised solos rather than playing the melody, a return to the head (once or twice through with the melody as written) and then some sort of ending.
What You Should Know
At the end of this week you should be able to:
Identify and analyze chord progressions with secondary dominants, using functional symbols such as V7/X
Homework
Enter the chord progression for your piece from Assignment 6 in Band in a Box. Enter your melody for "Tune Up" from assignment 5 into Sibelius. As usual, see the assignment sheet for details.
©2001 Robert Willey
