Altered Chords printable pdf download

music theory for musicians and normal people by toby w. rush

Altered Chords

up to this point, all the chords we’ve

been talking about have been built using

only the notes in the current key .

essentially, this means

no accidentals, with the

exception of the raised sixth

and seventh scale degrees

in minor, which we

consider to be

now that we’ve covered all

part of the key.

theory

the possible diatonic chords in

tertial harmony, it’s time to open

the door to notes outside the key ...

these “altered chords” add a

certain richness to the harmony

by using one or more notes

that are not in the key signature

we’ll be covering

and thus require accidentals.

several categories

of altered chords,

each of which have

their own unique

rules for use.

Secondary

NEAPOLITAN

Subdominants

BORROWED

however, there are

CHORDS

a few things that

SECONDARY

they all have in

common!

DOMINANTS

AUGMENTED

SIXTHS

first, every altered chord has to

have at least one accidental...

second, altered chords can be easily used in place of their

if it doesn’t have any accidentals,

diatonic counterparts. in other words, you can add some pizazz

then by definition it’s a

to a composition by replacing a diatonic chord with an

diatonic chord!

œ œ œ

altered chord

œ œ œ

that has the

& b

same root.

˙ ˙ ˙ n

˙ ˙ ˙

œ œ

œ œ œ œ

˙ ˙

˙ ˙ ˙ b

œ œ œ

altered

diatonic

in general, avoid cross relations.

a cross relation occurs when a note

˙ n

appears with two different accidentals

in two consecutive chords, in two

different voices.

with few exceptions,

lastly, when you use these chords

altered chords can use

in part-writing, you should,

the same basic root

˙ b

whenever possible, resolve the

movements that we’ve

altered notes in the direction

been using.

of their alteration.

like the diatonic sevenths,

so if a note has a flat, try to

however, the common root

resolve it down by step or by leap .

should only increase tension...

ii°

don’t move from an altered chord

and we generally avoid doubling altered tones,

to it’s diatonic counterpart.

since doing so would tend to cause parallel octaves.

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Altered Chords

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