Improvising on a musical instrument can be an extremely daunting task. Musicians spend entire lifetimes perfecting the art of improvising by practicing modes, transcribing solos played by the greats, and working on exercises that lend themselves to soloing. The greatest general advice for a budding improviser is to listen extensively and transcribe effective licks, and practice them in every key. The toughest part for younger musicians is learning, outside of transcriptions, what notes are the “right” ones and the “wrong” ones. The best way to establish the possibilities and limits implied within a chord is to study chord-scale theory and apply it to practice. While I will not spend any time in this article analyzing excerpts, I will discuss scale options when approaching specific chord types.

Within this article, we will discuss some options for dominant 7 chords. For simplicity's sake, I will refer to the notes within a C7 chord, with the chord being built by the notes C, E, G and Bb.

With the other chords that we have talked about, we've been able to at least fall back on a major or a minor scale. However, with this chord, notice the major 3^rd and minor 7^th. The combination of these two pushes us out of the realm of these scales. The simplest scale that we could use in this situation is actually a Mixolydian scale. A Mixolydian scale is the 5^th mode of the major scale, and is spelled as a major scale with a minor 7^th. This scale in C spells out as C, D, E, F, G, A, Bb. However, just like the scales we've discussed before, any mode of this scale could work well, examples are D Aeolian, E Locrian, F Ionian, G Dorian, A Phrygian, and Bb Lydian.

Especially interesting to note of the dominant 7^th chord is its extensions. A triad built off the 9^th scale degree would be a minor triad, in C it would comprise of D, F, A or a D minor triad.

An easy pentatonic to fall back on in these situations is your standard major pentatonic, which contains the major 3^rd but omits the 7^th completely. This would spell out as C, D, E, G, A. Pentatonic scales are often associated with Eastern music, so often this will give a “world music” vibe to the melodies played.

An alternative is to add a passing tone to highlight different chord degrees, as many bebop players would do. The “dominant bebop scale” you'll commonly find in books and Aebersold references has a passing tone between the 7^th and first scale degrees of a Mixolydian scale. This resulting scale in C would be C, D, E, F, G, A, Bb, B, C. However, when you're doing your transcribing and listening (which I hope you didn't forget about already), you'll realize that passing tones, both ascending and descending, can work around any chord tone. Worth noting, however, is that chromatically neighboring tones can become significantly weaker around extended chord tones (i.e. the 9^th, 11^th, 13^th).

Also, Debussy fans rejoice, the whole-tone scale works very well over a dominant 7^th chord. A whole-tone scale is a hexatonic scale that consists completely of whole-step intervals. This would spell out as C, D, E, F#, G#, A#, or enharmonically: C, D, E, Gb, Ab, Bb. Notice that the 5^th scale degree is altered in this scale, however, the overriding color of the whole-tone scale is able to keep this difference at bay.

Stepping into the realm of our modes we've been looking at is also extremely useful when deciding how to add color to our solos. The fourth mode of the Melodic Minor scale results in a scale very similar to our Mixolydian, the only difference being a #4. This results in a Lydian Dominant scale. Over C this would be C, D, E, F#, G, A, Bb. Not only does the presence of a leading tone pull the sound in towards the 5^th scale degree, but the whole-tone shaped motion ascending to this note also creates space for a soloist.

This scale is also further altered in the fourth mode of the Neapolitan Major scale, where it becomes a Lydian Dominant b6. You can probably guess how that one is spelled but I'll go for it anyways. C, D, E, F#, G, Ab, Bb.

The fifth mode of the Harmonic Minor scale is a Phrygian Dominant scale (or a dominant b2 b6 as its usually referred to off hand in the jazz community). This scale works well with the dominant 7^th chord due to the presence of the major 3^rd and the minor 7^th, but adds in some flavor in between. The scale spells out as C, Db, E, F, G, Ab, Bb. Notice the augmented second, or minor third spelled enharmonically, between the Db and E. Whenever you see a gap like this in a scale, note that there will be an exotic sound aurally happening there, and that, well, it'll probably be pretty cool.

The fifth mode of the Melodic Minor scale also results in a mode that works well for a dominant 7^th chord. The Aeolian Dominant scale is spelled C, D, E, F, G, Ab, Bb, C. Notice that, when you take out the 1^st, 3^rd, 5^th and 7^th, what you are left with is generally the same extensions that would be found in an Aeolian mode, with the tonic chord being dominant. This is important in identifying this mode.

The second mode of the Lydian Diminished scale also gives us an interesting color to work with over a dominant 7^th chord. The mode it spells out is a Mixolydian b2. This would result in a scale which, starting on C, would be C, Db, E, F, G, A, Bb.

An octatonic scale that would work well over a dominant 7^th chord is the Diminished scale beginning with a half-step. This would result in C, Db, D#, E, F#, G, A, Bb. Not only does this perfectly surround the dominant 7^th chord and highlight it, but it also spelled a completely different 7^th chord in symmetry. If we broke this down into two chords we would have C, E, G, Bb or a C7, and D#, F#, A, C# or a D# half diminished chord.

The realm of our koto tuning scales also creates fun pentatonics for us to use, however, not so many for the dominant 7^th chord, but that's okay because we have plenty to work on anyways. The Mixolydian Iwato scale is spelled as C, E, F, A, Bb. The Phrygian Insen is spelled C, Db, F, G, Bb.

What really opens up the sound of dominant 7^th chords, especially if they are traditionally resolving, is the ability to alter chord tones to create cool sounds. We will go over this in a future article, because I'm pretty sure we all have enough to work on here. Remember that there are a million colors that can be used over a dominant 7^th chord.

There are an infinite amount of possibilities, as you can apply any mode to different scale degrees to produce completely different colors and highlight different chord tones. A great place to start is realizing which modes line up directly on the tonic, such as all the ones listed above, and then begin to venture into modes off of different scale degrees.

Or you can just cop out and use the good old Blues scale.

But I won't spell that one out for you.