Suspended Fourth Chord and Quartal Harmony - The Study of Jazz Music

A chord quite common in much of today’s jazz is the so-called ”sus. 4”. Since the middle 1960s this chord occurs more and more frequently in many different tonal contexts. Sometimes it is used as a substitute for a dominant seventh chord: sometimes it elides into a dominant seventh chord or, on occasion it has a function all its own, outside the dominant – to – tonic harmonic pattern. The chord is most easily visualized as a dominant seventhchord minus the third, with the “sus. 4” taking its placea perfect fourth above the root of the chord:

 EXAMPLE 6

Example 7a illustrates the sus. 4 chordutilized as a dominant replacement moving to tonic major and tonic minor:

 EXAMPLE 7a

Example 7b illustrates the sus. 4 chord eliding into the “regular” dominant seventh chord, which is then followed by a tonic resolution:

EXAMPLE 7b

Example 7c illustrates the sus. 4 chord unrelated to dominant-tonic movements, but rather as an independent chord with a sequential life generated by root movements other than by syntax is similar to tunes such as “Maiden Voyage.” “Fancy Free” and “Cantaloupe Island".

EXAMPLE 7c

 

Quartal Harmony

A chord closely related to the sus. 4 structure is the quartal , a sonority constructed in perfect fourths. Although quartal harmony could embrace other kinds of fourths as building blocks (e.g. diminished and augmented fourths), it is the perfect fourth that is most often found as the interval upon which these chords are constructed. Quartal harmony as a musical element has been present for most of the twentieth century, but it is only in recent years that is has found its way into jazz. We propose a new system of chord symbols for these structures, since none have been of three picthes, each a perfect fourth apart, the letter (Q) would be placed next to the chord root. Hence:

EXAMPLE 8a

When a quartal chord is extended past a three-note structure a small arabic numeral can be utilized next to the (Q) to indicate precisely the number of notes in the chord.

EXAMPLE 8b

The following chart list chromatically and in sequence thirty eight of the most commonly encountered jazz chords. The keys are indicated down the left side of each page with the chord types listed across the top.