3 Melodic Minor Scale Jazz Improv Hacks

And melodic minor scale sounds like this It's essentially like the mixture of a minor scale and a major scale , having the major third included in it , and you can do all sorts of different cool things , playing the melodic minor scale in different sorts of ways over top of different kinds of chords . Well , in today's episode , i want to simplify all of that .

Forget about all of the possibilities that you could use the melodic minor scale and jazz improvisation and narrow it down to three . That , i think , will be really helpful for you for using the melodic minor scale . Let's jump right into it . All right , what's up everybody ? Brent here , i am a jazz coach . I am a jazz musician .

I'm here to help you learn how to play jazz while shortening the learning curve , no matter what instrument you play . Welcome to another episode of the podcast . Really excited to be here Now .

The other week , in our monthly jazz masterminds , which are live Q&A sessions that we do in my inner circle membership , someone asked a really interesting question And that question was how can I use the melodic minor scale in jazz improvisation ? What chords can I play the melodic minor scale over to help me improvise ?

I thought it was a great question because , as I mentioned in the intro , the melodic minor scale is one of those scales that if you dig into any college music theory textbook , especially when it comes to jazz , you're going to see a million different ways to use the melodic minor scale , a lot of different concepts behind it , different approaches to using it .

So I'm going to go over the three ways that you can use the melodic minor scale over three different chords that will come up in jazz standards time and time again , and so I'm really going to narrow it down to these three because in my opinion , you're going to get a lot more value out of this lesson today if we just really give you a simple way of

thinking about melodic minor scales . That's not going to make you have to count scale degrees , that's not going to make you have to think of the modes of the melodic minor scale , like all that can get confusing really quickly .

All I want you to really do is just to know what the melodic minor scale actually is and then how to apply it over just three different chords that will come up time and time again in jazz standards . Before we go into what those three melodic minor applications are , i always like to give my scales disclaimer .

Okay , when it comes to jazz improvisation , scales shouldn't be used as the primary resource or tool for improvisation . Like I just said a second ago , they are essentially just a tool . There are a way to conceptualize note choices that you can make over top of different chords . I like to call these pitch collections .

So , for example , if I have a B flat major seven chord right , then one pitch collection that's very obvious is right , that's just the major scale . Right , we can play the major scale over top of a B flat major seventh chord And essentially the B flat major scale is showing us notes that are definitely going to sound good over top of that chord .

Right , so it's a pitch collection because ultimately , when we listen to great jazz musicians play , they're really not playing major scales and they're not playing something that sounds like a major scale .

But scales can be helpful for conceptualizing jazz language , as the melodic minor applications are really going to show you today , or just by simply showing you different notes that you can play . I like to always just use the example , though that like , for example , over top of this B flat major , seventh chord .

Technically , if you really wanted to , you could play this , right , essentially I'm just playing the chromatic scale . Right , i could play any note over top of that B flat major , seventh chord . It really just comes down to those are the chord tones , right , call them the arpeggios of the B flat major seven .

It really comes down to how do I resolve those chromatic notes ? right , that sounded a little bit more like jazz , right , right , as long as I'm resolving to the chord tones with the chromatic scale in mind , then it's going to still sound good , right , and that really is kind of the freedom that jazz offers .

So I say all that my scales disclaimer , just to point out to you that just because we're saying you can play the melodic minor over top of this scale , it's really just helping you conceptualize , hopefully gain some patterns , some muscle memory , some idea of the notes that you could target and play , not necessarily that you should play these as linear patterns ,

okay . So , the disclaimer aside , let's go into the three applications , the melodic minor . So let's first start with the chords that we're going to be applying the melodic minor scale over top of . Let's use a , two , five , one in D , minor , okay , and a two five one , oops , that's the chord .

A , two five one is E , minor seven , flat five , a seven and finally , of course , d minor seven and really any variation of those right Like . Feel like adding the 13 , sharp 11 , whatever right , just the ninth there and the one chord . So E , minor seven , flat five , a seven , d minor seven , that's the two five one .

So what are the qualities of those chords ? It's a minor seven , flat five for the two chord , a dominant seventh chord for the five chord , although oftentimes in a minor situation , some kind of altered , you know , chord is very common . And then you have the one chord which is a minor seventh chord , right , great . So let's start with the first quality .

What can we play over top of this half diminished chord ? this E , minor seven , flat five . Here's the rule , very simple rule to remember You can play a melodic minor scale , a minor third , up from the chord that you're playing , the root of the chord that you're playing . So E , minor seven , flat five .

If we understand just a basic intervalical relationship of what a minor third is , right , that's a minor third . By the way , minor third , that's the third of the minor seven , flat five chord is G , natural , okay .

So it really just requires you know that , okay , what a minor third is up from , e or whatever chords you're playing , whatever minor , seven , flat five chord you're playing , and what the actual melodic minor scale is , right . So what's the melodic minor scale ? Okay , here's the root .

So it's one , two , flat three , four , five , major , six , major , seven to the eight or the root Right , like I said earlier , kind of a mixture between the minor scale and the major scale . Okay , so now that you know what the scale is , you know what a minor third is .

What you can do now is play that E minor seven flat five and that G melodic minor scale .

Now that we're playing right , because the G note is a minor third up from the E , the E root , and we're playing the melodic minor that works over top of the E minor seven , right E minor seven , flat five chord , and you can hear that , right , all those sounds totally make sense , right ?

If you really start analyzing it and you're familiar with other scales , you can play over the minor seven flat five . Really , when you start looking at it , right , when we start looking at it , it's kind of like playing the low C and sharp two . If you don't know what the low C and sharp two scale is , don't worry about it .

This is just another way , essentially , of playing a very similar pitch collection over top of the E minor seven flat five . So what's the rule ? Let's first restate the rule . The rule is you can play over a half diminished chords , minor seven flat five chords .

You can play a melodic minor scale , a minor third , up from the root chord that you're playing E minor seven flat five . You can play a G melodic minor scale And that is a perfectly acceptable pitch collection . That will sound good , the notes will sound good , over top of that chord . Awesome , right .

So let's move on to the second chord in our 2-5-1 , which obviously is the V chord , right . And so in the case of a 2-5-1 and D minor , that's going to be an A7

. And , like I mentioned earlier , oftentimes in jazz , like when you have a minor , especially when you have a minor 2-5-1 , it's kind of like often altered . What does that mean ? altered , by the way .

So an altered dominant 7th chord could be all of the above or just some of the above , and the possible alterations are the flat 9 , the sharp 9 , you can play . The sharp 11, . You can play the flat 13 , right . So that's technically whatever you see on a chord chart if it says alt beside it . That's what it's insinuating , right there .

Right , that kind of tense sound that really needs to be resolved right . And jazz musicians really use altered sounds a lot in jazz improvisation , whether it's a major or a minor , 2-5-1 or whatever the context is like . You hear that a lot happening in jazz . They like to create tension and resolution in their lines .

So this next melodic application , melodic minor application , is really helpful for conceptualizing that idea . So here's the rule If you have a dominant 7th chord , you can play a melodic minor scale a half step up from the root note . Okay . So in this case we have an A7 chord . A half step up is B flat , so a half step , like one step there .

One half step is B flat , so I can play a melodic minor scale . So we can now play the B flat . Melodic minor scale Same formula , right , once you know the formula for a melodic minor scale , it's the same . All you really have to be able to do is play it in all 12 keys .

Right , and better yet , like sometimes when we talk about playing things in all 12 keys and like , worrying about that , like , oh , what are the actual notes ? right , we're playing the B flat , and then we're playing the C , and then we're playing , right , the D flat . Like , yeah , it can be helpful and important to know what the actual notes are .

But more importantly , especially for jazz improvisation , is can you hear it ? Like , can you hear it in that key ? And then , of course , like , you'll develop muscle memory on your instrument for what that sounds and feels like on your instrument , right ? But I mean , jazz musicians aren't thinking about what every single note in the melodic minor scale is .

It's more like a sound that they're hearing right , and , yes , it does start with like actually knowing and analyzing , but then eventually it just becomes a sound , right , and a muscle memory pattern that you develop . Does that make sense ? So , again , the rule is we have a dominant seventh chord . A half step up from that you can play a melodic minor scale .

And you might ask why ? right , because you have this A7 right here . Okay , you might notice that that actually does sound good . Over the A7 chord , right , here's our A7 . And again , those are B flat , our B flat melodic minor scale . That sounds good Because it's actually altering a lot of those chord tones , those notes within the A7 chord .

So , for example , if you think about it , what is a B flat note , the B flat melodic minor ? what is the B flat , the root note , as it compared to the A7 ? It's the flat nine . We already talked about that . So one of the alterations over a dominant seventh chord can be a flat nine .

So you actually start the scale with the flat nine and then the sharp nine of the chord right And then you play the third right , so it's the flat nine , the sharp nine and the third of that A7 . So essentially , we're playing an altered dominant seventh chord here when we're playing a melodic minor scale a half step above the root note , right .

So all these sounds , they sound really , really , really , really cool , right ? So we just playing all the . We got the flat seven in there , the flat 13 , all that's really in there and it's making this dominant seventh chord sound super altered .

Now you might have heard before like what's another scale you can play over top of a dominant seventh chord to make it sound altered ? Well , it's the altered scale , and so technically , the altered scale is the melodic minor scale . It's actually the seventh mode of the melodic minor scale .

And once again , like I'm going to stop right there , because a lot of people get super confused by modes , and the major modes are way easier to explain And The melodic minor modes for me are just so much more difficult and the application is so less prevalent than the use cases for the major .

And so that's why , like for me , thinking about the altered scale as the seventh mode of the melodic minor and then thinking of it that way , right in the terms of modes , i think that can get super confusing . That's why , to me , this is a little bit easier .

This is just going like all I need to know is the melodic minor scale And then all I need to know is the rule . And then now you've got a great pitch collection to use for altered dominant seventh chords , right , which can be used really anytime we're resolving to a one chord of any sort or any chord that's being tonicized anyways , right ?

So one more time just to restate the rule Dominate seventh chord , half step up . You can play the melodic minor , in this case A seven . You can play the B flat melodic minor scale . Okay , bringing us to our last chord of the two five , one which is the D minor seven . That's the one chord right , two , five , one , all right .

So this one is super easy , because over top of any one chord that you're playing any one minor chord , you play the melodic minor scale of that one minor chord . So you play , in this case , the D melodic minor , right , easy , okay . So you might ask yourself , like maybe , like Brent , but why can we do that ?

right , okay , why can we play the melodic minor scale ? Because , as we know , the melodic minor has the major seventh in it And we're not playing a D major seven , we're playing a D minor seven . But there's a couple reasons for this . I'll give you reason number one .

That is kind of the easiest one to talk about , right , and reason number one is that one , a very perfectly acceptable , cool substitution that you can play for a minor one chord , is the minor major seventh chord , and really it's like this the chord that you could associate directly with the melodic minor scale .

It's essentially like you're playing a minor seventh chord which is root , third , flat seven , sorry , root , flat , three , five , flat , seven , right . But the only difference really is you're playing the major seven , so root , flat , three , five , major seven , right . And so you get this sound , that kind of mysterious sound .

I guess you call it the double because it's sort of like , does that play at the end of the 007 theme ? So it's a familiar sound that you might be aware of . It's kind of a mysterious sound and absolutely in jazz , like you can substitute that for a minor one chord . It'll just give it a little bit more flavor , a little bit more mystery .

Right , and again , let's go back to the concept of scales being pitch collections . Right , they aren't . Like , oh , we have to play the major seven , or the minor seven for that matter , over top of the one chords . Right , it's just an option .

Like we now have an option that is completely acceptable to actually resolve , to like , so we could resolve our line to right to the major seven , which would seem weird , but if you're playing a minor major seven , it's completely acceptable to do that . Okay , that's explanation number one , why it works .

Explanation number two is a little bit more complicated , but bear with me for a second . In minor harmony it's it's different than major harmony , right , in major harmony we have one scale , we have the major scale . Okay , and if you're not a big theory , john Key , and I'm going over your head for a second at least just listen to what I'm playing .

When we harmonize a major scale with seventh chords , we get this sound . We get the major one chord . Minor two chord . Minor three chord . The major four chord , dominant five chord . Minor six chord , the half diminished seventh chord and finally back to the major one chord . That's major harmony .

That's where we get two , five , one chord progression from one , three , six , two , five , one chord . All the chord progressions in major harmony come from that , right . And then with minor harmony , though , it's a lot more complicated . And what's the reason for that ? It's because we have actually three minor scales .

The first one is the natural minor scale , okay . The second one is the harmonic minor scale , which , by the way , also has the major seventh in it , right , but it has the flat six in it . So the , the melodic minor scale , is the third minor scale .

So if you're tracking with me , we have three minor scales and you can harmonize seventh chords with all three of those minor scales . When you do that , you're going to get different results , right ? So for the , the natural minor scale , the one chord is always going to be just a regular old minor seventh chord .

But if we're harmonizing , for example , the melodic minor scale , the one chord is going to be a minor , major , seventh chord , right ? So technically , technically , a one chord , just by theoretical definition , by theoretical fact , because we have three different scales we can harmonize is a true one chord . Okay , it is , it is one choice for the one chord . Okay .

And you can make arguments like , if you really want to get into the weeds with the theory and you're on that level , you know there are situations where , for example , the five chord , when harmonized with the natural minor , it's not , it's not a dominant seventh chord , which is just absolutely never going to happen , right , like , the five chord , you know , 9.999

times out of 10 , is always going to be a dominant seventh chord . Right , it's , the five chord is just always a dominant seventh and all of music it just the five resolves to the one . Like there's no dominant , there's not really a . I mean , i'm sure there are . There are definitely scenarios .

Even in one of our inner circle studies we had an argument for why the five chord might not be a dominant seventh chord , but pretty much in every single scenario the five chord is going to be a dominant seventh chord , right ? So sometimes , when you're harmonizing these scales , it's like , well , that's an obvious not choice , right ?

You're not going to play a major seventh for the dominant seventh chord , you're going to play a dominant seven , right ? So these are important things to know about minor harmony is . It's not always equal here , but again , this was a bit of a tangent . All just to say that the minor one chord can most certainly be minor major seventh chord .

So that's why you can play the melodic minor over any one chord and it's totally going to be cool and it's going to give you some flavor . Okay , cool , i spent a little extra time on that , going to the weeds on some theory , but if you didn't understand all that , that's totally okay too . It's just to try to explain how this all sort of works .

But really the most important thing for you to remember is just simply this what are the formulas for these three chords ? Let's review it . The first one we got the minor seven flat five chord . You can play a melodic minor scale , a minor third up from the root of that chord .

Okay , the dominant seventh chord right , you can play a melodic minor scale a half step up from that dominant seventh chord that you're playing and over a one chord , over a one minor seventh chord , you can play a melodic minor starting from the root of that chord .

Okay , and to me this is like the basics of melodic minor theory and for many of you and most of you , this is about as far as you will go or really need to go . Okay , i'm actually kind of serious about that .

I'm not saying that like exploring melodic minor theory on a deeper level isn't helpful or isn't useful or it might be a really good thing for you to actually do . Absolutely , if you're interested in melodic minor theory , knock yourself out and go for it .

But scales I never like people who get too overly obsessed over when it comes to jazz improvisation , because I find that it easily can be obsessed over .

But this is just an easy way to think about it and a simple application over the most common chords that you're gonna come up with in melodic or , sorry , in minor harmony in general that shows up in jazz standards , and so you're gonna see a minor two , five , one , all of the time in jazz standards , left and right , and now you have melodic minor application

over top of that that you can actually take action on and use , make sense . All right , my friends , that's all for today's episode . Thank you so much for joining me .

By the way , if you need help with your jazz improvisation , maybe you need help with jazz theory some of the stuff we talked about today or just improvisation , or certainly if you need help learning jazz standards , definitely check out our Learn Jazz Standards Inner Circle Membership . That's actually the inspiration for today's episode I mentioned .

It was asked in one of our monthly jazz masterminds , our Q and A sessions that we do And it's a really great time Like we all learn together . There's a lot of musicians in there playing all sorts of different instruments And we learn new jazz standards every single month .

There's courses and everything you really need And the community is just really fun Like people posting recordings of themselves getting feedback . My team and me are in there giving feedback . So if you're just someone who wants to improve your jazz playing faster , get that support , highly recommend it .

You can check it out at ljsinnercirclecom or check out the link in the show notes or wherever you're listening to the podcast in your podcast player . You'll find it in the show description . Would love to have you , my friend . All right , make sure you subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts when we're coming out with another great podcast episode next week .

Happy practicing and we'll see you back then . Cheers , we'll see you next time .