Every arpeggio is a melody and Triads is a great very strong melodic building block you can use in your Jazz solos. In this lesson, I will show you:
You will learn how to:
- Find Triads for Chords
- Exercises to play them
- How to use them as Odd-Note groupings, strong melodies and outside material
Let’s first look at how to find triads and then what to practice and how to use them going from diatonic to a little outside stuff as well.
The examples of lines using the triads are all on a static or modal Dm7.
Finding Triads – Analyzing Chords For Solo Material
This is really simple if you know a little theory. You only need to know the notes in the chords and the scale they are found diatonic to.
The basic way to look at this: II V I in C major – Dm7 G7 Cmaj7
The scale: is C major: C D E F G A B C
Dm7: D F A C
G7: G B D F
Cmaj7: C E G B
For each chord we can find a triad from the root, so Dm for Dm7 and from the 3rd of the chord. For the Dm7 that is F A C which spells out an F major triad.
By adding extensions and looking at the available triads you can construct this overview:
The available triads are:
Dm7: Dm, F, Am, C
G7: G, Bdim, Dm, F
Cmaj7: C,Em,G
What Should You Practice – Solid Triad Exercises
Now you can find the triads but you also need to be able to use them in your playing and for that, you need to have them as flexible sets of notes, so basically you want to be able to play triads in as many ways as possible.
You can try out these exercises, don’t focus on speed just on being able to play them in tempo with a good tone and technique, then you can use them in your playing.
Some of the triad exercises I play in the video are:
Diatonic triads
Triad arpeggios in Position
Across the neck (showing F major and G major triads)
Inversions on string sets
3-1-5 Pattern in the scale
Across the neck in a skipping pattern
You can check out more exercises in this Triads Lesson
or this lesson on a Blues Solo with only Triads
Making Lines – Using Triads In Solos
Whether it is Charlie Parker, Pat Metheny or Julian Lage, they all use triads as a part of their solo vocabulary. These 3 examples will give you some different ways to use them in solos.
Odd-note groupings and cascading triads
This lick starts with a chromatic enclosure and from the continues with cascading triads.
In this example, I use the F major, Am, and C major triads as 3-note groupings. The melody works because I am stacking the triads in 3rds to connect them.
Open-Voiced/Spread Triads
The 2nd lick is combining Dm, F major, and C major triads.
Dm in a standard root position followed by the open-voiced F major triad in bar 2, and finally the C major triad in 2nd inversion played in a pattern.
Outside Chromatic Triads
Another interesting way to use triads on a static chord is to use them as chromatic structures and approaches, similar to how you would use chromatic passing chords
In the example below you have the melody moving from Dm triad to Db major to C major triads.
An example of this in a Kurt Rosenwinkel solo on All or Nothing At All is shown below:
Kurt plays this at the beginning of his solo off the East Coast Love Affair album.
An equally powerful solo tool on Lady Bird
You can also purchase this lesson at a reduced price as a part of the Easy Jazz Standards Bundle
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