Triad Pairs and the modes of Harmonic Minor

Tim's triad-pair ideas got me thinking about other ways to apply triad pairs over chords.

• Let's examine how triad pairs would work when the triads are taken from the harmonic minor scale-

If we take the diatonic triads from a C harmonic minor scale we get the following triads:

C- ..........Ddim ..........Eb+.......... F- ..........Gmaj.......... Abmaj ..........Bdim

These are the possible triad pairs from C harmonic minor scale are:

C- /Ddim..... Ddim/Eb+..... Eb+/F-..... F-/Gmaj..... Gmaj/Abmaj .....Abmaj/Bdim..... Bdim/C-

Each above triad pair works over every chord that a C harmonic minor scale fits over!

So the chords that take a C harmonic minor scale would be:

C-maj7.......... D-7b5 ..........Ebmaj7(#5) ..........G7(b9,b13) ..........Abmaj7 (careful here, implies a split-third major scale)

(Please refer to my previous post on 'Modes of the Harmonic Minor scale for Jazz' if these don't make sense to you)

To apply these in an informed and meaningful way you should first try them at the piano. Play the chord with your left hand while playing each the triad pairs as alternating arpeggios to hear which ones work the best. Some pairs sound hipper than others so decide which ones you like and write them down.

This is quite a lot chew on. When you're finished try the same thing for the modes of melodic minor. This will open new worlds two-tonic-triadic possibility for you!

For lines using triad pairs pick up Gary Campbell's book called Triad Pairs for Jazz.