Diminished Bossa Lesson

Diminished Bossa

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  • Hello everyone, today I will bring you some bossa, it is called "Diminished Bossa" and besides there are a lot of diminished chords, it's name its due that part "B" is missing. The original sheet is from 1996 or 1997 and it was a college test where you have to write a lead sheet over some given subject (that time was diminish chords usage).

    Diminish chords have simetrical structure( four minor thirds) and are very ambiguous. Common practice use them as V7 (with the "missing" root one major 3rd below from any of the diminish chord nots) or also it can be viewed as a vii7 (VII grade from harmonic minor) or as a pass chord. It has no inversions and it's meaning depends on context.

    Those who are interested in the subject I recomend reading Walter Pistons' Harmony, it has an specific chapter on this subject very well explained and very short.

    But despite the lesson name, the main objective of this lesson is not to talk about diminish chords, it´s about getting in touch with a lead sheet. A lead sheet (in jazz) is (oftenly) some simplified score where only the melody and harmony are indicated, and also there may be some anotation regarding the style and the aproximately bpm of the tune.

    In this lesson I took the lead sheet and played it three times, one time using single melody, the second time using octaves, and the third time using chord melody (in that chorus there is no rhythm guitar so I can play more freely).

    I hope you like it. As always there is a pdf full size score in the instructor board and I´m running a collab on this called "Bossa Nova Collab".

    After this collab I will make a lesson on soloing over this progression and some solos from the collab may be featured as a bonus vid in the end.

    Have fun!
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