The attached PDF shows some simple, useful chord moves for ii-V and iii-vi-ii-V progressions.  Here are a few reasons they are so useful:

1) They feature a strategy where you are only moving 1 finger on a grip.
2) They feature voice-leading -- the finger you move outlines a chromatic descent to the next chord
3) They expose how a small vocabulary of chord shapes can be re-used for different voicings

As I've mentioned before, the first teacher who attempted to teach me about jazz guitar recommended the Mickey Baker books.  While they were nice at getting some basic and hip sounds going, there were a lot of holes to be filled.  While I don't particularly recommend starting with them, the best thing about his books was he gives a relatively small number of chord shapes to learn and re-uses them to stand-in for different chords in a hip way.  The first page of the PDF attempts to show how his chord shapes can be used in a ii-V progression.

The 1-finger ii-V is at the heart of what he initially presents, using a min6 as a Dom.9 voicing.  Making a min7 chord (acting as the ii) into a min6 chord (by moving the chord's b7 down 1 fret) gives you a rootless Dominant 9 chord, which is used as the grip for the V chord in the sequence.  Mr. Baker also shows that if you just hold or reposition min7 chord, you end up with a  rootless Dom11 chord.

As you may know, the min6 chord not only sounds like a Dom.9 chord, it is also a half-diminished (min7b5) voicing. The second page of the PDF shows all the various ways the min6 and min7 chords can be interpreted.  Understanding other uses for any grip you learn is a great thing to do.

Page 3 gives a few variations on a iii-VI-ii-V progression with Mickey's chord voicings.  This is the next most essential progression to learn after the ii-V.  Once you learn and hear the 2-5 and the 3-6-2-5, you will be able to abstract away several measures of many jazz standards which will make them easier to learn and remember.  Instead of learning several measures of a standard, you can eventually just represent it in your mind and ear as a 3-6-2-5 leading to a tonic.  If the six chord is a Dominant (has a major 3rd), then the 3-6 is like a ii-V going to the 2 of the ii-V which then goes to the tonic.  

Mickey's variations include using a min7 shape moved down one fret to represent the tritone of the ensuing V chord.  This tritone works out to be a Dom.7(#9) voicing.  A more common written variation is to use a rootless Dominant #11  for a V, which also happens to be a Dom.7(#11) a tritone away.  In addition to using a half-diminished (min7b5) shape as a rootless Dom.9 chord, we also see how a min7b5 shape can be grabbed as  Dominant Altered chords.  Finally, we see that the iii-7 chord can be a Maj9 voicing for the tonic.

Ideally you want to work out similar chord moves for every inversion of these chords.  The remainder of the PDF will give you a start in that direction.

Page 4 begins the chord moves for a I-vi-ii-V in one position for all the basic inversions which are in the Jimmy Bruno Inversions dictionary (you should check that PDF out if you haven't already).  This should allow you to do this chord move anywhere on the neck for any key.  Remember that the vi-7 chord is homonymous with the Tonic as a Maj6.  The squiggly arrow shows you will have to move up some frets to get the chord root on the correct note.  The min6 of the ii is equivalent to the Dom.9 of the V chord (as well as the other homonyms shown on Page 2).

Page 9 shows a 3-6-2-5 progression with altered dominants as the 6 and the 5.  The squiggly arrow is to alert that you will need to move the shape down on the neck to get the root in the right place.  When the 6 and 5 of a 3-6-2-5 are dominants, the 'tonal center' is located a whole tone (2 frets) away from the final Tonic during the 3 to 6.  The VI chord is a Dom.7(#11) while the V chord is a Dom.7(b9) -- which is also a Diminished voicing.  Note that each of the Dominant voicings here are exactly the same chord if played a tritone away.  Try out Mickey's other tritone subs -- making the tritone a min7 or min6 also gives a hip altered dominant sound to the V.  You should also try grabbing a different ii-7 chord to serve as a Dom11 chord for the V.

The basic goal of practicing the content in this PDF is to increase your vocabulary of chord moves for basic building blocks of jazz harmony -- the 2-5, the 3-6-2-5 and the 1-6-2-5.  With study, you will see these progressions again and again in jazz standards.  The extended vocabulary will give you a host of options up and down the neck for playing over these progressions so you are not endlessly repeating yourself comping behind a soloist.  Learning comping is more useful than just learning how to solo with scales or modes -- for starters, you will realistically be comping far more than soloing.  But dig this -- when you start to picture the chord tones of these progressions all over the neck, they will also be the targets you can approach (scalewise, chromatically or any other way) in your solo to outline the harmony.

​My current journey is to get more fluent with diminished chords and the symmetrical diminished scale.  When I see a Diminished 7th chord on a chart, I rarely have anything more up my sleeve then finding the root and climbing an arpeggio.  The sound definitely works but it can get a bit trite, especially over multiple choruses.  The fact that the diminished sound was such a huge part of pioneer Charlie Christian and then the be-boppers, not to mention Barry Harris's Sixth-to-Diminished concept, I've felt the need to visualize the Diminished arpeggios and scales better, at least in one context.

I'm already aware that the diminished sound can be applied with any dominant. The 'half-whole' symmetrical diminished scale can be used from the root of a V to get altered tones, but what about Diminished chords in Bossas or even folk and classic show tunes?

The best I can gather, the Diminished is like connective tissue that links the meat of the Diatonic chords.  Altered sounds on a Five chord is really just a way to lead the ears back to the I chord, often chromatically instead of scale-wise.  When you see a Dim.7 for a whole bar, typcially the same idea is happening -- it is a chromatic walk to the next harmony.  My plan is to get a baseline visualization for any diminished around the Major scale and then adjust accordingly.  My approach -- outlined in the PDF below -- is inspired by the bars in 'Shadow of Your Smile' which moves from Cmaj7 to C#dim7.

My strategy starts on page 1 of the PDF with a set of 'anchors' over the course of the fretboard.  Specifically I am trying to learn a set of 3-note voicings on the middle strings where I tend to gravitate toward when comping.  The voicings are just repeats of two shapes.  Sometimes it is helpful to actually give a name to shapes to aid the memorization -- I'm calling these 'arrow' and 'cup' shapes (the arrow's 'point' is towards the bridge and the cup's 'base' is toward the nut).

The first goals is to learn how these shapes 'sit' against the 'mode boxes' of the fretboard.  I visualize the fretboard by segments where you can vertically play a mode with the mode's root on the sixth string.  I'm learning these 'anchors' by looping two bars of Cmaj7 followed by two bars of Diminished 7.  For each mode-box, I start slow and work up speed alternating between the Major scale and then the arpeggio.  From these anchors I am extending the diminished arpeggio shape out.  The ensuing pages 2-8 show arpeggio shapes for other strings.  As I practice, I'm starting just with the 'corny' arpeggios as a line back to the major scale harmony.  For each segment of the fretboard, I want to visualize the map of these arpeggios over the major scale. 

Page 9 of the PDF begins the rest of the half-whole 'Symmetrical Diminished'. The second 'half' of the scale is rendered for each shape on page 1-8.  The other half of the half-whole scale is the same arpeggio voicings, just one semi-tone up from the anchors.

The 'Symmetrical Diminished' is a synthetic scale comprised of two sets of diminished arpeggios.  Every other note has a semi-tone or whole-tone interval.  The pages 9-16 show what I am calling the 'consonant' half of the scale.  All the notes of the scale one semi-tone up are in the Major scale, save the #5.  Even though #5 is not classically consonant with the major scale, it is okay to resolve on a Maj7#5 chord.  The #5 is consonant in the Barry Harris world.

The arpeggios in pages 1-9 I will call the 'Dysonant' half of the scale.  Even though they have a Perfect Third and Perfect Fifth, you are never going to resolve a Major 7 chord with flat 9 or a flat 7.  These are the same arpeggios in the 'Sixth to Diminished' concept.  They are the diminished arps that alternate between Maj6/min7 voicings to complete the Barry Harris chord scale.

Interesting, the 'Consonant'arpeggios have the voicings you might use for a V7b9 chord.  The major #5 is the b9 of the Dominant chord in a Major key. 

Together, both the 'Consonant' and 'Dysonant' arpegios make up my Symmetrical diminished scale for navigating over a C#o7 from a Cmaj7.  The end goal is to be able to go into this scale at any point, from any point in any Major scale.

Of course this pdf leaves out a third set of diminished arpeggios, which contains the root, the b3, the sixth, and the #11 of the major. These arpeggios lead to other Symmetrical Diminished scales which I am not going into in order to keep things from getting too out of hand. If you think of the 'altered Five' application of the Symmetrical Diminished using the scale in the PDF (the 'anchors' combined plus a semi-tone up) gives you the b9, #9, #11, as well as the root, the third, sixth and the b7 of the Five chord.  The only alteration you are missing is the #5 of the Five.  In the end, in order to play the remaining Symmetrical Diminished scale, you would simply use the 'anchor' voicings in page 1-9 as 'avoid' notes -- avoiding the Major scale's 5, b9, b7 and P3.  In terms of the Five chord, that would mean avoiding the 5, 7, #11, and #3 of the Dominant.

By learning the 'anchors' in page 1 for each mode-box, then learning the other voicings connected to them, then adding the notes a semi-tone up, I hope to get a go-to framework for coming up with diminished sounds relating to the major scale.

This post is inspired by this You Tube video by Jens Larsen: 8 Awesome Types of 3 note Voicings and How To Use Them.

​The zip file below contains a slew of three-note voicings progressing up the neck.

Three note voicing are the Jazz guitar player's go-to for comping.  With three notes against the bass-player's contribution, you can paint harmony that is solid and direct -- using the 3rd, 7th and 5th of a chord -- or more vague -- using 4ths, 9ths, 13ths -- or completely 'out there' -- using altered tones.

Three note voicings also often allow you to have a free finger to decorate or voice-lead the chord with an added line.

By learning the progressions in these pdfs, you will not only have a cool chord run in your pocket, but you will increase your vocabulary of shapes for comping or chord-melody.  While you probably have begun building up your 3-note shapes just by subtracting a note from 4-voice chords, there are other shapes which can be found that don't build up to a four-note voicing.

The voicings on the middle strings (4-3-2) are the most useful, so you may want to start there with each pdf.

Below is an example of Dominant 9 three-note voicings.  The zip download contains several other types, including min-Maj, quartal and cluster triads.

The Sixth-To-Diminished is a chord scale which alternates between Major Sixth Chords and Diminished Chords to provide a chord for every note of the Major scale.  It is just sandwiching a Diminished chord between each inversion of the Major Sixth chord.  If you run up this chord-scale,  you will quickly hear a sound which harkens the chord solos of Wes Montgomery.

Wes Montgomery's octave solos are perhaps the most distinctive part of his sound, but nearly all of his solos were like a three act play:  First, he started with single lines, then he moved to octaves, finally he moved to chords.  Just by the sheer number of strings, he was 'building' up his solo.

There are a few different approaches to chord soloing, most of which involve targeting the note on a chord's highest string as the 'Melody Note' with the bottom strings 'fleshing out' what chord is being stated below.  The Sixth-to-Diminished approach is a quick-and-dirty chord-scale which you can learn on the cheap.

The Sixth-to-Diminished concept is championed by Barry Harris.  I did a blog post on the Barry Harris 'origin' story, but there is no context of what to do with that information.   The  basic takeaway should be that, through these philosophical machinations, the 'Sixth' chord has some interesting 'genes' in its DNA -- specifically related to the Diminished scale.  I imagine early jazzers started heavily exploring the Diminished because they heard the leading tones in an altered functional dominant.

The two-dollar explanation of the sixth-to-diminished is that the chord-scale is continually going from Five-to-One.  As outlined in the PDF, the diminished fingering is really an altered Dominant - a Dom.7b9 chord.  The ensuing chord is the 'One' chord, the Maj6.  Now -- what do jazzers love to do with any harmony?  Take any opportunity to add a 'V to I' cadence.  The Sixth-to-Diminished has the V to I in spades.  Every movement along the chord scale is a V going to a I.  

The beauty of the Maj6 chord is you can easily interpret it as Major or Minor.  Any Maj6 is an inversion of a min7. You may notice that the diminished chords -- spelled out in the chart as Dom.7b9 -- consistently have a note outside the Diatonic Major scale.  The flat-9 of these Dominants are actually the same as a Major#5.  I don't have the complete story on the Barry Harris method, but I know the Maj#5 chord is a big part of it.

If you take a look at the Diatonic chords of the Harmonic Minor, you see the Maj#5 is the Third Mode there.  If we used the Harmonic Minor's Maj#5 as the 'One' chord, the II mode would be the Harmonic Minor's vi  -- Dorian#11.  Let's take a look at the Sixth-to-Diminished harmonization of the II in the PDF.  It shows a Dom.7b9 to the V, but looking from the perspective of the II, we have the Root, the flat third, the sixth, and the #11.  Are the chord tones are outlining the Harmonic Minor starting from the III? Perhaps a discussion for another post.

Below is the the Harmonic Minor Scale and it's diatonic arpeggios.  This PDF is similar to those for the Major Scale and Melodic Minor Scale, so check out those posts if you haven't.  The PDF outlines the Harmonic Minor, it's seven modes and the diatonic arpeggios.

As with the other Scale PDFs, it might be worthwhile to start with the arpeggios for each mode.  Not only are they less notes to focus on, but they are lines in themselves that make succinct, harmonic 'sense' out of the modes.  Once you understand the chord tones for a mode, then you can 'flesh out' the rest of the scale around it.

For the novice jazzer, it is less useful to understand this material for compositional movements, than to just be aware of the arpeggios that are buried within this scale.  While the Harmonic Minor is a great choice for the Min-Maj7 chords and sounds in tunes like Nica's Dream and Nardis, the harmonic minor is probably most used in jazz for altered sounds -- using the Phrygian Dominant over a #11 chord or the Ultra-Locrian for tri-tone colors over a functional Dominant.  Just learning the harmonic scale will give you access to these sounds, but being able to pick out all the arpeggios within it can give you a richer starting point for your lines.

Another key use of the Harmonic Minor in jazz is the 'Barry Harris' approach.  Barry Harris has a whole cosmology of scales and tones that starts with chromatics, splits into diminished and ends with sixth chords.  The 'Barry Harris' scale -- the Major#5 -- is really the third mode of the Harmonic Minor in this PDF.  Check out his 'Sixth-to-Diminished' theory which is at the heart of his teachings.  If you act as if the Third Mode of the Harmonic Minor is the 'One' chord for Major tunes, you can develop a unique perspective into the tunes of the Swing and BeBop era.  Either way, if you are familiar with the arpeggios in the Harmonic Minor and Melodic Minor scales, you will be able to spot them when transcribing the lines of Charlie Parker and other boppers when they go 'outside' the harmony.

Below is a reference for learning the Melodic Minor Scale diatonically.  The Melodic Minor is sometimes referred to as the 'Jazz Minor' due to its applications to Jazz.  You may have gotten hip to the fact that the 7th mode of the Melodic Minor can be used serve up altered sounds over a functional Dominant (a V going to a I).  At some point I also realized that the fourth mode of the Melodic Minor can be used over #11 Dominants.  Learning the totality of the scale with diatonic context of all the arpeggios will give much greater command over these sounds.

While the Melodic Minor only differs from the Major scale by one note, I still find myself struggling to visualize it thoroughly over the fretboard, certainly more than Major scale.  My ability to visualize the Major scale was significantly bolstered by learning all the diatonic arpeggios in the scale, across all the scale 'boxes' where the modes sit with the root on the sixth string.  Learning arpeggios also significantly strengthened my ability to generate lines strongly outlining the harmony. 

You can focus on parts of the neck by breaking it up into 'r6 mode boxes'.  These scale 'boxes' I term with the 'r6' meaning 'root is on the 6th string.'  For instance, 'III-r6' represents the way the notes sit when you play the Phrygian scale with its root on the sixth string.  This lines up as a box, or chunk of the fretboard which is easier to concentrate on, especially at first.

Just like the the Major scale, there are seven notes in the Melodic Minor.  Each of these seven 'degrees' has a mode, chord, and arpeggio associated with it.  Modes are simply the same notes of a scale arranged with a different note serving as the root.  The arpeggio for each degree can be found by skipping every other note in the mode until the next octave is reached.  An arpeggio is basically the notes of a chord played sequentially.

Below are the scales and chords for each degree of the Melodic Minor Scale:

​The Melodic Minor scales are:
I  - Melodic Minor (R, 2, b3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
II - Phrygian #6 (R, b9, b3, 4, 5, 6, #6)
III - Lydian Augmented (R, 2, 3, #4, #5, 6, 7)
IV - Dominant #11 (R, 2, 3, #4, 5, 6, b7)
​V - Mixolydian b6 (R, 2, 3, 4, 5, b6, b7)
VI - Locrian #2 (R, 2, #2, 4, b5, #5, b7)
VII - Super Locrian (R, b9, b3, 3, b5, #5, b7)

The accompanying chords are:
I  - Min-Maj7 (R, b3, 5, 7)
II - Min #6 (R, b3, 5, b7)
III - Maj7 #5 (R, 3, #5, 7)
IV - Dom.7 #11 (R, 3, 5, b7)(#11)
​V - Dom.7 b13 (R,3, 5, b7)(#13)
VI - Min7b5 (R, b3, b5, b7)
VII -Min7b5 (R, b3, b5, b7)
​
I recommend starting with the Melodic Minor arpeggios in the middle section of the PDF.  Take four or five days and run over the arpeggios for one mode (probably start with Min/Maj7) in all the different r6 mode boxes.  Maybe put on a relevant backing track and definitely a metronome.  By the fifth day, you should really concentrate on connecting between the boxes and try to work horizontally or diagonally.

After you have the arpeggios, the scales are just the rest of the notes to flesh them out.  Start with the most useful scales for playing over Dominants, like the Lydian Augmented and Super Locrian.

Finally, learn to run all the arpeggios within a particular mode box.  This will reinforce both the scale pattern and the diatonic progression within the Melodic Minor.

While you are not going to necessarily find a lot of complex harmonic movements of the Melodic Minor in Jazz tunes, learning the diatonics of the Jazz Minor will give you greater facility at minor two-fives and the ability to super-impose these scales in other applications.

​Knowing your intervals helps you quickly find the roots of classic chord progressions.  Since many chord progressions in classic jazz tunes move in fourths, it is a good idea to learn the circle of fourths and be able to move in fourths at any point on the guitar neck.  This pdf might help you locate all the perfect intervals in the major scale.

​Since the guitar is stacked in fourths, moving vertically from bottom string to top is automatically a fourths motion.  In the image below you can see how starting on the third on the low E and traveling to the high E will move you though the roots of a 3-6-2-5-1 and then to the four.  Remember that strings 2 and 1 (B and E) are tonally shifted up a fret.  The vii happens to be a tri-tone away from the IV. Tri-tones are basically a 'diagonal' away on the fretboard.

​
You can see how a 3-6-2-5-1 would look on the circle of fourths below.  Moving in a counter-clockwise motion brings you from the iii around to the I and then to the IV if you continue.  In order to get to the remaining interval -- the vii -- you would have to jump to the other side of the circle. Diametrically opposite tones on the circle are a tritone apart. 

​This is my first attempt at a chord melody.  I was told creating a chord melody would help me memorize the chord changes for a particular song.  It has also helped me figure out a few new fingerings.

I put chord boxes above the chords, stacking alternates at times.  The hollow circles are the second or third note to play holding the position (or en route to the next chord).  If you know the melody, you should be able to figure it out -- some go to a hollow dot and back to a solid dot.

The premise of constructing the chord melody is relatively simple -- the melody should run on the top two or three strings so you can stack the rest of the chord on the bottom strings.  The melody note should always have the highest pitch of all the notes in a chord.  It is not necessary to have a chord for every single note.  I always tried to aim to have at least the essential tones (3rd and 7th of the chord) and, if possible, the root note.  Often this required some inversions.

Please let me know if I have an error or typo.

Here is my crazy mnemonic device for memorizing the Circle of Fourths.  If you haven't got a circle, try the one I made here. 

Another mnemonic  you might try is Be Ever Alert During Guitar Class (Forever).

Another mnemonic for going in the direction of fifths I've learned is Fine Classical Guitarists Demand Accurate Execution (Buddy).

The Altered scale is the seventh mode of the Melodic Minor (aka Jazz-Minor) scale.  It is a great scale for finding leading tones over a "functioning" V in a ii-V-I.  These leading tones are 'outside' the Key center of the ii-V-I, which create even more tension over the already tension-inducing V.  This tension of the V is resolved when you get back to the I.

The typical way to play the Altered scale (aka Super-Locrian), is to sight the root of the Altered scale on the root of the dominant.  Alternatively, you can sight the Melodic Minor's root on the b9 of the V chord -- one semi-tone up from the root of the V.

The Super-Locrian/Altered scale is really the 7th mode of the Melodic Minor -- the root of the Altered scale is the 7th degree of the Melodic Minor scale.  Additionally, there are other modes of the Melodic Minor that work nicely over dominant chords in other situations.  

The Lydian b7 (4th mode of Melodic Minor) works great over Dominants with a #11.  If you are familiar sighting the altered scale, you can sight the root of the altered scale on the #11 of the Dominant. Or you can sight the root of the Jazz Minor on the 5 of the V.

For a Dominant with a #5, you can play the Mixolydian b6 - the fifth mode of the Melodic Minor.  Sight the start of the altered on the 3rd of the V chord you are playing over.  Otherwise, sight the Melodic Minor starting on the 4.

Finally, a Dorian b2 (3rd mode of the Melodic Minor) works over a Dominant with a #9 or a b9.  Sight the altered scale starting at the V chord's 13.  Or sight the Melodic Minor on the b7.

I learned the Melodic Minor via the Altered Scale, so I tend to sight with the Major 7 of the Melodic Minor.  But it is really best to sight the Melodic Minor.  When you first learn the Altered scale, your melodic lines will probably sound quite foreign if you think of the 7 of the Melodic minor as the root -- similar to when you attempt to play the Locrian mode out of context.  The 7's of the scale are really pulling the westerner's ear toward the next tone up, which is the root of the key.

If you play lines with the Melodic Minor in mind, you will still be creating tension on the V with the outside note, but the lines will sound a little more familiar and groovy somehow.  The best way to inflect the Melodic Minor sound is to focus on notes in the Melodic Minor arpeggio 1, b3, 5, 7.  This isn't the end approach to take with the substitute modes, but it worth starting with.  By focusing on the Melodic Minor arpeggio, you will begin to see the other modes in relationship to the Melodic Minor harmony.

The chart provided shows all the Super-Locrian, Lydian b7, Mixolydian b6 and Dorian b9 modes against the Mixolydian of a V chord.

In addition, I've broken each of my mode boxes out and repeated the information for each neck position.  The name 'r6-vi' Aeolian Box is my description of the 4-5 fret position where the Aeolian Mode for would start with its root on the 6th guitar string (low E).  That is the shape of the notes in the position, but the V is still the root in this context.

With the mode boxes, I've also stripped this box down to the arpeggios for each mode.  The yellow ring indicates the Root of the Melodic Minor.  Therefore, for the right-hand, stripped down box of the Super-Lociran, Lydian b7, etc., shows the Melodic Minor arpeggio, with the yellow ring as the root.  This outlines how to play a really strong Jazz-Minor sound against these altered dominants.

Try looping a passage with an altered dominant like a Dom #11, and find the mode of the Melodic Minor (Lydian b7 in this case) that works best over it.  Play the melodic minor mode over the V chord -- maybe even imagine the arpeggio of the V chord dimly sitting 'underneath' the mode you are playing.  Then try and make a line solely comprised of the Melodic Minor arpeggio before resolving to the next chord.  Try this in various positions over the neck until you start to see the juxtaposed relationship.  You should practice until you can see your Mixolydian notes or your V arpeggio, and then immediately super-impose the applicable Melodic Minor mode, understanding the 'essential tones' (3rd & 7th) of the substitute mode.

Once you are facile at seeing each mode in relation to the Dominant arpeggio the V, you can begin focusing on structuring lines that really capture the essential tones of the V chord while also including the altered notes of the chord on the lead sheet, pulling you toward resolution with an essential tone of the one.