Quartal Harmony

Juampy Juarez teaches quartal harmony — chords built in fourths that are neither major nor minor, with an ambiguous, suspended sound. The lineage runs from Wagner, Debussy, Schoenberg, Stravinsky, and Bela Bartok through jazz pianists McCoy Tyner and Herbie Hancock, while Coltrane and Shorter wrote many melodies based on fourths. On guitar, Joe Diorio is the quartal champion, with Jim Hall, Allan Holdsworth, Pat Metheny, Jonathan Kreisberg, and Frank Gambale all embracing these sounds.

What's covered

• Quartal theory: building diatonic fourths from the major scale and naming the resulting 7sus4 chords
• Quartal triads and tetrads, with horizontal and vertical inversions across string sets
• Drop 2 voicings and quintal chords
• Modal comping: playing all seven quartal triads over a pedal bass for Dorian, Aeolian, Phrygian, and Lydian colors — "the bass rules"
• Where clusters meet quartals in the post-60s harmony of Coltrane, Bill Evans, and the Miles Davis Quintet
• Applying the material over both modal and tonal music
• Beyond the major scale: melodic minor, harmonic minor, and harmonic major

For Juampy this is a mandatory subject: once you can use quartal structures with fluidity, you begin to sound contemporary — not only comping, but in composition and chord melody too.

"This class is strictly for, by, and about GUITAR. The ideas on unusual chords, such as Melodic Minor #5, are priceless." ~ James S.

• PDF Included: 32 pages
• Skill Level: Intermediate
• Duration: 62 minutes