Art and Design Review, 2017, 5, 181-188 http://www.scirp.org/journal/adr ISSN Online: 2332-2004 ISSN Print: 2332-1997 DOI: 10.4236/adr.2017.53014 August 14, 2017 The Art of Improvising: The Be-Bop Language and the Dominant Seventh Chords Carmine Cataldo Mechanical Engineering, Battipaglia, Italy Abstract The aim of this article lies fundamentally in illustrating the first part of a sim- ple and intuitive method, finalized to “speaking” the Be-Bop language imme- diately, without possessing any jazz background whatsoever. The main pecu- liarity of the method consists in the fact that the attention of the improviser is always focused on Triads. We herein exclusively discuss the improvisation techniques regarding the dominant seventh chords. Starting from a specific extended “sentence”, built around the Major Triad, we show how to instantly deduce further sentences, how to modify them, by cutting and adding “words”, and how to effectively combine them. Keywords Jazz Improvisation, Be-Bop, Fast Learning, Triads, Dominant Seventh Chords 1. Introduction We herein exclusively deal with the dominant seventh chords, starting from a fundamental extended “sentence”, built around the major triad that immediately gives birth to three further sentences. The sentences so obtained can be easily cut, modified, by using new “words” (Wise, 1983) and extensions, and then combined. Basically, the peculiarity of the method lies in the fact that the attention of the improviser is always focused on the triad. On this subject, we reveal in advance that the above-mentioned peculiarity apparently loses its importance when the (minor) seventh and the ninth are introduced. Actually, the integrity of the me- thod can be effectively preserved by learning to locally focus the attention no longer on the major triad, but rather on the minor one placed a perfect forth higher (with respect to the root of the dominant seventh chord we are consider- ing). Anyway, we will discuss this particular in the “Final Remarks and Conclu- sion” section. How to cite this paper: Cataldo, C. (2017). The Art of Improvising: The Be-Bop Lan- guage and the Dominant Seventh Chords. Art and Design Review, 5, 181-188. https://doi.org/10.4236/adr.2017.53014 Received: July 24, 2017 Accepted: August 11, 2017 Published: August 14, 2017 Copyright © 2017 by author and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY 4.0). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Open Access