B7♭9 — B dominant seventh flat ninth chord
A dominant seventh chord with the ninth flattened. The flat ninth sits a semitone above the root in the octave above, and the chord resolves down a fifth.
- 1 = B
- 3 = D#
- 5 = F#
- b7 = A
- b9 = C
- Symbol
- B7♭9
- Root
- B
- Quality
- Dominant seventh flat ninth
- Family
- altered
- Notes
- B D# F# A C
- Degree formula
1 3 5 b7 b9- Semitones from the root
0 1 4 7 10- Distinct pitch classes
- 5
- Interval structure
- Stacked from the root: 4 semitones, 3 semitones, 3 semitones, 3 semitones
- Notation
- Written 7♭9. The dominant of a minor key, because the flat ninth belongs to the harmonic minor scale of the target.
- Key
- B · B major / G# minor key signature
Fingering charts
The library holds 5 fingerings of this chord and all of them are shown, in the library’s own order. Several fingerings of one chord is normal: the same notes can be stopped at different positions and on different strings.
Formula
The chord tones in order from the root, with the interval each one forms above it.
| Degree | Note | Semitones | Interval from the root |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | B | 0 | Perfect unison |
| 3 | D# | 4 | Major third |
| 5 | F# | 7 | Perfect fifth |
| b7 | A | 10 | Minor seventh |
| b9 | C | 1 | Minor second |
Inversions
An inversion is the same set of notes with a different one in the bass. The last column gives the distance of each note above the bass note, in semitones.
| Inversion | Bass note | Degree in the bass | Notes above the bass | Semitones above the bass |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| root position | B | 1 | B – D# – F# – A – C | 0 4 7 10 1 |
| first inversion | D# | 3 | D# – F# – A – C – B | 0 3 6 9 8 |
| second inversion | F# | 5 | F# – A – C – B – D# | 0 3 6 5 9 |
| third inversion | A | b7 | A – C – B – D# – F# | 0 3 2 6 9 |
| fourth inversion | C | b9 | C – B – D# – F# – A | 0 11 3 6 9 |
Playable voicings
These shapes were found by searching the fretboard of a standard-tuned guitar (E A D G B E) rather than copied from a chord book. The search allows every string to sound or to be muted, rejects any shape with a muted string between two sounding strings, rejects any shape whose fretted notes span more than four frets (a five-fret window), requires every chord tone to be present, and then sorts what remains with root-position shapes first and the most compact, lowest shapes next. The shapes shown are the first six of that ordering; other orderings are possible at the same frets.
| # | Shape (low string first) | Notes | Degrees | Bass | Span (frets) | Sounding strings |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 7-6-7-5-7-5 | B D# A C F# A | 1 3 b7 b9 5 b7 | B | 2 | 6 |
| 2 | 7-6-7-5-7-7 | B D# A C F# B | 1 3 b7 b9 5 1 | B | 2 | 6 |
| 3 | 7-6-7-8-7-8 | B D# A D# F# C | 1 3 b7 3 5 b9 | B | 2 | 6 |
| 4 | 7-9-7-8-7-8 | B F# A D# F# C | 1 5 b7 3 5 b9 | B | 2 | 6 |
| 5 | 7-6-4-5-4-5 | B D# F# C D# A | 1 3 5 b9 3 b7 | B | 3 | 6 |
| 6 | 7-6-4-5-7-5 | B D# F# C F# A | 1 3 5 b9 5 b7 | B | 3 | 6 |
Shape numbers run from the lowest string to the highest, so the left-hand number is the sixth string (low E) in standard tuning. Multiple shapes are listed because a chord can be voiced several ways, and because a lower position is not always the better sounding one.
Related chords and scales
- KeyEverything in B
- ScaleB diminished (half-whole)
- ChordB7
- ChordB
Related