G♭7♭9 — G♭ 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 = G♭
- 3 = B♭
- 5 = D♭
- b7 = F♭
- b9 = A♭♭
- Symbol
- Gb7♭9
- Root
- Gb
- Quality
- Dominant seventh flat ninth
- Family
- altered
- Notes
- Gb Bb Db Fb Abb
- 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
- Gb · Gb major / Eb minor key signature
Fingering charts
The library holds 2 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 | G♭ | 0 | Perfect unison |
| 3 | B♭ | 4 | Major third |
| 5 | D♭ | 7 | Perfect fifth |
| b7 | F♭ | 10 | Minor seventh |
| b9 | A♭♭ | 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 | G♭ | 1 | G♭ – B♭ – D♭ – F♭ – A♭♭ | 0 4 7 10 1 |
| first inversion | B♭ | 3 | B♭ – D♭ – F♭ – A♭♭ – G♭ | 0 3 6 9 8 |
| second inversion | D♭ | 5 | D♭ – F♭ – A♭♭ – G♭ – B♭ | 0 3 6 5 9 |
| third inversion | F♭ | b7 | F♭ – A♭♭ – G♭ – B♭ – D♭ | 0 3 2 6 9 |
| fourth inversion | A♭♭ | b9 | A♭♭ – G♭ – B♭ – D♭ – F♭ | 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 | 2-1-2-0-2-0 | Gb Bb E G Db E | 1 3 b7 b9 5 b7 | Gb | 2 | 6 |
| 2 | 2-1-2-0-2-2 | Gb Bb E G Db Gb | 1 3 b7 b9 5 1 | Gb | 2 | 6 |
| 3 | 2-1-2-3-2-3 | Gb Bb E Bb Db G | 1 3 b7 3 5 b9 | Gb | 2 | 6 |
| 4 | 2-4-2-3-2-3 | Gb Db E Bb Db G | 1 5 b7 3 5 b9 | Gb | 2 | 6 |
| 5 | 14-13-14-12-14-12 | Gb Bb E G Db E | 1 3 b7 b9 5 b7 | Gb | 2 | 6 |
| 6 | 14-13-14-12-14-14 | Gb Bb E G Db Gb | 1 3 b7 b9 5 1 | Gb | 2 | 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 Gb
- ScaleGb diminished (half-whole)
- ChordGb7
- ChordGb
Related