This video was FANTASTIC! Christian, I know you say you don't teach theory, but your " philosophies " about simplification of the changes, substitutions, and the choices that can be made on this song, is a MUST, not only for Gypsy Jazz, but EVERY musician. This just opened a floodgate of choices for me now. Thx SO MUCH!!!

Thank you Christiaan.

yet another unmitigated triumph for functional harmony over chord scale theory. chord scale theory is great but when you add in functional harmony it all starts to open up. cant thank you enough Christiaan for hipping us all to the missing link.

Sorry back again - I think i’ve got it ! :) If a song calls for a Bm7b5 - or a Dm6 - (or a G7) you can play an F - G# - B -or Ddim. arpeggio But also because of the nature of diminished chords, these notes (F- G# - B - D) can be used to make :- C# - E - A# - & - G dominant altered chords/arpeggios (with a b9)

Thank you Christiaan ! That was great ! So helpful ! It’s helped me pull together a whole lot of ideas I’ve been struggling with. I knew that a min.6 chord and a min.7b5 are interchangeable. Also I knew that these two chords can also be seen as a dom7 without its root ….. (Therefore e.g :- Dm6 - Bm7b5 and G9 (no root) are the same) Now I’m starting to see how I can use this in my soloing !!!- I’ll need to watch at again ! but I can see how songs that call for minor chords and dominant chords can be translated into a series of diminished arpeggios - You prefer to see them as ‘altered dominants’ -For example - I can see how a Fdim. chord ( G# -B - D - F) can be thought of as an ‘altered’ G - F# - A# ) …. I’m becoming confused now… but you you’ve opened up a huge avenue of opportunities & area of exploration ! Thank-you Ken Chisholm

Hi Christiaan. I really love your approach. I'm a violinist trying to get a handle on the dom7 alt thing. Having looked online it seem there are slightly different opinions on what the notes are... or maybe i'm just confused. Is this the octatonic scale? Can you point me to one of your videos that covers this concept as it can be applied to violin?

have you looked at OBS software? Maybe just on computer.

4:15 7:47

Question… Your system doesn’t seem to work for every example. Take I can’t give you anything but love for the C# diminished according to your system you would think F# 7 altered or C7 not altered… But clearly the harmony is C7 altered? (Ie with a flat 9)