Bbmaj7b5 guitar chord
Root, third and seventh: the guide tones fix the quality, so the fifth is dropped. That is what leaves a string free, so pick a tension to put on top.
- Tap a note to hear it
- Arrows change position
- Fingers, notes or intervals
- Play the chord
About Bbmaj7b5 — shell voicings
Bbmaj7b5 is Bb, D, Fb and A — Bbmaj7 with the fifth lowered a semitone.
It sounds hollow and hard to place. Far more often met spelled the other way round, as a ♯11 over a chord that kept its fifth.
Bbmaj7b5 notes and formula
| Bb | D | Fb | A |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3 | ♭5 | 7 |
Coloured tonic — rare, and unstable for a major chord.
Also written BbM7b5, BbΔ7b5 or Bbmaj7(b5). The same chord either way; which spelling you meet depends on who wrote the chart.
How to play Bbmaj7b5
Root, third and seventh. The third and seventh, the guide tones, are what make the chord major, minor or dominant, so the fifth can go: it says nothing the symbol needs.
Three notes means a spare string, which is the real point. Put a tension on it.
Bbmaj7b5 has 7 of them, on strings 5-3-2-1, the middle four strings, strings 6-4-3-2, the bottom four strings and the top four strings, from open position up to the 12th — all in one inversion, so the bass note never moves. The one to learn first is the Bb shape at the nut.
Start with x1223x — no barre and down at the nut. None of the shapes for Bbmaj7b5 uses an open string, so every one of them is movable; the lowest sits at the 1st fret. 3 of the 7 need a barre. Together they cover the neck from the 1st fret to the 15th.
| Frets | Where | Bass | Top | Hand |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| x1223x | 1st fret | Bb, root position | D | all fretted |
| 657755 | 5th fret | Bb, root position | A | barred |
| 6777x0 | 6th fret | Bb, root position | Fb | barred |
| 6777x6 | 6th fret | Bb, root position | Bb | barred |
| x-x-8-9-10-10 | 8th fret | Bb, root position | D | all fretted |
| x-13-12-14-15-12 | 12th fret | Bb, root position | Fb | all fretted |
| x-13-14-14-15-x | 13th fret | Bb, root position | D | all fretted |
The same notes rebuilt from scratch give 14 drop 2, 9 drop 3 and 6 open string voicings, each on its own page.
Tensions. A shell of Bbmaj7b5, root, third and seventh, leaves a string free, and the tones that belong over it are the 9 (C) and the 13 (G).
How to use Bbmaj7b5
How you get to it. The turn that lands on Bbmaj7b5 is Cm7 to F7 — the ii and the V of Bb — and F7 shares its third and seventh with Cm7, so the hand barely moves between them.
In which keys. Every note of Bbmaj7b5 belongs to D minor (the ♭VI) and F major (the IV, the subdominant).
What to play over Bbmaj7b5
Every note of Bbmaj7b5 is in Bb lydian.
Chords near Bbmaj7b5
Change one note of Bbmaj7b5 and you have Bbmaj7 (the flat fifth becomes a fifth), Bbmaj7#5 (the flat fifth becomes a sharp fifth), BbmMaj7b5 (the major third becomes a minor third) or Bb7b5 (the major seventh becomes a flat seventh).
Bbmaj7b5 is a major chord — root, major third, fifth. Major chords on every root.
On Bbmaj7b5’s sound and use this page follows Robert Rawlins & Nor Eddine Bahha, Jazzology (Hal Leonard, 2005). The shapes and the derived voicings come from different places, and both are explained in where the chords and the theory come from.