Minor Major 9th

Notes and formula

The formula is 1 – ♭3 – 5 – 7 – 9, or 0 – 3 – 7 – 11 – 14 in semitones. A minor triad, a major seventh, a major ninth.

The ninth is what separates this chord from its four-note parent in use rather than in theory. CmMaj7 is a tension; CmMaj9 is a colour, because the added D gives the ear a consonance to hold onto while the B does its work.

How to play it

On piano keep the root low and the seventh high: C in the left hand, E♭–B–D in the right. The semitone between B and the C above must be an octave-and-a-bit apart or the chord growls.

On guitar the movable form is x–3–1–4–3–x, sounding C–E♭–B–D. There is no open-position version, and the shape asks for a stretch, which is part of why the chord is more common on keys than on guitar.

Where it comes from

The melodic minor scale, on its first degree. Every note of the chord is in C melodic minor, and the scale is the standard choice over it for exactly that reason.

In practice it is usually reached from a moving line rather than chosen outright: a minor tonic whose seventh is descending — B, B♭, A, A♭ — passes through this chord on the first step, and holding it there is how it enters an arrangement.

Where you hear it

It is the signature chord of screen suspense. The James Bond theme ends on a minor chord with exactly this colour, and the association has been strong enough that composers now use it as a quotation.

Outside film it appears in jazz ballads as a tonic that refuses to settle, and in bossa nova, where the descending inner line that produces it is a stylistic habit.

Against its neighbours

Cm9 is C–E♭–G–B♭–D and is smooth. CmMaj9 raises the seventh a semitone and is not. Cmaj9 raises the third instead and turns the chord bright.

One note separates each pair, and the three sonorities have almost nothing in common in use. This is a place where reading a chart carefully pays for itself immediately.

Scales that contain it

Melodic minor is the answer and effectively the only one. Harmonic minor fits the chord too, and its lowered sixth degree adds a distinctly different, older colour above it.

Natural minor does not fit: its flattened seventh is the note this chord raises. That makes the chord one of the few minor sonorities where the obvious scale is wrong.

Frequently asked questions