Every guitarist working on changes has a few dominant cycles under their fingers — but most players stop at the cycle of fourths and never explore what else is available. This lesson maps out four essential ways dominant chords can move, giving you a much wider set of colours to work with when you’re comping or soloing through changes.
What you’ll get out of this lesson: A working understanding of four dominant cycles — cycle of fourths, tritone subs, the descending semitone turnaround, and the diminished family — with clear practice instructions for each, so you can start integrating them into your comping and soloing straight away.
How to Use These Cycles
Everything in this lesson applies equally to comping and soloing. Any harmonic movement or substitution you understand well enough to comp through, you can also impose melodically — as long as your voice leading is strong and your harmonic choices are validated by how you resolve them. With that in mind, here are three ways to practise:
- Practise improvising and connecting lines through these cycles with a metronome. You can use arpeggios or scales.
- Practise saying the different cycles from every starting note — pick a random chord and say the cycle of fourths all the way around from that chord, then say its tritone sub, then say Cycle 3 and Cycle 4.
- Comp through a tune using these cycles.
Note: When using Cycle 3 in a tune or vamp, the last note of the run is the target key. For example, imposing Cycle 3 on a C7 chord means going Eb7, D7, Db7, C7. The lowest note of the four is the key.
Cycle 1 — The Cycle of Fourths
This is the most common way dominants move and resolve, making it the single most essential pattern to master. The full sequence is:
C F Bb Eb Ab Db Gb B E A D G C
Practise comping and soloing through the full cycle from different starting points. Also practise it in four-note groups to simulate a I–VI–II–V. For example, Eb Ab Db Gb is a I–VI–II–V in Gb and will appear in many tunes across many keys.
Cycle 2 — The Tritone Cycle
Every dominant chord can be substituted or cycled with a dominant chord a tritone (three tones) away. This is the most common substitution you’ll encounter. These cycles work as pairings: A and Eb, Bb and E, B and F, C and Gb. The third and seventh of one chord become the seventh and third of its tritone partner, which is why the substitution works harmonically. A tritone sub on a G7 chord heading to C major 7 means you can play Db7 instead — as a scale, arpeggio, or just for the last two beats of the bar. Practise going between a dominant chord and its tritone partner in every key until you can name them instantly.
Cycle 3 — The Turnaround / Tritone Run Down
This cycle combines the first four chords of the cycle of fourths with tritone substitutions on the even-numbered chords, creating smoother voice leading and that characteristic descending semitone feel:
Cycle 1 starting on G = G C F Bb
Cycle 3 starting on G = G Gb* F E**
*Tritone sub for C **Tritone sub for Bb
The result is three descending semitones — C, B, Bb, A in the example from the transcript — which you’ll recognise as the turnaround sound. The more fluid you can make this, the more sophisticated your turnarounds will sound.
Cycle 4 — The Diminished Family
Dominant chords whose roots are a minor third apart (spelling out a diminished seventh arpeggio) share common tones and tritones, making them interchangeable in context. This relationship was brought to the forefront of guitar pedagogy by Pat Martino — the video linked below shows him demonstrating how a diminished seventh chord generates dominant chords by altering a single note.
If you’re on G7, the related dominant chords from the minor-third cycle are G, Bb, Db, and E. You can play any one of them, or move through all four, over that G7 chord. You don’t need to go through the whole cycle — the point is to understand the possibilities and use whichever sounds right in context.
The image above shows Cycle 2 and Cycle 4 side by side — notice that Cycle 4 is essentially pairings drawn from Cycle 2.
Anything you learn within the realms of chord substitutions, chord movements, and passing chords — anything you learn harmonically — can also be used to create melodies and lines from, as long as you resolve them with the same strength that you would resolve them if you were comping them. The voice leading needs to be strong.
Taking it further: The goal with all four cycles is to internalise them to the point where you can call on any of them in real time, on any chord, in any key. Start by just being able to say them fluently — naming the chords of each cycle from any starting point. That verbal fluency tends to precede instrumental fluency. Once you can say them without hesitation, move to comping through them, and then to soloing.
Your homework: This week, pick one cycle — Cycle 1 or Cycle 2 is a good starting point — and practise it in two ways: say the chords aloud from every possible starting note until it’s automatic, then comp through the full cycle on the guitar with a metronome. Even five minutes a day on this will compound quickly. Share your progress in the group.