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What is a functioning Dominant Chord?
First of all, its important to understand what a Dominant chord is.

Let's quickly go back to the information we covered in the lesson on diatonic harmony.

If we look at the scale of C the chords created when we harmonize the scale are: no1 If we add the 7th note to these chords we get:



The V chord is the Dominant which is a major triad with a flat 7th: G, B, D, F: image 2

The reason we have a flat 7 is because the G chord is from the scale of the C major. The C Major Scale

image 3

So starting from G as the root we have the B which is a major 3rd, then the D which is a perfect fifth from G. Then the seventh note is F which is a minor seventh interval from the G. Because the chords have to be diatonic this note has to be the note of F and not F# which would give us G major 7.

When we play the G7 chord or V Chord the sound of the chord creates a tension that wants to resolve to the I chord. This sound can be heard in many songs and chord progressions. Blues uses a I, IV, V progression and in the final bars or cadence the V7 chord resolves back to the I chord.

We also hear this is ii, V, I progression Dm7, G7, C maj7. When the V7 Chord resolves back to the I chord this is known as a functioning Dominant Chord.

The movement is either a Perfect fourth ascending of a perfect fifth descending.

Below we see the root note of G moving a perfect fourth to the C root on third fret of the A string which is a perfect fourth interval ascending.

2 images

In the example below we see that the Root of G7 moves down 3 frets and down to the C note of the Low E or 6th string which is a perfect 5th interval descending.

2 images

Non Functioning Dominant Chord
A Non functioning Dominant or Static Dominant chord is any dominant chord that moves to another chords that is not acting as a functioning dominant. i.e. it doesn’t resolve to the I chord.