Dominant seventh chord in the context of "Ii–V–I progression"

Musical technique is the ability of instrumental and vocal musicians to exert optimal control of their instruments or vocal cords in order to produce the precise musical effects they desire. Improving one's technique generally entails practicing exercises that improve one's muscular sensitivity and agility. Technique is independent of musicality. Compositional technique is the ability and knowledge composers use to create music, and may be distinguished from instrumental or performance technique, which in classical music is used to realize compositions, but may also be used in musical improvisation. Extended techniques are distinguished from more simple and more common techniques. Musical technique may also be distinguished from music theory, in that performance is a practical matter, but study of music theory is often used to understand better and to improve techniques. Techniques such as intonation or timbre, articulation, and musical phrasing are nearly universal to all instruments.

To improve their technique, musicians often practice ear training. For example, musical intervals, and fundamental patterns and of notes such as the natural, minor, major, and chromatic scales, minor and major triads, dominant and diminished sevenths, formula patterns and arpeggios. For example, triads and sevenths teach how to play chords with accuracy and speed. Scales teach how to move quickly and gracefully from one note to another (usually by step). Arpeggios teach how to play broken chords over larger intervals. Many of these components of music are found in difficult compositions, for example, a large tuple chromatic scale is a very common element to Classical and Romantic era compositions as part of the end of a phrase.

Resolution in Western tonal music theory is the move of a note or chord from dissonance (an unstable sound) to a consonance (a more final or stable sounding one).

Dissonance, resolution, and suspense can be used to create musical interest. Where a melody or chordal pattern is expected to resolve to a certain note or chord, a different but similarly suitable note can be resolved to instead, creating an interesting and unexpected sound. For example, the deceptive cadence.

In music, a factor or chord factor is a member or component of a chord. These are named root, third, fifth, sixth, seventh, ninth (compound 2nd), eleventh (compound 4th), thirteenth (compound 6th), and so on, for their generic interval above the root.In harmony, the consonance and dissonance of a chord factor and a nonchord tone are distinguished, respectively.

Chord factors are taken into consideration in voicing and voice leading. A chord contains exactly as many factors as it contains unique pitch names (octaves don't matter), while a voicing can have any number of voices that draw from and represent some or all the factors of a chord in various octaves. Thus, a chord with three unique pitch names always has three factors, even if some of those pitches are doubled or omitted in a particular voicing. For example, the figure to the right shows a four-note voicing of a C Major triad, which has three chord factors. The "root" chord factor (pitch name "C"), is represented twice in the voicing by voices 1 and 4 in different octaves. The chord factor called the "fifth" (pitch name "G") is represented in voice 2 (shown in red).

In jazz, a bar-line shift is a technique in which, during improvisation, one plays the chord from the measure before, as an anticipation of a chord, or after the given chord, as a delay, either intentionally or as an "accident."

Bar-line shifts may be caused by a novice having lost their place in the chord progression, but is most often attributable to: "(1)...harmonic generalization, as in the case of playing a II to V7 (+5, +9) progression [II-V-I turnaround] as only a V7 (+5, +9); or (2) the player wanted to play the previous chord (though it has already transpired), but was either pausing momentarily (as in taking a breath), and decides to adopt the 'better later than never' attitude." An example of a "very intentional" bar-line shift may be found on Cannonball Adderley's solo on "So What," "in which he deliberately enters and exits the bridge early, causing considerable tension, since the chord of the A section (D-) is one-half step lower than the chord of the bridge (E♭-)." Other notable performers to use this technique include Charlie Parker, Coleman Hawkins, and Pat Metheny.

A seventh chord is a chord consisting of a triad plus a note forming an interval of a seventh above the chord's root. When not otherwise specified, a "seventh chord" usually means a dominant seventh chord: a major triad together with a minor seventh. However, a variety of sevenths may be added to a variety of triads, resulting in many different types of seventh chords.

In its earliest usage, the seventh was introduced solely as an embellishing or nonchord tone. The seventh destabilized the triad, and allowed the composer to emphasize movement in a given direction. As time passed and the collective ear of the western world became more accustomed to dissonance, the seventh was allowed to become a part of the chord itself, and in some modern music, jazz in particular, nearly every chord is a seventh chord. Additionally, the general acceptance of equal temperament during the 19th century reduced the dissonance of some earlier forms of sevenths.

The first inversion of a chord is the voicing of a triad, seventh chord, or ninth chord in which the third of the chord is the bass note and the root a sixth above it. In the first inversion of a C-major triad, the bass is E — the third of the triad — with the fifth and the root stacked above it (the root now shifted an octave higher), forming the intervals of a minor third and a minor sixth above the inverted bass of E, respectively.

In the first inversion of G-dominant seventh chord, the bass note is B, the third of the seventh chord.

The tritone substitution is a common chord substitution found in both jazz and classical music. Where jazz is concerned, it was the precursor to more complex substitution patterns like Coltrane changes. Tritone substitutions are sometimes used in improvisation—often to create tension during a solo. Though examples of the tritone substitution, known in the classical world as an augmented sixth chord, can be found extensively in classical music since the Renaissance period, they were not heard outside of classical music until they were brought into jazz by musicians such as Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker in the 1940s, as well as Duke Ellington, Art Tatum, Coleman Hawkins, Roy Eldridge and Benny Goodman.

The tritone substitution can be performed by exchanging a dominant seventh chord for another dominant seventh chord which is a tritone away from it. For example, in the key of C major one can use D♭ instead of G (D♭ is a tritone away from G, and G is the dominant of C).