Common-Tone Diminished Chains

I was sightreading Giulio Regondi's 4th etude recently when this little chromatic passage caught my attention:

In the dominant key (B-major), this excerpt showcases a very interesting romantic-style turnaround. In essence, it's just an embellishment of the dominant chord (F#7) as it resolves in the following measure. But Regondi's means of getting there are very hip. Observe how on the third beat, a fully-diminished chord resolves up to an F#7 in 2nd-inversion. That is a prime example of a common-tone diminished chord.

This sound is achieved by lowering the 3rd, 5th, and 7th of a dominant chord by one semitone, while maintaining the root (hence the term "common-tone"). Regondi takes it a step further and proceeds to a B-diminished 7th chord before resolving to B-major. Notice how every note of the B-major chord in the 2nd measure is approached from a semitone below? (except for b which is the common tone)

After analyzing this fragment of music, I wondered, what if it was extrapolated? What if the 2nd beat extended the logic by incorporating an E-diminished chord resolving up to an E7? And so I came up with the simple exercise demonstrated here:


This exercise alternates strictly between dominant and fully-diminished chords.. Start on a fully diminished chord, such as G-Dim7. Then raise the c-sharp, e, and a-sharp by one fret. Now you have a G7 as shown in Example 1.

Example 1


Next, how do you turn this G7 into a diminished chord while continuing the sequence of going up? Simple, just raise the root:

Example 2

At last, we leave off where we started, but 1 fret up. Repeat the process to turn this chord into a dominant:

Example 3


Now, try the following exercise:

Example 4


...and continue infinitely. This exercise can be played in any inversion, on any string set. It's a really good warmup that makes you focus on coordination, getting your fingers right next to the fret each time, and carefully lifting up your fingers so you don't get that wisp sound on the wound strings. Try it out and tell me what you think. Can you come up with other ways of chaining together diminished chords? Let us know in the comments!

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