[Viscount Cramer & His Orchestra]

In the course of my campaign to badger people to play my songs (their own versions, that is) I have actually received some interest from a local trumpeter/singer who has requested a 'chart' which has caught me on the hop somewhat.

I thought he'd just be able to scab it from my version.

So I've got to notate it which I've done after a fashion. Wasn't quite sure how to do the melody when it has to be notated 'straight' then 'swung' by the interpreter but I muddled through.

He's already going to realise that I'm a novice at this but I want to look a little less stupid by at least getting the chords right.  There's a diminished seventh chord so........

How do I know which chord to specify when I've got a choice of 4?

[Boydie]

There's a diminished seventh chord so........

How do I know which chord to specify when I've got a choice of 4?

Although the stacked notes of a dismissed chord can work in any order with each other when looked at in isolation - the chords either side should help you decide how to best "label" each particular diminished chord as diminished chords are usually used to give a feeling of leading out of the previous chord or into the next chord (or both)

E.g. D to D#dim to E

If you post the context of the diminished of chord we can help you find the best label for it

[GuyBarry]

What I do with diminished sevenths is identify them by the bass note, so for example:

C-Eb-F#-A would be "Cdim7"
Eb-F#-A-C would be "Ebdim7"
F#-A-C-Eb would be "F#dim7"
A-C-Eb-F# would be "Adim7"

Although they're all different inversions of the same chord I think that's the clearest way of doing it.

[Viscount Cramer & His Orchestra]

I have actually found the answer in my case now Thanks Boydie and will post it for anyone else's benefit.
As you said it seemed to be dependent on the surrounding chords.

Standard jazz turnaround eg Cmaj7-A7-Dm7-G7-C

I'm not 100% sure of the actual theoretical reasons (nor why you can change the Am of the C major scale  to an A7 but something to do with it being the dominant of the Dm I think). Chord substitution stuff.

If you flatten the 9th of the A7 you end up with A7b9 (obviously!) which if you ignore the root is a diminished 7th chord which works nicely and I use it all the time. I even knew this but not what to call it!

I finally found a score by Richard Rogers...can't recall the name of the song now and in every bit of sheet music I checked they used the root note which comes between the 2 surrounding chords so....Cmaj7- C#dim7-Dm7

Not very well explained by me but that seems to be the answer in this case.

Thanks.

[Boydie]

Cmaj7- C#dim7-Dm7

Yup, that makes perfect sense and the same use as the example I gave