Q: what does this mean in a lead sheet : theres a chord and another chord on top of it in pharantheses like (Em9 Abm7 Db7#9 Gm7b5) and under this there's G13 (lines up with Em9) and C9sus (lines up with Gm7b5)
A: maybe parenthesis was the way someone actually played it, but the regular version was maybe what you could do if you wanted to do it simpler. looking at your example i can't imagine that those 2 options would ever work in the same place and time, but maybe it makes more sense in context