When did Jazz Musicians start using the altered scale?

[Robertkoa]

I imagine those mischievious Jazz Guys just started using the entire Vocabulary of Classical Harmony and twisting it , bending it to what they wanted to hear and
the linear extension of Tension/Release over Dominant Seven Flat Ninth and other altered 'Classical ' Harmony was the result.

Also most Modern Harmony Theory books
credit Jazz partially as extending Classical Harmony Principles in the 20th Century.

So I think - linear Tension Release Codified gone wild - lol.

[ViolentOrigami]

I'm a little late but since nobody mentioned Mingus I had to make an account to come post this.

One really striking use of the altered scale (INCLUDING the #11/b5 is) is on the tune Jump Monk from 1955. It comes at the end of a really long blues lick over 1 and 6, and is actually played over the 2 chord which really to me is the dead giveaway that he was thinking of it as a complete self realized mode and not just as maybe part of the lick being a whole tone run and part of it being a half-diminished scale (although my improv teacher actually taught it that way instead of as a mode of melodic minor). To me that could also suggest that it was at least in someway known earlier.

[christianm77]

I'm a little late but since nobody mentioned Mingus I had to make an account to come post this.

One really striking use of the altered scale (INCLUDING the #11/b5 is) is on the tune Jump Monk from 1955. It comes at the end of a really long blues lick over 1 and 6, and is actually played over the 2 chord which really to me is the dead giveaway that he was thinking of it as a complete self realized mode and not just as maybe part of the lick being a whole tone run and part of it being a half-diminished scale (although my improv teacher actually taught it that way instead of as a mode of melodic minor). To me that could also suggest that it was at least in someway known earlier.

Thanks Mr Origami (:-)) I shall check it out.

[setemupjoe]

Conception by George Shearing written in the late 40's. The second bar of the bridge plays an entire octave straight down of C melodic minor scale over B7.

[setemupjoe]

And here's a killer version with Chuck Wayne on guitar to check it out.

[christianm77]

Yeah I know that tune, not sure why I didn't spot it. Good shout!

[joe ellipse]

the old guys like me was not in the scalar approach as nowadays , the first time i ve heard about the superlocrian was late seventies in MAHAVISHNU Scores where john mc laughlin gave some of this favorite scales for the benefit of serious students ..... his famous composition BIRDS OF FIRE , 2 altered dominant chords is based on this scale.

[christianm77]

the old guys like me was not in the scalar approach as nowadays , the first time i ve heard about the superlocrian was late seventies in MAHAVISHNU Scores where john mc laughlin gave some of this favorite scales for the benefit of serious students ..... his famous composition BIRDS OF FIRE , 2 altered dominant chords is based on this scale.

Well, according the bloke above we can go back to George Shearing.

Scales have always been used in jazz - how could they not? Mozart and Bach used them, why not jazz guys?

The thing that's newer is MODES. They should call it Chord MODE theory really. But even then if you go back you can hear the 30's guys using modes. Folk guys had been using them for hundreds of years.

I actually think 3 closely related things have changed with scale use over the years (again, this is based on my imperfect knowledge of history, so happy to take any extra info.)

1) increasingly, chords are viewed in isolation, rather than as parts of a key.

2) scales are used as an extended chord sounds rather than functioning within a key. So - the emphasis is on finding scale sounds that blend with a particular chord - that have no avoid notes. So we used lydian dominant instead of dominant, altered instead of harmonic minor mode V and so on... MM modes are good for this.

3) instead of being used in clear patterns like up and down, in 3rds and triads and so on, scales are used more intervallically with lines built out of 4ths, 5ths, 7ths etc. These lines are used alongside more conventional language by contemporary players such as Kurt Rosenwinkel, Mike Moreno even Peter Bernstein from time to time - but it's a different approach. I think of this as the Gary Burton revolution - but Allan Holdsworth had similar ideas.

So in the example above Shearing runs the superlocrian/altered as a stepwise scale. These days, plays might well break it up more into chordal arpeggios or even intervallic lines.

[PMB]

Yeah I know that tune, not sure why I didn't spot it. Good shout!

Ha, I play that tune regularly so ditto. Shearing was writing some amazing tunes in the late '40s. He was a close friend of Lennie Tristano's at the time and I think that helped to pushed him compositionally.

[joe ellipse]

the question was when people has begun to use the altered scale ( as a scale ) ?

and my answer was the seventies . This modal way of thinking , more horizontal, was not commun before , it was more vertical , sorry , english is not my natural language ......

[ragman1]

and my answer was the seventies .

Well, no. Actually the answer is no one has the slightest idea, which is why this is page 8 :-)

[christianm77]

Ha, I play that tune regularly so ditto. Shearing was writing some amazing tunes in the late '40s. He was a close friend of Lennie Tristano's at the time and I think that helped to pushed him compositionally.

The Tristano connection is definitely of interest to this thread....