Playing melody in thirds, fourths, etc.

[Christian Miller]

Vanilla is very good but also, the best thing about it is that you can add ANYTHING(nice) to it and it works.
No other flavor behaves like that.

Oh that’s a very good point.


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[mr. beaumont]

Vanilla is very good but also, the best thing about it is that you can add ANYTHING(nice) to it and it works.
No other flavor behaves like that.

But not with beans and toast.

[emanresu]

But not with beans and toast.

Got to try it tomorrow.

[Reg]

Yea metaphorically... vanilla is great, sweet and musically also LOL... the trick is have a direction with organization when you add, and of course there is the taste up front ... and then the after taste.

I tend to like spicy .... food, although a little weird with vanilla. I'll need to start paying more attention when my wife is watching all the food channels.

[rpjazzguitar]

Some of my favorite players could be described as vanilla, at least, from the perspective of a player who is much more adventurous with harmony and includes a lot of outside sounds in solos.

The more vanilla players play with great melodic and rhythmic ideas - and play it all with force.

I also like some more harmonically adventurous players.

[ragman1]

Altered is the new vanilla.

[AllanAllen]

Altered is stupid. Ambiguous chord symbols annoy me.

[ragman1]

Well, a chord is either specified or labelled 'alt'. I don't think alt is ambiguous, you can put what you want in.

[orri]

Altered is stupid. Ambiguous chord symbols annoy me.

In jazz, all chord symbols are ambiguous.
That's one of the things I love about playing jazz.

In jazz, chord symbols are more of a guideline for what you could play, but you can ignore it and play something else (or tacet). You can play anything that sounds good to you. (of course it depends on the situation, who you're playing with, your role in the ensemble etc)

If you see a G9 chord, many people will think it means that you will fail at playing the song if you don't play that 9, but the song will sound fine without it.
People from a pop/rock backround background often seem not understand this difference.
If you want to play Every Breath You Take by The Police and ignore the add9 you're arguably not playing that song properly.
But if you ignore a 9 in a lead sheet for a jazz standard, probably no one familiar with the song will even notice.

So if you're unsure about what to play on an "alt" chord, just play the 3rd and the b7 and ignore the extensions.

It would even make sense to me to teach beginners that when they see an alt chord that they should default to only playing the 3rd and the b7, and when they reach the point where they can hear in the head what the b9, #9, #11 or b13 will sound like, then they can start adding ones they want to hear.
(that's to say, if you're sight reading a sheet in an ensemble. If you're by yourself learning a song you can of course try all options and pick the one you think sounds best).

[Christian Miller]

Altered is stupid. Ambiguous chord symbols annoy me.

Haha go play in a big band then. You'll be begging for ambiguity after two hours of reading charts where the arranger has put the horn arrangement in the chord symbols (pro tip - ignore that stuff.)

But, there's a lot of considerations in how much you put into the chord symbols. Barry Harris favoured the simplest possible chord symbols on lead sheets, because that's how he taught improvisation. No alt even. Just 7.

But if you are reading purely from a chord chart for a song, it may be good to have the chord symbols a bit more specific so you don't mess up the melody instrument.

(Experienced players with good ears of course are less likely to do this - and there are some interesting examples of 'clashes' in some classic recordings.)

Alt is a quick way of saying - please don't put a major 13 or 9 in here...

[pamosmusic]

Haha go play in a big band then. You'll be begging for ambiguity after two hours of reading charts where the arranger has put the horn arrangement in the chord symbols (pro tip - ignore that stuff.)

The worst

[Kirk Garrett]

Good vanilla is better than most other ice creams in another flavor. Good chocolate is better than most vanilla. And so forth.

It’s not necessarily what you do, but how you do it that matters.

[AllanAllen]

Alt is a quick way of saying - please don't put a major 13 or 9 in here...

Do you mean major 13 or major 9, or any 9 at all? I just play a R35 triad when I see alt now. If you want a G7b13 just put it in the sheet.

Orri, G9 means one thing G B D E A, you can choose to leave off whatever you want, but G9 calls for G B D E A. Alt does not mean one thing, that's my hangup. Why can't they just put G#11, or whatever.

[AllanAllen]

Good vanilla is better than most other ice creams in another flavor. Good chocolate is better than most vanilla. And so forth.

It’s not necessarily what you do, but how you do it that matters.

I've never had chocolate ice cream that's been better than Breyer vanilla. (for you cultured types, Breyer is one tier above generic ice cream)

[orri]

Do you mean major 13 or major 9, or any 9 at all? I just play a R35 triad when I see alt now. If you want a G7b13 just put it in the sheet.

Orri, G9 means one thing G B D E A, you can choose to leave off whatever you want, but G9 calls for G B D E A. Alt does not mean one thing, that's my hangup. Why can't they just put G#11, or whatever.

What Christian means is that if a big band chart says Galt, It first and foremost means that that should not play A (major 9) or E (major 13). The less important information in the Galt symbol is that you can optionally play either Ab (b9) or A# (#9), together with either C# (#11) or Eb (b13)
(you could also refer to them as the natural 9 and natural 13, just to clarify that they are neither flat or sharp. major 9 is the name of the interval in this context, but could be confused with the maj9 chord).

How Galt is usually taught is that you can pick one out of these four: G7b9#11, G7#9#11, G7b9b13, G7#9b13.
But these are also options: G7, G7b9, G7#9, G7#11, G7b13.
I will argue is that you should default to G7 if you don't know how the others are going to sound in the context and you want to play it safe.

[pamosmusic]

Do you mean major 13 or major 9, or any 9 at all? I just play a R35 triad when I see alt now. If you want a G7b13 just put it in the sheet.

Orri, G9 means one thing G B D E A, you can choose to leave off whatever you want, but G9 calls for G B D E A. Alt does not mean one thing, that's my hangup. Why can't they just put G#11, or whatever.

lol R35 is one of the things “alt” distinctly doesn’t mean.

For what it’s worth, I dispute the idea that “alt” doesn’t mean anything specific.

it means b9 #9, b5 #5.

We can’t play all those notes, but that’s not really any different than most other big extended chords. If you see alt, you can choose to play something that doesn’t clash with it (a shell voicing) or some combination of those extensions by way of a smaller voicing. Just like if I saw maj9(#11). Not sure it needs to be weirder than that.

And for what it’s worth, I’d rather see Calt than C7(#5, #11, #9) or some such.

[Kirk Garrett]

I've never had chocolate ice cream that's been better than Breyer vanilla. (for you cultured types, Breyer is one tier above generic ice cream)

I don’t doubt it. I like blue bell vanilla personally. But I’m such a fan of chocolate that I prefer their Dutch chocolate flavor, even though I readily acknowledge that it is not the same quality as the vanilla.

I would even say the vanilla is objectively better. But I don’t personally care.

[pcjazz]

lol R35 is one of the things “alt” distinctly doesn’t mean.

For what it’s worth, I dispute the idea that “alt” doesn’t mean anything specific.

it means b9 #9, b5 #5.

We can’t play all those notes, but that’s not really any different than most other big extended chords. If you see alt, you can choose to play something that doesn’t clash with it (a shell voicing) or some combination of those extensions by way of a smaller voicing. Just like if I saw maj9(#11). Not sure it needs to be weirder than that.

And for what it’s worth, I’d rather see Calt than C7(#5, #11, #9) or some such.

For Galt you can play Abm6 (tritone’s minor in Barry-speak): Ab (root) is the b9 of G7; B (m3) is the 3rd; Eb (5th) is the #5; F (6th) is the b7. Let the bass player take care of the G. For other alt voicings play the m6 a minor third above or below the Abm6 or its tritone (family in Barry-speak). They all come from the same diminished chord.

[pamosmusic]

For Galt you can play Abm6 (tritone’s minor in Barry-speak): Ab (root) is the b9 of G7; B (m3) is the 3rd; Eb (5th) is the #5; F (6th) is the b7. Let the bass player take care of the G. For other alt voicings play the m6 a minor third above or below the Abm6 or its tritone (family in Barry-speak). They all come from the same diminished chord.

The minor thirds doesn’t give you all the “altered” family of sounds. It pulls sounds from something closer to (but not quite) the diminished scale family of sounds. It’s more interesting than that, but definitely not going to give you all those altered 9s and 5s in the way the tritone minor would.

Playing other voicings related to that tritone minor would be more to the point. Bmaj7#5 etc

[AllanAllen]

lol R35 is one of the things “alt” distinctly doesn’t mean.

For what it’s worth, I dispute the idea that “alt” doesn’t mean anything specific.

it means b9 #9, b5 #5.

So now you're saying a Calt is C E G B Db D# Gb G#?

What happened to the 13th?

Are you guys really not seeing the problem here?

All the other chord symbols mean one thing and Alt means, flat or sharp 9, 11, 13 and now 5ths, you decide.

And for what it’s worth, I’d rather see Calt than C7(#5, #11, #9) or some such.

How do you know that it's not C7(b5, b11, b9). Alt means both right?

[pamosmusic]

So now you're saying a Calt is C E G B Db D# Gb G#?

What happened to the 13th?

Are you guys really not seeing the problem here?

All the other chord symbols mean one thing and Alt means, flat or sharp 9, 11, 13 and now 5ths, you decide.

No idea where you’re getting that.

it is:

C Db D# E Gb Ab Bb

D# and E being enharmonic spellings for the Eb and Fb that show up in Db melodic minor Ab and Gb being dual-use too

[pamosmusic]

How do you know that it's not C7(b5, b11, b9). Alt means both right?

Because no chord in its right mind has a b11.

[Tal_175]

Because no chord in its right mind has a b11.

Super Locrian has a b11. In fact, that's why it's called super (locrian with a b11). But you're right in the sense that I don't know if anyone plays it as a chord with a b11. It's only used derivatively as the altered chord.

[pamosmusic]

Chord symbols are always up to some interpretation.

Does C13 have an 11 in it? A sharp 11? No 11?

Does it even need to have the 9?

Is Cm11 a quartal or all those stacked thirds?

Can you put a #11 on that tonic chord?

Theres interpretation baked in, even before we get to the practical choice of what to play and what to leave out.

[orri]

For Galt you can play Abm6 (tritone’s minor in Barry-speak): Ab (root) is the b9 of G7; B (m3) is the 3rd; Eb (5th) is the #5; F (6th) is the b7. Let the bass player take care of the G. For other alt voicings play the m6 a minor third above or below the Abm6 or its tritone (family in Barry-speak). They all come from the same diminished chord.

That's one of many options.

The G7b9b13(no5) is same as Abm6/G or Fø/G. So you can use your Ab jazz minor* magic tricks on G7b9b13.

If you take a Abo7 chord and replace the Ebb with a Eb, and then you have a Abm6 chord.
If you take any inversion of Abo7 (Fo7, Bo7, Do7) and replace the D/Ebb with a D#/Eb, then you get an inversion of Abm6.
I would though not say that it means that that is "where they come from". It's just a relationship these chords have. It doesn't explain anything about their origin as far as I know. It makes more sense to me that they originate form th Ab jazz minor scale (or the Ab m6 diminished scale).

(* I'm now trying to fit with the popular kids on this forum, by using their preferred terminology)