The Minor Cliche

[Christian Miller]

Trying to understand what the firewood pic has to do with this piece, maybe a remedy for the damp monastery?

"It is believed that the title "Quelles larmes au fond du cloître humide?" ("What tears (are shed) from the depths of the damp monastery?") corresponds to Prélude No. 4."

I literally just got it

choppin’


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[rpjazzguitar]

I've come to this thread late. Lots of good ideas advanced upthread.

I'd add a bit, perhaps too obvious.

Anywhere there's a minor chord, there's an opportunity to play the cliche. Which means it can be at the bottom of the chord, at the top, or somewhere in the middle.

You can play it straight, as triads, but you don't have to.

Sometimes I play the line cliche (D, C# etc) as octaves. If you really want it to be prominent, that can work. If you do it every time, people in the audience will get their checks and leave.

You can harmonize it, per Reg's suggestion (which I hadn't really thought about much before). To my ear, Dm A7b13 Dm11 (eg xx5565) and some G dominant chord sound pretty good.

So, several choruses later, when you're trying to comp something you haven't already played three times, you can think, Dm A7b13 Dm7 G7, but, instead of playing those voicings, you can put in tritone subs for the dominant chords. So, maybe it becomes Dm7 Eb13 Dm7 G7b13. It does depend on what the bassist does.

Then, maybe you can try the Warren Nunes' rule for subs.

Fmaj7 = Am7 = Dm7 (I can't recall if he taught Cmaj7#11 as another equivalent). And Dm7 = Fmaj7 = G7 = Am7.

You have to try them to see which ones sound good. As you know, Dm7 is part of the harmonized major scale (and their relative minors) in three keys (C F Bb), among other scale possibilities, so there are a lot of choices. Too many, but all you have to do is try a few.

Well, the last few paragraphs may have been gibberish, but here's an example. Suppose, instead of Dm, you start the cliche with Fmaj7. Next, you need a C#, so you raise the C to C#. Now you're playing A/F. When the cliche goes to C, you can simply lower the C# back to C and, then, to B. At that point you're holding F A B E. If the bassist plays G, the audience hears G9(13). If the bassist plays D, the audience hears Dm69. Or you could add alterations. The point is, it no longer sounds like xxx765 xxx665 xxx565.

Or, if the bassist is running the line cliche, then you can just pedal something above it. Like maybe a Dm triad. It probably will sound best if not everybody is playing the same thing.

[Christian Miller]

don’t forget that the line cliche also totally works in major. Midnight Cowboy aside it’s an obvious way to move into the IV


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[rpjazzguitar]

don’t forget that the line cliche also totally works in major. Midnight Cowboy aside it’s an obvious way to move into the IV


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The song Make Someone Happy has harmony which is based substantially on variations of the chromatic cliche.

[ragman1]

Allan -

The thread having gone this far, I'm wondering what were the actual alternatives you've used in real life as a sub for the usual cliche. Can you tell us?

Which were the most effective that you'd use again?

[garybaldy]

xx7555
xx6557
xx5558
x24232
(xx3210)

there’s a tune in there somewhere

That's heavenly!

[AllanAllen]

Allan -

The thread having gone this far, I'm wondering what were the actual alternatives you've used in real life as a sub for the usual cliche. Can you tell us?

Which were the most effective that you'd use again?

kind of hard to hear me, I don’t remember exactly what I used. I did remember about half way through that I didn’t want to hit every 1 downbeat. A bad habit that came up in the last recording.

I ended up not taking a solo on this, trumpet just went back into the head.

[ragman1]

Brilliant. I haven't worked it all out but I can hear what you're doing. It's very nice. You haven't just played the usual cliche sound over every Dm and Gm and I can see why you wanted an alternative. And they work perfectly.

The fact that you can't remember what you did but that it worked so well means you certainly did your homework. Impressive, because I know what that means. Power to you, my friend. If only they were all like that. I'm glad you're getting gigs, it can only get better.

[AllanAllen]

Thanks! I used the Dm7 A7 Dm7 G7 move for sure and I think I played around rhythmically with that and the cliche.

[ragman1]

That's what I got. Well, as far as I got. Sounds fine, nice and simple. Always the best way, I think. And, absolutely, you didn't need to hit on every downbeat, not with the rhythm section there. I like the way you play your voicings with treble notes too, not always low down the neck.

Good stuff :-)

Sorry, I'm not trying to give you the seal of approval or something

[AllanAllen]

I like the way you play your voicings with treble notes too, not always low down the neck.

Yeah, I like the 7th to 13th frets. No idea why, but if I can play there I try to.

[ragman1]

I tried it for myself once. Didn't sound good at all. If I soloed low the chords sort of twinkled above it somewhere which was pretty useless. If I played high my single notes clashed with the treble notes of the chord. Not because they were wrong but it was all too much of the same thing. So I went back down again.

In your case I think the sound of the trumpet at medium pitch doesn't clash with your treble notes, in fact they complement it. So perhaps it was just an intuitive move on your part. Whatever, it was the right one and we can hear that.

Any more recordings from that gig?

[AllanAllen]

I'll send you the playlist in a private message.

[Christian Miller]

I just did this for another project - may (or may not) be of interest.

[Christian Miller]

Apols for the dodgy tab....

[AllanAllen]

Cool, something to work over on Saturday. Thanks, looks interesting.