Barry Harris chord movements - My Romance

[grahambop]

For the benefit of Guitarplayer007 (and anyone else who's interested), here are some ideas I got from Alan Kingstone's book for some chord moves over the beginning of 'My Romance'.

There was too much to copy to the screen so I've put it all in a PDF.

[Irez87]

Wow, that's detailed and must have taken a lot of work to put together.

Can you record yourself playing it, by chance?

I definitely want to read through it asap, looks really easy to follow (seriously)

Thanks!

[grahambop]

Wow, that's detailed and must have taken a lot of work to put together.

Can you record yourself playing it, by chance?

I definitely want to read through it asap, looks really easy to follow (seriously)

Thanks!

Just try playing through it, ballad tempo, basically one chord per beat. Hopefully it should sound ok!

[matt.guitarteacher]

For the benefit of Guitarplayer007 (and anyone else who's interested), here are some ideas I got from Alan Kingstone's book for some chord moves over the beginning of 'My Romance'.

There was too much to copy to the screen so I've put it all in a PDF.

Dude, that IS a lot of work!

[Irez87]

Thanks, Graham. I feel like I should post something of worth to repay you. That PDF looks like something that belongs in an actual book.

[A. Kingstone]

That is very impressive grahambop!

The important thing is you are using Barry's system and building on it to suit your needs.

I hope you find years of tasty sounds and spicy moves with the method.

Alan

[guitarplayer007]

For the benefit of Guitarplayer007 (and anyone else who's interested), here are some ideas I got from Alan Kingstone's book for some chord moves over the beginning of 'My Romance'.

There was too much to copy to the screen so I've put it all in a PDF.

That's awesome!!!! Will try it tonight after work. I really appreciate your effort in doing this!!!!
Thanks!
Ken

[grahambop]

That is very impressive grahambop!

The important thing is you are using Barry's system and building on it to suit your needs.

I hope you find years of tasty sounds and spicy moves with the method.

Alan

Thanks Alan! What I like is that I've only considered a few bars, and already there are loads of possibilities coming out, just in those few bars.

[grahambop]

That's awesome!!!! Will try it tonight after work. I really appreciate your effort in doing this!!!!
Thanks!
Ken

No worries Ken. I basically took this as a kind of challenge, and in the process I think I learned more than I would have done just idly browsing through the book. (Which I have a tendency to do!)

It's also useful for me to have a written record, I can see this being handy to refer back to, so I don't forget these ideas.

[Rob MacKillop]

Looks interesting, Graham. Another book to buy!

[jordanklemons]

Nice movements!

[JazzMuzak]

For the benefit of Guitarplayer007 (and anyone else who's interested), here are some ideas I got from Alan Kingstone's book for some chord moves over the beginning of 'My Romance'.

There was too much to copy to the screen so I've put it all in a PDF.

Thanks a bunch for this. I spent some time working through the variations and referencing the book...the reference notes are especially useful. My guitar hasn't sounded this great in quite awhile!

I wanted to ask, how long would you say it's taken you to get a handle on this? Did you practice these methods in any particular way? Just taking them through standards slowly? Or perhaps breaking it down one page at a time through cycles?

[bako]

No worries Ken. I basically took this as a kind of challenge, and in the process I think I learned more than I would have done just idly browsing through the book. (Which I have a tendency to do!)

Ted Dunbar, (my teacher at Jazzmobile) who was a serious book collector, used to say "For every page you read,
write 10 of your own".

Nice work. Thanks for sharing.

[docbop]

Ted Dunbar, (my teacher at Jazzmobile) who was a serious book collector, used to say "For every page you read,
write 10 of your own".

Nice work. Thanks for sharing.

That is so true. I live with pencil, paper, lead sheets, or book with me all the time. Today was Taco Tuesday so it was taco and Richie Zellon book catching up on reading the text parts. Guess that's why I don't finish books, I can read one paragraph and it will keep me thinking and experimenting for days.

[NSJ]

Looks interesting, Graham. Another book to buy!

I just got the book and started taking a look at it. I've already gone through this material before, via Ronny Ben Hurr's DVD. It looks like the book is excellent complementary theoretical and practical companion to the DVD.

The first chapter, I already knew. I just started looking at chapter 2, which seems to form the crux of the matter. It looks to be excellent, lots of stuff that wasn't in the DVD in terms of putting it altogether. Which is to be expected, the DVD is one long master class and can't cover the material in the same cogent way . I will study the book this weekend when I have more time.

It's really not that hard to apply this material to fake book tunes and so forth. I just looked at the Fakebook changes to autumn leaves, and I instantly can see some alterations

The first chord is the fakebook version and the second set of chords would be the Barry Harris change

Em7------G6 --Cdim
Am7------C6 --B dim
D7--------Eb6 --Bdim or Am6 --Cdim
CM7------G6 --Cdim
F#m7b5---Am6--Bdim
B7---Cm6-Bdim F#m6--Bdim

Those changes are what I learned to use after absorbing the RBH DVD. You could look at the changes of the real book and take a couple minutes only to figure out the Barry Harris Adaptations. Once you get it, it's not that hard. But you have to get it.

I am curious to see how my analysis will change after reading Alan's book. It looks like there are a lot more possibilities formally explained, given how Alan explains the relationships between the four dominant chords associated with diminished chord . The RBH DVD alludes to this as well, but it looks like that Alan explains it more systematically.

The C dim is related to B7, F7, Ab7, D7. It looks like, just from a very preliminary glance, Alan explains how to put these chords into play in a very systematic way.

This looks to be a book that everyone should have their library. It's packed with information on every page. And, given that it is a book and not a DVD of a master class, everything seems to be tied together very nicely.

It should be very clear how to apply the Barry Harris system to real songs from the Great American Songbook. I transformed autumn leaves in two minutes. Yes, it was a very basic transformation, and there are lots more possibilities to dig into.

Just skimming the book, I can already see one thing Alan mentions that was not mentioned in the DVD: the use of the bIIIdim.

[grahambop]

Thanks a bunch for this. I spent some time working through the variations and referencing the book...the reference notes are especially useful. My guitar hasn't sounded this great in quite awhile!

I wanted to ask, how long would you say it's taken you to get a handle on this? Did you practice these methods in any particular way? Just taking them through standards slowly? Or perhaps breaking it down one page at a time through cycles?

Well I got Alan's book at the beginning of December, so I guess it's taken since then, allowing for minor interruptions like Christmas!

Really I just went through the book and played all the chords and examples to get my head round it, then I worked through My Romance, just trying to apply everything I could recall or find in the book.

The great thing is that once you've figured out a few movements, they can probably be applied to loads of standard tunes. That's why I spent a lot of time on all those 'bars 3 and 4' variations, they are all ii-V-I so could be used for any tune, if you transpose them or choose other suitable voicings from the book, to suit the context.

[destinytot]

I just got the book and started taking a look at it. I've already gone through this material before, via Ronny Ben Hurr's DVD. It looks like the book is excellent complementary theoretical and practical companion to the DVD.

Thanks for this, Navdeep. I've just ordered the Roni Ben-Hur DVD to work on (amazon.es say it'll arrive between 6th & 26th Jan).

(I've allowed my practice room to become a storage space. But that stops today. I'm clearing out, de-cluttering and reclaiming that space - right now.)

[Irez87]

You guys gotta make a trip out to NYC and actually sit in on BH workshop. Alan, you were right. I went twice, and loved every minute. Especially the second time! I played in a quartet backing all the vocalists in the vocal workshop, and BH liked it so much that he only yelled at me once

Honestly, he's a beautiful cat. We sang happy birthday three times that night to honor the birthdays of all of his vocalists for that month. Then he introduced us to this old Asian lady who helped him start the workshop. She wasn't feeling well but Barry got her to speak the lyrics to her favorite song. That cut me real bad, that moment reminded me of why we play music.

BH is 86 years young, but he plays piano like he's a 26 year old who's managed to accrue all of music's lessons about life and still stay young.

Why is it wrong to be young and foolish?

Thanks for helping me get into that circle, Alan. I might have to take a personal day or two so that I can get some more BH from the man himself before I leave NYC.

[A. Kingstone]

You guys gotta make a trip out to NYC and actually sit in on BH workshop. Alan, you were right. I went twice, and loved every minute. Especially the second time! I played in a quartet backing all the vocalists in the vocal workshop, and BH liked it so much that he only yelled at me once

Honestly, he's a beautiful cat. We sang happy birthday three times that night to honor the birthdays of all of his vocalists for that month. Then he introduced us to this old Asian lady who helped him start the workshop. She wasn't feeling well but Barry got her to speak the lyrics to her favorite song. That cut me real bad, that moment reminded me of why we play music.

Thanks for helping me get into that circle, Alan.

So well said.

I remember vocalists lined up down the hall in NY. Those 'same song, different key' sessions are invaluable.

Barry is a very intuitive teacher, he only gets heavy with people who he feels can handle it. Clearly you can Irez87.

[Irez87]

He just told me I was getting a little loud. I was doing my best Oscar Moore/ late swing impression of guitarists playing short lines to compliment the vocal. He just looked at me towards the end and said "too loud". That was a compliment, since he was criticizing all the other horn players and pianists for playing too much. I turned heads when I started playing your figures with the pianists. They were like "you can do that on the guitar?"

I don't like to brag, but I like to put people in their place and show 'em that the guitar is just as legit at comping as the peeannah.

Barry loves jazz guitarists. He knows what it is!

[NSJ]

Upto now, i've been using this strictly as a way of playing around the fundamental musical cadence-V7 to I (eg, CM6, B dim).

But it seems to be pretty easy and sufficiently logical to put the pieces together: there are only 3 Fundamental Chord types-major, minor and dominant; each of these chord types can be converted to a relevant sixth chord ; once converted to a sixth chord, the diminished chord comes into play; there are only three diminished chords; all three diminished chords can be brought into play by converting the I, ii and iii chords to their related 6th chords; Once all three diminished chords can be brought into play, the dominant seventh chord associated with each note of the chromatic scale can be brought into play.

Think about that for a second: the possibilities are endless! So much can be derived from some fundamental and basic musical principles .

[grahambop]

You guys gotta make a trip out to NYC and actually sit in on BH workshop. Alan, you were right. I went twice, and loved every minute. Especially the second time! I played in a quartet backing all the vocalists in the vocal workshop, and BH liked it so much that he only yelled at me once

Honestly, he's a beautiful cat. We sang happy birthday three times that night to honor the birthdays of all of his vocalists for that month. Then he introduced us to this old Asian lady who helped him start the workshop. She wasn't feeling well but Barry got her to speak the lyrics to her favorite song. That cut me real bad, that moment reminded me of why we play music.

BH is 86 years young, but he plays piano like he's a 26 year old who's managed to accrue all of music's lessons about life and still stay young.

Why is it wrong to be young and foolish?

Thanks for helping me get into that circle, Alan. I might have to take a personal day or two so that I can get some more BH from the man himself before I leave NYC.

I was lucky enough to see Barry with a trio some years ago at the Pizza Express in London. I was right next to the piano so had a ringside view. One thing I do remember is that sometimes he only played a single note, maybe a 5th, in the left hand, while soloing with his right hand. So it was like a one-note chord, it created quite a 'lean' sound which was interesting. I think he told us some story about Dizzy Gillespie and how the tune 'I Waited for You' came about (it was written by Gil Fuller), then he played it. Unfortunately I can't remember the story now! Possibly it was something about Lorraine Gillespie or Dizzy always waiting for each other to show up, but I'm not sure.

Anyway it was a great gig, classic piano trio bebop, blues and ballads.

[Petimar]

I've been following as many Barry Harris threads on here as I can. I will receive Alans book Harmonic Method in a couple days and will look through it to see if it answers this question. I do have Barry Harris' first workshop book and have just reread the chapter on chording (6dim and m6dim). These make total sense to me as what to play over major, minor 7, minor/major and half diminished sounds.


My real questions is, what to do chord wise against long sections of a single dominant chord. The first measures of Sweet Georgia Brown and Limehouse Blues come to mind.


In all the Barry Harris stuff I've read and seen videos, this question has never been answered to my satisfaction.


My goal is to get where I can improvise chord solos ala Wes. I'm feeling comfortable on major, m7, m6 and half diminished chords. I have stuff that works over dom7, but am really intrigued by the Harris stuff.


Anyone care to fill me in?

[joe2758]

you can use the m6 dim off the dominant chord's 5th. so play Dm6 dim for G7. There's a scale called the dominant 7th diminished scale that is in Alan's book. Also a thing he calls "Monk Moves." so you should be in good hands with the book

[Petimar]

I've been using the dominant/diminished scale. Thanks for the other two suggestions!!