The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #26

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    Atm, I try to learn to play a chord when hearing it. Using my devilish web app again.
    Not functional and in context but random in any key. Dom7s were easy but the m7b5 chord took about 2 months to become fairly reliable.
    Now, alt dominants, b5 #5 b9 #9.... I was 2 weeks in with very little success and then got covid.

    Anyway - I think learning to hear the chords in good context is the way to go for sure. Maybe the only sensible way.
    But the title of the thread is "how to hear chords", wanted to chime in and say that there is the stupid hard way also Doable. But so freaking hard.

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    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #27

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    Chords tend to occur in a context and they are generally easier to hear that way.

  4. #28
    Quote Originally Posted by Christian Miller
    Chords tend to occur in a context and they are generally easier to hear that way.
    Mind blown

  5. #29

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy Smith
    Mind blown
    Mind blown is just the first step

    The process of learning to play
    by ear means all of the chords
    will occur within songs' context

    So this is more like in the song

    I could have been exploding in space
    Different orbits for my bones @2:30

  6. #30

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    My mind is blown every day.
    When I was younger, I learned about the lydian dominant chord from John Scofield. I'd heard about it of course but he played it for me one day and showed it within a context, how the very scale I'd studied so diligently , when he played it was EVERYTHING I loved about his playing that I couldn't figure out. He demonstrated it in a way that made it simple and relevant at the same time. I was awestruck.
    He then said "It's simple. But when you don't really know it, everybody thinks you're a genius."

  7. #31

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
    My mind is blown every day.
    When I was younger, I learned about the lydian dominant chord from John Scofield. I'd heard about it of course but he played it for me one day and showed it within a context, how the very scale I'd studied so diligently , when he played it was EVERYTHING I loved about his playing that I couldn't figure out. He demonstrated it in a way that made it simple and relevant at the same time. I was awestruck.
    He then said "It's simple. But when you don't really know it, everybody thinks you're a genius."
    About 30 years ago when my interest in jazz led me to explore how to make jazz sounds in my guitar playing, I invented something that had some extraordinary qualities. It was harmonically like and could produce the sounds of the diminished and augmented passing chords, it could produce the whole tone sound, and it definitely produced the altered "jazz sound" in about as many ways as their are chords in a progression, and it sounded great with all kinds of jazz - blues, straight ahead, modal, fusion, etc. It was also very easy to apply with reference to the organization of a song's harmonic changes; the tonic of this invention seemed to correspond with the natural mechanics of chord root change harmony.

    It would be after about 15 years of developing and playing this thing that I would discover that this sound was called the altered scale, but every attempt at grasping explanations of how to form it and apply it seemed awkward and confused. It took a while until I figured out that what I had "invented" was the Lydian Dominant.

    Everyone else seemed to have acquired the altered scale conceptually as the seventh mode of the melodic minor, whereas I had found it by the way it sounds. The only difference is the assignment of the tonic, but that is a big difference. For example in a two-five-one, if the usual altered scale's tonic is reassigned to the root of the tri-tone sub chord (a very natural harmonic perspective), the thing is now Lydian. Dominant, and it was just incidental to me that this could be conceived as the fourth mode of the melodic minor.

    Sometimes slow motion mind blowing is good, too.

  8. #32

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    "Everyone else seemed to have acquired the altered scale conceptually as the seventh mode of the melodic minor, whereas I had found it by the way it sounds." Pauln

    Hi, P,
    Music is culturally based and what one would expect to hear being born in India, China, or Western Europe is markedly different than music in Tahiti. It is the subliminal acceptance/understanding/absorption of your native music that develops as one gets older and certainly when one studies a musical instrument within that cultural context. That's the simple answer but, of course, this type of discovery for you would be much more multi-faceted since one's personality is also an integral part.

    Marinero.

  9. #33

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    Quote Originally Posted by pauln
    It took a while until I figured out that what I had "invented" was the Lydian Dominant.
    Sometimes slow motion mind blowing is good, too.
    So often it's taught as a scale. But it's learned as a sound. And it's owned as a personal connection.
    You started with ownership. We all want that and it can't be taught. High five!
    Michael Brecker had an awesome command of harmony yet he never knew scales or modal harmony for their names. When he heard what it was you were referring to, well then he could bring out sounds you never imagined. Because owning the sound was his thing.

  10. #34

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
    So often it's taught as a scale. But it's learned as a sound. And it's owned as a personal connection.
    You started with ownership. We all want that and it can't be taught. High five!
    Michael Brecker had an awesome command of harmony yet he never knew scales or modal harmony for their names. When he heard what it was you were referring to, well then he could bring out sounds you never imagined. Because owning the sound was his thing.
    Hi, J,
    Brecker studied clarinet at 6, switched to Sax in Jr. High and studied Music at Berklee and Indian University. He never knew scales for their names??? And, they gave him an honorary Doctorate at Berklee??
    Marinero

  11. #35

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
    What Michael Brecker did was for and from the music. What Berklee does and will do is about the branding and the money.
    Berklee may have given him a degree but it was in Berklee's interest, ha ha. Brecker needed that degree like he needed someone to tell him which end of the horn to put in his mouth. They study his accomplishments in school.

    Making real music. Going to a music school. All too often two things that little or nothing to do with one another.

    (Ha ha, ask me what I really think)
    Hi, J,
    You get the JGF Gobbledygook Award of the month. Divine inspiration???? Ya, right.
    Marinero

  12. #36

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    Quote Originally Posted by Marinero

    Hi, P,
    Music is culturally based and what one would expect to hear being born in India, China, or Western Europe is markedly different than music in Tahiti. It is the subliminal acceptance/understanding/absorption of your native music that develops as one gets older and certainly when one studies a musical instrument within that cultural context. That's the simple answer but, of course, this type of discovery for you would be much more multi-faceted since one's personality is also an integral part.

    Marinero.
    Quote Originally Posted by Marinero
    Hi, J,
    You get the JGF Gobbledygook Award of the month. Divine inspiration???? Ya, right.
    Marinero
    We'll share this one.

  13. #37
    Quote Originally Posted by Marinero
    Hi, J,
    Brecker studied clarinet at 6, switched to Sax in Jr. High and studied Music at Berklee and Indian University. He never knew scales for their names??? And, they gave him an honorary Doctorate at Berklee??
    Marinero
    Lol!

  14. #38

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    Ummmmm….the “Altered scale” is the Melodic Minor from the 7th degree. No b5, no altered.