Could there be 1 tune that teaches you 90% of all jazz?

[pamosmusic]

Could there be 1 tune that teaches you 90% of all jazz?

Define jazz.

Hell yeah

[princeplanet]

...if you learn to handle blues, rhythm changes, and ATTYA, you're in good shape for most of what is standard / mainstream / straight ahead jazz....

While we all have to agree with this, it would be interesting to hear from others regarding what important moves or progressions are NOT contained in the above 3 pillars of Jazz? Eg. II7 - Take the A train? Cherokee?

[Doug B]

Define "define".

[Bop Head]

While we all have to agree with this, it would be interesting to hear from others regarding what important moves or progressions are NOT contained in the above 3 pillars of Jazz? Eg. II7 - Take the A train? Cherokee?

You can easily put a II7 dominant in meas. 9 of a blues and it is also in the bridge of Rhythm Changes. In Take The A Train there is a specialty, a II7/b5 (reflected in the melody as well) which makes it a "mother tune" according to Bruce Forman IIRC.

IMO there is not one tune that teaches it all. Apart from the fact that there is the factor of rhythm which must not be underestimated.

I think it makes much sense to train your ears on certain progressions that occur repeatedly in GASB tunes and feature certain important moves in certain harmonic rhythms. Because of realizing the repeated re-occurence of those progressions people were able to learn thousands of tunes by ear on the bandstand back in the day. There is a collection of those progressions in a book written by a French musician and researcher. But I am repeating myself.

[Christian Miller]

Nothing modal happening, all functional harmony so it gets you to 1965 or so. An excellent study for early jazz though.

I did say that


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[Christian Miller]

ATTYA is certainly played by jazz musicians but could be simply a pop tune of the day if you play it square. It has almost zero to do with Basie, Ellington, Monk, and some other serious jazz artist. Not to say that it is one of the most basic tunes to know in the repertoire, but that is hardly covers jazz in any great amounts. Just play some modal stuff and Coltrane a whole different bag,

I am a preacher by trade, and you cannot but God in a "box" and my analogy is you cannot put jazz in a box.

The words "standards changes" used in my post indicate this. Which is to say, Tin Pan Alley repertoire of which ATTYA is an unusually sophisticated example, so there's a lot in there.

Anyway, I'm just passing on a bit of street info I remember hearing. At the time I thought 'Nah', these days I can see more what they meant.

[Jimmy blue note]

There are a number of people playing on this historic recording.
Ask any one of THEM what you could learn from the blues.

[Christian Miller]

You can easily put a II7 dominant in meas. 9 of a blues and it is also in the bridge of Rhythm Changes. In Take The A Train there is a specialty, a II7/b5 (reflected in the melody as well) which makes it a "mother tune" according to Bruce Forman IIRC.

IMO there is not one tune that teaches it all. Apart from the fact that there is the factor of rhythm which must not be underestimated.

I think it makes much sense to train your ears on certain progressions that occur repeatedly in GASB tunes and feature certain important moves in certain harmonic rhythms. Because of realizing the repeated re-occurence of those progressions people were able to learn thousands of tunes by ear on the bandstand back in the day. There is a collection of those progressions in a book written by a French musician and researcher. But I am repeating myself.

This is Bruce's list of starter tunes BTW with the rationale given for each

• Autumn Leaves--learn about the cycle
• Take the A Train--[didn't catch a reason, perhaps because it moves to II?]
• All The Things You Are--hard, but best example of how the cycle works, and a great form
• It Could Happen To You (or Ain't Misbehaving)--Chromatic ascending bass line
• There Will Never Be Another You--Backcycling to IV
• Honeysuckle Rose--ii-V-Is, and the classic bridge, highly quoted melody
• Satin Doll--everyone plays it, and a great study in ii-V-Is
• Green Dolphin--cool form, "triadic shift--C to Eb to D to Db)" also cool backcyling through relative minor
• Just Friends--starts on the IV, great melody, check out Parker with strings
• Stella by Starlight--hard, but everyone wants to play it, so you've got to know it

I think he also added Blues and Rhythm Changes to this

[Jimmy blue note]

COULD THERE BE 1 TUNE THAT TEACHES YOU 90% OF ALL JAZZ?

And if not, could you write one?

John Cage 4'33

[Christian Miller]

TBH there's not much about harmony you can't learn from a through study of the blues and it's variants.

If you make a thorough study you'll go from functional changes through into modal and post-modal too

[ragman1]

Define "define".

Define means describe. But there are so many varieties and sub-varieties of 'jazz' that it's highly unlikely that any one tune, or even more than one, could possibly answer the thread's question.

Bit of a crazy question, really :-)

[Jimmy blue note]

Define "define".

Define means describe.
Bit of a crazy question, really :-)

Question questions.

Why ask why?

So What?

What IS this thing...?

Why was I born?

[AllanAllen]

This is Bruce's list of starter tunes BTW with the rationale given for each

• Autumn Leaves--learn about the cycle
• Take the A Train--[didn't catch a reason, perhaps because it moves to II?]
• All The Things You Are--hard, but best example of how the cycle works, and a great form
• It Could Happen To You (or Ain't Misbehaving)--Chromatic ascending bass line
• There Will Never Be Another You--Backcycling to IV
• Honeysuckle Rose--ii-V-Is, and the classic bridge, highly quoted melody
• Satin Doll--everyone plays it, and a great study in ii-V-Is
• Green Dolphin--cool form, "triadic shift--C to Eb to D to Db)" also cool backcyling through relative minor
• Just Friends--starts on the IV, great melody, check out Parker with strings
• Stella by Starlight--hard, but everyone wants to play it, so you've got to know it

I think he also added Blues and Rhythm Changes to this

These kinds of questions get answers that start with "after blues and rhythm changes I think..."

Also, I'm tickled to have 6 of Bruce's list down. He's probably my favorite active player. With Kenny Burrell still holding the favorite living player spot.

Bruce has a great mix of chops and showmanship that makes him fun to watch AND to hear. John Pizzarelli has both as well. I always liked westerns more than noirs though... what was the question?

[Jonah]

Nothing modal happening, all functional harmony so it gets you to 1965 or so. An excellent study for early jazz though.

well... I would say ATTYA can be easily treated as modal.

Yes it is all functional harmony but it has sequential harmonic structure with repeated patterns going through different key centers quite freely

It is more or less the same logics as with Along Came Betty or Falling Grace (or Always September by Scofield also the same type of modality to me)... though those two were probably deliberately built up like this and treat the keys much more freely, with ATTYA the composer still had general traditional tonality plan and form as reference. So it has more firm tonality structure.

But the actual jazz application can be much the same - they all contain functional turnarounds (like different types of cadential turnarounds) moving relatively freely through the key centers... like cells shifting around

It is not of course that type of modality where you compose from the mode (like Indian music etc) or play on one-two chords only with no strong functional tension/resolution...
but still it is also modal because to me the functional tonality is defined first of all by the general form and how tonalities and modulations define the form.
ATTAY also has it... so it is kind of both to me.

[ragman1]

This is 90% of jazz. Could be any tune.

Why? Because it's not in any other genre, not folk, not country, not blues, not classical, etc.

Why? I don't know. Because that's the way it is. The rest is window dressing.

[kris]

1 Tune......?
I've been playing blues all my life.

[supersoul]

To learn jazz you really need to be playing with other people, and to play with other people you just can't play one tune.

[PMB]

There are a number of people playing on this historic recording.
Ask any one of THEM what you could learn from the blues.

C Jam Blues is a jazz blues with all the possibilities for harmonic expansion that form allows. Melodically, it's exclusively based around the fundamental core of 'the cycle' (V-I) and its two rhythmic figures are the most common found in jazz - the 'doo-bah' heartbeat followed by the Charleston. It may not cover all the bases but it's arguably the quintessential tune.

[Cunamara]

And if not, could you write one?

Giant Steps. Teaches ii-V-I functional harmony, V-I changes, tonal center playing, melodic cells, use of arpeggios and pattern playing (e.g., Trane's 1-2-3-5 pattern that he uses throughout his solo).

That being said, the same argument could be made for a lot of other tunes. I Got Rhythm, for example, will teach you functional harmony, back cycling, etc.

[Bop Head]

C Jam Blues is a jazz blues with all the possibilities for harmonic expansion that form allows. [...]

Not true. Think e.g. "Swedish Blues" like Blues for Alice. Or, like I said before, putting the V of V into bar 9.

The blues form per se probably allows almost every kind of reharmonization that you can imagine (especially considering that there is minor blues as well) but C Jam Blues itself is rather simple harmonically. (Which does not mean that I am denying the beauty and genius lying in the simplicity of a good riff blues composition.)

[pamosmusic]

Not true. Think e.g. Swedish Blues, e.g. Blues for Alice. Or, like I said before, putting the V of V into bar 9.

The blues form per se probably allows almost every kind of reharmonization that you can imagine (especially considering that there is minor blues as well) but C Jam Blues itself is rather simple harmonically. (Which does not mean that I am denying the beauty and genius lying in the simplicity of a good riff blues composition.)

I think he means that the simplicity of the melody leaves space for all those reharmonizations. Like … I could play Blues For Alice changes behind the C Jam melody and it would still work.

He did use the word “possibilities.”

It’s pretty common practice to plug in different changes for key parts of the blues form regardless of the changes used for the head anyway. But you know that, and said as much.

[Bobby Timmons]

If you define jazz narrowly by just getting basic mechanics down: I suppose if you did a massive study on 1 tune and learned everything the players did and how to do that also. Then that would get you a lot of ability. Not 90% of it tho.

If you define jazz as the entire music: then f no.

If you mean just the tune itself: then f no also.

[kris]

Not true. Think e.g. "Swedish Blues" like Blues for Alice. Or, like I said before, putting the V of V into bar 9.

The blues form per se probably allows almost every kind of reharmonization that you can imagine (especially considering that there is minor blues as well) but C Jam Blues itself is rather simple harmonically. (Which does not mean that I am denying the beauty and genius lying in the simplicity of a good riff blues composition.)

Have you heard Oscar Peterson play it?

[Bop Head]

Have you heard Oscar Peterson play it?

I have heard him play C Jam blues and a lot of other blues tunes. Peterson was the first jazz musician I listened to in- and extensively when I started to listen to jazz 35 years ago. He has a strong boogie-woogie background that comes out all the time, sometimes at the verge of unbearable cliché. (There were times I could not listen to him because of that but I "re-discovered" him meanwhile.) He has impeccable classical technique beaten into him by his authoritarian father which shows here as well of course.

But sincerely, do you really think this is a good example reharmonizing a jazz blues? Apart from a little tritone sub thrown in here and there either in the soloing or the comping as passing chords?

Don't get me wrong, i really like it, great players, Ray Brown always rocks as well, but I'd consider this recording pretty standard apart from the virtousity.

Do you know the "My Mama Pinned A Rose On Me" album by Mary Lou Williams? Much more interesting in that regard IMO.

Or listen to this recording that one of Muddy Waters' harmonica players did with two jazz musicians:

EDIT: Barry Harris (as well as Mary Lou Williams BTW of course) had a strong boogie-woogie background, too. In high school he would compete with Berry Gordy (of later Motown fame) for the title of the best boogie player. But later he would refer to boogie and blues clichés as "swear phrases".

[kris]

I have heard him play C Jam blues and a lot of other blues tunes. Peterson was the first jazz musician I listened to in- and extensively when I started to listen to jazz 35 years ago. He has a strong boogie-woogie background that comes out all the time, sometimes at the verge of unbearable cliché. (There were times I could not listen to him because of that but I "re-discovered" him meanwhile.) He has impeccable classical technique beaten into him by his authoritarian father which shows here as well of course.

But sincerely, do you really think this is a good example reharmonizing a jazz blues? Apart from a little tritone sub thrown in here and there either in the soloing or the comping as passing chords?

Don't get me wrong, i really like it, great players, Ray Brown always rocks as well, but I'd consider this recording pretty standard apart from the virtousity.

Do you know the "My Mama Pinned A Rose On Me" album by Mary Lou Williams? Much more interesting in that regard IMO.

Or listen to this recording that one of Muddy Waters' harmonica players did with two jazz musicians:

EDIT: Barry Harris (as well as Mary Lou Williams BTW of course) had a strong boogie-woogie background, too. In high school he would compete with Berry Gordy (of later Motown fame) for the title of the best boogie player. But later he would refer to boogie and blues clichés as "swear phrases".

is it blues?