Scales for the II V I Chord Progression

[ksjazzguitar]

"play Dorian on the ii, Myxo on the V and Ionian on the I" when you are in a tonal harmony situation like a ii-V-I is almost like a nonsense. In this situation, the I is where everything will resolves.

I agree. It's often taught this way though. I guess it's easier than trying to teach people how to bring out the harmony (much more valuable, IMHO.) The only thing I'd change in you statement is that there can be other resolutions besides the I, the main one being that the b7 of the ii7 will resolve to the 3 of the V7. And of course secondary dominants can have all kinds of resolutions.

...In modal harmony, playing Dorian - let's say D dorian - means that the point where we are going to resolve is D....

That's kind of my objection to people throwing around the word "modal." "Modal" refers to a jazz aesthetic that focuses around a scale (mode, whatever), where non-chord tones are not dissonances, there is little to no chord change, there is no tonic-dominant relationship (unlike almost all of western music), and the leading tone is usually avoided. It is the way to play modal jazz, when you have 8 bars of Dm. It makes me cringe when I hear people say, "I play 'Satin Doll' modally." But it's one of those words that has gotten misused so much that the "wrong" definition has become right.

Peace,
Kevin

[franamico]

Hey Blue Sky,

You can certainly play arpeggios...or fragments of them...
Make sure that you spend some time relaxing and playing
what you hear...you'll be surprised by the results...