knowing chord changes

[cisco kid]

Hello,
I know when one wants to improvise on a tune it really helps to know the chord changes (progression) in advance.
But if one walks in a group and sits in to jam on a tune and you don't know the chord changes - how do you improvise? Is this where ear training, music experience comes in or should.
I read stories where Chuck Berry would come into town to play a concert with a backup band 5 minutes before the show starts ask for his money from the promoter then go to the stage and start playing with backup band trying to figure what key. But in the that case you know the songs and that's just rock music. In jazz it's more complicated it jump in cold and jam and do a solo. Is that ever done. One would think you'd had to be a Django Reinhardt to do that ... all by ear and gifted musician.

[docbop]

There are common chord movements and substitution in Jazz or any music for that matter. So its about working on those and at same time getting the sound in your ear.

[mr. beaumont]

I try not to put myself in that situation too often! No shame in sitting out...plus, my personal belief is that if I can't back somebody up in turn, I have no business taking a solo on a tune.

If the situation does come up, there's a few things to listen for...

Like doc said, common movents are big...as you play jazz over and over, you'll start to hear these things...

The other thing to listen for is the "oddball" chord...jazz tunes don't necessarily stay diatonic, but they often do have stretches that stay in one key...if you can identify that key and look out for the oddballs...the chords that don't belong, you can fake your way through a song...but it ain't easy! But if you can identify the oddballs and hit those changes, you can "hang." When in doubt, follow Jim Hall's advice-- "don't just play something, sit there!"

[TimW]

Kid,

This is the situation that I have found myself in, as we speak.

I have been playing for 35 years and took about 10 years off. I picked the guitar up a year ago and started studying jazz (chords, progressions, etc...). All new to me. But, very cool.

I started getting a handle on chords and alterations. I got to a point were I could follow along without to many mistakes. Then...... jumped into a real book class.

This class is: call out a page number, count it off and play.

I can follow along pretty well comping. Then each instrument takes a solo around the circle (through the chart). My first class, I passed on the solo's. I was thinking to myself, "How can this possibly be a beginner intermediate class?" I felt like I jumped into the twilight zone.

I posted on this forum
https://www.jazzguitar.be/forum/getti...mposition.html

I went to my third class yesterday and got very frustrated. I tried to roadmap the key centers in the songs, while the other instruments were playing their solos. But, just wasn't ready to even try a solo when the time came to me, on most of the songs.

I expressed my frustrations to the instructor after class and she pointed out that I have only been trying to improvise over jazz progressions for less than a month and "I need to get over it and enjoy where I am at, in the journey". Which I am assuming means that I need to continue woodshedding and have a blast in the process.

Improvising over these chord changes seems very foreign to me at this point and may even seem to be to overwhelming. However I know what sounds good and what I would play if I knew where it was on the fretboard.

I can think back a year ago when I first saw a jazz chart, thinking to myself "what the heck is that chord?" Now I know what "that chord" is and can play it in several different positions.

I can also think back a month ago and was wondering what my rig would sound like in a live practice jazz situation and can now say that it sounds pretty good.

As to your question "In jazz it's more complicated it jump in cold and jam and do a solo. Is that ever done." I can honestly say that it is done and I have no advice for you other than what my instructor told me yesterday and "enjoy the journey".

[marcwhy]

The good and the bad of jazz is: there's a lot to learn. [I really see that more as a good thing, but it can be frustrating]

I always recommend Hal Crook's "Ready, Aim, Improvise" as a reference -- the first third of the book is all you need to know for theory, and the rest of the book is improv concepts, practice tips, play-along charts for "typical" progressions, etc. A great resource.

And as was said above, enjoy the journey!

[Mike A]

in all honesty you sound a bit out of your depth in that situation. you should pass if it is bothering you or just go for it!, no-one should mind hearing some wrong notes if you are all learning. good players will be able to get by with soloing on a tune they dont know, but to really blow you need to have a clear roadmap in your head. That said a lot of jazz players prefer to have an element of "freshness" so they can be more spontaneous and make discoveries (especially on recordings)

[jazzadellic]

You need to learn how to quickly identify key centers. And then you need to have the ability to play the major/minor (diatonic or pentatonic would work) scale in all keys, preferably anywhere on the neck of the guitar. These two things combined will allow you to sit in with any group and play off of a chart you have never seen before. There is no mystery to it, no talent needed. I'm surprised nobody gave you a simple clear answer to your simple question.

To identify key centers quickly you need to learn how keys work, key signatures, and the resulting chords in all keys. Also you need to learn to recognize common harmonic progressions. Some fundamental understanding of music theory is necessary to progress in jazz.

[wolflen]

learning diatonic harmony along with learning standards will help accelerate your learning process..

the built in chord cycle in the diatonic system and its variations are used over and over in many standards..seeing these patterns after some time becomes second nature..a iii7 vi7 ii7 V7 progression can be seen as "one chord" and the scales and arpeggios that are born of them become very finger friendly also...they are home base so to speak...so when you solo..you can leave them and add a few notes from another scale perhaps see if that works and come back home ... if you study diatonic harmony in all 12 keys..you begin to see "circles within circles" and progressions within progressions...and see how chords relate to each other .. even in different keys..this will take time (give yourself a year to learn just the basic 4 note chords in all keys) once done..your musical world will change manyfold..

play well

wolf

[Reg]

It's almost beginning to be funny... I've been posting on this subject for way to long... You need to be aware and understand how harmony works, understand FORM and then start what almost everyone preaches... Put in the time on your instrument. If you simple play and memorize tunes... It will take you at least 50 years to memorize all the tunes.... And there will a new collection of tunes before you finish.

Take 20% of the time you spend noodling on your guitar or hours trying to memorize some hip head or cool licks and learn how tunes are structured... The form... Ears not required, how tunes are put together, an outline of the music. There are very mechanical choices, which also relates to how the harmony of changes is organized.

Key centers, as Jazzadellic and somewhat related to Wolfins post about diatonic changes... Are simple mechanical references, they become organized plug and play choices. The next level of references become more complicated, but still sound and works as mechanical references, that next level is simply more tonal systems of organization.

A blues is just a blues, there are forms or outlines of how the bars are organized, still a blues. All jazz tunes fall into forms or outlines of the bars. They also have typical harmonic motion.
The pieces will fall into place when you have somewhere for them to fall, your ears will hear when you teach them what to listen for.
Reg

[MarkRhodes]

The pieces will fall into place when you have somewhere for them to fall, your ears will hear when to teach them what to listen for.

Reg, that's a great line! The pieces will fall into place when you have somewhere for them to fall. Yeah, I'm gonna remember that one.

[Al_F]

I'm a beginner at jazz ... where I've started is - take a tune, do the roman numeral analysis ie write out ii V I over the chords to start seeing the forms, work out appreggio's to solo or a mode like Dorian may be. I suck but am progressing. Diagraming out the chords really helps. A little theory goes along way too.

[Reg]

Your in a great direction ALF... you will progress quickly and not run into as many walls...

Reg

[Rich Cochrane]

I've heard stories about beboppers who learned tunes by just jumping in and following their ears; I don't know how much of that's macho boasting / mythologising, though.

Personally, I enjoy putting on an Aebersold track for a tune I don't know and taking a solo by ear. Sometimes it goes better than if I learn it and try to make the changes. It's also a lot more fun than trying to sight-read your way through a forest of #5s and half-diminisheds, which usually makes me feel like a horse doing the steeplechase.

Mind you, I've spent a lot of time in more or less free improv situations where I have little idea what anyone's going to do next. Since my straight jazz playing isn't especially stellar, maybe this isn't an approach I should be recommending... I'd be interested to know what others think about an "ears-only" approach.

[monk]

There's no doubt in my mind that ear training is one of the most important skills a musician should develop. As Reg has pointed out there are harmonic patterns that tend to crop up in different tunes repeatedly.

However, don't forget that much of the music of the swing era was popular music and that a lot of the bebop repertoire was based on the chord progressions to many of those same pop tunes. The musicians of that time grew up with those songs. That's what they heard coming out of jukeboxes, radios and movie theaters. This was their music; the music they learned to play when they first picked up their instruments. They knew everything about those songs. Melody, harmony, lyrics. The same as someone starting in the 60s knew The Beatles or someone in the 80s knew Van Halen.

Ears are important and so is the ability to hear the chord changes, But it's also important to remember that these are songs not just chord progressions and some of the most profound solos ever recorded were played by people who knew the songs on a deep personal level. Not as chord progressions but as songs. That's why I believe in learning songs.

[henryrobinett]

Good points Monk. Also keep in mind that though those tunes were of THEIR era, the beboppers re-worked most of those tunes with ii-V progressions. Many of those tunes were a little cornier than the way we know them. Many of the bop substitutes became the standard way we know those songs.

[Reg]

This post is not for players that can ALREADY PLAY JAZZ. This is basic info for those who want to.

What are chord changes, melodies, rhythmic patterns... whatever you want to to use to define the SONG.... there all some type of reference, what you use or like as your device for memorizing your reference to the song.

We can make a very mechanical list of aspects that make musical songs. But as a musician... you need more of a nuts and bolts approach to what those songs are. We need more than what we like or feel about a tune.

You do need to be able to hear root motion and what harmony or changes are above that root motion. How or what you relate that motion to... that's much more complicated. But hearing root motion and what type of chord that root motion is... is not difficult.

Just start... every one can hear a simple blues... which establishes a reference, I IV and a V chord. So you can hear root motion by a 4th and 5th and maybe that maj. 2nd, IV to V. Start being able to hear and recognize that root motion. Then begin to add other chords with blues, the bVI going to V chord.

Start the same learning process with I, II V I. Then I VI II V etc... Many use songs for reference to being able to hear different root motions.... eventually... you'll just hear intervals and harmony above. You won't need the songs for reference. Just as you know Red is not Blue etc...

We all make mistakes or can be tricked etc... we're not machines. But your ears won't be able to recognize changes without teaching them what to listen for.

The more complicated relationships between the root motion movement and harmony above, (all the other elements), will take time and can be subjective...

Hearing changes etc... is not like, I'll get it together sometime... you can't play jazz without hearing what's being played. Playing jazz is not rehearsing a tune and playing it over and over.

Reg

[AmundLauritzen]

But your ears won't be able to recognize changes without teaching them what to listen for.

Exactly! Some people think you either have it or you don't. Well, Bird only knew two tunes that he played over and over(regardless of what tune was called out) when he went to his first jam session and got booed off the stage. He went into the shed for real and a year later he was unrecognizable.

In my case, I couldn't hear major, minor or dominant seventh when I started out with jazz. It was that bad.
Now, about four and a half years later with intensive and hard work I can hear all the common chord progressions, tritone subs etc...

I'm not saying that to brag or anything, but if someone like me starting out with a shitty ear like that can improve significantly in four years from hard work alone, then it means that it is a skill that must be learned and not some God given gift that must be inherited, or that one is born with by chance.
Of course, some people like Wes Montgomery, George Benson and Bireli Lagrene probably learn it quicker and easier than others.
But they wouldn't have gotten to where they are without hard work, and lots of it. They all practiced for hours every day.

Developing the ear and making these connections is a process - a lifelong one too.

So, those starting out on their journey must realize this in order not to be discouraged!

[MarkRhodes]

However, don't forget that much of the music of the swing era was popular music and that a lot of the bebop repertoire was based on the chord progressions to many of those same pop tunes. The musicians of that time grew up with those songs. That's what they heard coming out of jukeboxes, radios and movie theaters. This was their music; the music they learned to play when they first picked up their instruments. They knew everything about those songs. Melody, harmony, lyrics. The same as someone starting in the 60s knew The Beatles or someone in the 80s knew Van Halen.

Good point, Monk. Speaking of the Beatles, it's interesting to consider what *they* knew. They logged thousands of hours on stage in clubs playing covers, pop songs, country, rockabilly, rock, "anything the traffic [would] allow." Nick Lowe once talked to Terry Gross (NPR's "Fresh Air") about how that sort of background taught them (and other cover bands) how songs--all kinds of songs--are put together and work. It gave them a real leg up when they started writing thier own stuff. (Or course, not all cover bands turn out to write great originals, but learning how to play a variety of songs never hurt anybody!)

[MarkRhodes]

Good points Monk. Also keep in mind that though those tunes were of THEIR era, the beboppers re-worked most of those tunes with ii-V progressions. Many of those tunes were a little cornier than the way we know them. Many of the bop substitutes became the standard way we know those songs.

Good point, Henry. Bop players added lots of things to the songs they knew so well. It's worth mentioning, though, that the sheet music we see from the swing era was not published for professional musicians but for people playing piano at home. It wasn't meant to be what we now call "guitar recorded versions." (There was a lot more money in publishing sheet music then than there is now; many homes had much more sheet music than recorings in them.) Good swing bands played more complicated changes than the sheet music of the day indicated.

There's a cool book out about the "Tune-Dex" which was an ever-growing set of index cards (-not actual index cards, but small like that) with song titles and changes on them. Working musicians bought those so they'd have handy useful changes for popular new songs they might be asked to play on the bandstand. Another advantage, of course, is that you didn't have to turn pages!

[richard vandyne]

I hope i can get my thoughts across in a way that i will be understood and i hope i am not stepping on any toes but I have some thoughts that i havent seen expreessed and I feel they are relevant. I hear some people talking about the ability to improvise as if it were a gift that only a few people are blessed with. My feeling is that your ability to improvise is directly related to your physical ability and your knowledge of music and those of us who can,t do it or do if very well just haven,t put forth the amount of effort to make it happen. The people who do it extremely well have played,practiced,read,studied and generally worked to such an extreme that there music is automatic. When they are going to improvise and the leader of the .band tells him or her that they are going to solo for 16 bars later in the key of Eb minor-there minds have done this so many times and they are so sure that they can do it that when the times come they just go on to automatic pilot and perform what is already in their heads because they know that it will work whatever they play.I don,t think they are doing anymore than recalling what they alreadly know and they are not inventing some mysterious revelation in music because they are a genious.The ability of the mind to totaly recall knowledge that is implanted there through repetition is so great that it can be brought forth immediately at an instant henceforth it seems that the player is dreaming up the performance when in reality he is doing no more than bringing to the forefront the sum total of previous knowledge.The mind and body must be trained in order to accomplish this an that is what we are all doing on the jazz forum. Tryin to get enough completely believable knowledge implanted in our heads to let us be able to perform the way the advance players do.There probably is no shortcut to accomplishment. To me - If you cant improvise it,s because you haven,t put in enough work -no matter how much you have tried. ayour mind hasn,t receiver enough believeable information to put you on automatic.This is just my take on improvising for what it,s worth

[AmundLauritzen]

I hope i can get my thoughts across in a way that i will be understood and i hope i am not stepping on any toes but I have some thoughts that i havent seen expreessed and I feel they are relevant. I hear some people talking about the ability to improvise as if it were a gift that only a few people are blessed with. My feeling is that your ability to improvise is directly related to your physical ability and your knowledge of music and those of us who can,t do it or do if very well just haven,t put forth the amount of effort to make it happen. The people who do it extremely well have played,practiced,read,studied and generally worked to such an extreme that there music is automatic. When they are going to improvise and the leader of the .band tells him or her that they are going to solo for 16 bars later in the key of Eb minor-there minds have done this so many times and they are so sure that they can do it that when the times come they just go on to automatic pilot and perform what is already in their heads because they know that it will work whatever they play.I don,t think they are doing anymore than recalling what they alreadly know and they are not inventing some mysterious revelation in music because they are a genious.The ability of the mind to totaly recall knowledge that is implanted there through repetition is so great that it can be brought forth immediately at an instant henceforth it seems that the player is dreaming up the performance when in reality he is doing no more than bringing to the forefront the sum total of previous knowledge.The mind and body must be trained in order to accomplish this an that is what we are all doing on the jazz forum. Tryin to get enough completely believable knowledge implanted in our heads to let us be able to perform the way the advance players do.There probably is no shortcut to accomplishment. To me - If you cant improvise it,s because you haven,t put in enough work -no matter how much you have tried. ayour mind hasn,t receiver enough believeable information to put you on automatic.This is just my take on improvising for what it,s worth

Couldn't have said it better myself! People just make up excuses so they can watch TV instead of practice, and expect to be able to play jazz well just by owning an archtop.
Some people end up owning 20 archtops and think that the more guitars are in the room, the more magical "archtop aura" there is to siphon and this will ultimately make them play like Wes. NOPE.

To play like Wes one must practice like Wes, as much as Wes practiced.

At one point it becomes a choice, and at that point one will have to eliminate some things from their life to be able to invest enough time needed to become proficient on the instrument.
People who have a hundred hobbies will know them all half-way.
Those who choose the guitar and pour all their spare time into it will succeed if they practice smart and right

Talent isn't a God given gift, it's the WILL to do the work until you get the results.

[Reg]

All true... there is talent, which some have more than others. But we all have access to motivation. "the will to do the work until you get the results"
There are different approaches to become aware of what's required to improvise. But again that takes years of organized time. Time spent beating your head against a rock... may not get you there.

The practice or learning of hearing changes... is not subjective... A Cmaj7 chord voiced in 3rds is just that. The references and relationships and what may be implied can become complicated. But being able to hear whats played or notated is simple. There may be quicker methods of learning to hear... but they all end up with the same end result...
Reg

[richard vandyne]

Thanks amund and reg. I only wrote that article because when i hear you guys play it always reminds me of how much time you have on the instrument and how much of your lives have been given to this art. You deserve what you have gotten. I really wish though that there was a more definative information as to how one should procede from beginning to end to accomplish the goal of jazz guitar. There is to much generallity of how to go. I mention that for the benefit of those who are just starting out. It can be a very confusing process. If someone really knowledgeable about the real things there were to needed to progress would take the time to give a definitive program on jazz guitar i think it would be of emmence help. Again thank for your input-by the way would like to hear more of your bebop playing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!