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My expansion of this point is that bebop scales are designed to do one thing - to put the chord tones on the beat. So they are a rhythm thing.
Originally Posted by destinytot
For me the bebop language is primarily rhythmic. If it wasn't there could be no such thing as a distinctively bebop drum solo - but we can tell the difference between the Jo Jones/Krupa generation and Max Roach and Kenny Clarke right away.
The notes are purely there as part of the rhythm. Some notes - often the top notes of a line - are clearly accents, others are 'filler.' In fact some notes can be sketched in or missed out 'ghost notes' - they fulfil a purely rhythmic function, a bit like the way ones hands play the drum quietly between accents.
So, you might see a line of eight notes, but actually there's a much more interesting rhythm encoded within. A good way to get into this is to look at the way Charlie Parker heads are structured, in terms of what notes are accents and which are not.
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06-25-2015 09:12 AM
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So you have a rhythmic pattern and feel... You could make quick analysis etc... and you end up with...somewhat an outline of the phrase... if your a more experienced player this outline could have more levels of organization.
Say your playing standard 8 bar phrases... it takes a while to be able to perform, to solo and have phrases that are in 8 bar durations, but it becomes natural. Whatever the lengths are.
So as Christian was getting at.... within that 8 bar phrase... there is a rhythm accent pattern. That accent pattern, is what make the feel work and somewhat lock... the most important attacks which create and imply the feel.
For sake of simplicity... say that 8 bar phrase is two 4 bar sections... one pattern of accents with a 2nd version of that accent pattern with some type of organization... could be simple call and answer type, a variation, an embellishment... there are many compositional, which is what your solo is...methods of organizing your improv.
So the better you get... the better you can take that same accent pattern and use it to organize how the attacks are filled in, rhythmically how you fill in between the accent pattern. And not destroy the feel. I generally just think of and call the Fundamental attacks of the Accent pattern... targets.
That feel generally needs to be keep going. Even when you don't actually play it, or by choice break it down... it's still going on... it's the basic reference from which your creating rhythmical relationships and developing them.
So the choice of melodic notes also has an accent pattern, which is generally from the Harmonic Rhythm of whatever your playing. The Harmonic Accent pattern is just.... a rhythmic accent pattern with chords. The targets of the rhythmic accent pattern.... those important attacks which create and define the groove... the accent pattern of what your playing...
Always has a basic starting reference... a starting Harmonic Accent pattern.... sometime simplified and called Harmonic Rhythm. But not just the chords.... where the chords are played rhythmically to create... a Harmonic pattern or groove.
And just as you fill the space between those accent targets... rhythmically, you can also fill that space harmonically, And the notes you play... your improve can reflect those harmonic choices.
So generally the filler... the stuff in between the main targets, also has organization, with bebop their usually dominant or chromatic.... not notes... chords. the Notes are from Dominant approach or chromatic approach chords.
Your approaching a Bbmaj7 chord or target note from that Bbma7 chord... the chromatic filler notes are generally from say a A7 chord or a Amaj7 chord... there are lots of choices... but generally there is organization going on. Even when you just play and haven't thought about the organization...harmonic reference is implied... the organization is implied.
If you don't think about the organization... it becomes, what sounds right or "good".
As I was saying before... use of arpeggios is about spelling those changes, or at least implying changes.... and sometimes different melodic organization. (their all the same, it's just what you want to call it at a given moment).
You either develop the skills by lots of memorization or by understanding what you doing, or a combination of the two, a much better choice. Just the act of thinking about it and being aware will generally improve you playing... use of arpeggios etc... when you bump into something... it will ring a bell and become a reference. Which becomes an organized memory.
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Neighbors/enclosures are your friends.
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Thanks Rich well sort of that first feel is a Partido Alto, with a little funky jazz groove and the bridge is a fast Bossa or Samba... no my mistake, that's the other tune, i recorded 2....yea it's a bossa, with variation Originally Posted by richb2
Here's the other tune... might as well I'll probable never hear them again...
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Great post. I'd love to see an example of some of this stuff, Reg. Kind of broken down I guess. I very much live in the "what sounds good" world when it comes to targetting etc. I get basic MM or half step approaches as they relate to dominant, but when it gets to longer chromatic patterns, it's difficult to see the organization as it would relate to approach chords or how they imply a specific approach chord. Originally Posted by Reg
Always appreciated.
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Yep, its not just scales and arpeggios. Its jazz patterns, lines, and of course "licks"
it's been said above what to do, but if you have $5.00 a pop for a few good short books I recommend Corey Christiansen's Gig Savers series, in particular Killer ii-Vs and Intro to Jazz Lines.
To bridge the gap between straight arpeggio playing and jazz vocabulary, he lays out very clearly and concisely:
Guide Tones
Targeting (with approaches)
Enclosures
and - he includes lots of nice; short and long, major and minor, ii-V-I patterns, as well as voice lead chords for comping.
There are many, many other books that cover this as well, and in greater volume in some cases, but Corey really cuts straight to the stuff.
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Reg, Very nice tune.
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I think I've always used scales and arpeggios together. Sure when trying to learn a new arpeggio I'd limit myself to just the chord tones to get the patterns down, but as soon as I could I would revert to trying to make melodic lines with both scales and arpeggios, and chromatic tones. The important thing here is always try to make melodic lines. If you do that, your ear well tell you all the good places to use scale tones or chromatic tones. I've always made a strong effort to use all 12 tones in my soloing. I see arpeggios as the skeleton of my solo and the scale and chromatic tones I use to flesh it out. If you don't have a good skeleton holding up the solo it will be weak (i.e. you don't outline the harmony well enough). But if all you have is the skeleton ...it sounds pretty boring and you do sound like all your doing is practicing arpeggios.
Try making a conscious effort to use scale tones and chromatic approach tones constantly in your solo. Just practice playing over one chord. Something I've always found very useful is to just put one chord into BiaB and try to make it interesting. You are forced to used more than just chord tones and to vary your rhythm in order to make interesting melodic lines.
Another idea you could try is force yourself to use all 12 tones to make a line. For example, every 8 bars use all 12 tones. If you have trouble doing it in real time, try writing it down and tweaking it on paper playing it, and then editing it again. Keep doing that until you get a decent line. You'll still base your lines on a chord-tone-skeleton, but you'll have to find a way to make the other scale tones and chromatic tones work.
Try practicing intervallic ideas. For example create a line using all 4ths, or all 6ths, or only two intervals like 4ths and 5ths etc...Mix it up. This will force you to get out of your compulsion to always play 3rds ;o) I've been doing a lot of intervallic stuff lately and it's really opening me up to some new melodic ideas and approaches.
Another thing that has given me a ton of mileage in my latest practice is to play with atonality and free improvisation. It's not just choosing notes randomly, although that is one way to achieve it. What I find works best for me is to use tonal structures, i.e. arpeggios and scales, but mix them in a way to achieve nice atonal lines. Another way of looking at it is streaming a series of small tonal ideas together to form a larger atonal line or a line that is weaving inside and outside. I have been doing a ton of practice with this lately and I feel it's really expanding my melodic concept in a good way. I for the most part am practicing the atonal stuff unaccompanied in sort of a a 'free jazz' type approach, but then later when I pop in a back track I find little ideas from my free improv practice sessions creeping in. It's really helping me to stretch out of my normal comfort zones and habitual ways of playing lines.
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As you've figured out Rich, PLAYING the arps is NOT the point, it's KNOWING them. Think of a distinct rhythmic figure and apply fragments of arpeggios - USE them, use pieces of them, but don't just run them. We've all done this playing a tune….you start playing without a place to go or a statement to make, so you fall back on what you spend so much time practicing, and all of a sudden you're "playing arps" instead of playing a solo. Leave more space, have clear phrases assembled from fragments of arps and scales. You'll sound more like a musician rather than just a guitar player.
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I used to think it was about appropriating bleeding chunks of jazz and inserting them vigorously into your solos. I did this for a few years with some success, but I never felt like a was truly improvising, just shuffling a few blocks of basic material.
At this point I was focussing on learning a style - 30s/40s swing, so I was to an extent 'relearning' from my more modern jazz style.
I now realise it's about
1) knowing what jazz sounds like (i.e. listening closely and learning to sing a few lines.)
2) working on your rhythmic understanding (looking at lines from a purely rhythmic point of view)
3) analysing what is going on with the stuff you've learned
4) practicing with material (scales, arps, enclosures, whatever you like) in such a way that you make aesthetic ear based decisions and your improvisational voice starts to emerge. A classic exercise is to slowly improvise in single time (i.e. eights) on a standard of your choice with a pulse of 60-80 bpm.
The Barry Harris Improvisation (not the Harmony) stuff is really interesting because it basically gives you a bunch of simple rules that you apply in various combinations. However the result quickly starts to resemble actual bebop language.... it's like you do something VERY left brain, and suddenly your right brain starts to kick in. I love stuff like that.
I think it's true of anything though - enclosures etc. It's just that the BH stuff 'generates' convincing bebop lines very quickly. And that's just various ways of playing stock scales, with added notes, missing out a note, playing in 3rds etc.
EDIT: I saw a Johnny Smith quote where he said it might be best to practice 4) away from your instrument. Lee Konitz has a nice exercise on his video where he sings 4/8 bars and then plays 4/8 bars on a blues.Last edited by christianm77; 06-26-2015 at 05:25 AM.
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Very important advice! Think of 'chord tones' not 'arps'. Originally Posted by whiskey02
I found it fruitful to practice chord tones in half notes through a tune, for example. I was running arpeggios for years, with the result that I could never play simpler. A half note chord tone line can be the structural framework of your solo. (Check Hal Galper's Forward Motion.)
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Hey Matt... simple version, Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher
Playing I VI II V
ll Bbma9.. / G-7 / ll C-7 / F9 / ll play chord tone arpps
ll Bbma7 Ab7 G-7 Db7 ll C-7 Gb9 F9 B7 ll play same chord tone arpps and pull from dom approach for filler
ll Bbma7 Ab-7 G-7 Db-7 ll C-7 Gb9 F9 Bma7 ll same thing, this time chromatic approach chords
So generally I would never really just play simple chord tone arpps, I would be using other relationships and work with structural relationships with Form... Have some type of spatial pattern, to create feel, groove.
The melodic line(my improv) from the basic chord pattern would probable become blue note influenced, become altered versions of I VI II V, and the approach chords would also have more relationships going on, at least become complete 7 note chords.
So the chord pattern is just a I VI II V... that's my starting reference.
Then I would create more motion, style and feel by adding approach chords to the basic starting I VI II V.
Whether the approach chords are dominant or chromatic etc... can be approached in a few ways...
I can use how I define the approach chords as organization for altering the basic I VI II V, what and how i develop those starting chords.... or
I can create relationship with the starting I VI II V and then use that as the organization for what the approach chords become.
So when I say chord... to me it's the same thing as saying a melodic line or arpeggio... any form of melodic line I play implied a Chord... or harmonic reference. I don't separate the two.
It gets complicated verbally talking about, there are many levels of organization going on simultaneously, But it all can be broken down to pretty simple pieces.
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Hey Reg, could you be troubled to write a line or two over those last two?
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Originally Posted by richb2
I think this is what grahambop means (see attached pdf). I practice this a lot. Great exercise. I learned it from Gary Campbell. Practice in all keys, all scales, over the entire range of the instrument.Last edited by Dana; 06-26-2015 at 12:40 PM.
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Yes that's it going up, but looks a bit different when it comes back down. I'll see if I can do a pdf of mine. Originally Posted by Dana
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reg....nice lines man....
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Here's the Ivor Mairants exercise: Originally Posted by Dana
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Mr. Sandman! Well...almost... Immediately went back to my childhood watching Back to the Future. Originally Posted by grahambop
Here's the Ivor Mairants exercise:
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I am a little confused about how to use the diatonic chords. This may be the wrong place to ask. If I am in the key of C, can I sub any of those chords in place of any other or those chords? I was watching Romero playing wave (which I will attach). Do you see around 4:50 to the end? I think that he is playing a solo line as the high note but he throws a chord on top of each note. I know that he is really being able to play any note from the scale over over a chord position. This is more a question about using the diatonic chords above.
I have been looking at Frank Vignola's chord melody lessons on Truefire. Frank breaks it into playing a single chord in many positions to get the melody note and I get that. But Romero seems to be playing different chords (besides soloing rather than playing the melody)
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4:33 to end variations on:
Gm7 | C7 | Fm7 | Bb7 | E7 | A7 | Dm | % ||
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Yes thanks. But what are those chords? They are not part of Wave.
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An additional vamp that Romero added. You can do such things.
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Thanks you so much. Now it all makes sense!
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Descending II Vs by whole step.
listen to Wes' version of Four on Six in the short break in the melody after the opening phrase.
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Well other than the string of ii-Vs trick, in general there are a few common ways to think of chord subs. The first is, consider a chord to be just the upper structure of another chord. For example C major works well as a sub for Am because C-E-G is like the 3rd, 5th, & 7th of Am7. It's also the 5th, 7th & 9th of F major...etc...In other words realize that all chords overlap and the 1-3-5 of one is the 3-5-7 or 5-3-7, or whatever, of another etc...Another trick that I think I picked up from reading Ted Greene's books is that if two chords share at least two notes, they can sub for each other. Or similar to the ii-V idea, you can do a cycle of 4ths progression. So say for example you have two bars of Gmaj7...instead of literally playing Gmaj7 for two bars you can create a circle progression that ends on the Gmaj7, i.e. vi-ii-V-I. To make it more interesting you could use non-diatonic chords who's roots are a 4th apart. When subbing careful attention needs to be paid to the melody of course, or whatever the implied scale is. But just as certain scale tricks can be used by the soloist to get outside, certain tricks of harmony can be used by the accompanist to go outside as well, you just have to be more cautious about it if you are accompanying someone. Originally Posted by richb2
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