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In the 80's Barry Harris gave us his half-step rules. He never called anything a bebop scale.
In the new century Barry said "The rules are more important than the half-steps". (Paraphrased due to my age)
What he means (I believe) is it's not where the chromaticism happens (and lets face it that's what we are talking about) but the right amount for the given line.
So our recipe : Chromaticism (Bebop/Bullshit/Fertilizer) + Time In The Field = A Bumper Crop.
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07-07-2016 07:32 PM
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Originally Posted by JensL
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Originally Posted by jordanklemons
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Originally Posted by A. Kingstone
Rhythm first, notes second. Always. That's what bop is IMO, and it's certainly where the bop scales come from.
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One way of using chromaticism is to make certain note land on a certain beat, that's because, over time, purely diatonic enclosures, trills and other ornaments became overly cheesy, but then, over time, chromatic approaches became cheesy, too, so musicians got to invent something new and there they came up with half naked dancers, twerking and all that stuff ...
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Originally Posted by nick1994
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Well there are only 12 notes, how hard can it be,LOL!
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Originally Posted by jordanklemons
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Originally Posted by Vladan
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Originally Posted by fuzzthebee
I play this stuff REALLY slowly when I'm working on it, so I get a similar effect in my practice time. Only later do I speed it up to a more "real world" bop tempo. But actually being able to sit back and hear the recording at half time is kind of the perfect way to take in the lines. Great call! thanks
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Originally Posted by christianm77
Here's the deal. Bebop scales didn't work for me. I read and worked at BH's method of counting the number of chromatic passing tones for a while. It didn't work for me either. While it made sense intellectually, it didn't help me gain a sense of improvisational freedom.
So I went to the drawing board and asked myself, what's the biggest stumbling block I have that's preventing me from just being able to blow bebop lines over changes. The best answer I could boil it down to was harmonic rhythm. I couldn't truly FEEL and ANTICIPATE the strong, structural beats within each measure that held the harmony and rhythm together in my bones. Mainly, I chose to think of beats 1 and 3 as the primary and most important beats. While there are other beats and subdivisions worth exploring... I saw 1 and 3 as the two structure columns holding up the building.
So I went through the blues form and composed a guide tone line that used chord tones on those strong beats. The chord tones were not just 1, 3, 5 and 7. They were ANY note that could define the chord... including 9, 11, 13, and altered extensions. That gave me 2 notes per measure. I wanted to compose the etude with constant 8th notes, which meant I needed to fill in 6 more notes per measure. (+ 2 +) and (+ 4 +). ANYTHING can happen there. It could be a purely diatonic scale run, it could be an arpeggio, it could be 3 chromatic passing tones, it could be a scale run with one chromatic note, it could be a neighbor tone movement... it really didn't matter what I put there, because the goal was simply to learn to feel the 1 and 3 coming ahead of time... so what happens in between them didn't matter. I mean, it did and didn't matter at the same time. I decided to utilize a lot of chromatic movement because I love the sound of it personally. But anyone else could focus on filling these in with diatonic arpeggios or baroque style ornamentation or anything. The primary goal is simply learning to feel the harmonic rhythm moving. And when performed, it SHOULD sound like you can hear the chords changing because every time you get to a new beat 1 or 3, the guide tone line resolves to the next chord tone and the harmony and rhythm work together to create the effect of movement.
It's actually a really similar idea to BH's chromatic passing tone method, I just focused it more on stemming from the feel of 1 and 3 as the starting point and let the rest of the notes take care of themselves. But same idea of filling in notes to get things to line up "properly".
Does that help it make sense? Also, fuzzthebee's idea of listening to it on youtube at 50% is a GREAT way to hear the harmonic rhythm moving and the chord tones falling in the proper place. That might help too.Last edited by jordanklemons; 07-08-2016 at 03:23 PM.
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@Christian...
Sorry. It's always in my tendency to start with the big picture, try and explain the whole thing, and THEN break it down into the smaller particulars. I keep trying to remind myself that that's not always a good way to approach things in typed word. I find it seems to confuse people more than anything. So let me apologize for my previous post. Not that any of it is untrue, I'm just not sure how helpful it actually is. Let me try one more time in a different way.
Maybe we can just break down the first two measures of the etude to see the details of what's happening?
So if you look at the beats 1 and 3 of the 1st 2 measures, you get 4 chord tones making the guide tone line I wrote.
Db - C - B - Bb
It's just a descending chromatic line. Against the chord changes it's
#9 - 9 - #5/b13 - 5
After playing the #9, there's a sort of pentatonic/blues scale idea which I intentionally started off the etude with because, while it is a bebop etude... it IS meant to be the blues. So I wanted to start there. Then I used the B natural note (+ of 2) as a chromatic approach note to resolve to the natural 9 of the Bb7 chord on beat 3. Following that C note, I just employed a straight up arpeggio for the rest of the measure to outline the chord.
Measure 2 starts on the B natural which is the #5/b13 of the Eb7 chord. Then I employed 3 chromatic passing tones from the 3rd of Eb (G note) to resolve me up to the Bb on beat 3. After playing the natural 5th of the chord, I jumped down to the b7 of the chord and then employed a 2 note chromatic passing phrase to resolve into measure 3.
As you can see, there's no standard rule being employed for the note selections in every measure. We could analyze every measure of all 10 of the etudes I composed and you wouldn't ever find a deadset rule that governs all of them. It's not about adding this many chromatic notes here and that many there, or about following some predetermined set of rules from a scale. It's about creating a sense of improvisational freedom from all of that. ALL musical devices are allowed for and employed. The only steadfast rule that doesn't change is the focus on feeling the destination. It's not about HOW to get to the destination. It's just about feeling the destination so that you can choose to approach it in any way you wish... chromatic, diatonic, arpeggios, combinations thereof. The harmonic rhythm is fixed. The rest is up to you. You could even rewrite the guide tone line and come up with your own etude if you don't like mine. You can employ whatever devices you want in your lines. It's all fair game.
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Originally Posted by jordanklemons
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Thanks Christian. I'm glad it comes off as traditional yet still my own. It's part of the "curriculum" I'm putting together for myself to help me relearn guitar. So that's kind of perfect. Got a lot of practice ahead of me. Just wrapping up number 9 and 10 and putting them into the computer tonight so I can print them all up and have a little booklet on my music stand to work from.
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Originally Posted by jordanklemons
How are you doing? Are you actually playing again, or still trying to get a feel for everything?
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Originally Posted by eh6794
Also working a lot on my album since the music is done. Trying to get the masters done, the artwork done, all that garbage. But it keeps me 'working' on 'music'.
Definitely anxious to be healthy enough and comfortable enough to start gigging again. Even just to go see music again!!!! I miss it so much. It was such a big part of life before. It's like losing a close loved one. But we're getting there. Slowly.
Also... I'm ALWAYS trying to just get a feel for everything
It's like the story of my musical life! haha
Thanks for asking. Hope all's great with you and yours!
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It sounds like you are trying to figure out how to do everything a different way and adapt. If that's the case, I know the feeling.
It sounds like the first half of 2016 was not your time, lets hope for the second half!
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Originally Posted by eh6794
At this point, it's really just a lot of taking all those ideas I'd been working towards, and organizing them in a way that's simpler and more digestible so I can start working through it. Hoping the 2nd half of the year will be better than the 1st for sure!!!!!... and will hopefully just be all about working through "the curriculum", getting back on my feet, gigging again, teaching again, seeing music again, connecting with people again... all that good stuff.
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Originally Posted by jordanklemons
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Originally Posted by jordanklemons
Actually, at least for me, the bebop scales are so stupid. We have heptatonic scales, like dorian, mixolydian, Ionian, Aeolian, etc... And, if you are playing some bebop language you need to learn the way to approach to the important notes of each chord. I mean like thinking about target tones and approaching tones. And you're not going to learn it if you just use an heptatonic scale with an added chromatic note (bebop scale). The way to master bebop improvisation it's to learn wich cromatic sounds you need to add and at the right moment.
So, for me these scales are a total waste of time.
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Are bebop scales bull$**t?
Short answer, no. Depends how you use them. I use them in part and I don't play bebop.
Artists' music quoted with audio examples in this article:
Bill Evans
Charlie Parker
Michael Brecker
John Coltrane
Sonny Stitt
Freddie Hubbard
Clifford Brown
Joe Henderson
Mulgrew Miller
Tom Harrell
'The trap that many players fall into with practising scales is that they develop melodic and harmonic tunnel vision... Unfortunately this approach is not going to make music – it’ll end up sounding like a music theory exercise.
The secret to sounding good comes in how you apply this scale to your solo in a musical way.... The point of practising the bebop scale is not to insert the entire scale into your solos, rather to use this material you’ve learned as a tool in creating musical lines.'
How To Master the Bebop Scale in Jazz Improvisation • Jazz Advice
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First two chords of Donna Lee. Ab F7. Imaj going to VI7. The head descends Ab major bebop scale to the 3rd of F7 then continues with an half diminished arp from the 3rd of F7 pivoting after A. I think lines like this give a good indication as to how to practice bebop scales (or half step rules).
I don't think bebop scales (or half note rules) should be practiced like how you would practice the major scale, MM scale (in thirds, repeating patterns, diatonic triads, inversions etc). But they should be practiced by working on creating bebop style lines that necessitate them like in the example from Donna Lee.
My understanding is that, that's exactly what jordanklemons post is also suggesting.Last edited by Tal_175; 10-02-2019 at 10:07 AM.
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Christian also has a great video demonstrating this approach.
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Bebop scales, or their derivatives, are just another tool in the box. And aren't that difficult at all.
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Originally Posted by rod2605
Of course there’s different approaches. I’ve always done my best learning when it’s been from the music itself. I first spotted bop scales in the B section of Wayne Shorter’s solo on Yes and No.
the thing about them that was interesting is I could hear them as a gestalt- a single thing, a musical word. Now I hear them and I’m like - oh yeah, it’s that thing. Saves having to work out each note, right?
‘Bop’ scales are just the entry level to doing interesting musical things with scales, ways of taking scales, modifying them and turning them into musical lines.
And sure you can have your own approach, and you can take them or leave them. I was a pure arpeggio player for years and it worked great. But then I started getting serious about the language and the tradition and it rapidly became clear Parker et al weren’t only playing arpeggios and passing tones.
You might think they are overused, or don’t work for you as an improviser or whatever.... you might reject obvious bop language just because it feels a little trite and ‘just so’ 60 years on....
But listen to the great horn players and pianists.... they all play them.
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