Official Barry Harris Thread

**joe2758** · 09-09-2018, 08:55 AM

tamir, ozmond? i have an inferiority complex

**matt.guitarteacher** · 09-09-2018, 09:16 AM

I'd say something like this:

**********
"The Things I Learned from Barry Harris study group"

This study group is for fun and basic accountability in working on the ideas presented in Chris ??'s videos, the first which is posted here:

To start things off, post your version of the same in this (not yet created) thread. Our deadline for this first one is the 29th. Of course, feel free to post after as well. Discuss questions and philosophy of fingering approach etc etc.

The

***********
Anyway, cut, paste, edit, rip apart...

**joe2758** · 09-09-2018, 09:31 AM

to feel it out, whos interested? id participate and maybe sort of get it going. in my opinion id do a whole month per video since we all are working on multiple things, plus we need to be learning all positions and at tempos that are challenging

**joe2758** · 09-09-2018, 09:33 AM

also multiple ways in each single position due to which octave of scale we select

**grahambop** · 09-09-2018, 10:42 AM

Originally Posted by grahambop

Hey if it helps, a while back I found this interesting thesis/paper by a pianist Vera Marijt, might be of interest. Somehow I managed to get the pdf of the paper from this menu. Don’t know how I did it, as it does not work on the iPad. So suspect you have to use a PC / mouse to get it from the menu options.

Anyway she gives examples of how she applies Barry’s devices etc.

Well I can’t make any sense of that website any more, so here’s the PDF anyway. First part is about chords, but later and at the end there are example lines.

**christianm77** · 09-09-2018, 10:46 AM

It’s possible I’ve already done videos on this but I cannot remember....

**Petimar** · 09-09-2018, 01:21 PM

Originally Posted by joe2758

to feel it out, whos interested? id participate and maybe sort of get it going. in my opinion id do a whole month per video since we all are working on multiple things, plus we need to be learning all positions and at tempos that are challenging

Im interested and will be following (learning this on mandolin, Im here as very few mando players play bebop).

**joe2758** · 09-09-2018, 05:58 PM

just ordered the vocal workshop dvd, can’t wait!

**joe2758** · 09-09-2018, 06:51 PM

Things I learned from Barry Harris Study Grouphere we go

**rlrhett** · 09-18-2018, 05:22 PM

Quick question for those who have been working with this stuff:

How do you practice the Half-Step Rules in time? I mean, if you have a backing track or something measuring out a bar or two and you practice tonic to tonic with one half step, how do you get that in one bar or two?

For example, starting from the second with no half steps I have nine notes (if I go to the tonic as in the chart in Page 8 of the Howard Rees DVD booklet). Now I try with two half-steps from the second so I have eleven. Now from the third I have eleven with one half step, but 13 with three...

In short, I have an odd number of eighth notes increasing each time until I am up to seventeen notes starting from the b7. That's two bars plus one eighth note. How do I practice that in a musical context?

What I want to do is have a backing track playing a vamp of, for eg, two bars of C7 and two bars of F7. I can practice one rule over C7 in time and the same over F7. Then maybe starting from a different note, etc. But I'm thrown as to how to do this rhythmically over actual music.

**joe2758** · 09-18-2018, 05:31 PM

Hey Rhett, at one point in the Reese book he has you start playing them down to the 3rd...I forget at which point he starts doing that

**christianm77** · 09-18-2018, 05:55 PM

Originally Posted by rlrhett

Quick question for those who have been working with this stuff:

How do you practice the Half-Step Rules in time? I mean, if you have a backing track or something measuring out a bar or two and you practice tonic to tonic with one half step, how do you get that in one bar or two?

For example, starting from the second with no half steps I have nine notes (if I go to the tonic as in the chart in Page 8 of the Howard Rees DVD booklet). Now I try with two half-steps from the second so I have eleven. Now from the third I have eleven with one half step, but 13 with three...

In short, I have an odd number of eighth notes increasing each time until I am up to seventeen notes starting from the b7. That's two bars plus one eighth note. How do I practice that in a musical context?

What I want to do is have a backing track playing a vamp of, for eg, two bars of C7 and two bars of F7. I can practice one rule over C7 in time and the same over F7. Then maybe starting from a different note, etc. But I'm thrown as to how to do this rhythmically over actual music.

This is not a question that has ever occurred to me. Just take a little break and do the next one. Stick a metronome on if you want to be sure you are in time.

Personally, and I understand this might make me a BAD PERSON, but I just practice the scale for one bar, so

C B Bb A G F E D | C - break for the rest of the bar
D C Bb A G F E D | C - break for the rest of the bar
E C D B Bb A G F | E - break
F E C D Bb A G F | E - break

And so on

Please don't use a backing track. You don't need it. The changes are in the line.

C7 --> F7 - one bar each, say, this is fun. Apply the appropriate rule from the start of the bar.

C B Bb A G F E D | C Bb A G F E Eb D | C
E C D B Bb A G F | Eb D C Bb A G F E | Eb
G F E D C B Bb A | G F Eb D C Bb A G | F

And so on....

**don_oz** · 09-19-2018, 04:10 PM

Oh sheeeeeeeit I missed these posts looks like you guys started! I haven't had a chance at all to shed what I want to shed since I got back from holiday. Quite depressing actually. Getting withdrawal symptoms of not shedding BH. Been super busy with another project and haven't quite settled into a routine with my teaching etc. But I'll try and join in once I start shedding BH again!

**christianm77** · 09-19-2018, 04:18 PM

I haven't even touched the stuff mentioned at the workshops this year

**don_oz** · 09-19-2018, 04:24 PM

Originally Posted by christianm77

I haven't even touched the stuff mentioned at the workshops this year

Need to revisit that too!

**joe2758** · 09-19-2018, 04:41 PM

Originally Posted by don_oz

Oh sheeeeeeeit I missed these posts looks like you guys started! I haven't had a chance at all to shed what I want to shed since I got back from holiday. Quite depressing actually. Getting withdrawal symptoms of not shedding BH. Been super busy with another project and haven't quite settled into a routine with my teaching etc. But I'll try and join in once I start shedding BH again!

goddammit osmond get with it!

**christianm77** · 09-19-2018, 04:51 PM

GET ON WITH IT!

No sympathy on this thread. Just guilt and hectoring.

**christianm77** · 09-19-2018, 04:54 PM

Dear forum, one of the oiks I teach refuses to do his scale outlines like a good little jazz weevil. Which picture of Barry Harris glaring unimpressed over the tops of his glasses should I print out, frame and gift to motivate him?

He kept on talking about wanting to 'link up the scales.' JUST DO THE FLIPPING EXERCISE

**joe2758** · 09-19-2018, 04:58 PM

Originally Posted by christianm77

Dear forum, one of the little oiks I teach refuses to do his scale outlines like a good little jazz weevil. Which picture of Barry Harris glaring unimpressed over the tops of his glasses should I print out, frame and gift to motivate him?

He kept on talking about wanting to 'link up the scales.' JUST DO THE FLIPPING EXERCISE

Official Barry Harris Thread-barryharris03-jpg

**christianm77** · 09-19-2018, 05:01 PM

That'll do. Alternatively I'll get it printed out on a laminate card and show it to unruly students.

**matt.guitarteacher** · 09-19-2018, 05:06 PM

Originally Posted by christianm77

Dear forum, one of the oiks I teach refuses to do his scale outlines like a good little jazz weevil. Which picture of Barry Harris glaring unimpressed over the tops of his glasses should I print out, frame and gift to motivate him?

He kept on talking about wanting to 'link up the scales.' JUST DO THE FLIPPING EXERCISE

Practice is dead. It's for old guys like us...

**joe2758** · 09-19-2018, 05:15 PM

Originally Posted by christianm77

That'll do. Alternatively I'll get it printed out on a laminate card and show it to unruly students.

show it to osmond lol

**don_oz** · 09-25-2018, 05:21 PM

You thought you got all the ABCs for the major scales, you thought wrong

**rlrhett** · 09-25-2018, 07:15 PM

Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher

Practice is dead. It's for old guys like us...

Right... 'Cuz the "me" generation was famous for its discipline.

You want to see practice, you should see some of these little kids taking piano and violin with my daughter. I'm bursting with pride when she gives it 10 minutes here and there (she's 6). We get to class and some little girl about her age is playing Rachmaninoff and getting a "kitty" sticker for practicing 20 hours that week.

Christian has the wrong "oiks", whatever the hell that is.