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The melodic minor has been used for hundreds of years. However, the idea of melodic minor harmony separate to simply minor harmony is pretty recent and certainly post dates modal jazz.
Originally Posted by kris
It seems to me that melodic minor was used before. It fits perfectly with the altered dominants - it was played and played to this day / a half tone higher than the base of the dominant /.
what I am trying to say is if you look at a typical minor on dominant line like for example the melody on Night in Tunisia, you’ll see something that mixes the dorian and melodic minor very often.
just go and have a careful look at the transcriptions of bop era solos you’ve made you’ll see what I mean.
So older teachers and musos will teach this not as ‘such and such mode’ but actually as a sub formula - ii V relationship or what Barry Harris calls important minor. This offers more flexibility, as you can use all the minors as you wish.
There’s absolutely nothing to stop you using the melodic minor sound; in fact it’s often used as you say; but it’s freely mixed with other minor sounds.
and any major 7th sounds you might express on minor are not necessarily an obligatory part of the song.
The reason why the melodic minor has to be defined as a separate thing to the dorian is down to that seventh being considered a part of the basic chord in modern pedagogy; you have to call it. Hence the confusion about this tune.
But it’s not how those players composed and improvised their lines.Last edited by christianm77; 02-27-2021 at 11:35 AM.
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02-27-2021 11:01 AM
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Yeah, I didn't mean people didn't play MM....I meant they weren't basing whole tunes on it, or modes or scales at all-- yet.
Hey, lets do Inner Urge next week!
(Just kidding. Maybe)
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Yeah it’s quite a subtle thing. People who categorise things from a neat modern theory perspective will just look at these things and go ‘melodic minor’ especially as all those sounds are played to some extent at least. Originally Posted by mr.beaumont
Basically in terms of making convincing jazz language it sounds good to mix it up. But if you are checking out the music carefully, you will already know that of course, whether you use the term Melodic Minor or not.
I just think people get a bit shy about going outside the melodic minor scale when you talk about it being Melodic Minor, so want to steer away from that when teaching unless I really do mean it.Last edited by christianm77; 02-27-2021 at 11:38 AM.
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Inner Urge as a gypsy swinger Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
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OK... so I'm old and have been performing for over 50 years. I not calling anything wrong... but I am saying there are also different understanding of what, why and how different jazz harmony and melodic concepts can work.
For me the embellishment approach just misses way to much. Like I've probable said before....modal jazz is not middle age melodic melody types, and embellishments etc...
Modal concepts expanded to also include Harmonic influence and behavior. If you understand the concept of Function in music, the tonic, subdominant and dominant concepts... basic Maj/Min functional harmony... Which generally becomes... V I etc... Modal concepts expanded the Subdominant harmonic doors in Jazz.
Modal jazz expands Subdominant relationships. OK simple example, Recorda Me or Remember me Was virtual tune, a few weeks back. (can also work on Nica's)
Take the 1st 8 bars, A-7 to C-7
If you add modal concepts to A-7, you can create harmonic or melodic movement.
A-7 Dorian, If you use Modal Functional relationship, ( which have harmonic and melodic organization) which help keep the bigger picture together while one gets lost in the details, the tree and the forest etc... sorry
1) A-7.... the relative Major would be Cma7, Lydian. Now if you expand that relative relationship, modally you also
get E-7, (Aeolian) and it's relative may Gma7, (Ionian).
... A-7...Cma7...E-7...Gmaj7
2) Now expand even further, use intervals of 5ths... (bass players will relate)
A-7 becomes...A E B or A-9
Cma7 ..............C G D or Cma9
E-7...................E B F# or E-9
Gma7...............G D A or Gmaj9
You end up with Chord tones of A-7 becoming chords with modal relationships using relative and intervals of 5th.
You can keep expanding.... add a modal melodic relationship A- pentatonic A C D E G , which can become chords constructed on A- pentatonic scale, just add the D chord, and instead of D7 or D9 and make sus chords. generally with modal concepts your careful with use of tritones and Dominant functional implications.
Generally you just use Chord patterns approach. Which can make the D7 the implied V7 chord of A-7, which creates different functional use of Dominant chords.
If you just expand this approach to Melodic Minor... A-7 to A-ma7.... you can end up with a different pentatonic melodic pattern... A C D E F#, which most think of as D dominant pent. or D9.
Now you've almost opened the Blue Note Door.....
Again sorry to BS, I'm lazy.... easier than getting out guitar and recording.
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I am not sure what melodic minor you are talking? Originally Posted by christianm77
-jazz melodic minor is different than melodic minor.
-jazz melodic minor sometimes called jazz scale.
I know melodic minor from the school-I learned classical guitar and doublebass.It has been used for hundreds of years.
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Yeah it’s the same stuff, differently expressed (at least I think it is)? Originally Posted by Reg
Last edited by christianm77; 02-27-2021 at 01:14 PM.
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Any one you like! Originally Posted by kris
I am not sure what melodic minor you are talking?
-jazz melodic minor is different than melodic minor.
-jazz melodic minor sometimes called jazz scale.
I know melodic minor from the school-I learned classical guitar and doublebass.It has been used for hundreds of years.
in jazz melodic minor generally means that the ascending form only.
But it turns out the classical ascending/descending thing is... not true. I’m looking at a piece of baroque lute music atm and there’s a fairly typical example of the ascending A melodic minor form used in descent over an E pedal. You might know it; Kellner’s Phantasia in Am?
It needs to be that because of the G# in the E chord. That’s the whole point of it. The F#’s just there to even out the steps.
So anyway, in jazz they didn’t seem to care so much; we look at jazz charts and see things like the the descending melodic minor form/natural minor/ aeolian used in the same situation.
Example
Blue Bossa descending C natural minor over a G7 chord. Honking Bb in the melody, G7 in the harmony. So we could say that’s an altered dominant sure, but it’s also a case of what happens when you play a minor 2 5 1 under a descending minor melody. You see an awful lot of this in jazz. And that’s probably where the 7#9 chord comes from.
A blues note, in fact.
(TBH many soloists simply express 7#9 chords as minor chords but that’s another thread.)
So anyway.... a little beside the point, as that’s more about the scale form a key rather than chord perspective but jazz musicians were I think a lot more melodic in their use of minor so to speak.
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Another massive difference with say, Bach and Kellner, is in the fact that jazz musicians regard the major sixth as a consonant colour sound on the minor chord. This I think in the 30s? (Might be earlier)
m6 is also very common sub in dominant chords, up a 5th. (Half diminished chords were thought of as m6 in this era anyway.)
Later on, Billy Strayhorn popularised the major seventh as a colour tone on the minor chord... (1940s)
In the 40s it becomes common to hear the tritone’s minor ‘altered scale’ used
minor seventh became popular after Kind of Blue (1959)
So it’s easy to see how melodic ‘jazz’ minor became a thing. (It was already a thing in Tristano’s circle by late 1940s according to Peter Ind)
jazz musicians were always likely to play the Jazz Minor and Dorian scales on Im chords long before Miles or Herbie.
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Mommy, I'm scared. The Theory Monsters are back. Please Mommy, don't let the Theory Monsters get me.
Don't worry boychik, all you need to do is side slip a little this way, then that way, and you'll be safe.
Thanks Mommy, I feel so much better now.
That's good dear, and when you're done with that you can try some modal interchange, and treat all your major tonal centers as Lydian modes and all your dominants as subdominants and ...
Oh no Mommy, the Theory Monsters have got you too! Help! Somebody please help me! The Theory Monsters got my Mommy!
John
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hey kris... I was trying to imply jazz usage. Traditional classical musical practice and typical concepts like ascending and descending control applications etc... are cool, but not what most think of as jazz application.
Maybe... when I say Diatonic and functional chords, arpeggios, scales, embellishments ... any label you want, of Cmaj. or A-7
What do yo hear, think etc...
As a jazz player, performer, I don't just think, or hear, (which is the same thing, scales, arps, chord, extensions etc... are all the same thing , just different label, classification or organization of.)
Ok... all the scales, arps and chords with embellishments constructed from Cmaj scale.
I always also always think and hear all the different "Modal" diatonic functional scales, chords, chord patterns etc...
The use of modal implies other functional organization, other possible relationships. You need to get past the misconceptions of CST.... it's not about what scale, it's about the organizations implied.
Of course, understanding Basic Maj./ min functional organization is one and all of the organizational concepts. And also no one just used only one concept at a time. Relative and parallel functional relationships, expanding borrowing through Modal interchange.
And MM has many common practice usages and can also use Modal Functional organization... then personally, and many other performers also include Blue Notes and blue note concepts. Which when used with modal concepts helps create different jazz results, different sound.
Christian... becoming a thing isn't the point I was trying to establish. I was trying to open some improv doors to help
non jazz players and beginners and on up the ladders of performance... to start understanding modal jazz concepts and applications with performance and composition.
I understand you tend to think of many of my concepts as embellishments, and try and fit them into your personal box of understandings. And it's cool, I don't care. But please try and not white wash everything, it's not "the same stuff".
Sorry about being a theory monster... I'll stop.
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John A, I sympathise with you, I don’t give a f**k about any of this theory verbal diarrhoea either.
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I think there's a place for it. It's okay where it's relevant. Personally, I just play what suits, not because it's expected. And I like the mel m sound generally speaking, it's interesting in the right places. And I thought it was in this tune.
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that's easy for you to say Originally Posted by Reg
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Reg, so this is how I interpret what you're saying (at least the big picture of it, if not all the details): 1. Analyzing and understanding harmony and melody in terms of functional harmony and embellishment leads to playing lines that don't stray far from chord tones of what's written in a chart. If you want want your playing to incorporate sounds that are farther away from those vanilla sounds, you have to (intellectually) build a framework that allows you to talk about how collections of non-vanilla notes connect to a composition, and then practice patterns spawned by that framework. CST (as you learned it and use the term) is such a framework (and not just a list of which scales go with which chords). You (i.e.. C77) can reduce anything to functional harmony, but doing that stands in the way of playing more outside and adventurous material. Is that it? If so, it makes sense to me. I mean that's what the people who expanded the sound of jazz beyond swing and bebop in the 50s-70s did, though not all did so in a formal academic sense. Originally Posted by Reg
John
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I already made bad on my promise to keep a lid on scale/ harmony theory talk...
I blame myself for this
Wnat aboots rhythm? Phrasing? Feel?
In the past couple of months I've been focusing on how and when I release a note. I mentioned that to Lawson-stone because I heard him doing the same. Hard to remember to release/ lift off a note on a guitar. Much easier to keep it ringing.
Bebop, Hardbop, and Latin--all of it, really, important to know how to control each note you play. Punctuation if you will.
I'm still a 1 and 3 guy in terms of tapping me footsie. There's still a huge divide on where ya put ya metronome click or where ya tap ya foots. 1 and 3 still gives me more control of my feel than 2 and 4.
For when the tempo gets 200bpm and above I try to puts my metronomy click on the downbeat of each 2 measures. Mark the small phrase--4 measures is da big phrase. 8 measures is the extra large with a Coke and fries phrase. I dunno if Coltrane liked McDonalds, but he sure did like those extra large phrases.
Where does the phrase start and where does it clock out? What notes/ themes (not scale) are carried through the solo.
What would Wes Do?
That's my effort to talk about something else than scales that relates to the music. I dunno if I succeeded. Reg, help me out here
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U
Try this. Say the beat (in 2 or 4) and play the upbeats. Originally Posted by PickingMyEars
I already made bad on my promise to keep a lid on scale/ harmony theory talk...
I blame myself for this
Wnat aboots rhythm? Phrasing? Feel?
In the past couple of months I've been focusing on how and when I release a note. I mentioned that to Lawson-stone because I heard him doing the same. Hard to remember to release/ lift off a note on a guitar. Much easier to keep it ringing.
Bebop, Hardbop, and Latin--all of it, really, important to know how to control each note you play. Punctuation if you will.
I'm still a 1 and 3 guy in terms of tapping me footsie. There's still a huge divide on where ya put ya metronome click or where ya tap ya foots. 1 and 3 still gives me more control of my feel than 2 and 4.
For when the tempo gets 200bpm and above I try to puts my metronomy click on the downbeat of each 2 measures. Mark the small phrase--4 measures is da big phrase. 8 measures i the extra large with a Coke and fries phrase. I dunno if Coltrane liked McDonalds, but he sure did like those extra large phrases.
That's my effort to talk about something else than scales that relates to the music. I dunno if I succeeded. Reg, help me out here
I find this a bit of a roast lol, but getting better.
As one of my teachers (a drummer) puts it, rhythmic independence is always a good way to work on rhythm...
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I like 1 and 3 cause it helps frame everything when I try to make an arse of me-self and double time
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Bloody hell everyone thinks I’m a pure functional harmony guy. Originally Posted by John A.
oh well can only blame myself lol. But no. Not for a while.
personally I decided on listening carefully to the music of that generation and seeing what I find. It’s not CST exactly, because; well CST hadn’t really been formulated. CST itself had a different function at the outset than later on.
I actually think what Reg is saying is closer to the way it was originally used, which as ideas and resources as opposed to now where it’s meant to teach how to play jazz. Which it doesn’t very well.
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Not sure what that means, but my main reason for practicing that type of thing was to get better at playing fast tempos (220+) without playing a zillion notes on one hand or sounding like I was playing at half speed on the other... needs well placed upbeats! Originally Posted by PickingMyEars
I like 1 and 3 cause it helps frame everything when I try to make an arse of me-self and double time
i think I’m getting better as I cringe more at recordings of myself. always a sign of growth.
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This is home style. The couch where I practice and the cheapo gear I usually use there. That's the cheapest Yamaha Pacifica Strat copy (012) with a Lil 59. Also a Crate amp (GFX15) that sold new for under $100. Also, this is what I'd be likely to do if I was noodling a tune on the couch.
Theory? Well, I know the chord tones and the sound of the minmaj chords and I've played the tune many times so I didn't think about much of anything. Just focused on the mood.
I did use some chord voicings I figured out myself some time back. x x 8 10 10 9 and x x 11 14 13 13. Having these handy allows for creating a little melody in the soprano voice (high E string, mostly) while maintaining the Bbmelmin sound. I learned from Mark Levine's Jazz Theory that melodic minor voicings are interchangeable -- which was a rare Aha moment. I actually don't hear the Ebm7 Ab7 change. I hear the first ii V as Abm7 Db7. But, I had just poisoned my mind by looking at the chart and I threw it in. Worst notes in the clip.
Last edited by rpjazzguitar; 02-27-2021 at 10:21 PM.
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dont loose any sleep over it. it did not matter 90 years ago and it does not matter now. Originally Posted by PickingMyEars
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Try these three note voicings for Bbm(maj7)
X X X 6 6 8
X X X 5 2 5
x x 7 6 6 x
x 8 7 6 x x
x 4 3 5 x x
Some familiar, some less so....
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Wait... this is a PLAYING thread??? Gosh, I'd almost forgotten! Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar
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I hope you all don't shoot your total wad of enthusiasm for this tune too soon. Some of us who haven't been playing this tune for decades on end are having to learn it, learn the structure, practice the improvisational ideas, etc. I'm worried that by the time I post my clip you'll already be jumping onto the Next Big Tune.
But then going unnoticed might not be all bad...
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