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Yeah it’s very Cm6/9.
but decidedly not accidentally the relative major of the original Dm
My suspicion earlier was that nervershouldhavesoldit was trying to say it vibes F7 rather than Cm, and that he misspoke. I’m not sure why “accidental one flat Fmaj relative major of the original key” is where we landed though.
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10-14-2024 07:53 AM
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You are correct - it definitely vibes (whatever that means) F7. That's because he plays the head in F major - the answering chords to the head's repeated phrase are F major / F# major chords. He was a simple player, and I have no doubt that he intended it to sound just like it does. Green was not an educated musician. He knew nothing of theory and couldn't have discussed any of this if he wanted to (which I'm sure he didn't). Throughout his career, he simplified standard lines, chords, changes, and rhythmic patterns - and I think it's because he simply didn't know or care about the minutiae under the microscope in this thread. My main point was / is simply that the head is played in F major. How he played his solos is not relevant to this question.
Yes, a large part of his soloing lines up with Cm and Dbm, just as Wes wove many solos around 7ths, 9ths, and 11ths (both flatted and natural) while playing over the 1. Transcribe those WM solos and they "line up" with Vm too. But GG wasn't "playing" a Dorian mode, he was playing what he heard and felt and it happened to fall into this pattern. He had no idea what a Dorian mode was - he was almost certainly just playing a synthesis of what he'd heard Miles play and what he felt. And I have no doubt that the head felt right to him with F as the tonal center.
Criticisms of my knowledge base apart, simply transcribing 14 bars of a solo with no key signature and all sharps & flats entered as accidentals is a nice exercise, but it's irrelevant to the question of where he played the head. As for my criticisms of your choice of notation, the key signature most would use for music written in C Dorian is 2 flats, to minimize the number of accidentals and to convey more clearly to the player that the tonal center is C and the mode is Dorian. But there are many alternatives for choosing a key signature for modal music. Some would, as you did, leave no key signature and indicate every accidental. Far more would choose the signature that minimizes the number of accidentals needed. This is very common in non-Western music. You might want to study up on writing modal music to better understand what I said.
I think this thread is a perfect example of overanalysis. Green's playing was like his knowledge of music. It was not complex or theoretically sophisticated. Forcing his playing into theoretical constructs of which he was entirely unaware seems to me to be pushing round pegs into square holes - they'll go in if forced, but imperfectly. I've listened to a lot of GG over 60 years. I thought little of his playing when he first hit the scene, largely because I was disdainful of the simplicity and I heard the way he deviated from Wes, Tal, Barney, Howard, et al as compromise because he wasn't "good enough" to play the way they did. I came back to him in recent years and reexamined how I felt. I came to realize that he was playing what he heard and felt, and it was pure in its own way.
To me, trying to cram his concepts into standard theory is wrong. He was a different kind of player whose simplicity of thought and perception shaped his playing. I certainly understand him a lot better now than I did in the '60s, and I think I'm now able to hear and understand what he played the way he did. I think he played the head in F major and pushed his sidemen to go along (which they did to varying degrees, as has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread). Everyone's entitled to an opinion and that's mine.
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Don’t think anyone ever disagreed that he was playing the head up a fourth. Doesn’t make it F major. Next time you find a Cm in your F major scale, call me.
Criticisms of my knowledge base apart, simply transcribing 14 bars of a solo with no key signature and all sharps & flats entered as accidentals is a nice exercise, but it's irrelevant to the question of where he played the head. As for my criticisms of your choice of notation, the key signature most would use for music written in C Dorian is 2 flats, to minimize the number of accidentals and to convey more clearly to the player that the tonal center is C and the mode is Dorian. But there are many alternatives for choosing a key signature for modal music. Some would, as you did, leave no key signature and indicate every accidental. Far more would choose the signature that minimizes the number of accidentals needed. This is very common in non-Western music. You might want to study up on writing modal music to better understand what I said.
The head and first solo choruses sure sound like F major to me.
Also where you said this:
I have no idea what that's supposed to be or how it relates to the discussion of the key in which GG is playing So What. That score snippet is in 2 flats, which puts it in either Bb major or G minor - but no one has suggested that GG is playing in either of those keys.
Look at the notes - they're from a straight Bb scale. I'm not sure whether you simply got sloppy or actually heard what you wrote - and I'm not going to go over the entire solo note by note to find out.
I think this thread is a perfect example of overanalysis. Green's playing was like his knowledge of music. It was not complex or theoretically sophisticated. Forcing his playing into theoretical constructs of which he was entirely unaware seems to me to be pushing round pegs into square holes - they'll go in if forced, but imperfectly. I've listened to a lot of GG over 60 years. I thought little of his playing when he first hit the scene, largely because I was disdainful of the simplicity and I heard the way he deviated from Wes, Tal, Barney, Howard, et al as compromise because he wasn't "good enough" to play the way they did. I came back to him in recent years and reexamined how I felt. I came to realize that he was playing what he heard and felt, and it was pure in its own way.
I think he’s playing it in F major, which is the relative major of Dm, which is the original key. I assume Green got to F major by confusing, mistaking, or cleverly / innocently substituting relative major for minor in the same key signature (1 flat).
To me, trying to cram his concepts into standard theory is wrong. He was a different kind of player whose simplicity of thought and perception shaped his playing. I certainly understand him a lot better now than I did in the '60s, and I think I'm now able to hear and understand what he played the way he did. I think he played the head in F major and pushed his sidemen to go along (which they did to varying degrees, as has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread). Everyone's entitled to an opinion and that's mineLast edited by pamosmusic; 10-14-2024 at 10:40 AM.
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I'm with NeverShould on this one. The piano is playing what definitely sound like F6/C and F#6/C# chords all through the head at the beginning. Yes, the guitar and bass are playing Cm runs, but the piano is pretty well outlining F major and F#major chords. I guess maybe it comes down to which instrument you hear as defining the chord center. Since only the piano is playing chords, that's what influences me.
Yes, I'm aware that Dm7 has the same notes, but what is Dm doing with Cm runs? Whatever happened to you can play any note over any chord?
Here is just the piano. It definitely is starting with an F6 (spelled out middle C - A - C - D - F):
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Clearly it's a C-6/9add11 without the third. (add sarcasm)
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C Dorian mode
C Eb G Bb D F A C
To consider a modal tune to be a one chord tune is a mistake.
Every sequence of notes in the mode is available. Often sorted into chord pairs … one of the most common ways to outline a modal sound is by using the two major triads a whole step apart in the major scale (that’s Eb and F in a mode with two flats). But how does one distinguish Eb and F used to outline a C dorian mode as opposed to Eb Lydian or whatever?
The bass and the improviser. So when you say the bass and soloist are playing very Cm stuff, you’re answering the question.
In this tune, the pianist first leans more heavily on the F sound than the Eb sound which makes it more ambiguous and less “brooding minor.” But the reason you’d choose a Dorian mode over a straight up minor is that ambiguity.
It is objectively and decidedly not in F major, one flat, relative major of D minor. That is not theoretical nit-picking or ivory tower bullsh**. It is a literal fact of the pitches the musicians play in the recording. There is no E natural anywhere. E flats galore.
I mentioned earlier that a more useful way of thinking about this is not about how F major sounds different than C minor, or about F7 and Cm, but about the way that a Dorian modal vamp like Oye Como Va (ii minor to V major of the parent scale, the two chords in question here) sounds very different than a Dorian modal vamp like So What. These sounds contain multitudes. And that ambiguity is aided by the way Grant is playing … which is more like what you’d expect in a tonic minor vamp like Softly than in a modal tune.
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Sing C... it is home/tonic during the A sections. That's what I go on.
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Man, finally after thirty nine years of playing music by ear, I just started the Mel Bay course to learn to read music a couple of months ago. I am learning from you all on this forum. This conversation has gotten way over my head. I gotta go with what Grant Green said on this one:
Grant’s famous quote, “Jazz, R&B, soul, rocknroll — it’s all just the BLUES, man!”
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So let me throw my two cents:
The head groove, bass line is in F dorian.
The cord/stab could be named Cm11, with F on top.
The solo is a Cm - Dbm dorian, more of C pentaton with all kind of passing tones, color tones.
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Is this thread STILL happening?
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Not really, no.
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Good lord never ask the internet about a mode.
especially not guitar players on the internet.
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Guitar players might not know much, but we are very sure about it!
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Im curious about the whole playing the head in F over a Cm backing.
I've heard of people suggesting to play different pentatonic scales over a chord for different sounds.
I'm of the opinion that this must have been an intentional choice by Grant, no, as it sounds good to my tin ears.
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Okay for the love of all that is holy.
He is not playing it in F. Please do not go trying to play your F major scale stuff over C minor. It will not work.
Hes playing C D Eb F G over a C min. It will sound cool over an F minor too. Which is another way of saying that the original recording uses the same figure off the fifth of the underlying accompaniment. So G A Bb C and D over Cm in this case.
But sweet Jesus there is no key of concert F major one flat anywhere near this recording.
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All good. It's C minor
The accompaniment is pretty ambiguous but on a quick listen I think there's only C, D and F in the voicing. There's no A or Bb or Eb. Was getting a 7sus vibe initially but after playing it on the piano I think there's less going on than you/we think.
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Stop it, don’t break Peter, the kids need their jazz lessons.
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Some kid is going to ask him about Ipanema in F and it’s all going to come out.
More than one way to play guitar
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