Fats Navarro - Lady Bird Solo -- Db over Bb7?

[BreckerFan]

Attachment 127056
I'm partial to the theory that Fat's was playing a Db triad idea over those last 3 beats and then using an enclosure to land the 5th C. This to me functioned as a tritone sub of G so a V-I (as other people have pointed out).

One of the alternatives was the blues scale theory. That he was playing 3 beats of Bb blues scale with the enclosure landing on G.

Above is Fat's line from the 2nd chorus. Looks like he plays an AbM7 arpegio (or F-9) into beat 1 of the 4th bar. and then descends the Bb blues scale.

Does this 2nd phrase change your interpretation of the 1st phrase?

I think Bb blues here is right. Again it's producing a kind of G altered sound; starts on a G, and playing pentatonic up a minor third is a common way to access altered sounds. Doesn't change what I think is going on in the first chorus. The notes could be attributed to the Bb blues scale, but the effect that's created by the emphasis placed on the notes is a Db major (triad/pentatonic) sound.

That's the prime reason one needs to be cautious with applying chord scale theory to a solo IMO; flattening everything to a collection of pitches doesn't tell you anything about how those pitches are being used, ie the vocabulary. CST gives you a good starting point for playing over changes as it tells you what notes are generally in bounds, but it doesn't tell you what to do with those notes. Jazz vocabulary is what changes noodling a scale over a chord into something musical and recognizably jazz. Analyzing a solo can be a great way to learn actual vocabulary for improvisation. But if the analysis is just reducing that language to a scale, you're not really benefiting. I don't need to analyze a solo to know that you can play F minor over an F minor chord.

I don't see how bar 4 has anything to do with F minor, other than that the notes played are mostly diatonic to F minor. But that's also true of Ab major, Bb Dorian, C phrygian...

[djg]

i think he is trying to shoe-horn a Dbmaj/Bbm lick over the chords. i hear it like this. i made up resolutions in Ab, which seems the most natural.

[Christian Miller]

It's kind of a Db major pent/Bb minor pent thing. Not really Db7

[Christian Miller]

Yes.... As I said earlier, "a scale is a particular set of notes, one can emphasize whatever notes within in it one wants to suit the chord progression."



His line does not include the b7th of Db7 (Cb), there is a C natural.

I hear that C natural more as a lower neighbour tone. It's in the correct place rhythmically - on the up beat. It's not a harmonically significant note to my ears.

Boppers use this device on dominant chords all the time - it's a natural part of the vocabulary.

[garybaldy]

What about, it's a mistake from which he recovers very quickly?!!

[GuyBoden]

I've been a big fan of Fats Navarro's playing, I have always thought that Fats Navarro had a Charlie Parker type style, but on trumpet.

Here is another typical Fats Navarro line, so you can compare lines/phrases.

[ragman1]

I don't know if I missed somebody mentioning it

Good lord. And I thought you were happily biking over various obscure mountain ranges of the world