Half-Whole or Whole-Half Diminished Scale?

[PMB]

Certainly with bop and hard bop, 13b9 isn't common at all. However, Jim Hall used 13b9 voicings all the time. Sometimes they might both appear as part of a voice-lead line. A notable instance where E13b9 is used as a kind of suspension to E7b13b9 is in bar 11 of Jobim's Corcovado (although many people choose to play something more vanilla at that point).

[christianm77]

13b9 voicings? Nothing terribly modern about them - I mean you have them in Basin Street blues, Tea for Two, all sorts of old old repertoire - they just happen naturally when you write diatonic melodies over chromatic dim7 chords or 7b9 chords. A product of chromatic voice leading. Probably goes back to Brahms and all that lot...

It's interesting you say they are uncommon in hard bop and bop, I believe you. I daresay this is because the dim7 chord wasn't terribly popular with Charlie Parker - unless it was functioning as a substitute for a 7b9 chord.

There are quite a few dim7 chords in jazz that don't function this way - biiio7, #ivo7 and io7 are perhaps the most common. These normally form a part of bassline bass progressions like:

C/E Ebo7 Dm7 G7 or
Eb Eo7 Bb/F etc.

Which have a pretty 'old school sound.' For example, a swing version of Rhythm Changes would look more like this:

Bb Bo7 | Cm7 C#o7 | Bb/D Dbo7 | Cm7 F7 |
Bb Bb7/D | Eb7 Eo7 | Bb/F G7 | C7 F7 |

Than this

Bb Gm7 | Cm7 F7 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |
Fm7 Bb7 | Ebmaj7 Bb7#11 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |

You can 'ii-V' progressions with dim7's in, or use m7's instead of dim7s. For example Groovin' High compared to Whispering, turnaround at the end of the first half (they are meant to be the same changes):

Whispering: Eb/G Gbo7 Fm7 Bb7 as opposed to:
Groovin' High: Gm7 Gbm7 Fm7 Bb7

Barry Harris has a good rant bout this - 'why doesn't anyone play biiio7 diminished?' The simple answer is - because Charles Parker couldn't be arsed with them, Barry. ;-) Most jazz students start with Bird, and ii-V-I's.

Anyway, fewer dim7's, fewer 13b9s.

Jobim was interested in older harmony - a lot of his progressions are more like Swing era progressions or of course Choro harmony than bop. It's a different culture which makes his progressions unfamiliar to modern jazz players.

As is often the case, over time, the chord gets a bit more independence from the voice leading and becomes a thing in itself. That's how dominant sevenths got started, for instance.

And Jim Hall - that makes sense. Hall was as influenced by the swing era as he was by bop, if not more so.

----SOME LENGTHY EXAMPLES -------

It's what happens when you have a diminished chord in the harmony against a diatonic note. Take the key of C, this turnaround, E in the melody:

Dm7 G7b9 C. The second chord is going to be a G13b9 chord right? You can play this at the end of say, All of Me. Standard chord melody cliche.

Or, another very common example:

Ebo7 Dm7 G7 , and the melody might go B-A-A. Basin Street Blues, Tea for Two (last 8 IIRC)

You get this chord Ebo7 with a B which doesn't have a good name really (Ebo7(13)?). In charts you'd just have the melody note as a B and the accompaniment as an Ebo7.

The first chord of Stella by Starlight used to be a Dbo7 with an A melody. Same thing.

Also the first chord of Manoir de mes Reves (Django) is a Bbo7 with an F# in the melody - or a bVIo7 against a 3rd in the key, kind of an inversion of A13b9 and often written A13b9/Bb. Very common substitute for A7 in this music.

6 x 5 6 7 x

In terms of playing over these things - diminished (W-h) scales always sound good, for sure. I believe these scales originated in jazz as neighbour tone/chord tone patterns. If you have a diminished 7th with lower neighbour tones, you will end up with the W-H diminished.

There are other options too, that depend on context. How is the chord functioning in the progression? What's the bassline doing, going up or down? Diminished chords are all about the bass line.

[princeplanet]

13b9 voicings? Nothing terribly modern about them - I mean you have them in Basin Street blues, Tea for Two, all sorts of old old repertoire - they just happen naturally when you write diatonic melodies over chromatic dim7 chords or 7b9 chords. A product of chromatic voice leading. Probably goes back to Brahms and all that lot...

It's interesting you say they are uncommon in hard bop and bop, I believe you. I daresay this is because the dim7 chord wasn't terribly popular with Charlie Parker - unless it was functioning as a substitute for a 7b9 chord.

There are quite a few dim7 chords in jazz that don't function this way - biiio7, #ivo7 and io7 are perhaps the most common. These normally form a part of bassline bass progressions like:

C/E Ebo7 Dm7 G7 or
Eb Eo7 Bb/F etc.

Which have a pretty 'old school sound.' For example, a swing version of Rhythm Changes would look more like this:

Bb Bo7 | Cm7 C#o7 | Bb/D Dbo7 | Cm7 F7 |
Bb Bb7/D | Eb7 Eo7 | Bb/F G7 | C7 F7 |

Than this

Bb Gm7 | Cm7 F7 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |
Fm7 Bb7 | Ebmaj7 Bb7#11 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |

You can 'ii-V' progressions with dim7's in, or use m7's instead of dim7s. For example Groovin' High compared to Whispering, turnaround at the end of the first half (they are meant to be the same changes):

Whispering: Eb/G Gbo7 Fm7 Bb7 as opposed to:
Groovin' High: Gm7 Gbm7 Fm7 Bb7

Barry Harris has a good rant bout this - 'why doesn't anyone play biiio7 diminished?' The simple answer is - because Charles Parker couldn't be arsed with them, Barry. ;-) Most jazz students start with Bird, and ii-V-I's.

Anyway, fewer dim7's, fewer 13b9s.

Jobim was interested in older harmony - a lot of his progressions are more like Swing era progressions or of course Choro harmony than bop. It's a different culture which makes his progressions unfamiliar to modern jazz players.

As is often the case, over time, the chord gets a bit more independence from the voice leading and becomes a thing in itself. That's how dominant sevenths got started, for instance.

And Jim Hall - that makes sense. Hall was as influenced by the swing era as he was by bop, if not more so.

----SOME LENGTHY EXAMPLES -------

It's what happens when you have a diminished chord in the harmony against a diatonic note. Take the key of C, this turnaround, E in the melody:

Dm7 G7b9 C. The second chord is going to be a G13b9 chord right? You can play this at the end of say, All of Me. Standard chord melody cliche.

Or, another very common example:

Ebo7 Dm7 G7 , and the melody might go B-A-A. Basin Street Blues, Tea for Two (last 8 IIRC)

You get this chord Ebo7 with a B which doesn't have a good name really (Ebo7(13)?). In charts you'd just have the melody note as a B and the accompaniment as an Ebo7.

The first chord of Stella by Starlight used to be a Dbo7 with an A melody. Same thing.

Also the first chord of Manoir de mes Reves (Django) is a Bbo7 with an F# in the melody - or a bVIo7 against a 3rd in the key, kind of an inversion of A13b9 and often written A13b9/Bb. Very common substitute for A7 in this music.

6 x 5 6 7 x

In terms of playing over these things - diminished (W-h) scales always sound good, for sure. I believe these scales originated in jazz as neighbour tone/chord tone patterns. If you have a diminished 7th with lower neighbour tones, you will end up with the W-H diminished.

There are other options too, that depend on context. How is the chord functioning in the progression? What's the bassline doing, going up or down? Diminished chords are all about the bass line.

Shouldn't we be paying you for this?

[PMB]

13b9 voicings? Nothing terribly modern about them - I mean you have them in Basin Street blues, Tea for Two, all sorts of old old repertoire - they just happen naturally when you write diatonic melodies over chromatic dim7 chords or 7b9 chords. A product of chromatic voice leading. Probably goes back to Brahms and all that lot...

It's interesting you say they are uncommon in hard bop and bop, I believe you. I daresay this is because the dim7 chord wasn't terribly popular with Charlie Parker - unless it was functioning as a substitute for a 7b9 chord.

There are quite a few dim7 chords in jazz that don't function this way - biiio7, #ivo7 and io7 are perhaps the most common. These normally form a part of bassline bass progressions like:

C/E Ebo7 Dm7 G7 or
Eb Eo7 Bb/F etc.

Which have a pretty 'old school sound.' For example, a swing version of Rhythm Changes would look more like this:

Bb Bo7 | Cm7 C#o7 | Bb/D Dbo7 | Cm7 F7 |
Bb Bb7/D | Eb7 Eo7 | Bb/F G7 | C7 F7 |

Than this

Bb Gm7 | Cm7 F7 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |
Fm7 Bb7 | Ebmaj7 Bb7#11 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |

You can 'ii-V' progressions with dim7's in, or use m7's instead of dim7s. For example Groovin' High compared to Whispering, turnaround at the end of the first half (they are meant to be the same changes):

Whispering: Eb/G Gbo7 Fm7 Bb7 as opposed to:
Groovin' High: Gm7 Gbm7 Fm7 Bb7

Barry Harris has a good rant bout this - 'why doesn't anyone play biiio7 diminished?' The simple answer is - because Charles Parker couldn't be arsed with them, Barry. ;-) Most jazz students start with Bird, and ii-V-I's.

Anyway, fewer dim7's, fewer 13b9s.

Jobim was interested in older harmony - a lot of his progressions are more like Swing era progressions or of course Choro harmony than bop. It's a different culture which makes his progressions unfamiliar to modern jazz players.

As is often the case, over time, the chord gets a bit more independence from the voice leading and becomes a thing in itself. That's how dominant sevenths got started, for instance.

And Jim Hall - that makes sense. Hall was as influenced by the swing era as he was by bop, if not more so.

----SOME LENGTHY EXAMPLES -------

It's what happens when you have a diminished chord in the harmony against a diatonic note. Take the key of C, this turnaround, E in the melody:

Dm7 G7b9 C. The second chord is going to be a G13b9 chord right? You can play this at the end of say, All of Me. Standard chord melody cliche.

Or, another very common example:

Ebo7 Dm7 G7 , and the melody might go B-A-A. Basin Street Blues, Tea for Two (last 8 IIRC)

You get this chord Ebo7 with a B which doesn't have a good name really (Ebo7(13)?). In charts you'd just have the melody note as a B and the accompaniment as an Ebo7.

Nice post, Christian. Your example of swing-era rhythm changes reflects pretty much what Gershwin himself wrote, especially the iiio7 in bar 3. Rarely do you see a reference to the original changes with that chord progression included.

Listening back to Parker, there actually are a number of instances where he outlines the iiio7 with a diminished arpeggio and borrowed note. His famous solo over Embraceable You (take 1) has one at bar 18 and bar 11 of the head for Cardboard contains your exact example; Ebo7 with an added B. I suppose chords of this type could be considered as diminished with major 7ths - it all depends on which note of the diminished chord is taken as the root.

As for the diminished with a borrowed note in the context of swing-era dominant harmony, your example of All of Me is an interesting one. The original melody (in C) has an Ab rather than natural at "why NOT" and that sets up an expectation of b9 in the following V chord (G13b9). The 'tierce picardy' resolution to the major reminds me of the opening to Cole Porter's I Love You. Maybe they're both really minor iv-I cadences in disguise?

Regarding Jobim, he always considered Debussy and Ravel to be more influential than jazz upon his harmonic thinking so it's no surprise that he's something of a special case.

[pingu]

What do you guys reckon to the second chord
Of the bridge of September Song ?

Any ideas as to function ?

[PMB]

It's an example of the #ivo7 mentioned in an earlier post by Christian. In this case, the preceding chord is a minor rather than a major IV and the resolution is delayed. So once again, basically a minor iv-I cadence with a passing diminished. It makes sense if you check out the voice leading:

F-6: F-Ab-C-D
F#o7: F#-A-C-Eb
C6/G: G-A-C-E

[Johnny_L]

I combine the minor blues scale and mixolydian a lot, usually switch between them as I go.

When I've started working on incorporating the diminished scale I've noticed that the H/W doesn't add a lot of notes in my case. So if I want to add a lick that only stays in the diminished scale I usually prefer the W/H.

[christianm77]

Nice post, Christian. Your example of swing-era rhythm changes reflects pretty much what Gershwin himself wrote, especially the iiio7 in bar 3. Rarely do you see a reference to the original changes with that chord progression included.

Listening back to Parker, there actually are a number of instances where he outlines the iiio7 with a diminished arpeggio and borrowed note. His famous solo over Embraceable You (take 1) has one at bar 18 and bar 11 of the head for Cardboard contains your exact example; Ebo7 with an added B. I suppose chords of this type could be considered as diminished with major 7ths - it all depends on which note of the diminished chord is taken as the root.

As for the diminished with a borrowed note in the context of swing-era dominant harmony, your example of All of Me is an interesting one. The original melody (in C) has an Ab rather than natural at "why NOT" and that sets up an expectation of b9 in the following V chord (G13b9). The 'tierce picardy' resolution to the major reminds me of the opening to Cole Porter's I Love You. Maybe they're both really minor iv-I cadences in disguise?

Regarding Jobim, he always considered Debussy and Ravel to be more influential than jazz upon his harmonic thinking so it's no surprise that he's something of a special case.

Yes I heard about that. Haven't yet done the archeology on All of Me.

I think the weirdness of Jobim's harmony is a little overstated. Jobim is working from bass lines a lot of the time. Post war jazz is more about root movement.

Since Choro harmony is very bass oriented it seems to me safe to assume this was the principle influence on Jobim.... Choro changes look a lot like swing style progressions albeit with perhaps more modulation.

No More Blues has a Choro form rather than his more customary 32 bar and AABA forms - was NMB his first? Can't remember.....

I'll have to check out the Parker example. Always with anything I say it's follows by the caveat - of the stuff I've looked at. What Parker gets up to on biiio is certainly of interest.

[pingu]

It's an example of the #ivo7 mentioned in an earlier post by Christian. In this case, the preceding chord is a minor rather than a major IV and the resolution is delayed. So once again, basically a minor iv-I cadence with a passing diminished. It makes sense if you check out the voice leading:

F-6: F-Ab-C-D
F#o7: F#-A-C-Eb
C6/G: G-A-C-E

Great thanks , I'll have a play round that
Tonight ....