The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
Reply to Thread Bookmark Thread
Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Posts 1 to 25 of 34
  1. #1

    User Info Menu

    This is my fav scale:

    The Nine-Note Scale, in "C" it has three flats.

    The notes of this scale in "C" are: C, D, Eb, E, Gb, G, Ab, A, and B.

    (Obviously, they're the CM7 chord tones in bold)
    Last edited by GuyBoden; 05-31-2023 at 08:24 AM.

  2.  

    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #2

    User Info Menu

    Out of interest, what use do you make of this scale/sound?

  4. #3

    User Info Menu

    You add as many notes as you flipping well like boyo

    See 8:47


    the thing here is - if there’s no space for a semitone between two notes, go back to the diatonic step above. As Barry puts it ‘the rule is more important than the note.’ So for instance if we want to add notes between

    C B A G F E D C

    we go
    C D B Bb A Ab G Gb F G E Eb D Db C

  5. #4

    User Info Menu

    If I propose an 11 note scale over a dominant chord, omitting only the nat7, someone will point out that Wes made that note sound great.

    Same if I propose a 10 note scale, omitting the nat7 and the 11.

    If I then propose putting them both back in, to go to the full chromatic scale, someone will point out that it's not really helpful. It says, play any note, which is too vague, I imagine, for some people or applications.

    Which leads me to wonder, where is the balance? If you're going to try to apply scales, how many notes?

    Or, is this even a sensible question?

    Here's some rumination on the subject.

    When I try to imagine a scale based approach, my attention first goes towards 6 note scales (hexatonics). For a C major sound, it's the C major scale less the F. The F can give the line a G7 kind of character, so there's an argument for omitting it. Of course, it also gives a more modern character to the Cmaj sound when used correctly -- so there's an argument that it might be the best sounding note you can play. But, if you're after a very basic sound over Cmajor, sure, omit the F.

    Similarly, for G7, omit the C. Similar argument.

    Suppose the chord in the song is G7#11. Perhaps you consider Dmelmin. D E F G A B C#. Might you be better off omitting the D and using the rest as a hexatonic?

    Or just think about G B A F C#?

    I end up thinking about chord tones. The root and the proper third are always good. The 4th is always on the fence (could be best or worst). Then you have three fifths and three ninths to consider. One good approach is to select them by ear in the moment. Finally, there's the 6 or 13th which usually works nicely with major and dominant but minor harmony is something different.

    If it's minor, you get R b3 and 5. Then you have four combinations of 6 and 7 to consider. 9th usually works.

    Where I end up is thinking about chord tones and picking extensions by ear. But, I also end up more vanilla than I'd like.

    How do others make these general concepts into good lines?

  6. #5

    User Info Menu

    Is Db an avoid note in this context? lol.
    Every note can be played as a chromatic passing note. No need to discriminate.

    These days my favorite note to emphasize (not as a passing note) is the natural 7 on Dominants. For years I avoided it like the plague. BH opened my mind to it. It's at the color level of the b13th if not better.
    Last edited by Tal_175; 05-31-2023 at 08:20 PM.

  7. #6

    User Info Menu

    I only play 10 note scales. I don't discriminate against that much maligned 4th on a major. I think it sounds fine.

  8. #7

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar
    If I propose an 11 note scale over a dominant chord, omitting only the nat7, someone will point out that Wes made that note sound great.

    Same if I propose a 10 note scale, omitting the nat7 and the 11.

    If I then propose putting them both back in, to go to the full chromatic scale, someone will point out that it's not really helpful. It says, play any note, which is too vague, I imagine, for some people or applications.

    ...

    How do others make these general concepts into good lines?
    I don't think of it as trying to come up with ideas using all 12 notes. For example one of the simplest concepts is to apply all your dominant language a tritone away from a dominant. This would include the natural 7th. If you apply your dominant language both to a dominant and it's tritone, you'll use all 12 notes but the lines would have a melodic structure (as opposed to trying to come up with lines by just thinking the chromatic scale).

    I like the BH idea of using all four family of dominants that share the same diminished. I think Pat Martino used and taught this approach as well. If you consider arpeggios from all chord tones of these dominants, you'll get a total of 16 arpeggios and four scales over a dominant. The beauty is it's all just one set of language based on a single dominant scale applied to different parts of a chord.

  9. #8

    User Info Menu

    All the talk about scales around here lately and what to call them made me realize that if I'm thinking scales I'm pretty much just thinking major, minor, and dominate with accidentals to taste. Seems to cover a lot. Is that OK?

  10. #9

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by ccroft
    All the talk about scales around here lately and what to call them made me realize that if I'm thinking scales I'm pretty much just thinking major, minor, and dominate with accidentals to taste. Seems to cover a lot. Is that OK?
    I do even less, I just think major. C7 is F major, Gm is Bb major or Eb major.

  11. #10

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar

    Here's some rumination on the subject.

    When I try to imagine a scale based approach, my attention first goes towards 6 note scales (hexatonics). For a C major sound, it's the C major scale less the F. The F can give the line a G7 kind of character, so there's an argument for omitting it. Of course, it also gives a more modern character to the Cmaj sound when used correctly -- so there's an argument that it might be the best sounding note you can play. But, if you're after a very basic sound over Cmajor, sure, omit the F.
    This might be a different thread, but I would love to hear more about how you work on hexatonics.

    My experience is mostly with triad pairs, but I’m not super fluent so it’s still in the phase where it’s a bit of a device.

    When I work on 7-note scales, I just have lifetimes worth of material to work on. Pentatonic scales are a bit trickier but I’ve got more experience there. 6-note scales I don’t really have a handle on them. Do you work up facility in the same ways you do with a major scale, patterns or intervallic ideas?

    I’m just curious.

    I did read the rest of the post where you mention that you find yourself thinking more about chord tones anyway (me too probably, or at least chord shapes). So maybe you don’t work on hexatonics this way at all.

  12. #11

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar
    How do others make these general concepts into good lines?
    I think I spend most of my time in this respect finding lines I like and sequencing them. Like maybe a phrase from a bebop head I’m working on or a solo transcription or something.

    But I like to take it, describe the idea (“enclosure around the root and then up the scale to the fifth” or whatever) and then try to take that idea through a whole tonality in as many positions as I can (enclosure around the next note then up to that note’s fifth, then enclosure around the next note). When I get bored I try to change the idea (enclosure then down to the fifth, enclosure then go to the sixth or fourth or seventh, maybe rinse and repeat with a different enclosure or whatever).

    Anyway … I find that to be a really good way of using vocabulary to explore a scale. It makes me think of chord relationships if the idea is an arpeggio, it makes me think of intervallic relationships if there’s a skip, but it doesn’t get me in the rut of feeling like a scale is just a structural thing. It’s a tonality to explore. I’ve been doing that stuff for months now with melodic minor trying to get those sounds in my playing.

    As a bonus it’s great ear practice for melodic development when I’m soloing.

  13. #12

    User Info Menu

    Then there's...


  14. #13

    User Info Menu

    The Nine-Note Scale

    Obviously for people who play in 4.5/4

  15. #14

    User Info Menu

    Microtonal the future of jazz?

    If there’s a question mark, the answer is always “no”.

  16. #15

    User Info Menu

    I play 3 scales: Major, Dominant (Mixo), and Melodic Minor.
    I vary them via the Barry Harris Half step rules

  17. #16

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    I did read the rest of the post where you mention that you find yourself thinking more about chord tones anyway (me too probably, or at least chord shapes). So maybe you don’t work on hexatonics this way at all.
    I was thinking about it in reaction to this thread.

    In my playing, when I'm thinking, I focus on chord tones, some extensions/tensions, tonal center and do the rest mostly by ear. When I can, I sing to myself and try to play that and I have no idea what the notes are except by sound.

    I don't have any tips for hexatonics beyond omitting one note from a seven note scale.

  18. #17

    User Info Menu

    Yes, you can add as many notes or subtract as many notes as you think is best for the music.

    I'm glad I didn't mention my 9 note 4NPS 4th Tuning NotBop scale patterns, I would have got some comments.

    I do like diagrams/maps etc, my visual pattern recognition is very good, so I like a visual map for fretboard patterns. Because, we don't all learn in the same way.


  19. #18

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by GuyBoden
    Yes, you can add as many notes or subtract as many notes as you think is best for the music.

    I'm glad I didn't mention my 9 note 4NPS 4th Tuning NotBop scale patterns, I would have got some comments.

    I do like diagrams/maps etc, my visual pattern recognition is very good, so I like a visual map for fretboard patterns. Because, we don't all learn in the same way.
    There’s no empirical evidence to suggest that educational models such as VARK (visual, auditory, read/write, kinaesthetic) have any relationship to reality. That said the guitar is kind of visual instrument being as it is a plane rather than a line (like the piano). I remember doing a lot of diagrams like this… I got to the point where I just thought it would be better just to apply to the neck directly and cut out the middle step.

  20. #19

    User Info Menu

    The thing that I like to bore everyone senseless about is that in scale use in jazz it’s important to distinguish the harmonic notes and the non-harmonic (ie passing tones).

    In chord scale theory for instance what the avoid note thing is really (or supposedly) telling you is that you ‘can’t’ make a voicing using that note without it being very dissonant*. The harmonic tones in trad harmony relate to the basic notes of the chord, but in modern jazz harmony may include the extensions of the chords up to and beyond the seven note chord scales.

    This is what people are presumably talking about when they say notes will or won’t work on a given chord. They mean it will it work 100% of the time, regardless of context. This is ‘lines-as-arpeggiated-voicings’ which is definitely a thing but not the whole picture.

    harmonic music including bop has rhythmic and melodic context which gives it its temporal, dynamic nature. The ii V I is analogous to the three act narrative structure with the V being conflict and dissonance, for example. Any notes can be part of this story provided you understand how to wrap things up and are skilful at pacing and suspense.

    if you instead play a succession of colourful voicings informed by CST or something similar, you remove that feeling of motion - and music becomes more like a painting; something non temporal. The use of colour becomes critical and not everything blends. it’s another feeling one I would say is typical of the type of pan-modal intervallic playing you often hear in contemporary jazz. Or of course some works by Debussy and Ravel.

    So i so we are storytelling scales - major, harmonic minor - from colour scales - pentatonics, melodic minor modes, lydian, Dorian.

    So called Bebop scales are combinations of non harmonic and harmonic notes put together in such a way that all the functional notes are on a beat: that’s the definition. They are temporal creatures, storytelling scales. The notes in between are really not so important. Again the rule is more important than the note.

    (this rule can be broken, most frequently in the case of pushes, but more generally. Practicing neat orderly stuff does not mean you have to improvise that way; it’s an exercise.)

    That said any note at all will work on a functional dominant because the dominant is not really a resting chord. One of the other last things I learned in Barry’s class was spending time using a B triad on a G7b9 resolving to Cm. Very hip.

    See also G lydian augmented on G7 - someone did a video calling it the ‘Bill Evans dominant’. Major sevenths on dominants completes the chromatic gamut on G7.

    The tritone dominant also offers the most mathematically efficient cadence into the C6/9 chord btw.

    * the whole Berklee avoid note system is a bit messed up imo. I much prefer Stephon Harris’s approach…
    Last edited by Christian Miller; 06-01-2023 at 06:55 AM.

  21. #20

    User Info Menu

    So i so we are storytelling scales - major, harmonic minor - from colour scales - pentatonics, melodic minor modes, lydian, Dorian.
    Im not sure I follow the distinction here. Particularly with respect to melodic minor.

  22. #21

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    Im not sure I follow the distinction here. Particularly with respect to melodic minor.
    so it’s not a cut and dried distinction - more like a spectrum. The more avoid notes or clash notes a scale has (again this is something of a spectrum and probably subjective) the more of a storytelling scale it is and the fewer controversial notes a scale has the more of a colour scale it is and the easier it becomes to construct pan modal voicings from it (eg thirteenth chords or various intervallic combinations ala Holdsworth etc).

    Melodic minor modes tend to contain few of any avoid notes and so are very flexible for creating voicings. Dorian and lydian too, and the two most common pentatonic scales as well as m6-pent.

    It’s a bit of a weird one as the harmonic minor has only one note different but it feel that b6 in combination with the 2, 4 and 7 makes the scale much more dualistic and restless with itself. Intervals and their voicings also play a role. X 3 4 2 3 x is a different beast to x 3 x 2 3 2 for example.

  23. #22

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by Christian Miller
    so it’s not a cut and dried distinction - more like a spectrum. The more avoid notes or clash notes a scale has (again this is something of a spectrum and probably subjective) the more of a storytelling scale it is and the fewer controversial notes a scale has the more of a colour scale it is and the easier it becomes to construct pan modal voicings from it (eg thirteenth chords or various intervallic combinations ala Holdsworth etc).

    Melodic minor modes tend to contain few of any avoid notes and so are very flexible for creating voicings. Dorian and lydian too, and the two most common pentatonic scales as well as m6-pent.
    Ahhhhhh okay I see what you mean.

  24. #23

    User Info Menu

    Not that I think avoid note theory as presented in nettles and Graf has much to do with reality. The correct avoids notes for Cmaj7 are given by E phrygian, not C ionian for example imo…. C is highly dissonant against cmaj7. In fact, as Stephon points out D# is less dissonant than C on that chord!

    Not that dissonance is bad per se. This inherent dissonance in the inverted maj7 chord is soemthing modern musicians actaully embrace. But it’s one example of a number of things that Stephons ideas create a very rigorous and general theory for. For example, a 5th being a dissonance on Cmaj7#11, an F on Dm9(maj7) - all kinds of cool stuff

    So, moral is use your ears, not theory… it can lead you to some interesting conclusions…

  25. #24

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by Christian Miller
    Not that I think avoid note theory as presented in nettles and Graf has much to do with reality. The correct avoids notes for Cmaj7 are given by E phrygian, not C ionian for example imo…. C is highly dissonant against cmaj7. In fact, as Stephon points out D# is less dissonant than C on that chord!

    So, moral is use your ears, not theory… it can lead you to some interesting conclusions…
    Yeah the avoid note stuff never really worked for me, but I get what you’re saying.

    Where did you come across Stefon’s thing? Jordan?

  26. #25

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by Christian Miller
    if you instead play a succession of colourful voicings informed by CST or something similar, you remove that feeling of motion - and music becomes more like a painting; something non temporal. The use of colour becomes critical and not everything blends. it’s another feeling one I would say is typical of the type of pan-modal intervallic playing you often hear in contemporary jazz. Or of course some works by Debussy and Ravel.
    Quote Originally Posted by Christian Miller
    the fewer controversial notes a scale has the more of a colour scale it is and the easier it becomes to construct pan modal voicings from it (eg thirteenth chords or various intervallic combinations ala Holdsworth etc).

    Melodic minor modes tend to contain few of any avoid notes and so are very flexible for creating voicings.

    Good stuff, very thoughtful, I've been down this road for the last 10 years or so, creating progressions with colouful chord voicings and playing over them with scales, with as you stated "fewer controversial notes a scale has the more of a colour scale it is". It's a very impressionistic approach, which I like, but it can easily result in excessive noodling.