"Beebop" Scales

[klasaine]

It's a good time to reiterate that most folks who even play 'a little' jazz probably do this w/o even realizing it. Adding the above mentioned chromatic passing tones - however you want to codify them - IS the sound of jazz from Charlie Christian thru mid 60's Coltrane (or anybody that still plays traditional bebop). It's the 'standard practice'. It's what our ears hear. A lot of modern country lead players essentially employ these same 'rules' or tendencies, if you wanna call it that. Whether a player calls it that or even knows it is immaterial - it's part of the language at this point.

[tedro]

Originally Posted by klasaine

It's a good time to reiterate that most folks who even play 'a little' jazz probably do this w/o even realizing it.

+1

Adding the above mentioned chromatic passing tones - however you want to codify them - IS the sound of jazz from Charlie Christian thru mid 60's Coltrane (or anybody that still plays traditional bebop).

x.50's to mid '60's? x.milestones, kind of blue, giant steps... is bebop?

beautiful posts, love it, dig it.

[Erik8]

Interesting, got some more bebop questions. Any ideas of how to use the b5 interval in bebop? I use it as a passing tone but it don't really sound that outside that way.

[tedro]

Originally Posted by Erik8

Any ideas of how to use the b5 interval in bebop? I use it as a passing tone but it don't really sound that outside that way.

context/anti-context...context is everything? ..., perhaps try the b5 as something other... or maybe a jumping off point...in a whole tone activity, for example. or, try it on different beats/accents. anything that'll help you hear it as a dissonance.

[Samrsmiley]

I wanted to chime in on some of this bebop stuff. I tried to deal with those David Baker books years ago and was just FRUSTRATED! I couldn't get this into my playing, it seemed way too planned out and formulaic. I'm not quite as critical now on it but here's my take.

The bebop 'scale' is more of a rhythmic device. The idea is that you're getting chord tones on beats, NOT putting in half steps. B natural is not a 'bebop note' in C7, it's a passing tone to get the Bb and other chord tones on the beat. I think the best resource out there on this now is "The Jazz Line" by Jerry Bergonzi. He goes through a lot of ways to put in chromatic notes in order to get chord tones on beats. It made WAY MORE SENSE than David Baker's stuff.

Bergonzi's other idea that I think really makes this work is to practice the exercises like crazy because it trains your ear to naturally hear when you need the passing tones. It's weird, but after a lot of practice like that you start to almost naturally feel where you need them.

So try using it as more of a rhythmic device than a harmonic set of notes.

[Samrsmiley]

Originally Posted by Erik8

Interesting, got some more bebop questions. Any ideas of how to use the b5 interval in bebop? I use it as a passing tone but it don't really sound that outside that way.

Context is everything. The b5 is not usually an 'outside' note.
One common place you see it is on dominant II chords-like in Take the A Train (the D7). It's also very common on tonic Major 7th chords and IVmaj7 chords.

Notes won't sound out when they're being used as passing tones. The passing tone is used to bridge two other notes.

Try playing it more blatantly to get a more outside sound. In other words don't prepare and resolve it like you would if you're using it as a passing tone.

[Erik8]

Thanks guys

@Ken: I have not read George Russell`s books but Terje Rypdal who did take lessons with him said his (Russell) method was about learning what scales would work over the chords. But again I'm no expert on this.

[klasaine]

Originally Posted by tedro

+1
x.50's to mid '60's? x.milestones, kind of blue, giant steps... is bebop?

beautiful posts, love it, dig it.

Though 'milestones' and 'kind of blue' have a sub-classification of modal, the solos are still squarely in the bop camp - other than Miles' solo on the tune 'So What'. *There's only two 'modal' songs on Kind Of Blue - so what and flamenco sketches. Giant Steps is still a bop record - maybe harkening the end of it but still there.
Miles and Co. went back to bebop after KOB though it's generally called post-bop. Albums like ESP, Nefertiti are loaded with tunes that have a ton of changes and burning tempos. They may not sound like Parker too much but they owe a lot to Bird and his legacy. The more forward thinking jazzers didn't really back a way from bebop until maybe 1967 or so.

*Of course there was always Monk and Ornette. Two guys that followed no ones path. Albert Ayler, Cecil Taylor also.

*All jazz players still to this day are very 'bebop' influenced when they solo. There are other more modern elements of course but if you seriously play jazz today you need to at least go through and assimilate the bop thing. It's like if you're gonna be a mathematician, physicist or astronomer you can't just stop at geometry.

Big +1 to Sam's last couple of posts. The Jerry Bergonzi books are all great!

As to George Russell's thing, 1) it's pretty complicated and deep. 2) it's based on this concept: he posits that tonal gravity emanates from the first seven tones of the Lydian mode. Hence the name of his method - Lydian Chromatic Concept.
Of course he extrapolates from that how to use his lydian concept over all manner of chords/keys/etc.

[tedro]

Originally Posted by Erik8

Thanks guys

@Ken: I have not read George Russell`s books but Terje Rypdal who did take lessons with him said his (Russell) method was about learning what scales would work over the chords. But again I'm no expert on this.

when we would look at that book in the window of a back alley music store... it was viewed,e.g., as method to playing outside.
(and subsequently a reorganization.)

[tedro]

Originally Posted by Erik8

Thanks guys

@Ken: I have not read George Russell`s books but Terje Rypdal who did take lessons with him said his (Russell) method was about learning what scales would work over the chords. But again I'm no expert on this.

love the first cut on Descendre.

[klasaine]

Originally Posted by tedro

when we would look at that book in the window of a back alley music store... it was viewed,e.g., as method to playing outside.
(and subsequently a reorganization.)

It's not a treatise on specifically playing 'outside' over changes.
Just a different way of tonal organization.
George Russell's music is not that out.

[tedro]

Originally Posted by klasaine

It's not a treatise on specifically playing 'outside' over changes.
Just a different way of tonal organization.
George Russell's music is not that out.

lol...busted!

[tedro]

Originally Posted by klasaine

It's not a treatise on specifically playing 'outside' over changes.
Just a different way of tonal organization.
George Russell's music is not that out.

tonal organization...has to be cosmic. i'm all in. :-)

[klasaine]

I'm not gettin ya Tedro - ? It's too early .

[Leon Grizzard]

I downloaded The Barry Harris Approach to Improvised Lines & Harmony: An Introduction, by Fiona Bicket off the Barry Harris website ($15), and have been playing around with it. I like having a system or method to learn from. This is good for non-jazz players because this intro is key of C, with straight up unaltered G dominant scale.

But all of the examples, and others I have stumbled upon in my limited internet searching, have been descending lines for the scalar stuff. Coincidence? Clarity? Or some other consideration about descending as opposed to ascending lines?

Second Wondering Question or observation. We non-jazzers, meaning I, don't use as much major 7th stuff. The dominant lines are useful, but for major sounds we use major pentatonic more. To make it come out even as far as chord tones are concerned, we need a chromatic note or something. The 4th scale degree in the major hexatonic scale without the 7th scale degree seems to fill that role pretty nicely, as opposed to putting in a chromatic note in one of the whole steps. At least to my ear this afternoon. Is that one of the touted virtues of the scale? I see it in fiddle tunes.

[klasaine]

Originally Posted by Leon Grizzard

I downloaded The Barry Harris Approach to Improvised Lines & Harmony: An Introduction, by Fiona Bicket off the Barry Harris website ($15), and have been playing around with it. I like having a system or method to learn from. This is good for non-jazz players because this intro is key of C, with straight up unaltered G dominant scale.

But all of the examples, and others I have stumbled upon in my limited internet searching, have been descending lines for the scalar stuff. Coincidence? Clarity? Or some other consideration about descending as opposed to ascending lines?

Second Wondering Question or observation. We non-jazzers, meaning I, don't use as much major 7th stuff. The dominant lines are useful, but for major sounds we use major pentatonic more. To make it come out even as far as chord tones are concerned, we need a chromatic note or something. The 4th scale degree in the major hexatonic scale without the 7th scale degree seems to fill that role pretty nicely, as opposed to putting in a chromatic note in one of the whole steps. At least to my ear this afternoon. Is that one of the touted virtues of the scale? I see it in fiddle tunes.

The true master is one who asks a great question.
Second question first.
Yes the 4th will facilitate that as well as as the minor third. The m3 will also make it more chromatic - if that's what you want sometimes.
C D Eb E G A - this is sometimes called the C major blues scale.

Question one - Yes. Descending is where we tend to 'commonly hear' the chromatic jazz lines that are now classified as coming from/using the 'bebop' scale. (Again, this is a modern term)
Ex: C B Bb C A G F E C (octave below first C).
*That line descends - except go back up to the fourth note C in the line.

Note that the bebop scale sounds like (is) the John Phillips Sousa intro to the 'Thunderer March' ... C - D E - F G A Bb B C.

[Leon Grizzard]

Thanks. I do like the b3 with pentatonic scale. The b3 2 1 is a sound I use a lot.

[Donelson]

Jerry Bergonzi teaches that stuff very well. He has a bunch of books out there; many of you all probably have them. If not, buy them. Not much $$; less than yet another fuzzbox etc. Fantastic tenor sax player, who also plays about every instrument ever thought of. He can kick ass on the Fender bass! Drums too, and look out if he's on piano! Sounds like McCoy. I studied with Jerry for a year or so in the early 80's. A jazz "beer drinker & hell raiser".

http://www.jerrybergonzi.com/books.htm

[Leon Grizzard]

Originally Posted by klasaine

Descending is where we tend to 'commonly hear' the chromatic jazz lines that are now classified as coming from/using the 'bebop' scale.

Why?

You still have the basic problem of getting off the evenly spaced chord tones when you get above 5. Or is it that you don't get off until 5 and so you get a nice long string of notes before you get off? Descending you get off right away if you start on 1. Is that the deal?

Or is it that if you just have one note for the basic bebop scale, (either 1 M7 b7 in the dominant scale or 6 b6 5 in major scale), it sounds fine but if you have two or three notes added it kind sound of calliope like, starting out with ascending 1 b2 2? It doesn't sound like that descending. Is that it?

I'm just trying to get the textbook approach on these next questions. I like Sam Smiley's statement that it is about the rhythm rather than the notes, but it is nice to know the note choice doctrine as handed down by the masters.

Question the next: You either need no extra notes, or one extra note, or two extra notes to make things come out right, depending on where you start and how far you go. (Would JoeBob call that the ambitus?) And so if you want to add extra notes beyond those necessary, you have to add two at a time. After the M7 for dominant and b76 for major, the next preferred note is 2 b2 1, then 3 b3 2. Those are the only possible notes if descending from 4, but if descending from 5, the preference is still to use those instead of b5. Right?

Ken said to treat dorian as a mode of dominant, but what is the preferred order of other notes if you need them? Seems like 1 M7 b7 from the root of the dorian would be right. Wrong?

[klasaine]

The best I can do is re-quote myself. The lick in bold below.
This is the quintessential/cliche desc bop lick on a I7 or even I major chord.

Originally Posted by klasaine

Descending is where we tend to 'commonly hear' the chromatic jazz lines that are now classified as coming from/using the 'bebop' scale. (Again, this is a modern term)
Ex: C B Bb C A G F E C (octave below first C).
*That line descends - except go back up to the fourth note C in the line.

*I 'learned' there was be-bop scale long after I learned the sound of it.
As far as it being more of a rhythmic thing for landing chord tones on strong beats - sure, it probably works out that way and I've heard guys talk about that for years. This is one of those things where my ability to explain it fails. I've listened to jazz music literally all my life (father played trpt, bass and piano professionally and was an arranger). The phrasing thing and adding chromatic tones is natural for me.

*as for adding chrom tones to dorian ... I like it between the b3 and the 4, adding a maj 3rd.