Quiz #5/October 15 gig

Class on October 15 will occur at the Intermodal Center (i.e., the bus station on North Street). As rehearsed on October 13, the BCC JE will play Take the A Train and Witch Hunt. JE III members will perform Take Five. We will meet at the bus station at 5 PM. The Dan Broad Quartet will take the stage at 5:20 or so and play a few tunes. The BCC JE will play at around 5:45 PM. All equipment needs to be set up before the Dan Broad 4 starts so that there will be only minimal transition time between Dan Broad and the BCC JE. My thanks to Dan for graciously inviting us to be a part of his gig (which, incidentally, is part of the 5th Annual Pittsfield Jazz Festival). As you will recall, Dan also invited us to play last year at this time. It’s a great opportunity for us to get out in public in advance of giving full-length concerts.

Quiz #5

Quiz #5 will take place on Tuesday, October 20 in K111 at 5 PM. You will be graded on the following:

1. Your ability to play one of our melodies accurately and expressively. The exact melody will be a surprise.

2. Your ability to apply triads to the form of either Witch Hunt or Mahjong. The choice of tune will be decided at the quiz, so prepare both.

Why Study Triads?

Mike Steinel makes the point that beginning improvisers often overlook a study of triads, thinking that “jazz is really about seventh chords.” No one is going to deny the importance of seventh chords to jazz. At the same time, triads are fundamental to jazz improvisation and have been used in compelling and forceful ways by the masters.

Types of Triads

There are four types of triads: augmented, major, minor and diminished. See Steinel’s book for additional information. For our quiz, we will use the two-beat eighth note pattern of 1-3-5-octave. Where a chord change lasts the entire measure, follow the pattern with two beats of rest. Where a chord change is repeated in successive measures, repeat the pattern and rests.

Use the augmented triad for super locrian chord/scales (7#9 or +7#9) and whole tone chord/scales (+7).

Use the major triad for major (ma7, 6 or 6/9) dominant seventh (7), or lydian dominant (7#11) chord/scales.

Use the minor triad for minor chord/scales (mi7).

Use the diminished triad for diminished (07) and locrian (mi7b5)chord/scales.

Note: Chords that are spelled with 11 and 13 can be reduced to seventh chords. Examples are “Fmi11″ (Witch Hunt), “Cmi11″ (Mahjong) and “Gb13#11″ (also Mahjong). For our purposes, you can think of these chords as “Fmi7,” “Cmi7” and “Gb7#11.” Chords have an 11th or 13th in their name to draw extra attention to these notes. Usually they are found in the melody. As an illustration, take a look at measure one of “Witch Hunt,” where the 11th of “Cmi” (which is the note F) is the first note of the melody.

Major and minor ii-Vs

At this point, you should begin to look for the major and minor ii-Vs in our tunes. The “ii-V” is the fundamental unit of jazz harmony.

A major ii-V is a minor chord followed by a dominant seventh chord. The roots of these chords are a perfect fifth apart. An example is: d mi7 –G7. This is a ii-V in the “key” of C major. I put “key” in quotation marks because often dmi7–G7 doesn’t go directly to C major. Nonetheless, we think of dmi7-G7 as a “ii-V in C major.”

A minor ii-V is different. This is a locrian chord/scale, followed by a super locrian chord/scale. As with the major ii-V, the roots will be a perfect fifth apart. An example is dmi7(b5)–G7(#9).

Let’s compare: 

dmi7–G7  [major ii-V]  

dmi7(b5)–G7(#9) [minor ii-V]

Let’s compare the two in terms of scales:

dmi7–G7     dorian scale–mixolydian scale

dmi7b5–G7(#9)   locrian scale—super locrian scale

It’s important to hear the difference between the two, and to make the difference apparent in your playing.

The point of all this is that the two chord/scales in the above examples are related. They derive their meaning from their relationship to each other, just like words in a sentence mean something by virtue of being associated. 

And the moral of the story is…

When you start to perceive d mi7–G7 as a major ii-V (and not two random, unrelated chord/scales), and when you understand that dmi7b5–G7#9 is a minor ii-V (and not two random, unrelated chord/scales), your improvising will advance to the next level. As a result, your are much less likely to be seriously injured at a gig by an audience member who is irate because your playing is weak.

Allen Livermore