You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Beyond The Bebop Scale

Episode Date: July 17, 2023

Adam and Peter take a SpeakPipe question on how to use the bebop scale in a more melodic way.Check out the OS course "Scales of Chords" about Barry Harris' method taught by Chris Parks.Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open Studio🎹 Head over to our YouTube channel for a better look 👀.Follow us on Instagram

Hey, Peter. Yes. Do you have Mamba mentality? Ooh, yes. Now you're talking my language. Do you have Barry mentality? Ooh, I think so. Do you have Hans mentality?

Barely. I sure hope not. I'm Adam Menace. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the Yule here at podcast. Music advice. Coming at you. Coming at you today, we're sponsored by Open Studio.

Go to open studio, jazdustio.com for all your jazz lesson needs. It's my vocal warm up for the episode. This is my physical warmup for this episode. It always makes me think of, what? Yeah. Use car. Use car.

Manchester. Yeah, yeah. So we have three different icons. Yes. Kobe with Mammem mentality. That's right. Barry mentality from legend. I barely caught that reference.

Barry Harris. Yeah. Which we're going to be really talking about today. We're taking a couple speak five today. And then, of course, Hans Groiner mentality. That's right. Which I don't recommend. Shout out to Hans and apologies, Hans.

But not really going to work. with those other two mentality. That's okay. There's a place for everything, right? Yes. Yes, yes. So today we're taking a couple of speak pipes. We're back on the speed pipes.

I'm excited about that. We like to check in every so often. Yeah. Yeah. We got a couple of good ones. The first one is from Alm. And this is a question we get in some form of another, some form or another.

Yes. Every so often. Yes. Hi, guys. So I've just been doing a lot of shedding this summer. And I realize that whenever I use the bebop scale and I try to make bebop lines in my solos, I just, I can't get my lines to stop sounding like scales. Any tips?

First of all, congrats on the shedding. It sounds like you're quite young, and this should be the summer of the shed for anybody here. Summer of the shed. Yeah. You know, use your summer. Sometimes we have a little bit. Is that like summer of Sam? Because that didn't work out too well.

No. Let's not invoke the serial killer. It went straight there. No, the summer of the shed is the summer of practicing. So going to the wood shed is practicing. So we have summer of shed, summer of Sam. He's going to bring it back. Summer of love.

That's a good one. That was 69, right? 67, I believe, was the summer of love. Gotcha. Yeah, 69 was Woodstock. Oh, Woodstock. Loving, too, as well. So Om is trying to use the.

B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-ttale. And I always think about, like, is there sort of a perfect way to approach this? Not in terms of, like, theoretically, and we're going to talk a little bit about the different attitudes. But I do think there is maybe not a perfect time, but there's a sort of perfect range in which like learning this scale and don't worry if you've already learned it, you don't worry about going back in time or anything. But like it's, you're never too late with learning a scale like this, I think. I think this is one of those ones that doesn't need to be part of your core like technical connection with the instrument. Now, I'm a little bit selfishly saying this because I didn't know what the scale was until like I was well into

using it and understanding it. I mean, not understanding it, but like a, a little bit. applying it, right? I just feel like it's just one of those scales that you can, you can overthink a little bit too much, right? Which is what we're going to do right now. Well, no, no, no, no. It's actually, it's a scale that is really not a thing within bebop musicians themselves. Yeah.

As like Barry Harris will describe it later in his life. Yeah. It is the concept. He shafed at the name and the concept, right? Yes. As do many people. because it really isn't what the players that they were playing bebop were thinking about at the time. So before we get too deep into it, let's talk about what it is.

Traditionally, you just said it wasn't a thing. No, no, but what people call it, right? So I'm not actually sure where when people called it. Oh, no, this is that one teacher in Indiana, I think, started calling it. Someone put in the comments who came up with the bebop scale at first. But bebop musicians don't really talk about it like this, as Barry Harris will describe, and I'll talk about Barry's concept later. But it's basically the dominant Bbop scale or just the Bbop scale is putting a half step between

the root and the dominant seven. Right? And that puts all the strong tones on the beat when you're playing eighth notes. Then there's something else that people call the major V-Bop scale where you put a half step between the fifth and the sixth. Right?

So that is what Barry Harris calls the sixth diminished and that's really to build chords. It is not a melodic device. And it's a pneumotic device. No, no. But the, you know, the interesting thing is, is what you're really doing here is you're putting a half step between scale tones

so that strong scale, scale, notes end up on the beat. And then by the end of Barry's, Barry Harris's teaching career, he had developed a whole system that really you do hear more often in actual Charlie Parker solos and Bud Powell solos than any of these, you know, BBOB scale or major BBOB scale. Right. And also real quick, shout out David Baker. David Baker. That's who it was. That's who it was. Who's a great teacher. Fantastic teacher. Fantastic guy. It's kind of a limiting concept to have just the BBOB scale with just the half step between the first and the seventh degree. Because as Barry Harris says, you can actually do this in a few different ways.

What would you like to go from here, Peter? Because I could either teach the Barry's chromatic concept, which I think is really valuable, or we can talk a little bit more about the use of just these traditional David Baker-style bebop scales. Yeah, well, let's just talk about how there can kind of successfully be used, maybe, even just sort of our concepts. And then I think that the question really about not sounding like scales when you learning the bebop scales and you're starting to apply it.

I think it's really potentially a pitfall that we can maybe help with a little bit for any scale. Yeah. And just for your playing, especially kind of bebop playing. Because I think what people maybe get caught up in is like, oh, the bebop scale will give me that bebop sound. I get a lot of people being like, oh, teach me that hip, the way that you play those lines with that hip bebop sound.

Yeah. And I don't want to be like stuffy or or, you know, snooty and be like, oh, that's not a bebop sound. I am clearly a post-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-N modernist or whatever. And as we know, like, the names don't really apply. But so I try to get more into like, well, what are they looking for? Because I want to help them with what it is. Well, Ome says, you know, why doesn't it sound like bebop or it doesn't sound like B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-p,

sounds like I'm just running scales. I think the easiest way to get out of this, Ome, and I know you agree with this, to add some jazz arpeggios to the mixer. Right, right. But within the same phrase, maybe. Exactly. So instead of just, you know, maybe something like starting off with, That's like on C7, right?

Starting off with 3, 7, 7, 9, and then coming out. Like, adding these, or adding those things. Yeah, so we're adding these chord structures to our scale work. And that is, I mean, that's not, if you do that, you're just going to sound like you're, you know, eventually you start like you're alternating that. It's not real bebop language either, but it's a start. You're getting more into the territory of something that Charlie Parker would actually play. For sure.

And I think that you can actually, especially when you're practicing. And remember, when we're practicing, it doesn't have to sound great. It just has to lead to you sounding great on the gig. Like, that's the whole point of it, you know? One more thing on this. If you really want to sound like you're playing bebop, why not just transcribe some Bud Powell and Charlie Parker out the gate? Learn what they played over these tunes.

And you will. I mean, this is the thing. It's never like one answer to this stuff. It's not like, Bebop scale is valid. Bebop scale is not valid. Barry Harris's approach to bebop scale is valid. It's not because you're going to see elements of this, B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-Scal.

And so much of it is rhythmic and articulatory. 100%. And so you can actually use that. Also, the blues is a big part of it. And the blues, exactly. But if you just take the, like what you just did. And you're like, well, you're like, well, you're like, well, you're the, you're that sounds like the bebop scale.

You're literally playing it. Starting on beat one, running down the bebop scale over Athos with no skips, with no omissions or anything, no breaks or anything. But that could be a good thing. It's like,

how can you make that sound, you know, at some different tempos? Three, three, this is hard, right? Yeah. You know, how could you give it a little bit of swagger? Because then when you,

this sounds lame, doesn't it? I'm trying, though, man. Yeah, but this is not something that you would hear Bud Powell or someone like that play. No, but... There's no shape to it. But then you start to look at the other elements,

like, you know, just going up that simple... Yeah. You know, you did it the other way around. The arpeggio first, you could do it either way. But it's like, how do you start to give it that feel? And then, you know... That's starting to sound a little better. You speed it up, but you're getting that sound,

that swag, everything when you do it's slower. Listen, how you play is always more important than what you play. Yeah, yeah. And so that should be a consideration. Another, that's another case for listening to a lot of great... Right, right. But don't jump right to the end. and be like, oh, I have to be able to play

the way that Charlie Parker incorporated, you know, I did a little bit of a lick there. That was by accident. But, you know, like, don't feel like you're going to have to be able to do it like Charlie Parker. Use that as inspiration, but then restrict yourself a little bit

to start to get that swag in there. Yeah. Because then when you add in, I'm going to give just a couple of different ideas on how you can start to complicate the usage of this a little bit, but slowly. So if you've got...

Well, let's go up. Up. Right? So that's one, two, three, four. How about starting on the upbeat? One, two, three, four. Boom, okay. So now you've got a little something different.

Same thing, you're just running up the scale. Now we're gonna give it a break. Start, go back to the one, two, three, four. You know, just little things. Give a little bit of a break in there, and then there's so many different ways just to do that. So good. But you're still concentrating on like really locking things in.

You have to kind of delay your, more gratification as a listener and really as a player in doing this because it's hard. It's hard to make that sound good, but that's what's going to kind of force you into learning that stuff. If you take a Charlie Parker line and you transcribe it and learn to play just like he did, that's great and that's a valuable part of it. But you also have to be able to take these basic elements, especially when you start going through different keys because you're really starting to build things up.

If you just took... Right? What are you coming down on that? Just coming down on the jazz arpeggio. Up the bebop scale and then go up to the ninth. And then you can add that with the offset. One, one, two, three, four. Uh, right.

Then you start to see how these different things lay. Maybe a little bit of, but do, bo-do-bo, biddy-bid-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-. It's the same notes, but like how can you start to make it more interesting? But do it slowly as you go. Yeah. So that your ear acclimate, so that you start to really get those details. And, I highly recommend checking out some of Chris Park's material here on Open Studio,

if you haven't already. he's got a great YouTube channel of his own but he does some amazing work here at Open Studio Pro and he has released one chorus, the second chorus on his way about all of this stuff. All of the B-Bop elements that you're talking about here, he goes through them all very detailed. So it's not just like going down,

you could also do pivots. Yeah. That kind of stuff. You just put a beret on because you're playing B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-Rother. All that stuff, it kind of has that instant sound. It gets you there once you understand. Yeah, because, yeah, That's what I've realized, like, and it's no fault for anyone for being like, how do you get that beb sound?

I used to shave at that question. But now I'm like, no, I get what it is. It's all those things put together. But it's like when you practice, it's okay to just have them. In fact, it's preferable to just have them simple one at a time. You're not going to become corny because you're running up and down scales. The brilliant thing about Barry Harris, why people respond so well to him is he took this thing that is actually, like, seems difficult. And he systematized it in a way that actually makes you sound.

like that. Right. It's kind of like the fuchs book with counterpoint and you sound like Hyden once you do that book. It's like going pronounce fucks but I'm not sure. Excellent. I was trying to avoid that. Thank you. And but if you go but if you go through sort of Chris Parks's interpretation of Barry's teachings, you get a very similar sound. It's very cool. Let me just show you real quick that Barry's chromatic rules. I know those but show them for the people. Because own I feel like this could help you too. This to me was an eye-opener of how Let me just say to it, and you correct me if I'm wrong here, but before you show this, this is not exclusionary of the bebop scale. No, no, no, no.

Like, even you can take different elements. Sometimes even certain teachers will say, well, you shouldn't do that. You know, put things together however you want. It's all good as long as you understand it and practice it for your benefit. None of these are going to necessarily clash with each other, even if the so-called rules do. So the B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-scale scale and the reason why they work and why, you know, David Baker taught them is because they do put the chord tones on strong, the scale tones on strong beats.

But Barry's whole thesis was, well, bebop players were doing that with not just those notes. Yeah. It was actually any note. You could put a chord tone, a semitone between, and put, and if you look at the canon of music, it was being, it was more varied than just this particular instance, right? Yeah.

Or this. Right. So Barry's rules of chromatic scales are between, like if you have a C major scale, you can put a chromatic tone between any whole step so between C and D between D and E now we have a half step right between E and F so what do we do?

We go a scale tone above that F up to G and then back to F so that becomes like the note between E and F is the scale tone above G the C major scale tone and then we're back on F now that there's a half step between F and G, half step between G and A, half step between A and B.

Now there's just B and C, right? No half step between. Scale tone above, D. So you get this. Yep. And you can do it opposite on the way down. There's no half step between C and B. So we jump up to D.

Right? There's a half step between B and A. There's a half step between A and G. Half step between G and F. No half step between F and G, so up to G has the note in between. Now we're E, half step between there, half step between there. So that on the way down, this puts all of the notes of C major scale right on the B. You could do the same thing with Dominant.

That's right. Right, jump up before the B flat. Yeah. So that is sort of Barry's rule of the chromatic scale. Again, Chris Park has some amazing stuff here at Open Studio on that, and on his own YouTube channel. Yeah, shout of Chris Parks and shout out Open Studio Pro. And he is much heralded and well-received weekly lessons over there,

where he really integrates these concepts in a way that's so interesting and organic. He's beyond popular with our Open Studio Pro members. But the cool thing about this is you don't have to play every single one. Like you can just pick your spot, right? Right. Like you can pick where you put them in. And then you get all of this sound. Then you get natural enclosures.

you get all this stuff. It's like many things of Barry's teachings. It's completely genius and can really open you up to some more and closer sounds to the original, I think, than just the major bebop or just the dominant bebop. Absolutely. So you laid it out so well. And I think that it brings to mind and there's a great reminder for us all

that there's multiple ways to use these concepts to explain them, especially when you get to the sort of theoretical explanation of them. But for instance, like... So the way... that you explain that, boom, and then because of that break between the third and fourth, and you know, for non- pianists,

and for pianists, but non-pianists, you can think about when you're playing the key of C, that's the sort of visualization is the lack of black keys there, you know. But that, but the application of it a lot of times, and you'll see this with B-Bow players, you know, so like going to F major, but... Totally. That kind of thing, you know.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. you know, like a little extra surrounding of that. Like, that's how you actually hear it. And just because you're explaining it and understanding it first in the key of C major, that doesn't mean it can't be used over C7 going to an F major. It's a similar thing with our trope. Yeah. What is that?

Right? In a C major, G, F, sharp, F. And then we're jumping up. We're not jumping back up to G, like Barry recommends, but up to A. To put a note between the F and E. It's a similar concept. Absolutely. So one of many great concepts, OEM, that you can dive deep into.

And like even if you just heard like the way, you know, Adam just, like little thing, like the rhythmic thing of like how, like that's what I'm talking about, that swag, that attitude. Articulation is key here to one general rule to follow that isn't universal, but you can definitely hear is it's a geographic rule. Whatever's on top gets naturally accented. So something like that. Whatever is on top of that melody. gets accented and you get that. It's not hard and fast, but if you do it,

you can kind of get that sound. It's a great entry point, for sure. If you looked at the line on a sheet music, the top notes of the phrase are usually what are accented. And you can hear that in a lot of players. Yeah,

and like a lot of times when I have gone through and sort of analyze little phrases, I mean, not just beb, but anything that was influenced by beb, which is potentially any, you know, kind of modern jazz up to today,

it's such a big part of our vernacular. especially when you talk about articulation and like navigating lines. But where those top notes and those accents occur will often be some very interesting, you know, explanation of the syncopation. Totally. Like when you look at that going from downbeat to upbeat to which, of course we have so many different options, but the idea of there being variation, what you don't normally see is like an extended bebop line where the accented notes be them on the top or otherwise are

all occurring on just the upbeat or just. or just the downbeat. Yeah, that's when you get into a little bit of a cookie cutter kind of sound. Now, could you find Monk or Bub Powell or doing that sometimes? Maybe. But mostly it's like... But mostly it's like... Dude, big asseré on.

But you, even when you were, it's mimicking the human voice. We do this with our voice. You can hear it in my sing-songy podcast voice. I'm accenting things. The pitch that's highest is what I'm using to accent. Right. And so it's mimicking human speech. I don't know.

You just did, yeah. I just did. Do I do that too? But the different, do I do that too? That's the beautiful part about it. Do I do that when I play the B-Bop scale. You really was like, do I do that.

Do I do that do? You know, do I do- Mono neon, man. We've got to get him to do a whole. Yeah. Which is great. That was super fun. We have one more question here.

No, no, we're done, man. That's it? That's it. Well, no, we're not quite done yet. No, we have one more. We do want to remind you, if you have a question, Please hit us up at you'll hear it.com. You can leave us to speak pipe.

And as you can see, we sometimes answer. We don't always answer them because some of them are questions we've gotten before. Sometimes, to be honest, we lose track and forget. And sometimes we have technical error and erase them. But otherwise, we do not want to diminish your diminished scale question. Are they stopping at the stop sign today? That's all I'm worried about. Okay.

This is why I say we only won't want to talk about this a little bit. You're blowing through the yield? What are we doing? Okay. Interesting thing happened. Right turn on red? We had a little bit. Shout out producer Caleb.

And shout out producer Caleb. Cam? Oh, yeah. There he is. And just a little note, you can't see the total how this is set up, but I can see producer Caleb. When you went in and started grooving on the bebop scale

in time a little bit, producer Caleb with his socket sandal was tapping his foot in agreement with what you were playing. So that's always a way that you know the line is working if a great musician is to, or anybody's tapping their foot is great. But anyway, Shout out Caleb, producer Caleb because we had a, we had an episode that came out a little later because we had some in the can because we had a holiday.

Yeah. Shout out United States of America, July. Shout out Cairns in general. Shout out Canada for Canada Day, which occurred a little bit before that. Nice. Right. Fun fact, producer Caleb has spent much of his life in Canada, some of his life. Would we say much?

Not really anymore. Okay, he said not anymore. Okay. Immigration problems? Should we not be talking about this? Anyway, we said something that I totally forgot about, and we had some great things in the comments. Please continue the comments. We really appreciate the comments.

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