You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Dominate Your Lydian Dominants

Episode Date: March 6, 2020

Today's episode is all about the Lydian dominant scale: what it sounds like, how to play it, and when to use it.Coming soon - a new course from Open Studio! It's the long-awaited sequel to our Rhythm Section Fundamentals course, where you'll learn how to get the piano, bass, and drums to play as one well-oiled jazz machine. Stay tuned for more details, and check out the original Rhythm Section Fundamentals to prepare for part two.Interested in more music advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase. And be sure to check out our All Access Pass - every course from Open Studio on every instrument.Let us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel and leave a comment for this episode.Follow us on Facebook | Twitter | Instagram See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear Podcast. Daily Music Advice coming at you. Coming at you today, sponsored by Open Studio. Go to Open Studio Jazz to check out all of our courses, including our piano courses and our piano access pass. That's every piano course we make. Yes.

Do that. Also, if you're watching on YouTube, because we are on YouTube. We're back on YouTube. Make sure to like and subscribe this video right now. Right now. Maybe even hit the little bell. A little bell. It looks like a little hand, you know, like a little fist.

So when we go live, which we, as it were, we are live jazz musicians. It could happen at any time. That's right. Today, we are dominating our Lydian dominance. That's right. Well, I know about this because we've done this already, this episode. So this is going to be take two, as we say. We did it several weeks ago.

We had a little technical issue with the MIDI. I know I wasn't supposed to talk about that, but that was fun. We did a whole episode, and then we lost the MIDI. And we almost put it out, but we know how much folks have been loving the beautiful screen below that you will see. So we're redoing it, man. That's how we roll here. But it's all right. I could talk about Lidian Dominates,

you know, at least once a week for several weeks in a row. Are we going to be doing this once a week for several weeks? God, I hope not. Well, let's get into it, though. So are we staying in the key of D-flat? Because that could be fun.

Well, I don't know. I actually shifted back and forth. Yeah, let's do D-flat. I think it's always good to look at things in sort of different ways. That's awesome. Yeah. Okay, so the Lidian-dominit is a scale based off

of the melodic minor sound. It is. Is it? Okay, good. This is going to be another one, sort of like the altered scale, or award-winning altered scale, where we have two different ways of looking at it, but that might help some people.

It's the fourth mode of melodic minor. So if we have our D-flat, Melidian. Melidian. Oh. We have our D-flat, Lidion, dominant. It's based off of an A-flat melodic minor. So, in D. Ascending.

Ascending. Oh, my gosh. This classical, dude. Okay. So for D-flat, Lidian-dominant, we have D-flat, E-flat-F, G-natural, A-flat, B-flat, C-flat, D-flat.

So it's just like a dominant scale. Wait, you just called me classical, and you said C-flat. Oh, because it is. Because it is. Get your mind around it, man. So here's our regular dominant scale, right? With the G-flat. Yeah.

So that's how I think about it. This is, by the way, because we're in D-flat, this is, I feel like we're advanced explaining right now. That's right. We're advanced-splaining. We're both mansplaining and advanced-splaining. Damn right. Okay.

So that's our regular dominant scale. Lidian Dominant, we just sharp that force. We have a G natural here as you so eloquently just played. Now, would you normally hear, because actually what came out of the altered scale discussion in an episode, I think, that was great, was the different ways we think about it, the different ways

that we hear that scale and sound. And then different ways that we, that that leads to us applying it in an improvised situation. Which is so cool, because that's, we're not learning these so that we can have a theoretical mastery of it. We're not theory professors. Right.

It might seem like we are. but we really want to try to help connect you guys with different approaches to applying this to your improv. Yeah, that's right. And so, like, would you normally hear this as more of a Lydian scale with a dominant seventh or a dominant seventh scale with a raise fourth? I think of this as a dominant seven

with a sharp 11. That's the first way I think about it. Good. Yeah. But no, well, the first way you said was a melodic minor starting on. That's what it's derived from. But you'll most often use this in the case of like, again, if we're in the key of D flat

here, or I guess G flat, D flat 7 sharp 11. This is the chord symbol you might say. D flat 7 sharp 11. And that to me implies a lini and dominant scale. Right? So the first usage of this is actually as a dominant scale. I feel like this gets slept on a lot by people for using it as a dominant scale, one. So again, D-flat 7-sharp 11 to G-flat major 6-9 here. It's a great way, like, it's kind of like your first step into adding some tension

to your dominance. It's a light tension. Right? Pretty light tension. It's pretty light, but it does have that right, which is a nice leading tone towards the nine of the major. It's almost like it's Thanksgiving dinner. Everyone's

sitting down, you got all the relatives, you got Uncle Bob and Auntie Suzy and everything is just straight, no tension, and then there's just a little bit, which is like, so, who are you supporting in the presidential election this year? Just a little tension. Oh, Uncle Bob is adding some tension. Let's see what Aunt Kathy has to say.

Yeah, you haven't fully blurted it out yet, but, right. So, yeah, that's great. That's sort of level one is like your 5-1. You can use it as sort of your first step into altering a dominant chord, like a, I like it because it's not as sharp or as heavy as say if we were using an altered, like a fully altered kind of sound. Yeah.

It's not that thick. It's not that dark, right? It's more playful. Yeah. Can I jump ahead to maybe what is not level two might be a higher level, but I think it's an interesting one. Sure. Would be, this is a funny way to think about it, but melodically I would use this a lot. B

Major 7 with a raised 5th and then also up to the 11th I mean to the 9th What? Yeah, okay So Wait what?

You know we talk about the jazz arpeggio Right Which is 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 Right I mean like over like a C7 It would just be C, E, G B flat D But it could be anything

It's just a 1 or 3 or 5 and a 7 and a 9 And so like that shape because I see what you're saying. I use that so much. So a lot of times I'll hear things melodically you're saying it's like an arpeggio device.

It's an arpeggio device, right? You're not buying it. No, I am buying it because, you know, when we talked about... Even like a... Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, when we talked about the altered scale, I use that shape. And that applies here,

as this is an A-flat, you know, melodic minor. It could be a G-7 altered. It could be a D-flat-7-sharp a leit. Yeah. Yeah, that shape, it's a very similar thing. Just arpeggiating the main chunks of the chord. You think of it like is a B arpeggio.

That's interesting. Yeah, and it's more like kind of hearing it because the thing with arpeggiating it like this and then moving up, it's kind of the natural way you would move up as part of your line. Man, you really went in the weeds on this early. I did, I know, that's why I said. I'm skipping ahead a couple.

But YouTube's a fickle crowd. If you don't get to it pretty early, they're like, bam. But again, it's even more in the weeds because it's like we're using D flat. So you said B arpeggio, it's really C flat. You know what I mean? Oh, come on, man. I know.

But also I like the arpeggiated concept and especially the jazz arpeggiated concept with the seventh and the ninth because that reveals to your ears more than anything triad parish. You know, because this was a term, I didn't even know what that meant until recently. I never really thought about it. But I was always hearing those kind of things. Triads being, you know, some of the most kind of dominant as in a dominant scale, but just dominant sound. elements to how we put together melodic improvisation. We'll get there. We'll get there.

Let's go over more of the functions of the Lidian dominant. Ways you can use it, ways that it's mostly used. So we're going to do this two steps ahead? One step back. Two steps ahead? I like it. Well, let's try to go stepwise. Let's try to do that first.

Hey, I'm a little jacked up on my green smoothie here, man. So the most common way you'll use that. Like I said, you don't sleep on using it as an alteration for a five chord. But the most common way that most jazz musicians use Lidian dominance is for something like a five of five. more, you know, a dominant chord, a secondary dominant chord, to make it a little bit more airy, a little bit less of a gravity, like a tonic dominant or a dominant.

Yeah, 5 to 5. So in the context of a tune, if we take a tune like, Our Love is here to stay. So that first chord, right, that G7 in the key of F, we're in the key of F. We're going to get out of key of C-flat. In the key of F, we have a G7. Now this is a perfect opportunity where you can use the Lydian dominant.

It's based off of the D melodic minor, but it's that raised fourth dominant scale on G. We had some listeners from our... It's just just, you know, the F major, raised fifth, major seven. Not a preggio you're talking about, yeah. Exactly. That sound is really what you hear a lot of jazz music. going for. And then from there you can go to the five. So it works great

as a scale to use over a five of five. A five of five being like in a 251 making the two instead of Dorian like a dominant and you would use that lydian dominant. More often than you would use just a straight mix of lydia. Yeah and I love that the way that you've explained it on this tune because

the five of five or the two in this case it almost you can see how it works better by how this sounds. Like if you go to the five that's okay but it doesn't really even though it leads up to the

nicely, I don't know it just works better here you've got choices on the five you can go you know with some other alterations or you can go kind of sauce and then

you know what sounds really good which you'll hear in a lot of like string arrangements or whatever is when you have this Lidian Domino

on the two right you have this a arpeggio on the top and then when you go to the five you do an altered thing yep right so the a arpeggio on top becomes an A flat

Yep. You know? Love it. So the next level of using a Lidian dominant is, again, on a secondary dominant context, but it's really on what we're going to call a cycle of dominance. Think the bridge to rhythm changes, right? Where we have D7, G7, C7, and then F7. That's a perfect time to dominate your Lidian dominant.

So on the series of dominance, you'll often hear players use all Lydian dominance on this because or a mixture of using a Lidian dominant for a bar to something more more dominant like an altered or a half whole scale or something like that but that Lidian dominant because it's more airy

and loose and sort of up in the air it gives us a sense that we're not that we're not on a tonic that we're somewhere in between something right and I love that because as we said the beginning it's just a little bit of tension but because you're building it up and you don't know when it's going to resolve the added effect, especially over the rhythm

change. It's a perfect example. You know, it's cumulative, right? So by the time you get to the last one, you have the memory of the one, but you've gone on such a journey because if you're B-flap, once you get to the bridge, you know, the listener, you kind of lose feeling of where the tonic is. But when you get here, you're kind of like, oh, yeah, there we go. So it's just the right amount of attention.

Of course, typically other alterations are added, especially once you get to the five, but they're not really needed. Yep. You know, and you can get some good things. A lot of good, you know, pairs that are moving around interesting melodically as you solo. Try it pairs like you. So that's kind of an example of adding a little more tension, only the flat nine. So it's not strictly Lydian dominant, but just adding the flat nine on the five. That's kind of a cool way to use it too.

That's so good. Cool. The last way we'll talk about is on a blues. You got a list over there? What are you doing? Why are you so much more organized than me, man? Because we've already done this episode. Oh, that's right.

We've already figured it out. The blues is a series of dominant chords. And typically we'll use a mix of Lydian. Right? But again, if we want to air it out, it's almost a, it's almost a, not humorous, but it's more of an airy, like less sophisticated. Yeah.

somehow more angular sound to use a Lydian dominant. The lonest monk had... Lonious Monk was a big fan. On underground. And again, when you get to the 2-5 at the end, you know, you can use that Lydian-domin. Monk knew how to dominate the Lydian dominant.

That's right. So anytime there's like a dominant chord where it's not a 5-1, this is like prime opportunities for Lidian dominance. Yeah. And, you know, talking about Monk, oftentimes the way that we can kind of go next level off of the Lidian dominant is you know we think about it being like C7 sharp 11 and then to alter and then to one

but that actually is not quite as effective I think as like Lillian dominant so then to Holtong and then to one that's a little bit more of a logical or interesting I mean look you've got a lot of different choices but that's one that like Monk would do a lot for sure let's hear it Let's hear an example of this. Would you mind playing two choruses of a blues? Play the first chorus with using mostly mix of Lydian. No Lillian nominus.

And then play the second chorus leaning more on the Lydian dominion. Okay. So I'm going Lidian dominant. Real talk, that's a human sound right there. It is. No, that's a fun thing. And I think, too, you know, what that kind of highlighted was it is lighten and it is airy, but when we're doing it on a blues and we're just doing it on a one,

Like all those other examples we had were really five of five or five to one, a true dominant kind of function. But when we're doing it on a blues, on a one chord, it still brings out a little bit of that bluesy. That implication of the blues there. And, you know, in terms of usage, we'll play with that sometimes. Because it's a way to take it from being like super traditional to a little bit another sort of level, not a higher level, just a different place. You know, bebop. I mean, Charlie Parker playing a lot of Lydia. For sure.

But then you can throw in the blues, and that note is common between those. It's awesome. So good. So that's how you dominate your leading dominates. Enjoy that. I wonder this episode will ever get out. The other one is just like,

man, it's just lingering there. Maybe this one was better. We were terrible on that anymore. Really? Okay, good. It was what we got to do. It was a perfect you'll hear an episode. Oh, was.

Wow. Anyway, so we are sponsored by Open Studio Jazz, and we actually have a beautiful little message from one of our members. Check it out. Hey, this is Rob, long-time listener of the podcast and a big fan of Adam and Pete. I just wanted to tell you all about a little thing that happened to me, which

tied a bunch of the podcasts together. So Adam and Pete always say, you know, listen, if you're going to play, play your horn, like, touch your instrument 15 minutes a day, and don't miss too many days. So I had a day where I had missed a couple of days before and wanted to get on the horn, and it was just messing around, flailing around. And I was sitting back to the episode of how to rock a 15-minute practice. And I said, okay, I'm going to concentrate for 15 minutes. I'm going to get something done. And I was thinking, they did a recent podcast on the Frigian mode.

I'm like, well, the Frigian mode. I hadn't thought about that. So I'm going to play the Frigian scale in all 12 keys. And I know my major scales. And so I thought I'd do the Frigian in all 12 keys. Then I thought because they'd had an episode on Creative Scale practice. So I'm going to do the Dorian scale in all 12 keys. I'm going to do it in third.

So I'm fancy. So I'm going to do it alternating up a third, down a third, up a third, because I know my scales. So first of all, I don't know my Phrygian scale at all because I had to relate it back in every instance to the major key. It's like that's not how you should really think about the scale. You need to think about it because I don't think about the Dorian scale that way. It's not a second to a second. It's the Dorian scale. So I got deep into it.

like, okay, I don't know the Phrygian scale. So then I did my Dorian scales. And it's good for D-Dorian, G-Dorian, but do I really know A-flat Dorian up and down, alternating thirds? And the answer is no. So that 15-minute practice session turned into a 45-minute practice session, super efficient and got it done. That's my story. Awesome. If you want to leave us your Open Studio go to you'll hear it.com and leave us to speak pipe, leave us a voicemail. Tell us your story. That's right. Tell us your story. Until tomorrow, you'll hear it.