You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - The Best Part About Harmony

Episode Date: May 27, 2024

Adam and Peter dive into their favorite subject... HARMONY! Adam walks us through modal interchange and all of it's functions. North Sea Jazz Fest Unlock your FREE Open Studio trial to become a better player today.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

Let's go. Let's go. I'm Matt Amanus. I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear Podcast. Jazz. Explain. Brought to you today by Open Studio. Go to Open StudioJadio.com for, oh, you jazz listen.

People are digging that. Well, I'm digging it. It feels right. It's a great vocal warm up for the pod, too. It is good. If I could combine it with some lip twirls, like some. It would be a perfect. Oh, how about a little?

Oh, nice little. little cup of coffee. Oh, that's the Peter Martin cup of coffee right there. How's it going, Peter? I'm good. I'm good. How are you? Pretty good, man.

Yeah. Excited to be here today. I've actually got a cup of coffee that you purchased for me. I wanted to publicly thank you. It's about time. I privately thanked you. Which wasn't enough for some reason. I was like, thank you.

And you said, no problem. And that kind of irked me. I'm not going to lie. Man, I love some blueprint coffee. If I could just take my open studio. So, yeah, if I could just, from my bank account, direct deposit to blueprint. That's kind of what's been happening lately. I know, I know.

It's been great, yeah. Yeah, I'm doing good. How are you? Pretty good, man. I'm excited about today's episode. This is going to be a good one. We love talking about harmony here. I don't think we've talked about harmony on the pod in a little bit.

Although we do get around to it, but I'm excited about this. I think we just talked about it on our keyboards. We just dropped some harmony. You know what I'm saying? We just talk, we talk. Big time. But I like the idea of talking about it through the lens of pop music. I feel like pop music

I mean of course like we play jazz we play all kinds of music but like pop music is for me the harmonic equivalent of like it's just like a really direct it's like a simple meal with really great ingredients right it's like there's not a lot of

of like you know crazy accoutchement or like foam of like you know foam potatoes or whatever yeah exactly but it's like just a really straight is that a visualization of foam Well, you know how they have a wand with the foam and they take the, you know what I'm talking about in Spain. They got a wand and they've got like, you know, some kind of like mint potato foam and they put it on or whatever. This is not, pop music is usually a lot more like meat and potatoes style.

Comfort food. And I thought we could talk a little bit about some of the biggest influences for us because I think if you talk to any like jazz pianist or whatever, they have a laundry list of pop songs and pop albums that have influenced their harmonic language for sure. I mean, going all the way back. Yeah, yeah. So, like, Amad Jamal, like, has, like, this harmonic language that was reflective of the pop music of his youth. Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's such a great connection, no matter where you are in your journey, in terms of, like, your age and how long you've been playing music. Are you coming back to it?

Are you just starting out? Are you exploring a new area? Whatever it is, is like connecting with those, usually recordings, but it could be a live experience, but those songs. or recordings that first ignited, you know, your love of going from listener, maybe avid listener to, like, explorer. And like, it's like the thing where you first were like, let me look in the back of this machine and see, it's a beautiful machine. Let me see how it's actually put together.

You know, where it's like, I love this track. I love this song. I heard it on the radio in the summer of 83 or whatever. Absolutely. But then, you know, we don't stop there oftentimes as musicians. we say, you know, how is that put together? Like, what makes those chord changes great? What makes that harmonic progression great?

Because a lot of times we're starting from the point of like connecting with a lyric or a sound, a texture. And all these things, of course, go into, you know, making a sonic situation edifying to us. And, you know, maybe we're connecting with a memory or a time period of our life. All those things work together. But I think that that time when you start to say, like, wait, what is that? As a musician, you put your musician hat on, right? That's right. That's such an exciting thing. And so I found that different tunes, like I was thinking about some of these Stevie Wonder tunes.

There's so many of his that, like, that does it for me. Not to say that, like, when I first, you know, heard the same thing. What does that sound like? What does that make me feel? How is that different than the scales I've been doing? But don't you think there's like a step to this process where, like, as a kid or as a young musician or as a beginner musician, you're into at first you're into just like, you know, the popular music. You're a kid, right? Yeah.

Most kids are into either the classical music that their parents are kind of like making them take lessons with like on the piano and you'll kind of find music that way or maybe through your parents' record collection. Yes. Or, of course, through the radio and what is popular or just what's on in the car sometimes. Right. Or just Taylor Swiftman jammed down your throat everywhere you turn in the world. Everywhere you turn.

But I do think there's like, if you're a nerdy little kid that likes certain kinds of harmony, then you're kind of more susceptible than to enjoy the old, you know, kind of bluish things, which we're going to get to, by the way, very, very soon. But I think that it's a bit of progression. And then, like, that never leaves you. So what were your favorite, like,

when's the first time you remember hearing a song and thinking, like, well, what are those chords? Do you remember that? You remember that? I mean, I don't, well, I mean, there was certain things like one long ago, which was actually a Suzuki song I used to play. on the piano, oh no, on the violin in A.

And I remember trying, like, that was the first time I sort of connected with, like, and tried to kind of improvise or kind of make up some chords on the piano. I think I was played with my sister maybe or something. So you connected with that. For me, you know, I have a very specific memory. So what was that called? Long, long ago. Long ago. Traditional, I believe. So I was probably three or four heading to the precocious youth.

precocious. I was maybe four or five. Heading to the Kroger off Pee-P Road. That's the name of the county highway. County Highway, Pee-P. And there was a Kroger grocery store and an owl-be-back video. Did you have to pull over and go pee-pee?

No, well, eventually. But going with my mom and I can clear, and her Volkswagen, her 1984 Volkswagen Rabbit, and I clearly remember this song. You know the song? You'll know it. Oh, yeah.

This hollow notes It's a little blue-eyed soul from Philadelphia Hall and Oates Yeah, Hollin-Outs, right A little F minor 9 Yeah Wait, you were three or four Thinking about F minor 9?

I just remember the vibe of this song I wasn't thinking about F minor 9 But I remember That's amazing This part I just remember like Feeling that sort of like There's like, you know

It's vibe right Yeah And then I do remember the feeling Of going into the verse Going to that like that lift there, I was like, whoa, that's not something you hear on other pop music, right? And then,

I remember feeling something with this part. Oh, yeah. A little mortal interchange going to the major. And I've been chasing, I've been chasing, I can't go for that. No can do from Holo Notes ever since. That harmony there. I mean, look, we just listened to

less than 90 seconds of the tune and like so much interesting things happened. And it was a massive pop hit. Yeah. And to me, that, like, is, I'm still trying to write songs that are that good. That's cool.

Yeah. That's very Rod Temperton. Yeah. Very, like, that was... Yeah, yeah. Up to the minor 11. Yeah. It's good baseline.

Great singing, too. Very reminiscent of there. Some Billy Jean, yeah. No, that's some good stuff. Okay, so now, okay, so I see you're up in the game. I got to up my game here, too. You got up the game, man. So this was a song.

Check this out. that was a big hit. And I definitely remember being like, what is that? Not the baby crying, because this wouldn't be on by the radio. Like,

I remember, like, listening to the root movement. I was like, damn, what is that? And then when I sat down and was like,

kind of trying to play with it, I was like, oh, this is hard because it's an E, but otherwise it's sort of simple, but how does it sound so? And it's like, it's like vamping,

but then it jumps right to the chorus. Stevie wonders isn't she lovely. What are the changes there? That's C sharp minor, F sharp 7, B7 Suss, he made it. It's so good. And it's just this for the whole thing, isn't it? Yeah. Well, then it kind of goes up to here.

But even this, goes to the fore, down a half step, relative minor to the two, and then Suss. I think it was the Suss, because I remember, and then this request, it was like, and that's the part I figured out the first. I was like, I can kind of hear that, but I didn't connect that as much with the harmony as it actually is connected at pentatonic scale. Because, you know, I had heard like, what was it like, you know, all the little lines that Stevie would do with pentatonic scale.

I didn't even know the name of the pentatonic scale, but I was like, oh, that's a Stevie scale. That's what I thought it was at first, you know. And I didn't understand how that was connected with the harmony, but later I realized, like part of the thing is so satisfying. Like once I learned about shells and the difference between that and, you know, but it's all fours. It's the circle of force. But the root movement.

The whole thing is force. And then even when it goes to the four chord, it's still going up a fourth. And then this is the only time it slides down. It doesn't do a fourth. And then it goes up a fourth. And it goes up another fourth. Then it goes up another fourth.

And then it ends up. So it's like the reverse circle of fifth. It's a circle of fourth. I'm just at the age where the only Stevie hit that I got was, I just called to Say I Love You. Okay. I don't remember anything before that. Yeah.

At all. And so maybe there was one more. It was jungle fever later. Yeah. But I don't remember anything. Was there something? It was a hit between that and I just called Say I Love You. I don't know if there was.

Yeah. Well, there was a part-time lover. Part-time lover. That was big. But that was like, that was too adult contemporary for what. Yeah, that was kind of Darrell Hall and John Oates-esque to the track you play. Actually, that melody is very stuck in my head. But it was more for me, Michael Jackson during that time.

Yeah. Specifically, the bad record was like right in my way. That was the first ever cassette tape I bought was Michael Jackson's bad. So those had a huge harmonic influence. But there was actually a direct lineage. This is how I discovered Stevie Wonder was from this track. So, okay, let me paint the picture. It's 1994.

Woo. I don't, we don't, wait, 94? It's 94. We live in High Ridge, Missouri. We don't have cable. I don't know if it was because it wasn't available up in the hills or my parents were cheap. I honestly don't know. We never had cable.

By the way, I just want to make a point. As soon as I graduated high school and I left my house, my parents got cable. The full package, and I don't know why I never got it, but I never... Can I just paint a little sub... Just to make yourself feel a little better? Yeah, go ahead. When I was growing up, we never had cable. But we also never had a color TV.

Not that I'm that much older. Are you serious? I'm not kidding. You didn't have a color TV? We did not had. We had a black and white television. This is why he's so good at the piano. This is why he's so good at the piano.

And they didn't get... cable after I left either. They got cable like six years ago or something. Amazing. Yeah. Amazing. I just, shout out to my parents who just got rid of cable. I'm so proud of them. They cut the cord. Yeah. You know, that takes a lot of courage for some septuagenarians, you know. Right. Anyway, it takes a son coming by to help them set that up, I'm sure. I don't have cable, but we have a channel on my TV. And I have a little TV in my room, black and light, actually. And we have on, we have this channel called, It was first called the jukebox, and then it was called the box. And I think for $1.99, you could call and basically like punch in a code for a song.

What? Uh-huh. And that was the first time I discovered this song. I'm a freshman in high school. This is the UK's Jamir Akwai. Oh, yeah. Okay. I didn't really know Stevie Wonder at this point.

I'm 14 years old. Well, they did. So you're good. I knew I just called to say I love you. And I remember. this song, and this was another, this is like the Hall of Notes where I was like, what are these chords this part? It's modal interchange, right? Going to the minor.

Oh, yeah. It's a great tune, by the way. Nice, like a patient. It's so good. It's so good. Anyway, same year, I start hanging out with my friend Dave Johnstone. It's a great drummer who lives in L.A. now. And he gets a gig driving. Dave Johnson? John Stone. He gets a gig driving.

people from the airport to the bistro or from the hotel to the bistro. Oh, nice. The Jazz St. Louis. And one of the people that were driving one day is Gregory Hutchinson. He can't be that much older than us, honestly. I was 14 or 15 at this point. He's probably 19 or 20. I think he was playing with Ray Brown at the time. And we were, I think we were taking him to SIUE for a clinic. Anyway, we're in the back of Dave Johnstone's parents minivan. Uh, or he's in the back. And we're in the front. And Dave is putting on Jemirquai because we were into the track or whatever. And he's like, oh, you know, this is just Stevie Wonder. And we're like, excuse me now?

What is this? Can I write that down? You're talking about the I just called to say I love you guy? And he's like, yeah. And so Hutch really hipped us to a bunch of Stevie. And so this led us to things like inner visions and talking book. Yeah. I took away.

And God bless Jemirquah. I still have a soft spot. Oh, this stuff was great. The sound of that is really good. It's great. And the keyboard is, I'm forgetting his name, the Rhodes player who's played with him forever. Who's actually fan of the pod, by the way. Yeah.

I have to talk that. I apologize, I'm forgetting his name because he's a bad dude. He's got a great social media presence, actually. Yeah, yeah. I was just watching Jemiriqui live at the Norsee Jazz Festival in, like 95. So this was right during that time when they were huge. And when my man's hat was huge, too. A lot of velour going vertical velour.

Matt Johnson. Shout out to Matt Johnson. Matt Johnson. There you go. Yeah. So it's interesting you say... Not the hat. That's JK.

Matt Johnson is the Keys player. Right, right, right. But also check out, we'll link to this below is the Den Hogg, North Sea Jazz Festival, formerly in Den Hogg, is putting out fabulous videos on YouTube now from that kind of mid-90s period. And they kind of got on my radar, and subscribe to that channel, so it pops up in my feed.

But these aren't getting a lot of views. I mean, they've got like James Brown live at that, and it's great video and audio quality. and that festival, I mean, I did a lot, I mean, I've done a lot over the years, and it's moved now to Rotterdam and stuff. You know, it's a historic festival. The first time I went there was in 91 with Betty Carter,

and I have all these memories, but just hearing different players and, you know, Ray Brown, that's where I first heard him live. And it's such a cool festival, especially for the bigger kind of groups. And during that time, like when they would have Jamir Choir or something, it was in this huge, I mean, now it's big like that, too. They were a huge band.

They were huge. They still are in the UK. Yeah, but they were always good at North Sea about getting those kind of jazz adjacent, because that's definitely, I mean, they were kind of Neo-Soul, whatever they were calling it during that time. It was a very 90s sound where you would have that kind of sound. Right. Like brand new heavies and the Advenport.

On that alternative sort of like acid jazz scene or whatever. And it was kind of before like Maxwell and the real sort of like Neo-Soul. I think DiAngelo came along and kicked everybody to the curb. Yeah, but he was already doing this thing. Yeah, of course. So they've got a great one of DeAngelo live at Den Haq. That's a good one to check. And these things have like 400 views and stuff.

It's crazy. Nobody's discovered. So you mentioned Stevie Wonder. I mentioned Stevie Wonder. Your connection. And actually, I realized even for like that album, songs of the Key of Life, or you talk about before that with Intervision stuff, I discovered all that stuff later. I didn't. I mean, I heard it a little bit.

Well, yeah, this was my high school journey, right? And I was actually going to play the exact transit. I think this is the track Hutch told us to check out. Oh, cool. You know this one? Oh, yeah. Music in my mind, this album? Yeah, yeah. This is one of the greatest eight minutes of Stevie's career. Yeah, when they come into groove. A major to minor, man.

It's just all over the place and the music are like. A lot of tune, a lot of tune. And all the things she wants to be, she needs to leave behind. Stevie was the master of like taking just normal stuff and making it seem weird. That's just one four to five. But then here, the third time, The timing of it come on on on that four. The details.

It's just amazing. So all the things we're talking about that have in common so far, Peter, has a technical term that I've only recently discovered. Madmoe. Shut your mouth. In the last year. Right? So I always, I mean, I've been trying to write music with all of this stuff that we're talking about this. And it wasn't-

The initials, Am I, by any change? Yeah, it wasn't until we... There he is. It wasn't until we started really, putting this stuff in Open Studio that people were like, oh, that's just, that's just modal interchange is what? And I was like, and now you're saying that. I was like, modal what now? I was like, the major and the minor? You know, because we're not smart guys. We're not, we're not. Well, you're obviously smarter than me because, first of all, you were three or four peeping on

Peepee Road as you listen to a minor 11. Highway Peepee. Highway Peepee with a minor 11. You were both like a little, you're both in your diapers and you were in advanced music school. Just to be clear. I had no idea it was a minor anything. I just loved the feeling of going. I just loved the feeling of going with, like, I was attracted to that from such an early age, you know what I mean? Like, it really stood out to me. When I was four, three or four, I was still pee-pying in my pants. I wouldn't hear any

frigging fine or not. No, but I was just thinking with this modal interchange thing, full disclosure, I need to reach back out to our attorneys at law. You don't have to know what it is. Our attorneys at law in southern Louisiana. The bullshit. We need to check in with them. We have an unpaid bill with them.

We'll talk about that later. But modal interchange. Yeah. Can you break this down for somebody a friend of mine. Okay. No, no, no. A friend of mine. But like, but start for their sake. I'm going to need a name. So you're going to have to come up

with a name. Redup, nitram. Say again? Redup First name, nitram. Redup nitram. Yeah. So this person, this good friend of mine, is you know, we're pretty good musician, but pretend like they know nothing about

what modal entertain. Like maybe they know what it is, but they don't understand the theory of it, the connection why it's called that. Redup, nitram. Redup, nitram. Please explain. Okay. So for Redup,

ridiculous. Modal interchange is kind of exactly what it sounds like. You have two modes. That's not helping. Okay, there's two modes and you interchange between them.

So if we're in the key of C major, right, actually, let's go back. Hold on, hold on, I got to get this in full screen. You want some chordy? Yes. Go. Boom.

So we're in the key of C major. Yeah. We have all of our chord in the key of C major. I'm just moving this triad up, right? So we've got the one chord, C major. These are just all the white key triads. D minor, which is the two chords.

So we're moving dieter. E minor, the third. F major, the four chord. L.G. G, the five chord. A minor, the sixth chord, and B diminished, the seven chord. And then we're here.

Now, of course, we could do these with seventh, right? C major seven, the two. E minor seven, the three. F, major, seven, the four. G, dominant, seven, the five. minor 7 the 6 and b minor 7 flat 5 the 7 back here so those are all of the key all of the chords the diatonic seventh chords in the key of c major in the mode of c major this is the ionian mode modal interchange is the swapping the inter exchange if you will red it interchange the interchange between two

different modes so if we take c ionian and let's say c aonian right which is the natural minor right The six mode of E-flat major. So C, D, E-flat, F, G, A-flat, and B-flat. This is the most common version of, yeah. This is the most common version of modal interchange between the C-Ionian and the C-Aolian, right? This is one way to do it. So if you're playing in tune...

Yeah. Why did you choose that one? Because it's the most common, or is this theoretically where it's built off of? It is the most common because it's the major and the minor of the same key. And it's the most common minor. natural minor. But why more so this than say the Dorian? Because it gives you a sharp

contrast between major and minor. Got you. My most modal interchange is between some kind of major third minor third situation because it gives you. But this one gives you, like if you did, you could do, you could do dominant. And people do do do dominant. There's nothing like you could do. Right. So this is between C, Ionian and C mixolydian. Right? There's just one no difference. That B flat. If we do between C and C, C, C, I. Ionian and C A-O-I-O-I-Lian, the natural minor. So now, like, if we want to borrow, like, the four-cord, that's not it. At a-natural bit.

Anytime you hear something that's like A-flat, B-flat, C, that's modal interchange, right? That's each one of them? Or just the whole concept. So this A-flat to B-flat to C, that's borrowed from C-A-O-Lian. That's borrowed from C-minor. That's such a common one. That's really the only one you hear in pop music for the most part. Yeah.

It's just a walk-up. Yeah. And so, like, if you just take it. one of the games that we like to play around here is the C C-core game, right? And it's where you just keep the tonic the same. It's major. Everything else you can change to the C minor. So if you were to walk up, now change everything to the minor. Right? It's got this lift on it with the major.

So that's... But, so, okay, so you mentioned Mixilidian. What about another not common one, but one we've been talking about is Phrygian. So A-flat major starting on C, right? So this gets you stuff like C major and this sort of A-flat or C-fridgen. So when you're modal interchanging, you're typically not going straight from the original tonic to that other mode of that tonic. You're going to like another diatonic placement of the mode of the tonic.

Yeah, so think of it like this. When you're working with modal interchange, you have 14 options of chords. All of the chords from C major and all of the chords from C minor. And you can mix those however you want. So those are your 14 chords. So if you do go straight from... Well, like on the stevie... Is that still modal interchange?

Yeah, for sure. But your roots stay in the same. Yeah. Yeah, because C minor and C major. They're like... That's the C ae a only. But a lot of your examples, you were saying... showing where like you're shifting to another.

Yeah, totally. But this is probably the most common way is to go from. What about that sound that I love? A lot of people love it. Like C major, right? Up to F Dorian, F minor, 7. Is that a mold of interchange? 100%.

Okay. Yeah, that is the four chord of C minor. And maybe that's C Dorian. Or no. C, no, it'd be C A-O-Lian. Right. F-Dorian. Man, I've never thought about it like that.

It makes sense, though. That's what the four minor is, is modal interchange. But that's a big thing, like, thinking about it as opposed, like, I'm thinking about it as the four of the one, a major, and an alteration of that, turning that into a Which is fine. Yeah, you don't, like, I didn't know about this whole concept until a year and a half ago, Peter. So, like, but I was still writing tunes with this all over, just following my ear with things

that I like. But you know, another way that I like to think about, this is the Cush Chord game, right? Have you heard about C chords? I have heard about it. Congratulations on the millions of views. Thank you. It's a fun way to think about it. To me, it's more natural, I think, as a jazz pianist, than thinking about modal interchange. To me, I get confused when I think about C major

to C minor, because which C minor are you talking about? You've got to be very specific, right? Because the key of C minor, I often associate with like an A natural, right? Like a C you know, and a G7. That's not in the A. Right.

You know, that's part of like the C harmonic minor. So anyway, I've kind of come around to the Aeolian version. But what I also like to do, instead of thinking about it as C Ionian and C Aolian, I sometimes like to play a game where I do C Ionian and E flat Ionian. I think about two parallel major keys, right? So the Cushcore game is like we do one, four, five, one in C. And now we take everything except for the C, and we take it up to E flat.

So 1, 4, 5, C. And what's great about this is it keeps sort of the harmonic function of the 4-5 intact, right? So you're still using like a major 7 and a dominant 7 on the B-flat, right? Which is the 5. Yeah.

But you're doing that. And then you can do this with all kinds of progressions. 1, 2, 6, 5. Right? 1, 2, 6, 5. And that's all of the E flat of the minor third. Except for the C major, it's all E flat major. And for me, like, because, you know, we transpose all the time.

To me, it's just easier to think of, like, parallel major keys and transposing this and this. But then also, it's a fun game to play because you keep, you sort of keep the harmonic function of the major key of E flat together. Yeah. Within, I don't know, it's just a really fun way to think about harmony. And there's all kinds of different ways to think about it. These are just framing sounds that we like.

And you could do the same thing with, like, that that Phrygian like I have a short out actually came out today where we're doing like so if we did the same one six or sorry one two six five and C major D minor seven A minus seven G seven and did everything except for the C to the key of A flat right so one two six five yeah are those beautiful sounds are like one four five one that That very simple one, just a four, five, one. Yeah. Four, five, one.

You get all these crazy sounds. You could do this with anything. Like, you can pick any mode of the major scale. Like, what if we did Dorian? C, Dorian, right? Yeah. Like, so one, two, six, five, right? So C, Dorian, we would do everything except for the C.

Except for the one. The two is the same. Same. Dorian. Half a minute, straight. Oh, right. Six, and then the five is. minor. This is weird.

Yeah. Get you some weird sounds. Okay, so this is making me think, I don't know if it's going to be official modal interchange, but this was also a big memory for me. So we're talking about, you know, Michael Jackson and bad and stuff. For me, the first record was, and really the first hit was I want to rock with you off the wall.

So like when that record came out. I didn't, see, this was a little bit before my time. Yeah. When I heard this when I was in high school, though, I flipped the F out. I flipped out. Yeah. I was like, someone made a song just for me. Yeah.

Michael Jackson wrote and recorded a song directly to me. Right, right. So, yeah, and rock with you, incredible hit. I remember that summer and everything. But this tune, I can't help it. I remember when I heard that because my sister had the album. Yeah. And it was like, I don't know if it was a hit, but it was like later on.

But this, and I didn't realize this for years later, this is actually Stevie Wonder's dude. But that chord. I'll never forget. And because it's so exposed and like the roads. And I got a. of Rhodes like a couple years after they took me a while but like that sharp 11 like this now this was the time when I was like wait what the hell courted I still don't know what to call it but I

figured that out like 13 sharp 11 but how it resolves you know and then later on I started thinking about it just five to one I learned the baseline I learned this my senior in high school my friend Jason van Deeman's basement in Kirkwood because he had a Rhodes yeah and we had a little funk band and they taught me this song and then those MFers smoked me out. And I was freaking out. Yeah. I don't really do that kind of stuff. Oh, I thought you meant they smoked you in terms of modal interchate.

No. It was a revelation of a day. Finding things I like and things I definitely should not like. That's funny. Don't like. Yeah, but I mean, this thing of like, and with the bass, because I'm always like gravitating towards like the root movement and stuff.

So it was like that up to the ninth. that was really cool. But all the little details here, all the... Yeah. Okay, so that's the part I was gonna ask. Okay, let's just listen a little bit. Okay, I love this. That's a fat mood bass right there.

I'm going like this, but... Using all this underrated, you know, four to five. And that part, I was like, what is it? It took me forever. But you- So let's break this down here. Yeah, but so you were talking about before,

I don't know if this is modal interchange, because we're going, But it's definitely, remember when you talked about moving somewhere else and then using the function, if it's 25, 45, 1625 of that other area, but then resolving back, that's what he does here. Because when he comes to here, we're shifting up to E, right, for a second. And then up to A major? Yeah. But then it's back to here, but it slips to there first.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's got this great little shifting between E major and A flat major. Yeah. I think that is, that's modal interchange. He's going to the key of E major for a few chords, right? Because functionally, that has nothing to do with A flat major, right? No, no, this is, but this is like six. Yeah, this is E major.

I mean, it gives strong E major. Those are the first four chords of an E major scale. But it's also, it's... And it's moving up, dichotically. By the way, it's Michael Jackson track. It's a Stevie Wonder composition. Yeah, Steve Wonder. It's absolutely genius because...

So the first, can we just, we get to break down this whole thing. Put that cordy back up. Put that cordy back up. Put that cordy. So right, so here's your A dominant seven with the sharp 11 and the 13. And this is crucial, actually. If you're going to play this song,

because the bass movement goes from A to A flat. The top note goes from the F sharp to the G. A little leading tone, right? Looking in my mirror. Core. Let's see. So it's like six to two. So this two, though, is a secondary dominant.

And actually, this is like a secondary two-five. Yeah. And then what we go? It's six to two, right? six yeah and then a two dominant yeah which is a secondary dominant we're going to the four where we go four minor four minor four right but you know what i think that's actually this is like some diatonic movement into that weird e major right it's like the six to the seven of where we're going well isn't it it kind of is a six to stephen thing isn't it it's like c sharp minor is that

the relative minor of. Yeah. Although I think they slip in, like, on the E flat. I think it's too deep. So that does harken back to being the five, but it's like a deceptive. Oh, so brilliant. Yeah.

Yeah. So it is like four minor to five. Yeah, yeah. Which makes sense, because we're coming from this B flat dominant. Right. So this is a predominant chord, right? This should go to E flat seven. Yeah.

Voice leading principle. It's like one six, two, five. It's going to go to the four minor. That E, you're right. That's a dominant seven. and that should go back to here. Yeah, but it's kind of going two different possibilities at the same time. But it's a false, it's a false cadence to this.

And then it just keeps, and that kind of makes it the fact that then it can move up diatonically from there. It's just the first part of the song. It's just the first core progression you get. I know. It's ridiculous. And this, by the way, is a major, a major, right? Yeah, absolutely. And then back to the dominant seven.

And the fact that it starts on this with that extended intro, Like the way you would think about this that wouldn't have made this as hip is if it started one two three four but it doesn't it's three four and then resolves down yeah yeah which is course either way is cool would sound good and that it's kind of a cyclical thing but the fact that it starts here sets up so then when it gets back to the end of that first a section or that first verse whatever you want to call so then you got major to dominant because if it's started on the one, it would have been like, which would have been cool, but this is even more weird. Yeah, yeah.

No, it's super good, yeah. And then the chorus, where's the chorus go? F minor. F minor, yeah, the six. And then to that two to the five, four to the five. A sharp, sharp nine, flat 13 on the five. Yeah. So good.

And like, I think, I was going to say Steve, I've heard Steve, he's singing this. He doesn't sing a lot, but I heard him live one time. Yeah, so this is, by the way, this is from a. A flat major, A flat minor. Right. Oh yeah, so there's. That's its own little more interesting. But Michael Jackson is a thing.

Let me see if I can find it. And just to clarify that for folks, so the chorus, that F minor 7. That's from the key of A flat major. That's the sixth chord. This D. C sharp is from the key of A flat minor. The D flat minor seven. This is the four of the Aflat Aeolian. And this is like the five.

And it's that sharp nine only helps to like solidify. Oh, that's from the A flat minor. Yeah, right? Because that's a common, the sharp 9 is common in a minor key. Yep. More than a major, but it's... Right, because if it was a minor major 7, that would be very unusual. Yeah.

But it's brilliant. It's brilliant. And then at one point, Michael Jackson... He does this minor 11 thing. That was the first time I identified the minor 11th. What was it? What was it? He doesn't even.

I think he does. I can't help it. Dude, if I wanted to do, what else in love it, no, no. Nobody has improvs badder

than Michael Jackson for pop hits. Nobody has improvs badder than Michael Jackson ever. Man, ever. The greatest. A master. And like, that was the first time I heard,

like, and like his timing and his patience with going to that was so, so cool, right? It's just like so, whoa,

wow. It was just awesome. Not y'all good. Because they're sitting, And this is, like, this is whatever, three minutes and 40 seconds into it. I remember sometimes on the radio, they are, be starting to fade it out. But I remember when I heard that, I was like, what is that? And I've been in love with the minor 11 ever since.

Yeah. And like, when I heard Herbie doing it and like Steve, like, and the way Michael Jackson, because it's all dead nine, minor nine. It's really a minor seven of the thing. But when he lifts up to that, you know, and then all the different places you can go within the arrangement. And then with his improv and that blues line coming down, come on. It's so good. Come on.

So I want to give a shout out too here to another influential pop group harmonically. At least, I mean, they're a small band, so I wouldn't be surprised if I'm the only one. But these guys. Shout out to George Harrison here, the composer, Something. This is from Abby Road from the Beatles. Oh, that's a 10. Age 7,000. Dominus 7.

And this is all straight ahead here. This is why you can't copyright court, James. I know. They don't everything. So the key is this in? Z. To the 6. So even, yeah.

Weird A.F. Starts in the 4 and then E flat major, G major over D. But then it goes somewhere. It uses that. So it puts that in your ear. Yeah. And then the second time around it does something. And the whole song is beautiful.

The melody is gorgeous. strings all of it is perfect and this is one of about 20 Beatles tunes that I could say uses this kind of like sophisticated I just wanted to give George some credit here because he never gets the credit to be used to the six walk down yeah again a major now we're in any this is a chromatic media this is a chromatic media That's a total chromatic walkdown, right? Yeah. Listen to the second time. Back to, yeah.

So again, that second time. This is a killer. The greatest melodic solo is of his little pocket here. That's something so Mabby Road ever heard of it. And even that little, like that walk up off the five. You didn't have to do that. You could have just gone right to the sixth. The Beatles, they get loads.

of credit, obviously. But I think for good reason, I'll never forget, you know, my dad played... Especially this record. This was one of the few... This was the only Beatles record for a long time we had in our house. Yeah, oh, it's... That's a controversial take, Peter, to say that Abby Rhodes is a good record, but I'll let you have it. No, I remember... It was the only one

my parents had. Literally the only Beatles record they had. My dad was born in 46, and so he was, like, learning how to play guitar during, like, when rock and roll and everything was happening, and he... And his friends, when they were teenagers in high school, which would have been just before this. They're learning songs. And he said, and it's like in 1964, I'll never forget it.

We were learning all these rock and roll songs and everything's fine. And all of a sudden, the Beatles came and it's like, what are these chords? Like what, he used to say, like, we couldn't play the Beatles because some of the chords were too weird. Right. It wasn't just one four or five or one six, four or five. It was like all of these crazy modulations and things like this. And especially at the time you get to like, you know, revolver and then obviously Starge of Peppers, it's all over. But it's really, we take it for granted now, but it was a thing. To have the biggest band in the world again, pushing, much like Stevie, the biggest pop artists in the world pushing

harmonic boundaries is really fun. Much like Michael Jackson, honestly. Same thing. Absolutely. I mean, but that's a good example. In your family, we always wish for better for the next generation. Your dad was a teenager figuring out the Beatles harmony. Then his little boy, years later, it's just three or four years

old, figuring out a minor 11 chord on Highway Pee-P. So it's all good. I want to, another honorable mention here, more contemporary honorable mention has to go to this this whole album I think this changed

the way modern generations think about a lot of things rhythm of course but even harmony you hear people rip off this stuff every day shout out rock

we did in our intro did we yeah we did this is Robert Glasper from his very first black radio album Erica Badu how many like YouTube

tutorials like did that Rob Glaspher Neo Sol Layback Road sound came off of this It only gets more clear as the years go on how influential

Robert was during this time on everybody I mean he is of course now worldwide respected and everything but it was this this time for him I think solidified all that

and we'll continue to and save the joy And again, nothing harmonically crazy happening here, but like all of these things. There's nothing harmonically crazy happening in something from the Beatles either. But the placement of it, the timing of it, what else is harmonically happening around it. This is the job of an artist, is to evaluate what's all the other shit that's happening around me right now? And how can I make a statement on that and stand out from that using the tools that I have? I think Robert Glasper has been a genius of this.

his whole career. He's taken everything that's been around him, and he's turned it, he's turned his thing into the sound to have. And that's a difficult prospect for anybody, but he's a master at it. Yeah, absolutely. So I want to just throw in to dovetail with your honorable mention here. Wait, check this out here. So this is... Oh, yeah. Yeah, what is this? I know this. It's moot-tastic. That's movetastic right there. This Diane Reeves? Yeah.

Oh, so good. This is so good. Yeah. Is this right? This is a Glasper arrangement. And I think he's... Oh, yeah, this is Stevie Nix on it. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Where we talk about, like, kind of what you can do. I'm actually playing on some of this. I don't know what part is, me. There's like three different pianists. Oh, God. Golly. Yeah, that's good.

Woo. But you're talking about like just a simple kind of... How much is... Again, this has been ripped off, left and right. Diane sounds so feeling on this stuff. Can I make a request that she should do a whole album like this? Can you make that happen? You know people.

Well, this record kind of is that... I mean, but yeah. But that was... I remember Glassburg, I don't think he ever showed it. Like, we started doing... He wrote it for something else. It's like... You know, he kind of came up with this.

It's just like so... It's just... It's just... Total interchange. I don't know. Oh, we can't do that because cordy's not there. I got, I got you. But we got F.

There you go. Okay, so we got... Oh, this is moot chord, isn't it? Buddy. I said mootastic. Oh, yes. I said mootastic. So it's just...

But this is in C, right? So the tune is in C. Yeah. But it's like, so it's like four to five with the moo. Yeah. And then to the one... That's a stupid thing. Yeah.

Exactly. Wow. Like walking up... Summer song. is it? Or... Yeah. No. But it's kind of like the other walk-up of...

This is like a diatonic walk-up, right? And then back to the... Up to the move forward. Wait, do it again, do it again for the start? You got the four over the three, five over the three. So the one. And that's the only like straight

until you get to the four. Oh, no, I'm sorry. Oh, wait, what is it? Yeah. So then it goes straight to the four. And then it goes back to the 4 over A, I mean the F over A. Yeah. And then to the 5, like 5, 5, 2.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then one, straight new. One move. Yeah. And then it's the 4. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's funny. I've never, I played this a bunch. And, like, I played on this record, but I don't, she was like, is a great record,

but it was so many different, well, I know, I had some good company on here. I played on it. Rob played on some of it. George Duke playing on something right before he passed and there might have been another but nobody knows what

What's the name of the album? Beautiful Life Ah I wrote a tune on here It's going on my May playlist And then Oh we got to listen to that That's straight up

modal energy Yeah A major from C major And this is just that same thing I just laid out over and over That's the whole Chorus Is he playing drums?

Either Terry or Terry I gully. Yeah, that's true. But there's some mixed together, too. This is like A major, F major, D minor, D minor, nine. So again, so stop, so that's straight up like going from A major to A major, or from A major, C major, right? Now I get it!

Only an hour before I get it. Right, the F major and the D minor, that's like the, in A minor that would be like the six or the four in C major that would be the four and the two, right? Right. Coming off to A minor, Aeolian, right? Right. And by the way, the original...

Oh, then it goes to A minor. So that's... Okay, that's what's cool about this. A major seven... D-major, seven. D minor, nine, D minor 11, and then A minor. And then A major.

That's that... Oh, okay. Just... It's four chords, yeah. I think. That's what I played. And back to A minor I just saw Stevie Nick's last

Oh that's right Did she do this arrangement? She did, no she did not And she sounded kidding Check this next part This is some real like Glaspers is mootastic Sick, it's so sick

Yeah that is Terry on that's definitely Diane, come on the show Let me talk you into I got a project idea I got nothing to do with it Oh that's a that's stolen from that off the wall album too.

Yeah. Because Terran loves that. So this is... She's the... Did she have an album coming out? Did you play this a lot live? Yeah.

Was she doing this most shows? I love the minor 11. Man. It's so good. Again, modal interchange, to me, every time I hear something that I absolutely...

Am I allowed to lean back? That modal change got him leaning back. I know. I was like, here, put me on. Put me on, Caleb. Let's see this angle here.

How do you guys like the new angle? Are these new angles? Oh, yeah, I look like a people puddle. A people puddle. I was rolling down Highway Pee-P with my people-piled. Highway P-P-P-Pel puddle. Went to, I'll be back. I'll be sure.

We'll be analyzing him next episode. Yeah, I'll be there. No, I'll be sure. I know. So the moral of the story here is that sweet, sour, that dark light sound, that like warm, that is, that mixture that is oftentimes it's the essence of life.

The modal interchence, it's the minor and major combined. Can I give you a shout out? The yang, the zen and the zan. Can I show you, we've done a lot here, but can I show you the absolute greatest example in the history of modal interchange? Yeah, please hurry though, because I got to go to highway peepee, to be honest with you. I did a little short video on this

and it was pretty much do you make shorts? I do make shorts. O.G. OGMI. O-G-G-M-I. Key of E-major? Never heard of it? Nope, that's wrong.

Keyes this in. I just had it. C-sharp. C-sharp, thank you. I'm messing out. If anybody's made it this far, it doesn't matter. I was just looking at this. That's right, C-sharp.

Or D-5. D-5. That's right, it goes to C-sharp minor or E-major eventually. One over third? That was 13 core, that one. Yeah. OG. 6.

Check it out. Hit me. Where are we now, Peter? Where are we now? B. Flat minor 11? 2. 6. All right.

Peter, if you see this on a YouTube video, any YouTube video where they're playing Clare de Loon, this is the most replay part on all of them. D-flat F-minor, F-flat over A-flat. Right? So that major minor. And eventually, W.C. will modulate straight to E-major.

which is F flat. Yeah. Isn't that great? And the two dominant. So good. Oh, gee. Yeah. Right here.

Major 7. Augmented. The whole... Now we're an E major. So, so good. That's Alexis Weisenberg. Nice. Well done.

Should we get out with a little playing of our own, Peter? Sure. I'm inspired. Yeah, what do you want to do? Something without modal interchange. A little vamp there. Yeah.

What is it? I'll hear it.