You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Tune Breakdown: "Dolphin Dance" (Part 1)

Episode Date: November 10, 2020

It's another live edition of You'll Hear It where Peter and Adam take your questions. Peter and Adam introduce their new segment Tune Breakdown today as they take a deep dive into Herbie Hancock's "Dolphin Dance."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.Tuesday's Open Studio Live Events:1:00 PM - Adam's Daily Guided Practice Session (for Members Only)3:00 PM - Piano Guided Practice Session with Adam on YouTube8:00 PM - Live Listening Sesh with Peter and Adam on YouTube9:30 PM - Peter Sprague & Camarada | The Sanctuary Suite on YouTubeFor the rest of this week's calendar, follow this linkLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Facebook | Twitter | Instagram See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

So this is you'll hear live. That's Adam Asis. I'm Peter Martin. This is Christian McBride. That's Sean Jones. We're excited to have them here. And we're here for the next hour or so to entertain you a little bit. We're kind of adding in a new segment.

Should we announce that now? Yeah, we kind of just started it, right? Yeah. Did you mention it before? Because how did folks know about dolphin dance? Somebody tipped them off? About dolphin dance? Yeah.

Oh, I think I did mention today at the Daily Got a Practice session. Yeah, that we were going to be playing some dolphin dance today. And I mentioned, I might have, yeah, I might have sneak peeked the new segment. Okay, cool. That's right. It's all good. So, yeah, we thought we would take kind of almost like a tune of the week, something that we could study, that we could play in our various things. And then those of you that want to kind of either learn along with us or review, if that's the case, or just refresh yourself. You can do that. And I love this tune. I mean, it's such a, I mean, there's so many possibilities there. So we can talk about voicing. But we thought, as always, it would be fun to take questions from you guys. So if you have specific things that you might. have struggled with. And I know we already had, Adam and I are going to duke it out a little bit because we had a little bit of conflicting changes there. Yeah. Which is all part of the process, so this would be

the first thing I would ask you, of course, right? Yeah. Right? So this, on the, on the, we have our, and this is always the question, because, yeah. So we have our E-sus, our A minor, or C major 7 over E, back to our E-sus, back to this, then our E-flat-sus. Yeah. Now, I learned this chord

as this kind of sound, right? Right? And I'm trying to remember I need to go back to the original as like a B-flat 7, sharp 11, flat 9 over E-flat, right? No, because you had something else going on. So I think that's the double, I think that's the dopeo diminished there. I think you're right about that, actually. So you got, wait, do we have our, do we have this? No, we don't, man. Oh, bam. How do you like that?

It was too much going on. I'm just trying to get headphones working. Okay, so we got, so what we're talking. talking about it's basically the last four chords of the piece, right? Exactly, yeah, yeah. So there we got Suss E-flat for the fourth to the last measure. And then that one, the chord in question I'm going to say is, I have no idea what you call this, but the two diminished triads, A-flat diminished triad, and then separated by a whole step,

the E-diminished triad. So, hold on, say that again, so you have the... So you have E-flat on the bottom. The whole thing, the whole thing is E-flat pedal. So we've got Just play an A-flat Diminished triad Below middle C

Yeah And then an E-diminished triad A whole step up So okay Wow You know who showed me that Yeah this is what I said Nicholas Payton

He was like this is the chord dude But this is what I was saying It's a B-flat 7 sharp 11 flat 9 Kind of like right That's not what you play Yeah yeah Okay I was playing this

Yeah it's similar Okay. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. There you go. But, okay, so, but here's the thing. So you're using this. Are you thinking A flat whole half diminished?

Yes. Yeah, okay. Cool. Yeah, then we were on the same page. Why didn't it sound good? I don't know. Maybe, no, it was the next one. So we got, and then what do you play next?

Oh, yeah, I go back to the suss. Yeah, that's. Okay. I mean, you can do that, but it's something else there. I think it's, man, what is this? I used to know this. We're going to come back to that because I'm going to remember it. it's like

I think it's that it doesn't seem like it's going to fit the melody I know that yeah I think it's like a 13 sharp 11 flat like E flat 13 sharp 11 flat 9 sharp 9 so you got

it's definitely not like a static type of situation okay okay the more you know man and then 2 5 down to C minor and you're back at the top. So, hey, let us know how everything's sounding. We're getting some feedback here.

We had a bit of a power hiccup in the studio, so we had to kind of restart some things, obviously. Yeah, all the power went out. So I hear the piano's kind of bright. I adjust it a little bit. Let me know. We're here. We aim to please.

Did you know that, Adam? We do aim to please. Yeah. I think it's going to be good. Okay, so let's talk about this tune. Yes. So what I love about this tune is that it starts on this pretty E-flat.

major seven and then it never happens again right right exactly exactly exactly but it always you know it floats in and out of areas where you think it's going to go there and it seems like it is and we've got a lot of c minor of course and you know this is the kind of tune you can think about the relative major and the relative minor and what a strong story that tells in terms of setting up the architecture of the tune because that's like a natural thing that people can hear you don't need to know anything about music theory or be a musician. That's just like being able to look into nature and be like, wow, the leaves are changing. That's a pretty color or whatever.

So that's a built-in kind of situation that we can, as the young and say, lean into as opposed to like forcing out. You know what I mean? So every time you're going in and out of an E-flap major or a C minor being the relative minor. Yes, sir. Can I see it over on the other screen? We're getting some requests for some courtie come on. Oh, come on.

And I kind of agree. Oh, look at that. Look at that. Hold on. All right. While he works on that. So we'll just talk a little bit more of that. So we're thinking the first time that we go to the relative minor there is on that fourth bar,

and then we go to C minor. So you can almost look at these as kind of transitional, going to an interesting place. And then back to the Eflab major. We'll talk about where that goes second bar in a second. And then here, boom. And you always want to kind of think about the sound, like the harmony gives it such a, it either feels like it needs to go somewhere, whether it goes there or not. or it feels like it should be staying somewhere.

That's the kind of two basic ways of thinking about how we play harmony. There's in reality a lot of sort of gradations in between, but if you think about it, like that wants to stay there, that minor nine, and especially the way that I'm playing it like a minor 11. Right? And that dominant,

that A flat 7 definitely wants to be like, you know. Okay, so, okay, let's go back to where we're talking about from the top. We've got E flat major. And then that second core, what were you just saying about that? You had something nice to say. So that's an E flat seven suss, right? So the thing to keep in mind with this E flat seven suss, it's clear.

This is based off of the mix of Lidian scale, right? So it's got that major third in there. I mean, and in that melody, there's so much to do. So even if you just, if you're a pianist, if you just hit that like a D flat, major seven over E flat, and then you kind of play around on the dominant. Not that you ever solo on this chord on this tune, but if you were. Right. And then back to the E flat, major seven.

And then a D half diminished, right? Yep. G7. Hey, what are you doing? Yeah, there you go. Okay, so we got that, we got that. Oh, I got no cordy coming. That's okay.

You got no cordy? If you guys can only see, can you see that way? Let's go on. Do that look again. That was a nice look. That was a nice. This is Adam frustrating. Now, Adam's been doing a lot of meditation.

He's been doing a lot of soul searching. So you don't get to see this. But this is the Adam that I get to see. Let's see that one. Oh, look at him. He's trying to breathe. heavy. He's the technical goblins. They're trying to get him.

And I think they got him. There's no better feeling ever, really, than trying to think about music and trying to communicate that when technical things are going wrong. It's really I can't ask for a better situation. For my

equanimity. That's right. Let's get some equanimity going. You know what I'm saying? So all right, while you're doing that? Let me just talk. That was some cool stuff you were saying about that second chord, but what I think about too is a little bit of possible foreshadowing. So you've got, so we were talking about the major and the minor, you know, really starting to establish those as the tunes so that as we pass in and out of them, even though we go to some unusual places on this tune, that becomes the listener and the players kind of

home base a little bit, right? Yeah. Because what does this seem like it wants to go? Yeah, well, exactly. It's a dominant core. Yeah, yeah, totally. Now we're in a Summerfest R&B. for outdoor concert, right? I'm not minding that, though, actually. I'm not minding that. But that's the cool thing about like deceptive cadences and just suggestive things, especially when they're right at the beginning of the tune, is that like you're kind of taking the listener on a journey in a way, right?

Let me see what's happening here. Oh, no, we ain't going on that journey. So it's like, okay, we don't go here, but we've got the possibility of going there, right? That's right. And it's, and the fact that it resolves back. But you know what? this isn't too big of a stretch for a resolution, right?

Because this E-flat, because where does it resolve to? Right? What's in this A-flat major nine chord? There's only one note diatonically different between that and that. It's not that far away. And actually, this is a great lesson. And God bless you, Herbie, for great lessons in the first two bars, three bars of a tune, right?

Herbie's Buddhist, by the way. I know. Herbie would not be getting rattled like we had. are right now. Who's rattled man? But we can use these suss chords, right? As little dominant chords,

even back to the same thing. Yeah. You hit this all the time. And the important thing to think about for this, and this is really, I think, our concept, and I dare I say the open studio way for thinking about jazz theory

is that there's no usage of, there's no use to analyze something at understanding something from a theoretical standpoint. So we talk about jazz harmony theory, unless you can make the equivalent connection between how it sounds, how it feels, different places you can take the listener on the journey. Because we've got to, it's so easy to forget that the listener does not know jazz harmony, I mean, or jazz theory, does not care about jazz theory.

I mean, it's just kind of like when you've got a live stream going good and you can't see any of the cables coming and everything just works, that's the way you want it to be. That's the way professionals deal with stuff. But when the back end kind of comes out to see it. And so this is really the backend. And it's important for us as musicians, absolutely to understand this, but never lose sight of connecting it with how it feels. So knowing that where it could go and all the different possibilities is just as important as knowing where you are with it and knowing what kind of name, you know, it goes along with it. You know what I'm saying?

I do. Yeah. I do. Adam, please more piano volume. I'm trying, folks. He's trying. Just tell me what you want to play and I'll play it for you. How about that?

Okay, so let's keep moving on. Badoom, we got there and then we're back, as you said, the E flat, very similar to the A flat. And then we're going 2.5. And this is one, it's a 2.5, 2C minor, so very natural to bust out your D half diminished. No problem. but a lot of times I find myself hitting this, which is really, I'm hearing that as that A flat 7, but over the D.

It's a sharp 9 flat 13. Ain't nothing wrong about that. But it just slides to that G7 flat 13 nicely. So you're thinking about this is like a not half diminished. Yeah. Sometimes. Sometimes. That's one of the options.

Well, that works really well because right after that. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. We actually go there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so that's that kind of foreshadowing that's built into the tune

that once we tap into it can be really exciting, I think. For sure.