You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Why Scales?

Episode Date: September 18, 2019

It's a hot topic on today's episode, as Peter and Adam answer a listener's question about whether scales and theory really matter.Like those You'll Hear It shirts Peter shows off on the podcast? Want some YHI swag of your own? Take a visit to our store! Just go to https://teespring.com/stores/open-studioLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel and leave a comment for this episode.Interested in more jazz advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase.Follow us on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram at:https://www.facebook.com/heyopenstudiohttps://twitter.com/heyopenstudiohttps://www.instagram.com/heyopenstudio See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Hey Pete. Yeah. Why scales? Why not? True. I'm Adam Manis. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the Yule Here at podcast.

Daily Jazz advice. Coming at you. Coming at you today. Brought to you by Open Studio. Go to Open Studio jazz.com for, what do we got? Like one course on there for piano players? Man, we have more than one. Do you?

Yeah. We've got a whole lot. We have like six or something. You know what's kind of been our most popular course these last two months? What? Jump Start. Jazz Piano Jump Start has been popping off. So go check that out.

If you're a novice jazz piano player, like you really want to play jazz piano, perfect course for you. If you're a bass player or a drummer or a vocalist. Stay away. No, no, no, no. It's actually perfect for those folks because it's really designed to kind of like

get you into jazz piano from the jump. That's why we call it Jump Start. But you know, the most popular thing with the Jazz Piano Jump Start is the guided practice routines. Have you heard about this? Well, I have, but you know, we're renaming them. We're in a little bit of a rebranding with that. I don't know if you knew about this.

I don't know what is it. They're guided practice. sessions now. Guided practice sessions. GPS. GPS, because this is going to be your guidepost, your compass to jazz mastery basically. Never get lost in your practice sessions again. Never get lost to your practice session. Yeah. So the guided practice sessions are, well, we could call them guided practice sesh if you want. I'd rather not. Okay. So these are, I literally practice with you and I'm like, I set the metronome, I tell you when to start, what to play, and you're practicing with me. It's, you know what? It's been, it's been,

in like an overwhelming amount of praise. I hate to toot my own horn in this, but no, you don't. You love it. I do kind of like it. No, but we're also about to record a new course called Jazz Piano Technique, which is going to be primarily guided practice. Yeah, that's going to be bonkers.

Yeah. And you also, so when we say Adam guides you through your practice, I mean, we send you his cell phone number. No. No, no, no, no. No. Okay. Nope, it's a video.

It was recorded. I got you. Yep. Yeah, below will be the, okay. All right, so today we're talking about scales. Why? I don't know, but that's the question. Is this a rhetorical question?

Usually, yeah. We got an email from Russ. Russ says, hi, Peter and Adam. Love the podcast. As devout music theorists, I don't know about that. You may not like this question, but I feel compelled to ask it anyway.

You are always referring to the various scales. Think the Locrian mode here, then switch to the Frigian, then play the Dorian. Given the fact that music came before music theory, isn't it true, assuming that the player has a good ear and has listened to Jazz Master's

for many years, that the ultimate goal is to play notes that sound good together. When playing, that's all you should really be thinking about or can think about, not analyzing what mode the particular measure is in. Of course, conservatories feel compelled to teach this way, but how useful is it?

There have been many jazz musicians who didn't even read music, and they did just fine. Okay, I agree with much of what Russ is saying, but I'm wondering, has he actually listened to the podcast, or does he know, like, what we believe, because that's, I mean, This is actually exactly what we believe in what he's saying.

Yeah. Pretty much, right? Pretty much. He goes a little extreme with the antimodalism. Yeah. Because after the fact, modes are a great way of breaking down what has just happened. Yeah. They're not perfect and they're not going to get everything that happens in music.

Just like if you were to break down my speech during this podcast, there's no way it would be, you know, perfectly in line with the English language because I'm a human being who, was not very well educated. He was from Jefferson County. Yeah, and no, but you know what I mean, but I'm still communicating in a way. So there's some great things happening that isn't in the language. But the idea of using things like the Dorian scale to describe what you might play over a D minor 7 is exceptionally useful. Now, it's not the only way to figure out what you want to play, and it shouldn't actually be the primary way, but it is a way to get you in there.

Yeah, but I mean, the part, what I feel like he's miss. Maybe we haven't been strong enough in our beliefs on this as far as what we're thinking about when we're playing. We never talk about when you're performing. You should be thinking about the modes. In fact, we say that you should not be. You shouldn't be thinking about anything. You shouldn't be thinking. You should be listening.

Yeah. Listening to what's happening around you, listening to yourself, listening to the audience. But these are things for as far as scales. And you definitely shouldn't be thinking about I'm going to use the scale now because I'm in this measure. But you can and should think about this as one of the elements, part of the vocabulary. part of your melodic and harmonic palette that you have available to you. So you're thinking about and you're training yourself and getting the technical prowess to be able to play these things when you practice. That's right.

And that's a very separate time. It is. So I think to say that like because many jazz, first of all, I would dispute that there have been many jazz musicians. I mean, maybe there have been several and some, but it's definitely the minority of jazz musicians who didn't even read music. And this really scales have nothing to do with reading music. You could learn scales. Scales are just a building block. It's just how to organize the sound.

Yeah. And yeah, it doesn't matter if you know it's a Locrian or Frigian or what you call it. But I do think that, you know, most of the people that we gravitate towards and probably you, Russ, and just the jazz community. And I don't want to get into a thing of like, who's better. It's not about that, but like who we look at as kind of classic great jazz musicians. I mean, like, so Ella Fitzgerald comes to mind. Okay. Some people may like, oh, she's old and whatever.

But, I mean, she's a great. She's very relevant today. So you will hear her in her improvising sing quite a few different parts of scales and different modes for sure, diminished and all these different scales that we talk about learning. Is she thinking about them? Does she know what their name is? Can she read music? Who cares? Yeah.

But does she know that scale? Yes. Because she's singing that part and she knows where to put it. And most importantly, she knows what the sound of it is and what the practical application of it is. That's right. And so I think if we all could learn scales in that way. way like Ella Fitzgerald did. I don't even know exactly how she went about it,

but to know them like that and to be able to implement that in your music, in your style, with your story is the way to go. Yeah, I totally agree. Like, if I'm on a 3625 here in C, and I hear this as something I want to improvise, I'm not thinking, oh, Phrygian in my head, but that's just what I'm hearing.

And I know that sound because I've worked on that. It doesn't mean that I'm thinking like, and it's time for the Phrygian and it's time for the Dorian. Like, that's not how to think about it at all. And I do get his point, though, that sometimes they're, I mean, have you ever been on YouTube.com? Yeah. There are musicians that definitely overthink their way through this stuff.

But what I meant is like, that isn't us. We're not like that. I know. In fact, did he get us confused? If anything, we underthink most of these. I know. Well, when he started out as deviled music theorist, I thought he met himself and his departmenters.

I thought we were about to get slammed for not being deviled enough. Because I don't feel, I mean, you know, I know a fair amount about classical theory and jazz theory. but not, I'm definitely not a devout music there. And as you know, there's many concepts like drop to and even like Locrian, when you said that I had to think, I'm like, is Mochrean, is that major? Yeah, no, it's, I don't think so. It's minor. Oh, it's not.

It's like a minor on a C scale. What's the major mode? Ionian. Ione. Yeah. See, that's the first mode that he didn't know. Exactly. Number one.

But I know what they all sound like. That's the thing. I know what they feel like and I know how to apply them. And so I think that hopefully, you know, maybe we need to do a better job of kind of delineating what our belief in this is. because I really feel strong. And really open studio, that's kind of like part of this movement that I want us to be

is that you don't have to know this stuff, but you need to know it. You have to know the sound of it. Yeah, yeah. And you're not only have to, you're going to want to, and we want you to learn it in an organic way.

And I would say, yeah, in that sense, when you just talk about there have been many jazz musicians who didn't even read music and they did just fine, it's more about like, it's not about what you can't do

because reading music is a skill that is not necessary to have, a successful career playing music because you can get up in front of people and have a very edifying performance without any music being in front of you having everything memorized you learned I mean that's just like one part of a skill that doesn't make or break a musician but in terms of being able to know and understand the building blocks of melody and how that you know scales arpeggios and scales are just one of them and how that interacts with harmonic forms and

things like that you need to know on a much bigger level than know it as a theorist you have to know how to play it that's exactly and so like to russ's point I think if that's what he's saying I absolutely agree. I'll just try to do a better job of us. We need to do a better job, I think, of letting people know that's how we feel. Yeah, and listen, there's... Can I get off my high horse now?

You should. Let me climb back down. So he says here, I like this, given the fact that music came before music theory, isn't it true, that the ultimate goal is to play notes that sound good together? Exactly. That is true.

But how are you going to know that unless you have an idea of what notes sound good together? And that's really all, when we talk about, like, you know, typically a Dorian is played over the two chord. Yeah. We're not saying, like, you should always play a Dorian over a two-court. We're just simply saying, like, stereotypically,

this is what has worked for a lot of people. It might not be your sound. That's right. But wouldn't you want to at least know what, like, Clifford Brown played on a F minor 7? I want to know that information and then make my own decisions and try to hear it. Here at the, you'll hear a podcast,

we're more about stereotyping than educating. That's the bottom line. That's what we do here. You'll hear it. No, no, but I do, I mean, I absolutely agree with this. The ultimate goal is to play notes that sound good together. Absolutely.

Done. But then when you say when playing, that's all you should really be thinking about or can think about. I agree with that too. In fact, but you're not even thinking about that. You're thinking about, well, yeah, I guess you are thinking about, yeah, you say not analyzing. That's, that's the death now. Yeah, that's true. Not analyzing what mode.

Yeah, absolutely. But again, we're taking two different situations that most of what we talk about here on the podcast is about what you're thinking about what you should concentrate on in the practice room. Yeah, that's right. And I don't think we've ever said like, oh, when you're on the gig, think about this. I think we said the opposite. You see, I'm a little offended. I'm a little offended. Well, yeah, no, I mean. Russ, you don't want to catch me in a, and I feel bad.

He had a smiley, an emoji and a piano emoji. No, hey, you know what? This is actually, thank you, Russ, for the, because it is a really great, great observation and a great question and a great discussion to have of as an improviser, as a performer, how much analyzing should you be doing on the gig? And the answer is really zero. Yeah, yeah. And that's the ultimate goal. And also, I always say this, but don't feel back. Some people like, I try not to think about this, but then I get lost in the form.

It's like, okay, the ultimate goal is that you're not thinking about the form. You're not thinking about anything because you know it so well. But then I also realized that takes time. Yeah. That takes, and it's not just about you've got to be an old person before you get to that. But it just takes time in repetitions of being very conscious about it and then gradually letting that seep into repetition enough that it becomes second nature, really. And each one of these things is different, like kind of, you know, the melodic possibilities of scales is really just one.

one big element, but just one element, you know. And, you know, knowing the form, knowing the melody, being able to play in good time, all these things. Even if you could think about all these things and do it successfully, it's too many things to think about. One thing I do want to dispel here that he kind of implies, and maybe Russ, this isn't what you were implying at all. But there are, there is like a contingent of like people who think like, oh, well,

I don't want to know anything because I just won't be as pure. Wasn't there a historical movement out of the know nothings? Wasn't that like a back? Actually, I think that was the thing. But no, of like, you know, any music theory at all will ruin. Yeah. I think that's total BS, to be honest. Well, unless somebody could say that and then they sound great, then it's like great.

But that never. Have we seen that? That doesn't usually. But maybe it exists. I mean, maybe. But it's not usually the case. Usually the good musicians you hear Russ know a lot about music theory. Exactly.

And you have to be careful because there are some great players I've noticed that'll kind of be like, they'll skew more to the side of like, I don't know what I was doing. You know, like because. But they do. They know. I know. That's like a little thing. And I mean, just like you'll see some NBA players that like, I don't know, I just sort of did this thing. And it's not that they're lying or trying to hide up, hide things.

They forgot. Like, they might have practiced a move so long ago and it became so automatic from when they were in high school or something. And then it just sort of, it does feel like it's just happening. But that doesn't mean that they don't know it in a very deep and internal way. Agreed. Well, thank you, Russ, for writing in. Oh, come out of the cover there. Were we too mean to Russ just that?

You weren't. You weren't. I might have been, but now that I see the piano emoji, the sunglasses emoji, I feel bad. But actually, this is, I mean, thank you for writing this, because this is, like, really fun stuff for me to talk about. I mean, we should actually do more of an episode about this about what we're thinking when we're playing and what we're thinking when we're practicing. Not scales. I'm thinking about scales, I promise. But you know what?

If you want to learn a lot about scales. Well, we've got a little open studio. No, you know what? Actually, our lessons are not a lot about that. I mean, there's a little bit about that, but it's about the whole experience. experience of performing. Yeah, we kind of do pride ourselves and all of our artists sort of just, I don't know, they fell into this way of teaching.

And that's part of the reason that we assembled the great cast that we did where it's definitely not theory first. No. I mean, there's like breakdowns. I mean, like Jeff Keiser gets into some theoretical things, but it's more like, you know, it's more from the piano and the swing and the groove. Like all these different elements are there and there's some theory breakdown. But it's never like you start here and that's how you get to be a great player.

It's like, no, you got to know this. You got to know this. but it's not like this coming back at the end and then explaining it from theoretical terms for sure. No, no, no. And so it's very much like theory optional, I would say. Yeah. So, yeah, until next time.

You'll hear it.