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Thanks Jazzwee, your lessons help me a lot, please keep it going. I have been only figuring out the left hand by ear up to now, and your explanation is easier to understand than any book I read.

TB

I'm enjoying this thread too, and I thought Jazzwee gave a very nice summary of chord construction. Very nice.

I would suggest to keep this thread more interesting is for everyone to strictly keep the melody and the timing accurate; otherwise, I think it gets more difficult to make sense of what's being done here. Another thing is to differentiate between chord styles and harmony... I think these are very different topics. Personally, I would like to learn more about chord styles (in this thread or somewhere else). I like to hear the same song (strictly the same song, note for note, proper timing, etc) using block chords, broken chords, ballad style, Alberti Bass, arpeggiated styles, and many others, and variations thereof.

Yet, this is all great to hear.

I'm glad what I'm posting is of some use. I will keep expanding on it little by little.

Music In Me -- perhaps others can contribute those versions you talk about. I'm a jazz guy so I wouldn't be a good source stylistically speaking for some of the styles you mention. However, I can explain them theoretically.

I don't rehearse whatever music I've posted here. I record it in one or two takes so I can't perfect it. Hopefully, some more patient players will contribute what you are asking for.

But focus on what is being discussed here as related to learning to play by ear so perhaps the premise of note by note exactness is the wrong direction. There's a couple of lessons to be learned so far: (a) There are FEW wrong notes, (b) There's a physicality to the instrument and a few 'shapes' will get you a long way.

I'm trying to keep the audience here general. If people have deeper questions on more jazz related things, I recommend posting it on the jazz thread so this doesn't get too heavy.

I want to summarize what I thought were my original goals in starting this:

1. TEACH that Playing by Ear is easy, if you let go
2. There's no fixed rule to what should sound good (as creative posters have proven here).

Just because it is good practice for me, I've decided to do a recording of these, one step at a time. This might be useful for lurkers who are new to this, and it's certainly useful for me!

Maj7ths:
http://www.box.net/shared/75i4pu05uj

Fancy voicings - maj7(9) rootless:
http://www.box.net/shared/7qn594ay5q

Pale imitation of jazzwee's stride version:
http://www.box.net/shared/sbn9ctz5kk

(Jazzwee, were those 9ths with 7ths or with 6ths?)

Incidentally, I don't agree with the no rules premise, a.k.a. Gyro's thesis. What you Jazzwee and everyone else have shown here is that there are very explicit rules one has to follow, else you'd just be banging left and right hoping to get something out of the instrument...don't expect much to come out! All of these chords, the way they are constructed, chord progressions, chord styles, etc., are the rules. Throwing in unusual and unanticipated chords might work but only rarely. Speaking for myself, I'm mostly interested in the rules for now, and later on I may consider breaking them. Cheers.

TLT - thanks for those recordings! It was really interesting to listen to them all in a row and compare the different ways they made Mary sound.

Hm. No one's tried to make anything sound like Mary's lamb

Cathy

M_I_M, nothing wrong with that. Yes there are rules, so it is not random. I'm not exactly a big Gyro supporter (is anyone?), but he does present the other side. Jazz Pianist Kenny Werner often states, "There are no wrong notes" and so the concept isn't specific to Gyro. The answer is somewhere in between. You can learn the rules by trial and error. By putting some of these guides in here, I able to show that there is leeway.

For example, although I state the circle of fifths scale degrees in the Key of C, if you listen to the first two recordings I made, I clearly step away from the Key of C. But really I'm only ONE note away from the key of C. I arrived at that by a little experimentation.

Later on as we get more advanced with this, I can explain more rules that people will discover on their own. In my case, since I know the rules, I can jump start the experimentation. I know roughly where to look so coming out with new sounds takes only few tries.

But you may not have as much fun if I just laid out all the rules

TLT, you did great! I couldn't even play the stride one at regular tempo without practice. Let's just say it was a good practice of being in some Lounge and someone makes a request That's pretty much how I handled it.

The chords were just 9ths with 7ths. These are not the Jazz voicings. They're a little simpler. We will try those next and it will make it a little more complicated since there's no single shape for all the chords.

Thanks, Cathy and jazzwee!

The stride one I found easiest to play. I confess I practiced the other two. But once my LH knew where it was going (for the rootless 9ths), it was easy (perhaps even easier) to put in the root also.

Baaaaa!

Well don't make me look too bad Everyone else is practicing and I'm just plunking along without any kind of preparation.

But maybe that's a good thing. It shows how automatic this can be. As I said, even my initial recording was done without much planning.

Music_in_Me, I remember Seaside Lee posted several videos on this forum demonstrating different ways to play the same chords progression. I don't know if you have seen them.

TB

I haven't seen them. I will do a search, that sounds good.

Well I'm not sure a meagre vi-ii-V-I can make you look bad, but I'm willing to try:

http://www.box.net/shared/c0epee0r6m

TLT, you're really learning how to use those circle of fifths! Bravo!

Looking to Reharmonize? Let's Start With the Basics

I want to just expand little by little on what I tried to explain earlier. There are many facets to this so I could go on and on until the topics get really complex. But in the meantime, we're still at the simple stage.

So first we started out with our normal seventh chords.

Scale Degrees in C
I C-E-G-B (CMaj7)
ii D-F-A-C (Dm7)
iii E-G-B-D (Em7)
IV F-A-C-E (FMaj7)
V G-B-D-F (G7)
vi A-C-E-G (Am7)
vii B-D-F-A (Bm7b5)

Then we added another note to the end (called an Extension and specifically it is called the 9th extension).

Scale Degrees in C
I C-E-G-B-D (CMaj7(9) )
ii D-F-A-C-E (Dm7(9) )
iii E-G-B-D-F (Em7(9) )
IV F-A-C-E-G (FMaj7(9) )
V G-B-D-F-A (G7(9) )
vi A-C-E-G-B (Am7(9) )
vii B-D-F-A-C (Bm7b5(9) )


And then I proceeded to split the same chords into a bass and another chord.


Scale Degrees in C
I C / E-G-B-D (Em7)
ii D / F-A-C-E (FMaj7 )
iii E / G-B-D-F (G7)
IV F / A-C-E-G (Am7 )
V G / B-D-F-A (Bm7b5 )
vi A / C-E-G-B (CMaj7 )
vii B / D-F-A-C (Dm7 )

I just want to examine this more closely because this is one of easiest ideas to reharmonizing ever. Again there are tons of official "music theory" books that discuss this (classical theory) and you don't have to delve into it, but the main concept is that you can often find substitute chords by looking for COMMON TONES. Just by the geography of the notes, you will find as I show above that chords a THIRD away are often consonant.

So look closely at the last two scale degree charts above.

Scale Degrees in C
I CMaj7(9) contains (Em7)
ii Dm7(9) contains (FMaj7 )
iii Em7(9) contains (G7)
IV FMaj7(9) contains (Am7 )
V G7(9) contains (Bm7b5 )
vi Am7(9) contains (CMaj7 )
vii Bm7b5(9) contains (Dm7)

What can you see here? You can see that you can safely substitute a chord a THIRD UP. And that's exactly what we did here. If you don't play the Bass note to the I chord, it sounds like an Em7. However, depending on your melody note, likely the melody will imply C so there's this ambiguity that exists. Ambiguity creates tension and interest. Often you can release that tension by occasionally playing the bass note "C".

Another way of looking at this is that:

I = iii
ii = IV
iii = V
IV = vi
V = vii
vi = I
vii = ii

So you can see how you can substitute some chords for the other in a very safe way. Again, why is this acceptable? It is because these chords share common tones. The difference that cause the ambiguity is only one note. In this case, the BASS root note.

In Jazz, we utilize this concept a lot by not playing the root many times. We call it rootless voicings. So often, chords start on the 3rd of the chord and giving the exact same relationship shown above.

So in conclusion, Reharmonization Lesson 1: You can substitute a chord a THIRD AWAY (thinking here in roman numerals).

BTW this explains why many posters were able to use chords like IV, vii, iii, vi, ii, V, I in their reharmonizations. If you look at the chart above, you can find substitutes for I, IV, V. In fact, if you look closely you can find a substite going UP a third, or DOWN a third (do you get it? Just look for the I, IV and V to the left of the equal sign. Then do the same thing from the RIGHT side of the equal sign. Two possible substitutions). Again this all looks complicated but in reality it is simply finding the substitute chord a THIRD UP or a THIRD DOWN.

This kind of substitution, which is very basic, is what creates the circle of fifths and to simplify, most tunes can fit into the structure of scale degrees IV, vii, iii, vi, ii, V, I.

Try playing this sequence on the piano and you will hear a familiar sounding progression. Again several people followed that same progression here so at least we know it is well known.

But it isn't over. This is the most basic of harmonizations...

Music has a lot of symmetry have you noticed? So my teacher says Music is a lot like Math...

Great thread Jazzwee. You really do explain things very well.

Okay, now you totally lost me. :-) But I'll get back to it eventually.

Mom3 - did you try putting an F chord in - in beats 3 and 4 of the first bar? Then go back to a C chord for the second bar.

Try it both ways (C right through those two bars, or C-F-C) and decide which way you like it best.

Jazzwee,

As someone who doesn't have a lot of time to participate, but occasionally follows your threads, just let me say that it is exceptional that you are able to explain these musical ideas so clearly and that you have taken the time to do so. Excellent and very inspirational work.

Andy