Re: diminished modes

reed ( (no email) )
Fri, 16 May 1997 06:29:10 +0100

At 07:54 AM 5/16/97 -0500, you wrote:
>Thank you (once again) Reed.
>
>Your thought process on the Half/whole and whole/half step diminished
>scales is great. I try and focus on chords much more than scales/modes
>and this is a great way to relate the two. I know that the whole/half
>version works for diminished chords and the half/whole version works
>for altered dominant chords, but I never really related my thinking of
>the modes to the chords. It is so obvious and simple.
>
>As a side note I used to wonder why this jazz stuff was so complicated.
>I am a bright educated person, why doesn't it click for me. My current
>teacher (actually a 40+ year performer who I conviced to teach me) says
>it's because you think too much. He has shown me many SIMPLE ways to
>accomphish things that I had already "learned" but couldn't pull off.
>A simple example is rythmns. I learned the 1 and a 2 method of
>counting rythmns as a drummer (I currently play bass). I no longer do
>this. I quickly identify the 1-2-3-4 or 1-2-3 etc. and "feel" the
>other beats relative to these since I know where the down beats must
>fall. It took a little practice, and a little guidance, but it is much
>more intuitive than the cold analytical beat subdivision method I
>previously learned.
>
>
Mike,

There are 16 year old kids that after one or two years of learning
jazz can already play really well and sit in at local clubs.

Of course they are very talented but I bring this up to point out that the
way they are thinking about music has to be simple because they
havent been doing it long enough for jazz to be some complicated thing
to do. I.e. it's not quantum mechanics or general relativity. People
take heroin and get up on stage and play jazz.

Of course I don't mean to trivialize things or to say that it doesnt
take tremendous amounts of work to be a good jazz player
but my point is that if you are approaching things in some complicated
way it's probably the wrong way.

If a sixteen year old can play jazz well after a year or two,
I can guarantee you they didnt spend time learning things in twelve keys,
learning to tap on 2 and 4, trying to use chord scales to improvise over
standard tunes, ....

reed

Reed Kotler
reed@justjazz.com
http://www.justjazz.com