Chris Parks · Stage 9: Sixth chords and the scales of chords
How to create minor lines
For tunes built on minor, Barry reaches for his minor 6th diminished scale: a minor 6 chord plus a diminished, eight notes that contain both the harmonic and the melodic minor. Chris practises it in G in thirds, triads and chords, then makes lines with the minor 5-4-3-2 moves and Barry’s chromatic scale, where a gap with no half step is crossed by jumping up to the next scale note.
Step by step
- 0:00Minor lines are for tunes that start in minor or centre on the relative minor
- 0:34For those (If I Should Lose You, Yesterdays) Barry uses the minor 6th diminished scale: in G, G minor 6 (root, minor third, fifth, major sixth) plus the diminished on 2, 4, flat 6 and major 7
- 1:10Eight notes that contain both the harmonic and the melodic minor
- 1:42Barry is not just ‘the sixth diminished guy’: he has four scales of chords (major 6, minor 6, dominant 7 and dominant 7 flat 5 diminished) and a whole system for single-note lines
- 2:16Know the scale up and down to the tonic, in thirds, triads and four-note chords, all over the instrument
- 4:005-4-3-2 in minor: at 4 there is no half step between 2 and flat 3, so jump up to 4 to hit the 3; at 3 come up a triad from the fifth; at 2 rise chromatically from the major seventh
- 5:41Barry’s chromatic scale on G minor 6 diminished: play every half step there is, and where there is none (A to B flat) jump up to the next scale note, C
- 6:12The tricky spots: from 5 to flat 6 jump to the major sixth, from flat 6 to 6 jump to the major seventh, from 7 to the tonic jump to 2; practise it slowly up and down
- 7:18Phrases: tonic to third, a third up, then down a chord; or come down chromatically from the fifth to the third
Barry’s own words on this
In the course
The scale every way: up and down, thirds, triads, chordsBarry’s chromatic scale5-4-3-2Barry’s four scales of chordsThe minor 6 diminished scale
Transcript
- 0:00hello and welcome to episode 65 of things i’ve learned from bear harris and today i thought we would talk about creating lines using minor so we’ve done already major lines using major scale we’ve done uh two five lines using the dominant scale and now i thought we would do minor lines because people have been asking about those and those are really important the key thing to these are barry uses when he talks about minor now by minor i mean like songs that start or that
- 0:34are focused on going to the relative minor so and one of the things for relative like uh what’s a song like if i should lose you or um yesterday’s or just one of those things all those songs start in minor so when he thinks about those he thinks of his one of his scales which is the minor six diminished scale so we’ll do it in g so basically what a minor six diminished scale is is it’s a root minor third fifth major sixth is the minor six and it’s also has a diminished in it which is the second
- 1:10the fourth the flat six and the major seven so you put those two things together and you have the major the excuse me the minor six diminished scale so what i love about this scale is it has well first of all it’s an eight note scale it contains within it a uh the harmonic minor and the melodic minor so i like this scale the best because it has everything in it it has both the harmonic and melodic minor not that i don’t like those scales but i like this one the best
- 1:42also um this is one of barry’s four scales of chords and just to be clear because i hear it sometimes like oh barry harris oh he’s the he’s the sixth diminished he’s the sixth diminished guy no no no no no he’s got four scales of chords primarily that he talks about which is minor six diminished major sixth diminished same as this except the major third dominant seven diminished which is the same as this except it’s a flat seventh not a six not a major six and he’s got dominant seven flat five which is the
- 2:16same as this except it’s got a flat seventh and a flat fifth no sixth but a flat sixth so it’s not he’s not the major six diminished guy no that’s only one little tiny thing of what he does and that’s not to mention everything that he talks about single note lines which is another whole thing so but let’s talk about the scale for a second what you have to know you have to know the scale up and down [Music] which i like because it’s this eight note scale so you don’t have to you don’t have to do it to the seven you can do it right to the tonic you have to know the scale in thirds
- 2:50you have to know the scale in triads you have to know the scale in chords which is four notes now up and down for everything so [Music] you have to do everything up and down just so you know so now that’s this is primarily the scale that he that he refers to when he thinks of minor
- 3:26uh what so that’s very important you have to know that scale you have to know that scale all over the instrument you know every place you can think of it every place so and all these things thirds triads chords the next thing you should do it the no in minor that you help to create lines are the five four three two moves so five four three two if you’re new to the series it’s just when you land on the fifth it triggers
- 4:00something to happen so for minor if you land on the fifth of g minor one of the things you can do is go down and grab major seven tonic four three so five would be four would be when i get to four it’s normally two chromatically to three but since i don’t have a chromatic note between two and three i have to jump up and the four to hit the three so here’s four now here’s three
- 4:33[Music] which would just be a triad up from the fifth which is pretty the next one is two which would be now major seven chromatically up to second so here’s five four here’s all them together so you can use any one of those while you’re playing to get that sound you know wherever you
- 5:05start from that time i started from the three when i got to five i just did it let’s see if i start that’s nice phrase too let’s see pretty phrase [Music] really nice so 5432 is important
- 5:41another important thing that you should know in your minor along with everything else is barry’s chromatic scale various chromatic scale is that in between you play a total chromatic scale when you can but in the notes where you don’t have a half step in between uh you use the next scale note higher so for instance in g minor six diminished between g and a there is a half step so we use it between a and b flat there is not a half step so we have to jump up and grab the c
- 6:12so now here’s the first couple now in between b flat and c we don’t need it because it goes perfectly in between c and d we don’t need it so now we got this so far so good now here’s where it gets a little sticky between five and flat six we don’t have a half step so we have to jump up to the next scale note and the next scale note would be major six so that’s a weird one same thing here the flat six we don’t have a half step between flat six and major six so we
- 6:45have to jump up to major seven so now we have now in between major six and major seven we do have a half step in between major seven and tonic we don’t so we have to jump up to two so if i do this scale very slowly and i have to do it slowly because i don’t really know it it would be this [Music] beautiful scale and you also have to do it down the same
- 7:18way so [Music] now let’s see that’s it pretty scale i like to do maybe uh let’s see let’s see that’s nice so we’ll do tonic to third we’ll do a um just a third up when we get to the third up we’ll come down a chord so
- 7:50one two nice phrase one two [Music] that’s nice so i just did um uh the five chromatic down to three which is pretty so you just try to throw those in so [Music] that was i went up and tried
- 8:22[Music] and then i came down a cord it’s got a very pretty minor sound i really love it beautiful so all these little things that we’ve been working on for major and for dominant you try to use them for this minor and this minor six diminished is really a special scale same as his major sixth diminished same as his dominant diminished same as his dominant seven five diminished really all beautiful scales
- 8:56that we use but this minor sound this particular minor sound he really likes it i know he plays harmonic minor too sometimes and i think i have an episode where i did the rules for the harmonic you know i just you make up some rules for the harmonic minor but these are really beautiful so in this episode we just discovered the minor six diminished scale playing up and down thirds triads chords then we worked on five four three two in minor then we worked on um barry’s chromatic scale
- 9:27using the minor six diminished so all those things together i mean i know for me i have to practice the minor six diminished scale with those chromatics because i don’t have that together yet but anyway until next time enjoy practicing lines from your minor six diminished thanks