In plain words
Barry blamed modern teaching for moving the left hand up to the middle-C area, so that children now play their chords there with the left hand. He called that unmusical, mocked beginner books that use the treble clef for everything, and said Chopin did not learn that way. He met the habit everywhere he taught, from Italy to Japan and Australia, and blamed schools that never asked the jazz musicians what to teach.
Believe: a talk to musicians3:274:01Barry Harris - Ciclo Jazz Internacional | Centro Cultural Kirchner9:089:43
The jazz masters did not do it either. Art Tatum, Bud Powell, Monk and Dave Brubeck, he said, did not keep the left hand up high all the time; the only ones he knew who did were Erroll Garner and Red Garland, and he did not see why that should be the rule. Red Garland, he said, started playing chords way up high in Miles Davis’s band, when Miles had fallen for Ahmad Jamal’s little touches.
Small chords, not big ones1:402:13Believe: a talk to musicians47:25Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶479
The usual excuse is that the low register belongs to the bass. Barry rejected it: no bassist he played with, George Duvivier included, ever told him he was too low. Bass players used to stand at the pianist’s left to watch his left hand, he said, because the pianist knew about movement. Keeping the hand up also leaves chords unplayed: a graduating piano class he met had never played one he showed them.
Believe: a talk to musicians16:4317:1717:5022:00Artists House Master Class Barry Harris - Student Interviews After Concert7:53
Low is not enough. In the class where he plays Bud Powell’s Oblivion, Barry complained that everyone’s left hand drifts up into the same sound; he wanted to see the left hand, and said he did not believe in chords in the left hand. When he moved between minor sixth chords he let the left hand do the moving, and from a held chord he could move just the left hand.
Bud Powell’s Oblivion0:000:451:19Practising the sixth diminished scales11:2412:41Chords become scales1:20
How he said to practise it
Practise changing between minor sixth chords a minor third apart (B♭m6 to D♭m6, Fm6 to A♭m6, A♭m6 to Bm6), and let the left hand make the move.
Take a chord you know and look for every way to move it: the top note, the bottom note, or the left hand alone.
In Barry’s words
Each one plays from the moment he says it. Every other moment he teaches it is listed below.
I don’t want to hear it... I want to see the left hand.
I wanted to give you an idea of what kind of person I am. I do not believe in chords with the left hand... I don’t want to hear no chords.
Now they say you interfere with the bass player if you play low.
The bass player standing on the left side, that’s the way you used to stand and watch the piano play with the left hand. That’s really the truth.
Where this comes from
Everything above is drawn from these. Open any one to check it.
Every moment he teaches it12 moments in 7 recordings
Each time opens the transcript there; the video plays when you are online.
Bud Powell’s Oblivion
Believe: a talk to musicians
- 3:27
Somebody moved the left hand up to middle C; beginner books are all treble clef; Chopin didn’t learn that way.
- 16:43
A graduating piano class had never played a chord he showed them; they keep the left hand up for the bass.
- 17:50
No bassist, George Duvivier included, ever told him he played too low.
- 22:00
The bass belongs beside the pianist’s left hand, because the pianist knows about movement.
- 47:25
Red Garland began playing chords way up high with Miles, who loved Ahmad Jamal’s little things.
Barry Harris - Ciclo Jazz Internacional | Centro Cultural Kirchner
- 9:08
In Buenos Aires: a worldwide misconception pulls the left hand up; it belongs down in the bass.
Small chords, not big ones
- 1:40
Tatum, Bud, Monk and Brubeck didn’t keep the left hand high; only Erroll Garner and Red Garland.
Artists House Master Class Barry Harris - Student Interviews After Concert
- 7:53
They say playing low interferes with the bass; bassists used to stand left to watch the pianist.
Practising the sixth diminished scales
- 12:41
Moving between minor sixth chords: what the left hand can do is unbelievable; let it do the moving.
Chords become scales
- 1:20
From one chord he can move the top and bottom, or just the left hand.
From the lessons1 lesson, 6 points
Notes taken from Barry’s classes, each tied to the moment it comes from.
Keep the left hand low, and make it interesting
- Idea
Barry objects that piano teaching has moved the left hand up to the middle-C area, so that young pianists play their chords with the left hand there. He calls this unmusical, criticises beginner books that use the treble clef for everything, and argues that Chopin and the classical masters did not learn that way and seldom kept the left hand that high.
- Idea
The jazz masters didn’t do it either. Barry says Art Tatum, Bud Powell, Monk, Dave Brubeck and others did not keep the left hand up that high all the time; the only ones he knows who did were Erroll Garner and Red Garland. So he sees no reason for it to be the rule for every pianist today.
- Idea
Barry recalls that his generation learned to play chords with both hands, and that none of the older pianists he names, Hank Jones, Duke Jordan and John Lewis, played with the left hand up high and single notes in the right. Whoever invented that rule, he says, it did not come through the elders.
Artists House Master Class Barry Harris - Student Interviews After Concert7:538:289:01
- Idea
The usual excuse is that the low register belongs to the bass player. Barry disagrees: in all his years with bassists such as George Duvivier, not one ever told him he was playing too low. Bass players, he says, used to stand to the pianist’s left precisely to watch the pianist’s left hand, because pianists knew more harmony.
Believe: a talk to musicians16:4317:50Artists House Master Class Barry Harris - Student Interviews After Concert7:53
- Idea
- Idea
Barry kept taking weekly lessons from his own teacher, who made him work on his left hand after his stroke. He said it was still not back to normal, but that he had fallen in love with what it could now do: no longer able to do so much with it, he lays it down gently and it accompanies nicely.
In writing5 notes
What his interviews, his students’ class notes and other teachers’ articles add.
In a 2000 phone interview Barry named Monk, Art Tatum, Bud Powell, Al Haig and Bill Evans as pianists who did not play the new way, with chords only in the left hand. All you have to do is listen, he said: nobody who really listens to Monk could play like that.
At a Tuesday-night workshop in December, Allen Morrison heard Barry pass on Coleman Hawkins’s advice to a pianist: don’t play chords up in the high register, play them down low. Little chords, Barry stressed.
Forum members who listened closely to Barry’s playing describe a left hand that is seldom busy when he solos: a bass note and perhaps one more note, or a single loud note as rhythmic punctuation, with the colour coming from the right hand. One ties this to his complaint that pianists put the left hand too high.
jazzguitar.be members (usernames kept per post), Things I learned from Barry Harris Study Group ¶55jazzguitar.be members (usernames kept per post), Things I learned from Barry Harris Study Group ¶56jazzguitar.be members (usernames kept per post), Things I learned from Barry Harris Study Group ¶57
Sitting beside the piano at a London trio gig, a listener noticed Barry sometimes playing just one note, perhaps a fifth, in the left hand under his right-hand solo, which gave a spare, lean sound.
Vera Marijt’s study of Barry’s diminished teaching shows the sixth diminished scale played in the left hand as a bass line: over Dø7, G7alt, Cmaj7 she runs the F minor 6 diminished scale, then the A♭ minor 6 diminished scale.
Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper) ¶73Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper) ¶74Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper) ¶75Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper) ¶76
Read further4 links
These open on the web.
Free to read
- Barry Harris on WKCR-FM
— Barry in his own words (2000) on left-hand chords and the pianists who never played that way.
- Allen Morrison, Inside the Barry Harris Method
— A workshop report with Hawkins’s advice, via Barry, to play little chords low.
- Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper)
— Vera Marijt’s paper, with left-hand bass lines built from the sixth diminished scales.
Books and paid courses
- The Barry Harris Workshop Video Part Two, Howard Rees: ~4h15, 156-page workbook; chapters Improvisation (49 sections), Rhythm Section (17), Harmony (41)
Barry himself (produced and transcribed by Howard Rees) — Barry on video with a rhythm-section chapter on small chords and his voicings (paid; contents free).