Standards worked in class

The last 16 bars of Indiana in A flat as scales: A flat major up and down, landing on the third of F; B flat 7 up and down; E flat 7 up and down to the third of C; F minor up, E flat 7 down to the third of C (twice); F minor up, B flat 7 down to the third of G; then A flat major up, E flat 7 up, twice.

Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 10:011:081:44

The method is to turn the chords into scales run up, down, or up and down, several of them landing on a target note such as the third of a chord. Barry presents it as a way into any piece: take any tune you want to learn and you can at least learn its scales from it.

Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 11:08

The class played Cherokee in B flat with the melody. Barry outlined the bridge as a chain of dominants resolving to majors: F sharp 7 to B major, E7 to A major, then on to G major, then C7 and F7 leading back to the last section. He then had the class run scales up and down through the bridge.

The 1998 workshop, part 31:03:451:07:531:08:26

Drill: on the bridge play a B major scale, then A major, then G major, counting ‘one two and three and four’. The last two chords are dominants, so you no longer play a major scale: right after the G major go straight into C7, then F7. Barry stressed coming in with the C7 immediately after the G major, and had every pianist come up and do it in turn.

Major scales on the bridge of Cherokee0:351:081:413:06

In All the Things You Are, D flat major goes to D flat minor and then to C minor. A student put a D natural over that C minor and Barry said it was wrong: this C minor 7 belongs to A flat major, so you play the A flat major scale, with D flat in it. He only allows a D natural there if you are thinking of it as the flat five of A flat, and then it has to resolve.

The C minor seventh in All the Things You Are0:002:182:51

Barry told of a very good pianist in Italy who played this tune as if its C minor 7 were the C minor 7 of B flat. You can’t assume every C minor 7 is the same; it depends on the key it belongs to.

The C minor seventh in All the Things You Are7:10

When Barry recorded All the Things You Are, bassist George Duvivier told him how glad he was that Barry played the half-diminished chord at a spot where most people play a plain minor seventh, which Duvivier considered wrong. Barry thinks of that chord as minor seventh flat five because that is logical to him. His broader point: these songs hold pretty, correct chords that most players simply play wrong.

Believe: a talk to musicians17:5018:2318:58

Stella by Starlight does not begin with a II-V but with a single chord: a diminished chord, with a major seventh, over which you can run the scale. Barry points to the film The Uninvited, where Stella is played all the way through, and says Bud Powell played it the way the movie did. Listeners who hear that chord and think the player has it wrong are mistaken.

11 March 2016: Stella by Starlight2:33Believe: a talk to musicians34:40Jazz theory, part 7: Monk and Stella by Starlight10:1010:47

The first music Barry saw of the song was in G, which he gives as the original key. It opened on G major 7 with a diminished chord built on the flat third, B flat diminished. That flat-three diminished is important and often ignored; some play a sharp-one diminished there instead.

11 March 2016: Stella by Starlight2:33Believe: a talk to musicians34:4037:0537:38

When someone came up and said the first chord was E half-diminished, Barry said no. He objects to players who turn everything into II-Vs, such as E half-diminished going to A7: it may sound all right, but it isn’t right.

Believe: a talk to musicians34:4035:15

Barry recalled playing Stella with Chuck Israels, who announced loudly that at last Barry was playing a tune he knew; afterwards he admitted he had only thought he knew it. Barry has examined the song and points to one particular chord in it as the beautiful thing about it.

11 March 2016: Stella by Starlight4:305:04

Stella is one of those songs you should be able to play in any key. The way to do that is not to work out and transpose each chord but to know the movements: the major, relative minor, minor-with-the-sixth-in-the-bass movement from the opening returns later in the tune, and other sections start on the minor and then put the sixth in the bass. Recognising these recurring movements is what lets you move the tune around.

Stella by Starlight7:038:138:47

Barry points out a place in Star Eyes that he says is perfect for running the sixth diminished scale, and shows simply playing the scale there. He then experiments with a student about changing to another minor sixth diminished scale from that spot.

Practising the sixth diminished scales8:589:36

Over the C7, use the fifth and sixth (G and A) with the fourth in a quick sixteenth-note triplet, then go to E (the third of C) and the tonic C, then come down a triad starting from D. The last note lands on F major. Barry then added a pickup to the phrase, the D concert just before it, and liked it better that way.

Confirmation1:462:283:014:17

Another phrase: play the chord on the seventh of F7, approached from a half step below its first note. Then come down chromatically to the tonic of B flat, followed by the fifth, sixth and seventh of B flat 7. Barry pointed out that these pieces go together.

Confirmation5:276:05

Working on Perdido at a fast tempo, Barry had students play the B flat major chord and come down it, stopping on the second. Then play a chord on the third of B flat major in the right hand and come down chromatically from it; he suggested bringing in the fourth finger. The rhythm starts on the ‘and’, and he counted it ‘and-triplet-three-and-four-and-one’.

Fast phrases for Perdido0:000:331:082:20

Barry says you should almost be able to treat Giant Steps the way you treat Rhythm changes, starting anywhere and playing phrases. But players try to play it by thinking of chords, and he insists you can’t think about chords.

Giant Steps in the piano class1:081:44

His way through: play just one beat on the B chord and immediately go to D; you have to get off the B right away and keep changing immediately. He noted he played only one note of B because he hesitated. Moving is easier because B has notes in common with D and every chord has notes right around it, so he thinks of reaching D by a half step. He says this is the only way he can make the tune sound musical.

Giant Steps in the piano class1:442:203:335:26

On Piano Jazz, Barry and his host agreed that the standards have stood up so well because they are among the most beautiful music in the world.

Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland4:05

On Piano Jazz, Body and Soul came up as a tune you can’t play without thinking of Coleman Hawkins. In the conversation someone recalled the luck of playing with Hawkins and Roy Eldridge when they were brought in as guests with a trio at the Embassy (the transcript doesn’t make clear whether this was Barry or his host), and then Barry played the tune. Johnny Green’s song was described as a strong song that nobody will ever forget.

Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland22:3423:1029:16

Barry shared something he had learned about East of the Sun: it was written by Brooks Bowman for a Princeton student show, and Bowman wrote little else. Barry admitted he usually doesn’t know who wrote what, but because of the singers he works with he has become concerned with knowing lyrics.

Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland31:1431:48

Keep learning songs. Barry said a pretty, fairly new tune he had just played was one he only learned in roughly the last ten years, and pointed to other songs worth learning that singers love, such as How Do You Keep the Music Playing and Michel Legrand’s You Must Believe in Spring.

Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland43:2243:57