Mike's Music Musings

My goal was to invent some new modal voicings for chords to play over "Footprints" other than by stacking thirds (normal chords) or fourths (quartal chords) which I play regularly.  I then though of the more pianistic, cluster chords which include notes a half or whole step apart from each other.  I had already been playing a 3-note Cm9 voicing, comprised of the b7, and the 9 and b3 in the same octave, giving the voicing a tenser, "shimmery" sound due to the half step distance between those two notes.  I sought out to harmonize this Cm9 up the dorian scale to use while comping over "Footprints."  Because there is more space in this tune than bebop songs, you can hang on one of these voicings for awhile and let it shimmer. 

I jammed on Footprints for the first time this week, which was a lot of fun, albeit difficult.  The song is a C minor blues with a twist of a turnaround, which I was unprepared for and slogged through.  Although I've seen several variants of bars 8-10, I'm using the Real Book vol. 6, where the changes are F#m7b5 F7#11 / E7b5#9 A7b5#9. At first it's hard to make sense of these changes.  The usual turnaround to Cm7 would be Dm7b5 G7alt, or Ab7 G7alt. It seems like the turnaround is back cycled up another set of ii-Vs.  So it could be thought of as F#m7 B7 / Em A7 / Dm7b5 G7alt Where the F#m7 is a F#m7b5, B7 is subbed for its tritone F7#11, the Em7 is turned to a dominant chord, and the Dm7b5 G7alt is missing. In the practice room, my first approach was to just play all the arpeggios, and try to stick the landing when I got to Cm7, resolving smoothly.  After I could do that, I  created some more interesting lines of my own.

Sometimes you hear a song which that you can't get out of your head and play on repeat- for me this week, it has been "The Last Thing on my Mind" sung by Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton.  Maybe I'm a little nostalgic for these old-timey country duets that suggest simpler times.  But it's also obvious in the video below that both artists, aside from their great performances, are having fun, making it a joy to watch. Plus the Christmas aesthetic is a nice touch, and I'm amazed that Dolly Parton's hair stays put. Sure it's not jazz, no lydian dominant runs, quartal harmony, or altered scale licks.  But ultimately I'm interested in all types of music, and how that music is constructed.  Working in triads (no seventh chords here, except maybe on the V) with fewer and simpler changes (just I, IV, and V), how does the guitar lead create such active, and captivating lines?

While practicing over the tune "There Will Never Be Another You," my favorite jazz standard to play on, I used a classic jazz lick as a starting point to write a longer line of my own. The chromaticism builds tension and excitement, which is then released playing relatively simply following the Abmaj7. I continue after the ii-V to show how to outline the descending chromatic line that is internal to the skeleton of this tune. So the chromaticism doesn't really stop after my lick. The classic jazz lick (cliche) - can be played over Eb7 or Dbmaj7 as well. My chromatic line.  A lot of energy loaded into this line due to the chromaticism, and by accenting the & of 4.