Article 1
Hearing Notes in a Harmonic Context

Article 2
Notes of Departure ...and Arrival

Article 3
The Desired Dissonance of the Diminished Chord, Part I

Article 4
The Desired Dissonance of the Diminished Chord, Part II

Elements of Jazz by Greg Fishman

Notes of Departure…and Arrival

One of the most common challenges for the aspiring improviser is the task of “hitting” the changes of a tune when playing eighth-notes. Generating eighth-notes can be easily achieved by playing a scale or arpeggiating a chord. However, it’s not quite this simple to come up with a good eighth-note line.

Let’s examine what makes an eighth-note line “good.” A good eighth-note line manages to outline, suggest or “hit” the chord changes of a song. In other words, even if there were no piano and no bass playing to accompany the line, the single note line should suggest or imply the harmony in such a way that the listener would be able to tell, for example, if the improviser were outlining the chords or “changes” to, say, “Green Dolphin Street,” or “Satin Doll.”

The most common chord progression in “standard” jazz tunes is what is known as a “ii min7 / V7 / I Maj7” progression, or Dmin7 / G7 / CMaj7 (in the key of C). I feel that the first step to successfully playing on tunes with “changes” is to train the ear to hear it’s way through this common progression. Progression is the key word here…the chords are changing.

It’s something like navigating a ship through some rocky waters. You can’t just go straight and hope that you’ll be “lucky” and not hit any rocks. You also can’t get too fixated on one particular rock for too long. You can be staring at the rock you just missed, and then bang into another one that you didn’t see coming!

Making the changes, or “hitting” the changes is simply a matter of training the ear to hear in a specific way. Most young improvisers get into trouble with changes because they can’t hear “ahead” in the chord progression. They deal with each chord as it comes up.

This would be like driving your car at 40 mph and waiting until you were only one foot in front of a street sign, and then suddenly looking up at the sign to see if that’s where you have to turn! You’ll either lose control of the car when you turn at that high speed, or you’ll pass the street and have to turn around and come back to it.

However, after you’ve driven to this location a few times, you’ll seem to instinctively know to slow down, and when to turn on your turn-signal. After you’ve driven to this location many times, you’ll find alternate routes, and even be able to come to the location from a different direction.

The following examples will help train your ear to carefully hear its way through the chord progression. To keep things simple, I’ve used all two-measure examples with the Dmin7 / G7 / CMaj7 progression.

Before I go into a detailed explanation of the examples, I’d like you, at this time, to please play through the all of the examples several times at the piano and/or on your horn. There are five examples in all, and they’ll train you to hear your way from the root of the Dmin7 chord to the Root, 3rd, 5th, 7th and 9th of the CMaj7 chord. I’ve given four examples of possible eighth-note lines to demonstrate this concept.

Did you notice that each set of examples started with two whole notes? These are important! Think of them as your musical points of departure (the first whole note) and arrival (the second whole note.)

Please go back to your instrument now, and play through the examples again, noticing the way in which the eighth-note lines use the whole notes as departure and arrival points.

It’s important that you hear the Dmin7 / G7 / CMaj7 chord progression on a piano or guitar, and sing these whole notes while playing the progression. This will help to plant the sound of these two musical “locations” in your mind’s ear.

The next step is to sing or play the eighth-note line examples. Notice that each line has what I like to call a very soft, yet solid “landing.” This effect is achieved by leading into the arrival whole note with a distance of a whole step or half step. (In more advanced situations, you can lead in with much larger intervals, but for purposes of ear training, I’m limiting this example to an interval of a whole step for arriving at the second note.)

Notice that I don’t use just a single scale or chord arpeggio. While it is possible to simply play a C Major scale through the progression, I find that it lacks harmonic definition necessary to really outline the changes effectively. I’ve found that a combination of scale fragments, chord arpeggios, and intervals allow the most flexibility when trying to arrive at the “destination” note.

Also, notice that chord tones occur on all downbeats in measure one of each example. This helps give clarity to the chord’s “quality” (whether it’s major, minor or dominant.) It is also worthwhile to notice the close connection of the “and” of beat two and the way in which it leads to the downbeat of beat three. More often than not, it is connected by a whole step or half step. This helps to strengthen and smooth out the sound of the connection between the Dmin7 chord and the G7 chord.

It’s important to understand that there’s nothing random-sounding about these lines. They’re designed specifically to start moving you immediately to your “destination” note. The lines start moving forward on the “and” of beat one of the first measure.

I give four examples of different “routes” the eighth-note lines can take to arrive at the same destination note. However, it’s important to understand that I wrote these lines by “ear,” and NOT by music theory. I heard them in this way and played them on my instrument. It was not luck, but experience, and a specific way of hearing these sounds in my ear that led me to these eighth-note lines. All the theory came AFTER I played the lines, and not before.

I doubt if I would have arrived at such smooth sounding lines by theory alone. I’ve tried writing lines based strictly on music theory, and my conclusion is this: They work “on paper,” but in reality, tend to sound stiff or cold. The reason being that raw theory alone doesn’t take stylistic or idiomatic tendencies or traditions into consideration. The idiom of Jazz, especially, has a style which is based on a very strong musical tradition.

My sources for all of this knowledge were not books. Rather, they were the classic recordings of all time, by the legendary jazz greats: Charlie Parker, Sonny Stitt, Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins, Joe Henderson, Clifford Brown, Bud Powell, Oscar Peterson, etc. etc. Through intensive study of the works by these artists, over the years, I arrived at certain guidelines to deal with every imaginable musical situation.

After playing through all of these examples, try to write four examples of your own, using the guidelines outlined above.

This is merely a starting point for this type of exercise. I strongly recommend using all chord tones as a starting or “departure” point. For example, all of these lines were written with the root of the Dmin7 chord as the “departure” point. Try writing more lines, using the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, 11th and 13th as departure points. Notice, however, that you will sometimes have to accommodate the G7 chord by giving it it’s own arrival point. For example, if you start with a the seventh of the Dmin7, a “C,” you’ll have to either lower it to a “B” on beat three, or raise it to a “D” to insure that it doesn’t clash with the G7 chord.

It should also be noted that your “arrival point” could be a lower note than your departure point. This opens up many more possibilities for eighth-note lines. Also, it’s important to transpose these exercises to all twelve keys. I can’t stress this point enough!

Please keep in mind that this is primarily a way of training your ear and mind to hear, in a logical and melodic way, through the chord changes. Once you’ve achieved this goal, you should move on to more varied approaches to “hitting” the changes. I think that you’ll find the task much easier and more fun after you’ve worked on this exercise for a few months.


This article is © 2003 by Greg Fishman. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Saxophonist Greg Fishman holds a Masters Degree in Jazz Pedagogy from Northwestern University, and is a teacher of jazz theory and improvisation. His writing credits include three Stan Getz transcription books, published by Hal Leonard, and liner notes for the Verve record label. He has played with a variety of jazz ensembles, among them, The Woody Herman Band, Louie Bellson, and Slide Hampton. He currently performs and records with guitarist/singer Paulinho Garcia, his partner in TWO FOR BRAZIL, and with pianist Judy Roberts. Visit Greg at: www.gregfishman.com. Email: greg1111@aol.com.