I only play single note. I like droning bass notes. I like harps with equal tuning. I like Lee Oskar Melody Maker's which let me switch between blues and modal.
I've been trying to understand what Jimmy Page has been doing this whole time, and I think I finally get.
Anyone else familiar with this term, "blues-modal harmony"? The author of the page seems to be suggesting it as a new part of music theory.
----------
Last Edited by on Dec 17, 2012 12:00 PM
Ah yes, Modal....Another one of the ways that Miles Davis changes the course of music during his lifetime.
"Kind of Blue" was released in 1959 and it created quite a stir amongst musicians of all styles. What follows is copied from Wikipedia:
In 1953, the pianist George Russell published his Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization, which offered an alternative to the practice of improvisation based on chords and chord changes. Abandoning the traditional major and minor key relationships of classical music, Russell developed a new formulation using scales, or a series of scales, for improvisations: This approach led the way to "modal" in jazz. Influenced by Russell's ideas, Davis implemented his first modal composition with the title track of his studio album Milestones (1958), and his first sessions with Bill Evans, 1958 Miles. Satisfied with the results, Davis prepared an entire album based on modality. Pianist Bill Evans, who had studied with Russell but recently departed from Davis's sextet to pursue his own career, was drafted back into the new recording project, the sessions that would become Kind of Blue.
The album's influence has reached beyond jazz, as musicians of such genres as rock and classical have been influenced by it, while critics have written about it as one of the most influential albums of all time. Many improvisatory rock musicians of the 1960s referred to Kind of Blue for inspiration, along with other Davis albums, as well as Coltrane's modal records My Favorite Things (1961) and A Love Supreme (1965). Guitarist Duane Allman of the Allman Brothers Band said his soloing on songs such as "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed" "comes from Miles and Coltrane, and particularly Kind of Blue. I've listened to that album so many times that for the past couple of years, I haven't hardly listened to anything else." Pink Floyd keyboardist Richard Wright has said that the chord progressions on the album influenced the structure of the introductory chords to the song "Breathe" on their landmark opus The Dark Side of the Moon (1973). In his book Kind of Blue: The Making of a Miles Davis Masterpiece, writer Ashley Kahn wrote "still acknowledged as the height of hip, four decades after it was recorded, Kind of Blue is the premier album of its era, jazz or otherwise. Its vapory piano introduction is universally recognized". Producer Quincy Jones, one of Davis' longtime friends, wrote: "That [Kind of Blue] will always be my music, man. I play Kind of Blue every day—it's my orange juice. It still sounds like it was made yesterday". Pianist Chick Corea, one of Miles' acolytes, was also struck by its majesty, later stating "It's one thing to just play a tune, or play a program of music, but it's another thing to practically create a new language of music, which is what Kind of Blue did." ---------- The Iceman
Yep. Without sharps and flats you can create each mode by starting on a different note on a piano (so you don't touch the black keys). Key signatures are just a way to restore the pattern for major or minor. The major pattern starts on C and the natural minor pattern starts on A if you don't use the black keys. The circle of fifths is just a fancy way of showing how close to using the same combination of white and black keys a key is. C doesn't use any. Keys are created by adding either sharps or flats. Sharps raise the pitch by a 1/2 step, flats lower it by a 1/2 step. That means that some notes can be referred to by two names, although one is usually more common. You can, for instance, find harps labeled Gb or F#, but they are the same thing.
On the right side of the circle you add sharps to create the keys. On the left, you add flats. It's all about keeping the same pattern of steps and half-steps. Even if you can't read sheet music, you can memorize how many flats or sharps a key has and count them on sheet music to figure out the harp to use. The only tricky part left is figuring out if it's in major or minor, which will determine which position you use.
The circle of fifths is a handy way to visualize closely related keys and closely related keys are what allow us to play a diatonic harmonica in keys it wasn't made for.
Ignore the key signatures and the circle allows to easily find typical chord progression used in blues and jazz.
For example, find Bb on the circle. The chords to a Bb blues are Bb, Eb (one step counterclockwise), and F (one step clockwise). The chords to the bridge of "I Got Rhythm" in Bb are D, G, C, F and back to Bb for the last 8 bars, which is just jumping 4 steps clockwise and then stepping through the chords counter clockwise.
KillerJoe, I didn't post the link before, but there are stripped down versions. It's all useful as you learn more theory, but the essential part for a harp player is the progression of major keys (the red lettering in caps). It tells you all your cross harps. You just go one space counterclockwise and there you are. You can also figure out all the positions with it. Of course, you can do the same thing with this piece of gibberish I made up:
Baby (flat) Elephants (flat) And (flat) Donkeys (flat) Go (flat) Baby Elephants And Donkeys Go Circle of Fifths
You start on Bb and go around the circle. You just wait for the band leader to call the key and say the mnemonic in your head. Go one key past and that's your cross harp (and go back to the start at the end).
If you arrange your harps according to the circle of fifths it can also be really useful for finding the keys of songs. When your harps are arranged alphabetically (lowest to highest or vice versa) it's harder to hone in on the key. In circle of fifths order you start by playing one harp. If it sounds terrible, jump to the other side of the circle. If it sounds okay, but not quite right, you can just move a couple of harps. This works because the keys next to each other have most of the same notes (sharps, flats or naturals). If you can remember that little gibberish thing you can write out the circle of fifths. If you can remember that A minor is the relative minor of C Major you can use the same gibberish to write out all of the relative minor keys, or count to whatever position you want.
If you can remember one more mnemonic (one that works both directions) you can remember, or figure out, the name of every note in the scale. Battle Ends And Down Goes Charle's Father is the order you add flats to the left side of the circle. Father Charles Goes Down And Ends Battle is the order you add sharps to the right side of the circle.
We play an instrument that is designed to be diatonic, that is, only play in one major key. In truth, most of us don't even play in the key it was designed to play in most of the time. We play in cross-harp, second position. That means when someone calls a key we have to know which harp to pick up. It also means we can get away without knowing some of the finer points of theory and fake our way through, but if you've got a guitar player who is still struggling to learn keys being able to tell him which notes are in it is a big help.
I'm a guitar teacher that dabbles in harp purely for fun. It's always struck me as strange that harp players don't associate a mode with a position and a tonality. Playing 2nd pos is Mixolydian and Major, 3rd is Dorian and Minor etc. And harp is great for exploring modes because if you ignore 1st and 4th positions you've got all the other "exotic" modes to go at. 6th pos gives you the Locrian mode, you'd describe it as diminished and also as well weird.
I keep a little circle in my harp box for two of the reasons mentioned above by others. 1) To find the position harp for the key. Counting counterclockwise: If 'C' is '1', counterclockwise one position is F or '2nd' Bb is 3'd etc. 2) to identify the 1,4,5 chords for any key quickly. Start on the tonic (the key your in - or the '1' ) one on the left (counterclockwise) is your '4', one to the right of your tonic is your '5'
I used to have this big ass chart on the back of my old box - see my signature picture below: The small circle has replaced in my new box. ----------
Last Edited by on Dec 19, 2012 1:31 PM
Bah. You really don't need all this pesky music "theory" stuff. You guys are trapped in your narrow thinking. Modal prisoners, as it were. The key of harp doesn't matter. Just pick one and wail. You're a harmonica player. Keys just don't enter into it.
I like knowing the Co5 because 2nd pos. isn't default for me. The 7 natural modes all have different sounds and it's good to be able to use them for your blues. For example, that weird Locrian mode can sound hysterically grieved, and that can be great for blues. Now, how am I supposed to use that crazy mode, say, in E, if I don't know my Co5?
I grilled my harmonica teacher on what key/type of harp to use with the posted LedZep song. He advised 2nd and 5th position on an "F" to get to the C stuff and Am stuff. So, those are the two modes in the song (I think).
I was also trying to mix it up with an Am Lee Oskar Natural Minor, and G Lee Oskar Melody Maker... with mixed results.
But would love to hear recommendations on key/type of harp.
@Duke I'm not sure that I'm Gonna Crawl is an example of blues-modal harmony. The song is based around a I - VIb - V trick, whereas I think that blues modal involves the use of IIIb and Viib chords. Could be wrong as I found the link a fair way past my musical understanding.
a I - VIb is an ominous sounding chord change, it gives quite a minor sound to my ears, even though the chords are major.
Anyway, I think that either an F (in second) or perhaps an Ab in 5th are the best harps to try.
The problem is that Ab chord (Ab - C - Eb). In second, holding the C sounds fine, but you are limited for options. The flat third (Eb) works if I keep the intonation consistent, but I found the dominant seventh note (Gb, a four draw bend) didn't work, at least to my ears.
5th position isn't bad, and you can play an arpeggio against the Ab chord (say 5d, 6d, 7b) but it's very limited for the Am part.
Thanks, GamblersHand. I'm starting to get a better understanding of these chord progressions in blues songs - I thought it was all I-IV-V. But now, I'm going to be on the look-out for blues-modal harmony chord progressions as well.
Plus, as @Gerry pointed out, the different positions are like modes. I don't usually change positions during a song, but finding the right position to match the mode of the song - like you noted with the Ab harp - is a new challenge for me. It's a fun puzzle to solve.
I'm starting to believe this stuff is "Modern Blues Harmonica". Not just playing in 2nd position to a I-IV-V song, but really making an effort to get the most harmony out of the song, esp more complexly structured songs with modal progressions.
Yeah, I gotta break out of this I-IV-V midset. I thought learning about these modes was going to lead me to learning more scales, but now I want to hear these different chord progressions in songs first - gotta train my ear.
Started taking guitar lessons (finally) and few years ago, and that's helping - I can imagine the chord in head, and try to remember the notes/scale that it's from.
Last Edited by on Dec 17, 2012 12:00 PM
