Blues and the Pentatonic Scale Essential Terms and Symbols Blues Chicago Jazz Classic Jazz Cool Jazz Dixieland Jazz Jazz Kansas City Jazz Ragtime New Orleans Jazz West Coast Jazz    Blues as a Form. The basic form of blues revolves around a twelve bar period in which the lyrics make a statement on the tonic chord (I), then a restatement with more emphasis on the subdominant chord (IV), then a closing statement moving to the dominant chord (V) and finishing on the tonic chord, but typically returning to the beginning using a turnaround progression. A turnaround progression is designed to end a phrase in an incomplete manner, begging for a return to the beginning of the section or phrase.    

    What is Blues? "Man, if you gotta ask, you'll never know" - Louis Armstrong  Blues is a scale, a style, a musical form and a genre of American music that originated in New Orleans after the turn of the 20th century. Blues is characterized by a prominent regular meter, improvisation, distinctive instruments and performance techniques, and swing rhythms. Blues draws from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants and ballads. The blues form is twelve bars in length and the story line is developmental and interactive. Each return to the beginning of the refrain offers a fresh perspective on the lyric last sounded. In this way, blues is a living organism in that it allows the free exploration of the art of storytelling within an essentially fixed structure. The blues also refers to the "the two blue devils,” melancholy and sadness. The great blues singers were and are skilled storytellers, surrounding themselves with a small ensemble of creative interactive musicians. The responsibility of the rhythm section (piano, banjo, guitar, drums, bass, washboard and gutbucket) was to “lay out the changes” (play the right chords at the right time in the right way) and “keep the time.” (do not for any reason drop a beat, miss a cue, or

otherwise get lost). The solo instruments or voices spoke the truth of the blues, which in many cases was a funny story, a painful story or a complaint with which everyone can empathize. Interactively creating music in such a manner has inspired the legend that jazz musicians are somehow “playing by ear” and composing freely in tempo with other people doing the same thing. This is not quite accurate, given the existence of a fixed twelve bar form. But make no mistake, the musicians are actually freely talking to each other with their instruments. Individuality is crucial, but the band must gel at all times; after all, the blues band as a whole needs to “keep the soul on a roll.” Basically, the blues scale is based on the minor pentatonic scale. It is a minor pentatonic scale with an extra half step between P4 and P5. When the notes of the blues scale are aligned with tonic, which is a dominant seventh chord, there is a dissonance between the M3 or the tonic and the m3 of the blues scale. When the blues scale built on the 6th degree is sounded against the same tonic chord (F7), the dissonance between the two thirds has been removed. The characteristic cadential formulas are the same harmonically but not melodically. The harmonic movement of tonic to subdominant to tonic to dominant is still present, but the penultimate notes that lead to tonic are different, being drawn from a major pentatonic on C compared to a minor pentatonic on C. Traditional Harmonic Movement with Nontraditional Chord Qualities. The root progressions of blues draw from the Western European model of tonal harmony. That is, the system diagramed on the Circle of Fifths still functions in Blues and jazz. The chord qualities built on these tonal movements are altered from their otherwise diatonic structure. In blues, tonic is a dominant seventh chord, as is the IV chord and V chord. For that matter, most of the time II and VI are dominant seventh chords also. As would be expected, there are as many variations of the blues progression within the otherwise fixed form of twelve bars as there are cities, towns and ports of harbor. There are five, however, that seem to appear most often on the band stand.  

A Brief History of Improvisation: Where’s the Melody? Throughout the Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods, improvisation was a highly valued skill. The earliest treatises on polyphony acknowledge that additional musical parts were improvised for centuries before the first notated examples appeared. Many classical forms contained sections for improvisation, such as the cadenza or the prelude.

§ Throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance, the ability to improvise counterpoint over a cantus firmus (a fixed melody) constituted a part of every musician's education

§ Eighteenth century treatises suggest that flutists, oboists, violinists, and other melodic instruments were expected to improvise preludes.

§ Improvised accompaniment over a figured bass was a common practice of the Baroque era. § Beethoven and Mozart left excellent examples of their improvisations in their sets of variations

and in their cadenzas. § Improvisation is one of the basic tenets of jazz. § Silent film music performers were required to spontaneously match the style and pacing of the

films they accompanied at first sight, § Classic rock and blues musicians still routinely take extended solos, drawing on the rich

tradition of improvising artists who performed and recorded before them. § One of the core components of hiphop is improvising lyrics. Free styling, as it is known, is

considered an indication of a rapper’s skills. This is particularly true in rap battles, in which contestants must create on-the-fly rhymes to insult their opponents.

Improvisation is not only the domain of a blues and jazz musician, but that particular skill set requires immediate and instantaneous composition at a typically fixed tempo. Balancing expectation and disappointment, resolution and ambiguity, motion and repose becomes the chief responsibility of the improvising artist. Whether shredding up a Stratocaster solo, blowing changes on the bandstand, or spontaneously changing keys, tempo and meter, the improvising musician must master all elements of musical construction and form.

What is Jazz?

1. Ragtime: The precursor to jazz, early Ragtime composers borrowed from marches, waltzes and other traditional song forms with the common characteristic being the prominence of syncopated notes and rhythms.

2. Classic Jazz (New Orleans Jazz): At the beginning of the 20th century, the “New Orleans,” or

"Classic Jazz" style arose with brass bands that were performing for parties and dances in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the musical instruments had been salvaged from the Confederate War; the clarinet, cornet, trombone, tuba, banjo, bass, guitar, drums and occasionally a piano. Musical arrangements varied considerably from performance to performance and combined the syncopations of ragtime with adaptations of popular melodies, hymns, marches, work songs and the Blues.

3. Dixieland: A mature form of the New Orleans collective improvisation style

4. Hot Jazz : Around 1925, cornetist Louis Armstrong recorded the first of his Hot Five band

records. The music was characterized by collective improvisation around the melodic structure that ideally built up to an emotional "Hot" climax.

5. Chicago Style: The Chicago style was characterized by harmonically complex and innovative

arrangements with a high technical ability of the local musicians. Chicago style jazz significantly inspired the technique of improvised music.

6. Swing: During the 1930s, most of the jazz groups were Big Bands playing swing music. An

offshoot of the New Orleans jazz style, swing was dance music and was the popular music of its era.

7. Kansas City Style: During the Depression and Prohibition eras, the Kansas City jazz scene

thrived, characterized by soulful and bluesy styling of both big bands and smaller ensembles.

8. Gypsy Jazz: Originated by French guitarist Django Reinhart, Gypsy jazz is an unlikely mix of 1930s American swing, French dance hall "musette" and the folk strains of Eastern Europe. The main instruments are nylon stringed guitars and the occasional violin and double bass.

9. Bebop: Prior to the 1940s, jazz improvisation was chiefly derived from the original melody.

Quite different from the popular dance sounds of swing and the big bands that dominated the musical scene, bebop divorced itself from popular dance music, threw out the cumbersome arrangements for big band, reduced the size of the ensemble, and emphasized performance technique and harmonic fluidity.

10. Vocalese: The art of composing a lyric and singing it in the same manner as a recorded

instrumental solo, Vocalese reached its highest level from 1957-62.

11. Mainstream: After the end of the Big Band era, large ensembles broke into smaller more cost effective groups and Swing music continued to flourish.

12. Cool: The style that emerged from Los Angeles musicians collaborating with New York bebop musicians became known as "cool jazz." Cool jazz avoided the aggressive tempos and harmonic abstraction of bebop placing emphasis on the intellectual aspects of the music.

13. West Coast Jazz: A subset of Cool jazz, musicians from San Francisco and Los Angeles

collaborated through the 1950s.

Group Activities. Blues and Jazz Terminology “Jeopardy” or “The $64,000 Question” Break up into groups a write a Blues lyric, using correct form and structure. Then play a recording of (or perform live) the Blues progression with a walking bassline while each group sings their lyrics. Play examples of different jazz styles from the various periods and play some interesting game, like “Jeopardy”

Worksheet 13-1 Blues Progression in F

Write the blues scale on tonic and the blues scale on the 6th scale degree for the following keys:

Worksheet 13-1 (continued)

Worksheet 13-2 Perform These Jazz Voicings and the Blues Progression

Worksheet 13-3 F Blues, Walking Bassline and Right Hand Comp Pattern

Practice the following exercise in 12 keys.

Worksheet 13-4 Terminology: Blues and Jazz

Match the term on the left to the definition on the right.

1. Bebop

2. Blues

3. Chicago Jazz

4. Classic Jazz

5. Cool Jazz

6. Dixieland Jazz

7. Kansas City Jazz

8. Ragtime

9. New Orleans Jazz

10. West Coast Jazz

11. New Orleans Jazz

A. was the precursor to jazz B. arose at the beginning of the 20th century in New

Orleans. Same as Classic Jazz

C. Same as New Orleans Jazz

D. Mature style of New Orleans jazz

E. was characterized by collective improvisation around the melodic structure that ideally built up to an emotional "Hot" climax.

F. characterized by harmonically complex and

innovative arrangements with a high technical ability of the local musicians.

G. was an offshoot of the New Orleans jazz style,

was dance music and was the popular music of its era.

H. Kansas City Style: During the Depression and

Prohibition eras, this jazz scene thrived, characterized by soulful and bluesy styling of both big bands and smaller ensembles.

I. Originated by French guitarist Django Reinhart,

it is an unusual mix of 1930s American swing, French dance hall "musette" and the folk strains of Eastern Europe.

J. This style divorced itself from popular dance

music, threw out the cumbersome arrangements for big band, reduced the size of the ensemble, and emphasized performance technique and harmonic fluidity.

K. The art of composing a lyric and melody from a

previously recorded instrumental solo.

L. After the end of the Big Band era, large ensembles broke into smaller more cost effective groups and Swing music continued to flourish.

M. The style that emerged from Los Angeles

musicians collaborating with New York bebop musicians, emphasizing the cerebral side of jazz

N. A subset of Cool jazz