Song structure is a strange music theory topic, because there is not much “theory” beyond just describing it. Why are some patterns of song sections so broadly appealing? The answer has something to do with the balancing of surprise and familiarity, of predictability and unpredictability, but if someone has a systematic theory of why some …
Tag Archives: Miles Davis
Identifying phrase structure
It’s easy to understand what a section of a song is: an intro, a verse, a chorus, a bridge. It is less easy to understand phrases, the components of a song section. Usually a song section contains between two and four phrases. But what is a phrase? No one seems totally sure. This is important …
Identifying the diatonic modes
In Aural Skills class we continue our sprint through harmony concepts with the diatonic modes. These are an advanced topic in classical theory, but for popular music, you need to deal with them up front, especially Mixolydian and Dorian. Here are the tunes I’m giving the class to practice distinguishing the modes from each other.
Identifying seventh chords
In aural skills class, we are practicing identifying seventh chords. This is second nature for guitarists and pianists who play anything jazz-related, but I appreciate that it’s harder for singers and players of monophonic instruments. Here’s my reference guide to the four (non-diminished or -augmented) seventh chords.
Freedom Jazz Dance
A friend texted me to tell me that he was listening to a jazz show on public radio in Denver, and that they referenced an old blog post of mine about “Freedom Jazz Dance” by Eddie Harris. That was a pleasant surprise, and it made me want to go back to the post and freshen …
I made a new track for teaching swing
I just finished my Groove Theories book proposal and sent it out, that was about twenty years of very slow work followed by two weeks of very fast work. So fingers crossed on that. I included two sample chapters, one on blues tonality, and one on swing. For the swing chapter, I wanted to find …
RIP Wayne Shorter
In 2013, Wayne Shorter said, “The word ‘jazz’ to me only means ‘I dare you.’” I love Wayne’s playing and writing without always understanding it. I got exposed to both via Miles Davis, who put Wayne’s tunes at the center of his late 1960s albums. Here’s “Orbits” from Miles Smiles. And here’s an orchestral arrangement …
Where do jazz standards come from?
My Song Factory class is coming up on the Standards and Showtunes unit, covering the Great American Songbook. I mainly relate to these tunes via jazz. There are numerous sources of jazz standards. In this post, I collect some of the ones that appear in movie musicals, and I pair each one with a well-known …
Dorian mode
Dorian mode is such a cool scale. It evokes medieval chant and the blues. Its characteristic minor sixth chord is almost a diminished chord. And it’s unique among the diatonic modes for being symmetrical, meaning that it uses the same sequence of intervals going up and down. When you write Dorian on the chromatic circle, …
The microphone placement playlist
Last week in music tech class, we talked about audio recording, and how the placement of microphones relative to the voices or instruments can shape the sound of a recording. Mics don’t just pick up the sound of the voice or instrument itself. They also pick up the sound of the voice or instrument bouncing …