As with almost all folk happy music, the early classical jazz of New Orleans had harmony in the songs was based initially on the simplicity of a triad of major chords and in particular of 1-4-5 (the 12-bars blues deviated later to 5-2-1, substituting 4 with its minor relative 2).
Nevertheless even early classical jazz is known for its reach chromatic harmony, and this seems as a contradiction but it is not!
What happens here is what happens with a free accompanying of an improvisational melody with a chord. The chord fits as long as at least half of the the time that notes of the melody sound , are from notes that belong to the chord at various octaves.
Similarly an early classical jazz song is supposed to be on diatonic scale (or mode of it) as long as at least half of the the time that notes of the melody sound , are from notes that belong to the diatonic scale at various octaves.
Thus the triad 1-4-5 will work at least half of the time, with other chords either from this diatonic scale or from the chromatic 12-notes scale appearing if necessary as a closer follow-up of the melody!
Here is an example of such early classical jazz songs played by the marvelous band Tuba Skinny:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ7mg9Kl-RU
ACCOMPANYING WITH SINGLE POWER CHORD:
And there is more on this!
The harmony of a jazz improvisation song can be simplified nor to three but to a single chord!
E.g. If the improvisation song is in Bb, the single accompanying chord will be the power-5 chord on the root Bb3-F4-Bb4. Then two completely different melodies that are at least 50% in the scale and that follow the same rhythm, will very well be accepted as improvisational parallel countermelodies within the base simple harmony. (see also posts 71 ,126, 128, 135, 138, 141 )
Nevertheless even early classical jazz is known for its reach chromatic harmony, and this seems as a contradiction but it is not!
What happens here is what happens with a free accompanying of an improvisational melody with a chord. The chord fits as long as at least half of the the time that notes of the melody sound , are from notes that belong to the chord at various octaves.
Similarly an early classical jazz song is supposed to be on diatonic scale (or mode of it) as long as at least half of the the time that notes of the melody sound , are from notes that belong to the diatonic scale at various octaves.
Thus the triad 1-4-5 will work at least half of the time, with other chords either from this diatonic scale or from the chromatic 12-notes scale appearing if necessary as a closer follow-up of the melody!
Here is an example of such early classical jazz songs played by the marvelous band Tuba Skinny:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ7mg9Kl-RU
ACCOMPANYING WITH SINGLE POWER CHORD:
And there is more on this!
The harmony of a jazz improvisation song can be simplified nor to three but to a single chord!
E.g. If the improvisation song is in Bb, the single accompanying chord will be the power-5 chord on the root Bb3-F4-Bb4. Then two completely different melodies that are at least 50% in the scale and that follow the same rhythm, will very well be accepted as improvisational parallel countermelodies within the base simple harmony. (see also posts 71 ,126, 128, 135, 138, 141 )
