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Friday, January 29, 2021

358. HOW TO LEARN TO PLAY THE HARP WHEN YOU ARE ALREADY A GUITAR PLAYER

 HOW TO PLAY THE HARP WHEN YOU ARE A GUITAR PLAYER

(See also  post 260)

When you are a guitar player and also you play the harp (e.g.like Edmar Castaneda) , then you have finger nails only at the right hand , not at the left hand, and also the right hand is faster and more skilled in playing melodies compared to the left hand. It is not like a piano player who he may have trained both hands to play almost at the same complexity level. Then in such a situation , the harp player starts in playing with the right hand the melodic improvisation and with the lelft hand the simplicial submelody at lower octaves, which are so that there is one note per underlying chord , thus slow in changing, like the chords in a chord progression. In fact we just play at first one note almsot randomnly with the left hand when we feel that the chord changes or when we finish with the melodic theme with the right hand, and if the note that almost randomnly we play is not the right feeling we create a chromatic bass line up ot down till we end to a note that feels well and is in the underlying chord. Then as the skill is evolved instead of one only note per chord of the simplicial submelody we may start playing the whole chord or a bass-line over the chord.

Thursday, January 28, 2021

357. HOW TO CREATE A DOUZEN AND A WHOLE BUNDLE OF ALTERNATIVE SIMPLICIAL SUB-MELODIES OVER A CHORD PROGRESSION SO AS TO CREATE A MULTITUDE OF IMPROVISATION VARIATIONAL FULL MELODIES

 As we have mentioned earlier in many other posts,when starting from a chord progression so as to improvise melodically, one good starting point is to create at first a simple melody as simple as the chord progression e.g. one note per chord which we have called simplicial submelody (like a one note per chord bass line). 


E.G.  Let us start with achord progression inspired from the laton  jazz melody blue bossa in G major



Em       Am

D7       G

C         Am

B7        Em


Then we add one note per chord (mainly  the middle 3rd whcich discriminates majors from minor) and so we get the (we simboloze the notes of the G major by the numbers 1,2,3,4,5,6,7) 

1             4

Em       Am

7            3

D7       G

6            2

C         Am

5#          6

B7        Em


Till now we have not bridged the gap between the complexity of an improvisational melody and a chord progression (or complexity of the simplicial submelody).


But since for a chord of 3 notes we also have 3 possible notes for the simplicial submelody  corresponding to being  the 1st 2nd or 3rd, or 1st voice 2nd voice and 3rd voice, we may as well create many more simplicial sub-melodies that are x1% 1st voice x2% 2nd voice and x3% 3rd voice (x1%+x2%+x3%=100%) to the original simplicial submelody  . 

Now we do have the bridge between the complexity of one chord progression and the complexity of the improvisation melody. For each variation of the simplicial submelody (we may create easily a bundle and a dozen  of then for each  triad x1%+x2%+x3%=100% ) we ceate an alternative improvisation melody which is simply an embelishment of the corresponding simplicial submelody with waving of 2nds (or 3rds or 4ths and 5ths) and embelishment which is usually adding notes between two notes of the simplicial submelody as "bridge" or "bass-line" connectingthe two succesive underlying chords of the chord progression.

More advanced considereations include perceiving small melodic themes for any pair of succesive chords, and then variations of them by translations, inversions and dilations. 


Sunday, January 3, 2021

353. THE 8-NOTES SCALE OF NATURAL OVERTONES AT THE 4TH OCTAVE : IN SEMITONES 2-2-2-1-1-2-1-1 OR 2-2-1-2-1-2-1-1 AND ITS CHROMATIC TONALITY

 

THIS SCALE IN THE MODE  1 2 2 2 1 1 2 1



.
IS ALSO KNOWN AS THE 8-NOTES Neapolitan Major and Minor mixed
IT OCCURS AS THE 8 OVERTONES 8th-9th-10th-11th-12th-13th-14th-15th-16th AT THE 4TH OCTAVES OF OVERTONES ON ALL BRASS WIND INSTRUMENTS. IT IS  ESPECIALLY MUCH OF USE IN THE BAROQUE NATURAL HORNS AND BAROQUE NATURAL TRUMPET AS WELL AS IN THE BAROQUE AND MODERN FRENCH HORN.


E.g. if the root of the scale is C the harmonics from 8 to 16  are   the notes 

c-d-e-f#-g-g#-a#-b-c





As far as harmony and chords is concerned this 8-notes scale adds to the standard  7-notes diatonic scale  c-d-e-f-g-a-b-c the next major or minor chords

1) e-g#-b = E= 3M
2) d-f#-a=D=2M
3) g-a#-d=Gm=5m 


This harmony but also the blue notes of this 8-notes scale (f#, g#, a#) can be also obtained by
superimposing to th C diatonic scale the two neigboring scales in the wheel by 4ths and the harmonic minor , in other words for the C diatonic it would be the  F diatonic (will give a#) and G diatonic (will give  f#) and the A harmonic minor (will give the g#).


AS ALTERNATIVE ROUNDING

We may round the 8-notes chromatic overtones scale at the 4th octave of the overtones to the notes (in C major root)


c-d-e-f-g-g#-a#-b-c

 2-2-1-2-1-2-1-1

Which is known alaso as inverse Zirafkend: Arabic, Melodic Minor Bebop
Or
Inverse Shostakovich
Or 
JG Octatonic
(See post 227) 

As far as harmony and chords is concerned this 8-notes scale adds to the standard  7-notes diatonic scale  c-d-e-f-g-a-b-c the next major or minor chords

1) e-g#-b = E= 3M
2) g-a#-d=Gm=5m