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exploring the blues
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Subject: exploring the blues From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 30 Jun 07 - 11:50 AM Here it is, Saturday morning, and it's raining. It's been raining, with a few short remissions, since Tuesday evening. I suppose this is a side effect of the great low which has caused such terrible damage in Texas and Alabama. One effect of this is that I'm spending much time in the house. For some reason, I got to thinking about blues music. I like it, but I've never played it. I went online and found this definition. 2. A style of music evolved from southern African-American secular songs and usually distinguished by a syncopated 4/4 rhythm, flatted thirds and sevenths, a 12-bar structure, and lyrics in a three-line stanza in which the second line repeats the first [from The Free Dictionary by Farlex] ======= I'm aware that today's blues are not that simple, but with this as a starting point, I went to the keyboard and started fooling around. So far it seems that if you play a major scale and flat the 3rd and 7th, then what you've got is a piece in the Dorian mode. What's the Dorian mode? It's a piece where the second note of the scale serves as the tonic. It's the first note and last note, and in-between in gets played often or long. (Few modal songs are that consistent, I find.) For exmple, play a C scale but flatten the third (Eb) and 7th (Bb.) Those are the flats that make up the Bb scale. C is the second note of the Bb scale. Second note - Dorian mode. I've tried this for other scales and it works, but I haven't tried it for all of them. I don't even know all of them! Next I tried writing a blues tune myself. It's still a work in progress. The tonality is okay, but the rhythm sounds more like a slow air. I'm still working on it. I've discovered that I don't know that mahy blues tunes by heart. I opened the Rise Up Singing songbook and turned to "Hard Times and Blues." There are many songs there that I don't know. However, these songs fit the pattern: Frankie and Johnnie House of the Rising Sun Motherless Child (starts on G, but longest, lowest notes are C) Stagolee (what I can remember of it) Wayfaring Stranger A song that almost fits is "Heartbreak Hotel." Every note fits the Dorian except for "tel" in "It's down at the end of Lonely Street at Heartbreak HoTEL." TEL is an E natural. By the way, this is a good song to sing while cleaning up the kitchen. It isn't necessary to sing it (Elvis Presley style) as if engaged in bulldozing Heartbreak Hotel with loud equipment. For example, instead of plunging to the low note on TEL one could convey that the note is higher than expected. It's still raining. Now to work on that business of syncopation. It would be fun to hear from other people who'd like to experiment with these ideas. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Big Al Whittle Date: 30 Jun 07 - 11:55 AM wouldn't it be easier (and more fun) to live a life of depravity and jump on a freight train? |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 30 Jun 07 - 04:41 PM Can't jump a freight and hold on to a guitar at the same time. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Waddon Pete Date: 30 Jun 07 - 04:58 PM Ah now...I would dispute that...years of practice and self denial! You can't be a true blues singer if you ain't been on that train and gone (lawdy lawdy) :0) Best wishes, Peter |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: greg stephens Date: 30 Jun 07 - 05:49 PM Well, blues music does use flattened 3rds and 7ths, but not necessarily flattened as far as the F natural and C natural of a Dorian scale on D. Now, "variably flattened 3rds and 7ths" would be a better description. In fact, on a piano you get an instant bluesy effect by playing F natural and F# simultaneously against a D chord. Have a go. Or on the guitar, fret your F natural and push it up a bit sharper.This, incidentally, is hard work with the F on the D or E string, much easier with the F on the B string. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST Date: 30 Jun 07 - 07:25 PM My knowledge of correct musical terminology is limited. So perhaps the examples I give will clear up any misunderstanding. But there are two "bends" (on guitar) you hear a lot in blues: one sounds sort of country and the other a little bit more ominous, depending on what note you begin on. For example: If you are playing in the key of E and start on the second note of the E scale (F#) and bend up to the third note (G#), then grab the fifth note (B) ...and then back down to the G# and release to the F#, you get a classic-sounding country blues run (One variant -of many - is to grab the flatted 7th - in this example, D - instead of the B. It takes a little bit of the country twang off the run and gives it a little more "bite"). The other bend you hear a lot - still using the key of E - starts on the fourth note of the scale (A). Bend up to the fifth (B) and grab the flatted seventh (D). This run has a little more dissonance to it, and sounds more "nasty." So: 2-3-5 = country blues run. 4-5-b7 = nasty blues run. Obviously these intervals can be transposed to any key. On the fretboard these are laid out rather conveniently in "boxes" and sometimes you see players during an instrumental break just improvising within these boxes - moving up and down the neck to a different box to add variety, but mostly not breaking out of the confines of the box once they arrive at the specific place on the neck. Another little run that shows up a lot in blues involves a little "chromaticity." Again, using the key of E as an example, start on the flatted 7th (D), play the major 7th note (D#), then the root (E), grab the flatted third (G) then (usually) back to the root (E). D-D#-E is often played as a "triplet" - the G on the down beat, (if you want to get fancy, use vibrato or tremolo on the G for a count or so before going back the the E). This one falls again into the "nasty" category as far as my ear is concerned. As before, this run can be transposed to any key.
Thanks. -Joe Offer- |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: birdman blue Date: 30 Jun 07 - 07:54 PM y'all have it partly right. we tend to use the flatted 3rd to transition to the major 3rd and more often use a minor pentatonic scale rather than the seven-note scales such you have been using in your examples. this is not to say that octal scales are not used, they are indeed. in fact, there is a formal "blues scale" that is octal. using your key of E examples you'd get: E,G,G#,A,Bb,B,D,E or 1,b3,3,4,b5,5,b7,octave. Leena, I think the dorian sound that you hear is probably the minor pentatonic scale (although, we start with the tonic and not the 2d as one normally would the 2nd mode--in the key of E it is F# Dorian). the minor pentatonic (in any key) utilizes the intervals: 1,b3,4,5,b7,octave and forms the most common scale used in blues. Leena, your example used C diatonic and the scale formed off of the Bb would be Locrian mode or the basis of a 7b5 chord. the diatonic 2d of C is D Dorian.... or at least that's how we do it here'bouts.... bird there is also a major pentatonic scale but it is not used nearly as much as the minor variant |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: dwditty Date: 01 Jul 07 - 12:22 AM Hold on a second. First of all, it is "blues" not "blues music." Secondly, there is no room for discussion of scales - diatonic or otherwise - when talking about blues. And Dorian? 7ths just happen in the blues. It is part of the genre. (hmmm, have I violated my own rule in using a word as un-bluesy as genre?) Some time one speaks in terms of I, IV, V or maybe 12-bar. But genuine music terminology - I should say not! Of course I am kidding, but the blues is all about feel, much more so than about musical analysis. To much dissecting and you wind up with the whites. dw |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Azizi Date: 01 Jul 07 - 12:44 AM "...the blues is all about feel, much more so than about musical analysis..To much dissecting and you wind up with the whites." -dwditty Now that's a quotable quote. {Except it's "too" not "to"}. LOL! |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: birdman blue Date: 01 Jul 07 - 02:38 AM indeed.....and expression of the inner man and feeling is why I continue to play blues. I think understanding the theory only provides the artist with a larger palette with which to create. understanding harmony has led to an enrichment of my music.... not spelled an end to creativity or somehow implicitly resulted in my music becoming rigidly determined by form. I've never found that understanding the relationship between the guidetones has hurt my voice leading or comping in general either.....I like to think of it as having a larger universe of possible chord extensions and note choices.... and knowing what notes will detract from a composition prior to playing them hasn't hurt one little bit either. and please excuse my inept spelling of your name Leeneia, it is a name previously unknown to me. I probably mispronounce it as well, unfortunately....mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. bird |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 01 Jul 07 - 05:03 PM It's nice to hear from people who enjoying playing music and enjoy experimenting. The flattened scale I mentioned is just the beginning. Obviously people have added variations, otherwise blues wouldn't be such a rich trove of music. St Louis Blues, for example, can't be played in that scale. But for somebody like me, who has never actually made up or even played a bluesy tune, the flattened scale idea is a way to begin. Birdman, I'm not surprised you are unfamiliar with my name. I am probably the only Leeneia in the world. It doesn't bother me a bit when people misspell it. . |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: alanabit Date: 01 Jul 07 - 05:18 PM There are several learned books about the way blues evolved. The best I have read, because it takes into account social, historical, cultural and musical factors, was "Blues People" by Leroi Jones. I don't know if it is still in print, but I would read it again if I could get my hands on it. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST,Jay Date: 01 Jul 07 - 05:44 PM Blues Scale In C: C, Eb, F, F#(or Gb), G Bb. Root - Flat Third - Fourth - Sharp Fourth/Flat Fifth - Fifth - Flat 7th. In the original post, you just indicated the flat third and seventh. There are six notes in the scale, but you will find other notes in blues songs (like Heartbreak Hotel as your example with the E Natural). There is also a flat fifth between the fourth and fifth, plus no second or sixth to the scale. There are different styles of blues, but the blues that most people know like in C for example with this chord pro: C C7 F7 C7 G7 C - G7 Contributed to developing early forms of rock and roll, but when they switch to the fifth chord on the last line of the verse, they switch to the fourth before the tonic chord. (They also don't always use seventh chords) The fifth and fourth chord is usually just a major chord (but they use a blues scale) C C7 F C G7(or G) F C - G7 Also, a while back when I was reading history books about the blues; the blues as we know it has both African and European origins. The blues as we know it developed in the Mississippi Delta with both black and white influences. Traditional African tribes commonly used a pentatonic scale similar to the blues scale, and notes from this scale, and the major scale (used in Europe) were combined to form the six-note blues scale. The chord harmonization was constructed from European origin. The I IV V pro. The three phrase format in which the first two phrases are the same, was used in many traditional European folk songs. The rhythm, came from both. In Africa, music was based on percussion instruments, using "polyrhythms". Polyrhytms are when two different rhythms, not in the same Time Signature are played, simultaneously. As both rhythms play, they have make sure that both rhythms start each measure and end each measure at the same time. (Play them as if they were evenly the same. Example: 2/4 and 3/4 is a simple polyrhythm. One rhythm has to play the two counts in 2/4 evenly with the rhythm playing three counts in 3/4. (It sounds weird to explain) Now, European rhythm; Rhythm and Time Signature changes. European music, often has rhythm changes and/or Time signature changes in the songs; and the transition has to be made smoothly keeping the same steady beat. Both of these rhythm styles I have found in Blues. There is equally as much European influence as there is African influence in the early development of Blues music. Content of the lyrics: Field hollers, work songs, jail songs, chain gang songs; sorrows they went through, love. That's an outline of some of the categories that the early blues lyrics content. Now, that is where the black man took control of the blues. After the blues were developed, much of the artists were of African American ancestry. (Slave Trade years in Mississippi Delta, is the explanation for these categories) Also, the banjo was the early instrument of the blues. It was invented in Africa, and the guitar was introduced to the blues in the early 1900's. Then other instruments such as the harmonica and the bass followed, eventually. How the blues became electric guitar, electric bass, and drums; this was when the blues artists migrated from the Southern States to the Northern States like Illinois for example. After the blues was known throughout the South, they began to move North where the Big Band Jazz was played. The blues made the transition to electric instruments to compete with Big Band/Jazz, and adopted some of the instruments they used. That's a brief outline, I can give you some websites if anyone's interested, in more blues history; with more detail. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Azizi Date: 01 Jul 07 - 06:03 PM "Now, that is where the black man took control of the blues."-GUEST,Jay Just one man?! What was that black man's name? Give him a cigar! Oh wait, a cigar is what got Bill Clinton in trouble, wasn't it? ;o) |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 01 Jul 07 - 09:21 PM "In fact, on a piano you get an instant bluesy effect by playing F natural and F# simultaneously against a D chord. Have a go." I see [I mean hear] what you mean, greg. Thanks. --------- "using your key of E examples you'd get: E,G,G#,A,Bb,B,D,E" This too sounds good, although I personally would find it hard to do. Going up the scale, this has 7 half-steps in in. Chromaticity indeed! My choir leader told us that half-steps add emotion to music. This scale is certainly packed with it. --------- "If you are playing in the key of E and start on the second note of the E scale (F#) and bend up to the third note (G#)..." What's meant by "bend" here? I'm familiar with bending note on the flute. What do you do on a guitar? --------- Thanks for the history, Jay. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Q (Frank Staplin) Date: 01 Jul 07 - 10:23 PM dwditty said it. Blues is about feel. Don't know about all those musical terms, but "I knows it when I feel it." If I feel tomorrow just like I feel today If I feel tomorrow just like I feel today If I feel tomorrow just like I feet today Gonna git on that katy train And make my get away. Did you ever wake up and find your dough roller gone You wring your hands And cry the whole day long. I dream about my baby every time I go to sleep Then the blues come creepin from my head down to my feet. Feelin good- He shakes my ashes, freezes my griddle, Churns my butter, strokes my pillow, My man is such a handy man. He threads my needle, gleans my wheat, Heats my heater, chops my meat, My man is such a handy man. He flaps my flapjack, cleans off my table, Leads the horses in my stable, My man is such a handy man. Sometimes he's up before dawn, Workin' on my front lawn, My man is such a handy man. (Victoria Spivy, 1928, Okeh 8615. Listen to "My Handy Man" and lots of other Spivey recordings on Red Hot Jazz- http://www.redhotjazz.com/spivey.html Victoria Spivey (Hmmm, lots I have to download here- and Victoria Spivey is just one of them) |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Q (Frank Staplin) Date: 01 Jul 07 - 10:28 PM Give a listen to "New Black Snake Blues"- part I; and "New Black Snake Blues"- Part 2- same link to Victoria Spivey. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST,crazy little woman Date: 02 Jul 07 - 11:20 AM "I knows it when I feel it." We all do. Doesn't help much in getting a new tune composed, however. ------------ "Gonna git on that katy train" refers to the old Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad, which was known as the Katie or Katy(KT). People here in River City still mention the Katie once in a while. ------------ "Did you ever wake up and find your dough roller gone" I think this was supposed to be "Did you ever wake up and find your dough roll all gone?" where a dough roll would be dollars rolled up. Could be a reference to a baker who's had a burglary, but probably not. cf "rolling a drunk" |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Q (Frank Staplin) Date: 02 Jul 07 - 02:23 PM A dough roller is a kneadin' man- |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Q (Frank Staplin) Date: 02 Jul 07 - 03:04 PM A man also needs a good roller- I got a hot dog and it ain't cold, It's just right for to fit your roll, I'm a fittin' mother fuyer don't you know, ..... Roosevelt Sykes, 1936, Decca 7160. "Dirty Mother For You." |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Leadbelly Date: 02 Jul 07 - 04:46 PM You can't play the blues if you don't feel it. That's all. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST Date: 02 Jul 07 - 06:13 PM "A Quick One, While He's Away" .... The Bends
Thanks. -Joe Offer- |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST,crazy little woman Date: 02 Jul 07 - 10:41 PM "If I feel tomorrow just like I feel today Gonna git on that Katy train And make my getaway." and how could I forget the Katy Trail, which runs where the Katy railroad used to go? http://www.bikekatytrail.com/ Q, I fear that guy in your song is in for a shock when he discovers that the Missouri-Kansas-Texas freight cars have been supplanted by bicycles. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: Q (Frank Staplin) Date: 02 Jul 07 - 11:03 PM As a G. I., I rode the Katy several times. Always standing or sitting on the floor. A bottle of whiskey, brands never heard of before or after the war, dulled the boredom. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: birdman blue Date: 02 Jul 07 - 11:35 PM Leeneia, sorry I left just when things started poppin'....man's gotta sleep sometime and my time had come. in answer to your question regarding "bending" notes. I think perhaps I can illuminate that term a little better for you using two instruments common to blues: guitar and harmonica (harp). with a guitar, let us say I have just struck the 4th tone in the key of C and I wish to raise it to the 5th and use the #4/b5 tone on the passage to the 5th. I would physically bend the string upwards, which makes the note sharper by shortening the string, bending through F# and holding the note when it has risen to the G (5th....I would probably also do a finger vibrato to the held 5th to force the note to continue sustaining and --as we say-- put a little "grease" on it)....eventually, I would "release" the bend and slowly allow the note to return to the perfect 4th where I had started my bend. there are a number of ways to acheive all of these pitch changes and I described but one....you could also raise the 4th to the b5 to the 5 and back by sliding that finger through the adjacent frets. most of us prefer to bend the note. with a harp you are doing much the same thing in principle but it isn't so clear cut in practice. using differing amounts of blown or sucked air pressure one physically forces the reed to leave its normal position and modulate a half or whole step (in one direction or another? see below). not all reeds will bend the same amount but good players know which reeds on which particular harps will bend and how far to push them. I am far from expert on this instrument and I'm sure that some of the players I work with regularly could explain the technique much better than I....but that is the essence of the matter when we refer to "bending" a note...... something just occurred to me that I should mention, the process of bending a note on guitar only makes the note more sharp (we are making the string shorter with our manipulation) to one degree or another....but I really don't know if that is also true of harp. perhaps someone who plays much more than I do could answer that question: is it possible to make a note flatter with harp....I'm speaking of a single bent reed? bird btw., I have a sister with an unusual name as well: Anenia (we call her "nenie")....so your name does not seem "that" unusual to me. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: GUEST,theblueshadababyandcalleditpratface Date: 03 Jul 07 - 11:22 AM You cannot appreciate the blues unless your baby has done walked out on you an' taken yo shoes. That's the blues. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: M.Ted Date: 04 Jul 07 - 12:54 AM The bent notes are used for rhythmic punctuation. As you may discern from birdman blues comments, there are a variety of ways to muffle, deaden, bend, slide, or otherwise alter the sound of a note. Blues is about repeating rhythm patterns, and those are all devices to outline the rhythm. Thinking in terms of pentatonic scales, or dorian scales, or any of that other scale stuff is misleading, because blues doesn't really work from scales. |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: birdman blue Date: 04 Jul 07 - 04:45 PM indeed, M. Ted, I used a scale discussion to give form to what I had to say about key and tonality. I rarely, if ever when blowing blues, think in terms of scales....because of the many accidentals I commonly employ my blues playing is inclusive of about 10 notes chromatic....I tend to think more in terms of "key" and "interval" as points of reference. the scales discussed were mostly a matter of using a tool for illustrative purposes. when playing straight blues, key is more of a guidepost than scale.... then I'm concentrating on emotion and letting my fingers explore figures and tonalities that are expressive of a feeling I wish to illuminate....I'm not explaining this well at all. though I must admit that often my work is more in the genre of an acoustic blue jazz where scales DO become important tools for rapidly comping chord extensions on the fly, as it were.... and attempting to develop melody using voicings based on sound harmonic principles.... that form of music is quite cerebral and scales (and all other tools for describing harmonic development) become quite important items in my musician's tool kit. I guess it's all a matter of what is appropriate to the context within which one is creating ....or something like that. bird |
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Subject: RE: exploring the blues From: M.Ted Date: 04 Jul 07 - 05:00 PM Exactly so. |
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