Tag Archives: bebop jazz guitar

Simple Things To Play On A C7 That Sound Great

Sometimes it is great to have some things to fall back on when you are soloing. Stuff that you can easily get to sound good and that fits the chord, whether you solo on a song or on a Blues, you don’t want to run out of ideas or play something that doesn’t work.

In this video, I am going to show you some easy things to use on a C7 chord. Most of this stuff, you already know, I just want to show you how to tweak it and make it sound better.

Chromatic Shortcut

So we keep it simple, this C7 and this scale around it:

You probably know this way of adding chromatic enclosures around the notes of a chord where you use a diatonic note above and a chromatic note below. Joe Pass does this really often.

There is a way of using this that nobody really talks about, that really makes it sound so much better, I will get to that in a minute.

Like anything else, you should mix it with other things like the scale. Then you can make lines like this:

Here I have an enclosure around the G and the E, but this line sounds a little predictable and you can make it much more interesting if you turn around the enclosures:

so now I am skipping down to F# back up to A and then resolve to G, and the same thing happens on the E. This makes the line sound much more interesting and unpredictable but still has a natural flow.

So if you work on using enclosures then think about turning them around like I am doing here, that can really make a huge difference.

Make an Arpeggio Sound Amazing

Before I show you a visual trick that works great for dominant chords then you should check out this really useful concept that combines arpeggios, chromaticism and triplet rhythms.

If you have seen any of my videos then you have probably heard me talk about how you can use the arpeggio from the 3rd of the chord.

For the C7 then you have the C7 arpeggio and from the 3rd, the E, then you have this Eø arpeggio.

This already gives you a lot of material, but an easy way to play this arpeggio so it sounds even better is to add some chromaticism around it and change the rhythm.

Here you add a chromatic leading note before the arpeggio, play the arpeggio as a triplet to add a little energy, and then also add some chromaticism going down from the top note.

And this works great for the Eø, George Benson does this all the time, but you can also do that from the root:

As you can see it is great to really know the diatonic arpeggios because a lot of them work on other chords, so if you want to check out some exercises for this then check out this video called The Most Important Scale Exercise For Jazz

Visual Triad and Quartal arpeggios

You probably know this as the top of a C7(13)

and a great visual connection is how this is diagonal across the strings and you can flip it around and then you have a C major triad.

and that is what I am using here, which sounds great and is pretty easy to play.

Let’s look at some another great arpeggio option

A Secret Arpeggio

One arpeggio, which is in fact another favorite of both Charlie Parker and George Benson, is using the arpeggio from the 7th of the chord, so for C7 that is a Bbmaj7 arpeggio. (filmed end of the examples no backing)

That is what I am using here, playing it as a triplet and putting it together with some basic scale melodies, typical bebop

But you can also connect it to a Gm triad like this:

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How To Make Your Own Bebop Licks

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You already know that Jazz lines use arpeggios and chromatic phrases, but at the same time just knowing that doesn’t mean your lines sound like Bebop, and you don’t want to only play other peoples licks that you transcribed. You need to study phrases and learn how to create and hear those types of lines.

That is what I will show you how to do in this video.

Most of us already practice arpeggios and chromatic passing notes, but one thing is going over exercises another is to put it together and actually use it in your solos. As you will see in this video, One of the best ways to do that is to check out what makes up a strong lick and practice making lines with what you find. In this video, I am going to give you some examples and break them down so that you can take some things away and start using that to get some stolid bop lines into your vocabulary.

And when you strip down the lines then it is pretty amazing how simple they are!

Lick #1

Understanding How a Bebop Lick Works

This is a basic Bebop G7 lick, and it may seem very complicated, but it is really just built around a G7 and a Dm7 arpeggio:

Let’s break it down and then I will show you how you can start playing lines like this yourself:

The first part is a way of adding leading notes moving from F to D in the G7 arpeggio

You can see how the melody is moving from E via Eb down to D, and I am using the G as a chromatic note in between F and E. This is btw a Barry Harris trick.

So moving from F to D becomes F G E Eb D

The Eb to D is played with a pull-off because that gives and accent to the Eb leading note, that is more interesting, and the (boring) resolution is naturally a bit softer.

I am using the same principle between the B and C and inserting a D

Then you have the next part of the G7 arpeggio: G and F

From there the next part is a Dm7 arpeggio with an enclosure around the first note using a scale or diatonic note above and a chromatic note below, E and C#.

The lick ends on the B, adding a grace note.

Making Your Own Licks

Right now it might seem like there are a lot of things happening, and I think that if you want to work on making licks in this way then it makes more sense to just take a single thing and make variations on that, so, for example, take the first phrase and then try to use that together with a G7 or a Dm7 arpeggio

something like this line with G7:

or if you combine it with a Dm7 arpeggio:

And you can also just take the first part of the line and combine that with a Bø arpeggio like this:

Practicing With Material Like This

1 Be able to play the line.

2 to make a line with that chunk and combine it with the scales and arpeggios you use.

And if you work on it like that then you will start to hear melodies with it can come up with great sounding licks of your own that use this.

Let’s have a look at another example and go over some more things you can use in your playing plus see other ways of using what I already covered.

Lick #2

More about how the viewer recognizes the structure?

Maybe you can already begin to see the structure.

The first part is a G major triad in 2nd inversion, followed by a scale run, an Fmaj7 arepggio, and two G7 arpeggio notes.

The G major triad is played in the 2nd inversion with a leading note before the first note.

You can get a lot of interesting melodies by just adding a chromatic leading note before an arpeggio or triad, and practicing this as scale exercises and exploring melodies with it is very effective. Think of melodies like Well You Needn’t or Night in Tunesia

Adding a chromatic passing note to the scale run between A and G

The next part is a descending Fmaj7 arpeggio with an added trill on the first note:

And finally two notes from the G7 arpeggio.

Analyzing Licks for New Vocabulary

Now you are probably beginning to see how you can also transcribe some of your favourite phrases from Joe Pass or Parker and then really try to understand what is being used in there and use this method to get that into your playing.

A huge part of improving our playing is actually figuring out what it is we like and what we need to change, and that is very difficult when you are on the inside looking out.

So now whenever you find something you like in a transcription you can analyze what is going on, and instead of only having a single technique you can copy/paste, you can now start to make it a method for thousands of variations that you can use to develop your own bebop vocabulary.

Let’s check out another lick and get some more things to work with!

Lick #3

This lick is mostly coming from scale melodies, but then you can add a lot of interesting twists and turns to make those more interesting to listen to, but you can already now see that there are some new tools in there that you can use in your own playing.

So, as you can see, then removing the embellishments leaves 3 pretty simple building blocks:

Which is two scale melodies and two notes from the arpeggio

The first part is adding a trill and a leading note around the first D, using hammer-on pull-off to play the fast 16th note triplet and the fast notes really add a lot of energy to the line.

The next technique is one of my favourites, and it is great for making a scale run sound a lot better! Here I am first inserting a low A in between the F and the E, it is similar to the way I use the G in example 1, but adding this large interval below sounds great.

I follow it up with another chromatic leading note between E and D

The next scale run is another example of how you can get a great sound out of adding a lot of passing notes in a line. Here it is also really changing the direction of the line and making it much more playful and surprising.

Chromatic note from D to C, Chromatic note above between C and B, and an extra leading note below the B.

And then finally two arpeggio notes to still nail the sound of the chord

More Bebop Vocabulary

If you want to build your bebop vocabulary and play more interesting lines then check out some this download:

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3 Simple Bebop Tricks You Can Make Great Jazz Licks With

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In this video, I am going to show you how to take these 3 basic phrases: play 1-3 short and make some really great licks. The important thing you will learn from this is to hear the difference between boring and interesting lines. I am sure you have already been struck with the Curse of the Bad Bop Licks with all the right notes and arpeggios and still sound really boring. This video will help you improve that and develop your melodic ear in general.

Curse of the Bad Bop Licks with All The Right Notes

Here is a line with the right notes and arpeggios that still doesn’t work:

It is using the right scale and a Dm7 arpeggio with some chromaticism, but it is still boring.

The main problem with this line is that it is very predictable and it changes direction on the heavy beats of the bar, so 1 and 3.

You can play scale runs in your solo, but often it is nice to try to break it up so that it is more surprising to the listener. If you can make it surprising without making it sound random then it works better.

If I took the 3 phrases I talked about at the beginning of the video and made them into a lick then that would sound like this:

Here the melody skips around a lot more and is a lot less predictable. It is not nearly as much just something that moves in one direction.

In this video, I will show you how you can start making licks that sound like that, and develop your skills and ears.

The Diatonic/Chromatic Enclosure

The first phase of the example above is really just an enclosure of the 3rd of Dm, F. You have the diatonic note above G and the chromatic note below E. In this case the chromatic note is also diatonic, but that is actually a coincidence.

If you are writing lines on a Dm7 then it pays off to check this exercise out on the chord tones:

And as you will see later in the video, the direction of the enclosure can make a huge impact on the line that you are playing so you should also try to play it the other way around:

Melodic Direction is Important

Let me show you how the direction of the enclosure can make a huge difference:

If you have a simple scale melody like the first bar below.

You could do it like as in bar 2 or like this bar 3

I am sure you can hear how the last variation sounds a lot more interesting with the skip down to the C#. And that is because you are adding an enclosure that moves in the opposite direction of the scale melody, so the scale melody moves down and the enclosure moves up.

You can then make a lick like this:

What you want to spend time on with material like this is to compose and play lines, that way you start to figure out how you can get it to work and you also start really getting into your ears how solid lines should sound, so don’t forget to get started working on writing lines. This is also how Barry Harris teaches bebop in his masterclasses.

Break Up The Flow: Lower Chord Tones

Besides the enclosures, I will go over another great way to use arpeggios in your lines, but first le’s look at a way to add some large interval skips to a simple melody without sounding completely random.

The first bar shows how you can add a lower chord tone in between notes in a scale run.

One way of understanding this is that you start with a descending scale run and then you add a chord tone between two notes, in this case, the F and the E.

In the original example, I use a low A, because the 6th interval is nice and it is clearly breaking things up, but you can also use a D or instead take a high chord tone like the A

You can turn this into an exercise using a Dm triad as the foundation, and you actually get 3 really solid melodic building blocks:

Turning this into a lick could be something like this:

Notice the rhythmical variation used in the 2nd bar

Bebop Arpeggios

The 3rd phrase I used in the intro is this way of playing an arpeggio using an 8th note triplet.

I am sure you have already heard this in tons of Parker, Benson or Wes lines, and I also have a video where I talk about talking triplet arpeggios through the scale that I will link to in the video description.

For the Dm7 chord that I am using here there are 3 arpeggios that are really useful and easy to use, namely from each of the notes in the Dm triad: D, F and A

D: Dm7 – D F A C

F: Fmaj7 – F A C E

A: Am7 – A C E G

You can practice these ascending like this:

and the descending version is also really useful, though it is a little less common:

A lick using the triplet arpeggios sounds like this:

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This Is Why You Should Study Bebop

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You have probably heard people say that you have to check out and learn Bebop in order to learn Jazz Guitar. That in itself can cause some discussion and I am not going to go into that too much in this Bebop lesson.

I think the point I want to make is more than studying bebop is a really efficient way to add what most of us consider Jazz sound to our playing. And there are some things that are just so great in Bebop that you really want to check out, so in this video, I am going to explore some amazing sounding lines that are so pure in that style and you want to know them as well.

I am also throwing in an unwelcome truth or two along the way.

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Content:

Content:

00:00 Intro

00:44 Lick #1 – Bebop Voice-leading and How my solo sucked

3:03 Variation on Lick #1

3:56 What is the point of studying this

4:22 Do you have to become a Bebop monk?

5:14 Lick #2 from Parker: Playing the arpeggio But not just running the changes

5:50 Bebop scales – Creative vs Systematic?

7:02 Basic Arpeggios but very melodic!

7:44 Several voices in one melody

8:51 What should you practice? Maybe do what Barry Harris does!

9:54 Making A Similar Lick for Rhythm Changes

10:45 Octave Displacement = INSTANT JAZZ!

11:01 Example 4

11:59 Example 5

12:26 Bebop is not about Scales

13:09 Example 6

14:21 Improve your phrasing and solos

14:31 Like the video? Check out my Patreon page.

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This Is A Great And Easy Recipe For Jazz Licks

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You probably already know that a big part of what makes a solo sound like jazz is the are chromatic passage like this:

And another part of it is how there is a close connection to the chord that you solo over using arpeggios to spell out the harmony.

In this lesson, you are going to see how putting these two concepts together is a solid recipe for making some great sounding licks.

Even if you are not that familiar with Jazz then I think this way of making lines could be a good way to try and make your own licks that have more of a Jazz sound.

Let’s start with a basic 1-octave Cmaj7 arpeggio like this. You probably already know this one.

You want to add some chromaticism to this arpeggio and there are a few ways you can do that. Let’s start with this chromatic enclosure.

Here’s an enclosure that I learned from Pat Martino:

What is a Chromatic Enclosure?

In this context, a chromatic enclosure is really just a short melody with some chromatic notes that resolves to a target note, and when we are using it here the target note is one of the notes in the Cmaj7 arpeggio. You can read more about them here: Chromatic passing notes – Instant Bebop guitar lesson! And if you put together the arpeggio and the enclosure then we get:

This already sounds pretty good, but we can add something at the end like this:

Chromatic below – diatonic above

And now I added an extra chromatic approach which is using a scale tone above and a chromatic note below. In the lick it is on the 5th, G and then you have A and F# to resolve to G.

You can do this on the entire arpeggio like this:

And you can even add one more to the lick like this:

Let’s try making another lick, but now start with a descending arpeggio

the lick could be something like this:

Here I am using an enclosure that works really well on the 7th and also on the 3rd like this:

And you can go back up and add another part like this:

Better Rhythm

You can also change the rhythm of the arpeggio a little by making it a triplet and then adding some chromaticism, something like this:

Here we have an enclosure of the C, then the arpeggio played with an 8th note triplet and then a double approach going from B via Bb to A:

Benson’s chromatic run

Another great variation that you can hear George Benson do a lot is using this type of arpeggio and then connect the top-notes with a chromatic run.

Something like this:

And putting this into a lick could sound like this:

Of course he actually stole this from Charlie Parker who also does this all the time, but you probably knew that already…

Descending Benson

And you can also apply the triplet to a descending arpeggio and add an ending to it:

Add More Chromaticism to Your Playing

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3 Easy Bebop Licks – How To Sound Like Jazz

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What makes a phrase sound like Jazz? Even if you know the chords and can play the right notes there is more to get it to sound like Jazz. This video is going to give you 3 examples of Bebop licks which really use some of the core elements of the jazz sound. I also give you some exercises so that you can get them into your playing and add them to your own solos.

The techniques and the licks

The topic of this lesson is jazz and bebop sounds so it makes more sense to also work with a moving chord progression like the II V I. But at the same time the techniques and exercises will work just as well on static chords, and you can easily convert them.

#1 Lick using Arpeggios and how to use them

The first example here is using arpeggios on the different chords of the II V I.

On the Dm7 the arpeggio from the chord is played with a C# chromatic leading note. On the G7 the melody is created from the arpeggio from the 3rd of the chord: Bø. Here I am adding a scale note between the F and the A.

When you improvise with arpeggios the melodies are created by mixing arpeggios and the scale that fits the chord.

Arpeggio from the 3rd and the Exercise

Something that I have discussed earlier is the concept of using the arpeggio from the 3rd of the chord.

The concept is really simple. Let’s look at a Dm7: D F A C.

You were to build a chord from the 3rd(F) then you would have an Fmaj7: F A C E. Obviously these two chords share a lot of notes and the Fmaj will sound great on the Dm7.

Using that logic we have two arpeggios per chords, the one from the root and the one from the 3rd:

Dm7 – Fmaj7

G7 – Bø

Cmaj7- Em7

Practicing these two arpeggios through the progression could be like this:

#2 Lick using Chromatic Leading notes (and an alteration)

Another very characteristic part of Jazz is the use of chromaticism. Chromatic leading notes and Chromatic enclosures .

This lick is using chromatic leading notes. The two places where they are used are both to lead to a chord tone, so the G# resolving to the 5th of Dm7 and the A# leading up to the B on G7.

Notice how the A# is used to transition to the G7 and in that way really drive the progression and the lick forward.

Practicing leading notes

A great way to work on this is to play through the arpeggios and then add a leading note to each chord tone. This is shown in the example below.

#3 Lick using 8th note triplets

Jazz and especially bop-oriented jazz consists of a lot of 8th note lines. An amazing way to add variation to 8th note lines is to use some 8th note triplets, and especially when playing arpeggios.

8th note triplet arpeggios move quickly over almost an octave range and nicely break up the 8th note flow.

The lick below is using a Dm7 arpeggio played as a triplet and with a chromatic leading note before the root.

Similar to the first exercise this can be used on the arpeggio from the root and equally well on the arpeggio from the 3rd of the chord. This is what the exercise below shows:

Explore these concepts on a song!

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How To Add Bebop Embellishments To Your Licks

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Bebop is famous for having solos of long 8th note lines and bebop licks are often a lot of notes. But an important part of what makes the lines really beautiful and breaks up the constant flow of 8th notes.

In this video, I am going to go over some great lines from Bebop Masters like Dexter Gordon, Clifford Brown and Sonny Stitt. The way they use embellishments and construct lines is a great resource for learning and enhancing your own playing.

Content:

0:00 Intro

0:00 Adding Variation to lines

0:50 Example #1 – Dexter Gordon – Confirmation

0:53 Triplet- Enclosures

2:10 Using Chromatic Triplet enclosures in Your own lines

2:30 Example Lick Using Gm7

2:37 Example Lick Using C7

2:43 16th Note Trills

3:24 Example Lick Using Gm7

3:32 Example #1 Slow

3:39 Example #2 – Clifford Brown

3:43 Joy Spring Solo

4:06 Melodic Enclosure (Peter Bernstein’s Favourite?)

4:37 Triplet Embellishment of an 8th-note line

5:15 Example #2 Slow

5:21 8th Note Triplets in Bebop

5:43 Example Charlie Parker – Using A Similar Idea

6:06 Example #3 Sonny Stitt

6:11 Sonny Stitt on Ornithology

6:40 16th note triplet Embellishment of an Arpeggio

7:03 Example Grant Green Using this rhythm

7:18 Stitt Altered Dominant line

7:50 Using this idea on other lines, like Wes

8:09 Example #3 Slow

8:14 Like The Video? Check out my Patreon Page

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5 Easy Ways To Sound Like Bebop on a C7

The most important part of sounding like jazz, whether you play in that genre or in another, is probably to have some Bebop as a part of your playing.

This video is going to demonstrate 5 easy bebop licks on a C7 chord in a very position and quickly connect it to a scale and an arpeggio. I will go over how you can add some bebop flavour and chromatic phrases to your playing in this position.

Learning and adding to your vocabulary

Finding practical and playable solutions is essential if you want to learn something like the jazz language and this video should give you some easy to apply examples and ideas. This is also how I work and have worked with learning new material.

Keeping Bebop simple: Chord, Position, Licks

The examples I am going to cover are all found around this chord, which is C7 in the 8th fret:

which is closely related to this arpeggio.

And in that position you could think of this C7 or F major scale:

I find that this is an area of the neck that is a good starting point if you want to add something new to your C7 vocabulary because it is very close to the chord and the Cm pentatonic scale so we have an overview already.

Chromatic Passing note idea 1

This first example is adding a chromatic note on the top E string. The melody is adding a note between the 9th and the root. From there it is a descending scale run ending with a C major triad.

Notice how the end of the phrase is no on the beat which is also typical for bop lines.

More Chromaticism and a bit of Blues

In this example I am using a longer chromatic run on the B string. On this string we already have 3 strong C7 notes: 5,13 and b7.After a short bluesy phrase with those the lick is descending from b7 to 5 in halfsteps again reconnecting with the chord by playing a descending C major triad at the end.

Pivot arpeggios and arpeggios from the 3rd

This example uses two really strong bebop concepts. First this way of using an arpeggio inversion where I am using Em7b5 in first inversion but starting with the high note and then skipping down. If you want to check out how George Benson uses this I have that in a video here.

The other example is adding a chromatic note between b7 and the root which is also extremely common.

Two note chromatic approach

Here the chromatic approach is two notes and inserted between F and E in the beginning of the lick. The rest of the line is using an Em7b5 arpeggio and ends on the root on the high e string. Again ending on the 1&

Encircling: Diatonic above, chromatic below

Encircling a chord tone with a chromatic note and a scale note is also a very common bebop melody. This example is first encircling the 5th(G) with A and F# before it continues with first the arpeggio from the 5th: Gm7 and then a C7 arpeggio.

A few closing Bebop remarks

Besides the devices I talked about in this video it is also important to remember that bebop lines are based on the chords your are playing over. This means that you want to use those chord tones as target notes and as start and ending points of your melodies when you are improvising.

If you want to explore more bebop and especially focus on the phrasing then I have this WebStore lesson with some exercises for that:

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5 easy ways to sound like bebop on a C7

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Amazing Bebop – How to play like Sonny Stitt

If you want to learn Bebop then there are few people better to check out than Sonny Stitt. In this video I transcribed and analyzed two bebop licks from his solo on Au Privave from the Stitt plays Bird. These great licks are fantastic examples to learn from and contain some solid ideas you can add to your vocabulary.

How to Learn Bebop

Often when you work on learning bebop all your solos are just up and down scales and arpeggios. Stitt has some beautiful ways to add variation both melodic and rhythm that I will try to explain in this lesson.

On a side note it is also worthwhile checking out this album because Jim Hall is playing on it as well.

Sonny Stitt Bebop Lick #1

This first example is a clear example of how he isn’t only running up and down . The first bar is really a descending melody with D, Bb, A, G and F. But he breaks up that movement by adding a lower chord tone: D. This is similar to some of the ideas that George Benson used in the All The Things You Are line that I talked about in this video: Why George Benson lines are Amazing

On the C7 Sonny Stitt uses triplets as a variation for the 8th note lines. First a chromatic run from the 3rd(E) to the 5th(G) and then a descending C7 arpeggio.

The line ends with a short scale run from A to F.

Sonny Stitt Bebop Lick #2

The 2nd example uses a lot of similar ideas. On the Gm7 the low D is again used as a note to insert into the melody and break up the scale run. This happens twice and at the end of the Gm7 line he also adds a chromatic approach to the D.

The C7 line also makes use of the low D, but is for the rest using two arpeggios that work really well over a C7: Bbmaj7 and Eø. Both are played as ascending 8th note triplets. I this case Stitt is suspending the resolution of the C7 and continue into the F bar with a chromatic encircling of the C, so the resolution isn’t until beat two of that bar.

The rest of the F7 line is a descending melody built around a Dm triad and flowing into another encircling of the Bb. From the Bb the line ends with an ascending Bbmaj7 arpeggio.

Applying this to your own playing

For now I will focus on adding the idea of adding notes to descending scale runs on the Gm7.

The first part of Example 3 here below is a Gm7 scale (or F major if you will) and in the 2nd half I have added lower chord tones to the descending scale run. In this example I find that it works better to use the Gm triad as lower notes, so that is what I have used. You can of course experiment and discover what you prefer.

Example of using this concept in your own playing

The example here below is using the D pedal point idea on the Gm7. As you can see it can be placed differently in the bar without loosing its effect. I am using the low D twice on the Gm7.

The C7 line is first an ascending Eø arpeggio played as an 8th note triplet. From there it is a descending chromatic run ending up with an enclosure of the A on Fmaj7.

Adding the same idea to the dom7th chord

Adding the same type of idea to the V chord in the II V works as well. Here the Gm7 line is similar to the one above except the D,C,Bb is replaced with a chromatic passing note phrase: C B Bb.

On the C7 the phrase starts with a descending scale rund and then adds the lower G between the D and the C. From the C I use the passing note again and then skip down to a G to approach and resolve to the 3rd(A) of F.

Bebop lines and their construction

If you have followed any of the classes of Barry Harris then you are probably familiar with the idea of writing lines like this where you have a scale run or an arpeggio and then you add embellishments to it in the form of extra notes, chromaticism etc. This way of thinking is a great way to describe the language which is why I use it here as well.

If you want to play lines like this then it is very useful to work on construction them in this way and get the ideas into your ears in that way.

From Bop to Bach: Forward motion and Target Notes

If you want to take a closer look at one of my solos with my analysis you can check out this lesson which also includes some thoughts on how to construct solo lines, but then using forward motion and target notes:

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Amazing Bebop – How to play like Sonny Stitt

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3 types of Rhythm Changes licks you NEED to know – Bebop Guitar Lesson

Rhythm Changes and The Blues are probably the two most important chord progressions that you need to master if you want to play jazz guitar and especially bebop.

This lesson is going to go over 3 different approaches to play over the rhythm changes. Each one demostrated with a 4 bar lick and some exercises.

Rhythm changes in Bebop

Since Bebop the chord progression from I got Rhythm has been used countless times for great bebop themes such as Anthropology, Oleo, Dexterity, Moose the Mooche etc. In fact about 30 percent of all Charlie Parker compositions are on Rhythm Changes

Most of the time when you are soloing over a rhythm changes form you find yourself improvising over this turnaround in the key of Bb major.

Of course there are many variations available on this turnaround, but the essence of it will probably always be this progression.

Using several approaches to a solo

In most good solos you will find that during the solo different things are being emphasized, so the approach in the solo changes. In fact I think that most (good) solos on Rhythm Changes will probably contain parts that use each of the ideas that I go over in this lesson.

Room for rhythm – The Simplified Chord Progression

The first concept is to reduce the amount of chords that are played in the solo. This means that instead of playing all 4 chords of the turnaround in example 1 above. The focus is now on the two main chords in that progression: Bb and F7, the tonic and the dominant.

Both of these chords are diatonic to the Bb major scale as shown in example 3.

One good exercise to get used to hearing these two chords and the scale over the changes is to do the Barry Harris scale exercise shown here below:

Another very important exercise is to play the chords in time over the progression as shown in example 6:

The example line that I played using this approach is shown here:

The first line on the Bbmaj7 is a line consisiting only of Bb maj7 arpeggio notes. On the F7 the line is first a descending scale run from Eb to Bb and then a small melody with the notes of an A dim triad.

The 2nd Bbmaj bar is using a Bb6 or Bb major pentatonic melody that with a string skip moves to an Eb major triad over the F7. The line concludes with inserting a chromatic passing note between D and C.

Advantages to this type of thinking

For this type of playing you get a lot more freedom to think about the rhythm since you don’t have to catch as many changes. In fact this approach is also very close to what you will hear in older swing recordings on Rhythm Changes.

Nailing all the changes

This way of playing over the chords actually makes the progression as difficult to play as Giant Steps from a technical perspective.

Very often if you analyze Charlie Parker solos on rhythm changes you will hear him play simpler phrases in the first two bars and really spell out the changes in the next two bars.

Finding the scales

In order to play over the chords we can use the Bb major scale on the Bbmaj7 and the Cm7 chord.

On the G7 the scale that is most appropriate is a C minor harmonic or G mixolydianb9,b13

We can do the same thing with the F7 as shown in example 9:

Setting the target notes and connecting the dots

The concept behind the lines in this example is to use target notes, and then make lines that move towards that line. Something I have also worked on i other lessons.

An example of a set of target notes that you can fill in with short melodies.

The line example that I am playing is using this technique to connect the lines. To build a vocabulary for this type of playing you need to work on having simple 4 note phrases that you can use to aim for the target notes in the next chord.

You can always use the Blues

Of course since the Rhythm Changes is such an important part of jazz it also is connected to the Blues, and using blues phrases on a rhythm changes progression is very common.

The approach that I am using in the line below is mixing some blues phrases with more some F7 phrases. The blues phrases are using a more mixolydian sound than an actual minor pentatonic sound. You can use the Bbm pentatonic as well of course, but the more major sounding blues phrases are a little more common, which is of course also the case for jazz in general.

The phrase on the first Bb chord is a D dim arpeggio. The line on the Cm7 F7 bar could be seen as both a F7 line or a Bb major line.

The 2nd Bb bar has a clear Bb7 line with a leading note to the 3rd. This also really evokes the blues sound.

The last bar has a Cm7 line to take us back to the chords before the progression would go to the 4th degree.

Conclusions

As I already mentioned it is important to realize that you should vary your approach during the solo. This is by the way true for all solos. I hope you can use the examples as inspiration to widen your vocabulary and the array of sounds you have available over Rhythm Changes.

Take your Rhythm Changes skills to the next level

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3 types of Rhythm Changes licks you NEED to know

If you have any questions, comments or suggestions for topics or how I can improve the lessons then please let me know. Leave a comment on the video or send me an e-mail. That is the best way for me to improve my lessons and make them fit what you are searching for.

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