The Jazz Sax & Improvisation Blog of Saxophonist Bobby Stern

Korner Karnataka #5 - Take A Ride on the "South Indian Line"

6/27/2014

All Aboard!
Take A Ride on the "South Indian Line"

"People get ready, there's a train a-comin''. Don't need no ticket, just get on board " - Curtis Mayfield

(...and If you actually get to where you're goin' in one piece. you'd better thank the Lord!)

The exercise here is a page from my personal workbook (as is most of the stuff I post, I guess).

In order to kill two birds with one stone, I thought I'd create` these lines for myself as a method to get closer and more personal with this odd meter Carnatic composition "South Indian Line", and post them here, to share with my fellow masochists.

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2 B Continued...Continuous Melodic Minor ii-V7-i, 3 Scale Exercise

6/19/2014

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2 B Continued...
Continuous Melodic Minor ii-V7-i
3 Scale Exercise

The purpose of this minor ii-V7-i exercise, which utilizes 3 Melodic Minor scales (in directionally alternating diatonic 3rds), is at least three-fold:

1) Because Melodic Minor has no "avoid" notes, one can start and resolve the ii-V7-i cadence on each and any scale degree.

2) To smoothly connect, by whole or half step, from one scale to the next, moving in the same ascending or descending direction.

3) Most importantly, to help train the ear to the sound of Melodic Minor in general and to the sound of this type of polymodal ii-V7-i in particular, as well as to build instrumental technique.

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'Trane Fare for Slonimsky - A Diminished Scale Sequence

6/12/2014

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'Trane Fare for Slonimsky - A Diminished
Scale Sequence

A Beautiful (Musical) Mind - Times 2

Here's another symmetrical scale exercise.

This time, it's 2 minor 7th chords a tritone apart, a pair of 4 note patterns, which reveal all 8 notes of a diminished scale.

I was sure this pattern, which has its descending version in retrograde of its ascending form (second two measures), was contained somewhere in the depths of Nicolas Slonimsky's "Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns".

But it wasn't!

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Rep. Tile Dept. - Express Your "Scales" as Arpeggios

6/5/2014

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Iguana play some scales

Musically speaking, a scale (in German "Tonleiter" or "tone ladder") is an ordered set of pitches, either ascending or descending. Such scales can be expressed stepwise (horizontally) or intervalically as arpeggios (vertically).

The subject of this exercise is the arpeggiated version of the Melodic Minor Scale starting on it's 4th scale degree (Lydian Dominant), over a minor ii-V7-i root movement.

A wealth of information on Melodic Minor harmony can be found in previous posts on this blog, together with ii-V7 exercises.

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Korner Karnataka #5 - Take A Ride on the "South Indian Line"

All Aboard! Take A Ride on the "South Indian Line"

2 B Continued...Continuous Melodic Minor ii-V7-i, 3 Scale Exercise

2 B Continued... Continuous Melodic Minor ii-V7-i 3 Scale Exercise

'Trane Fare for Slonimsky - A Diminished Scale Sequence

'Trane Fare for Slonimsky - A Diminished Scale Sequence

Rep. Tile Dept. - Express Your "Scales" as Arpeggios

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All Aboard!
Take A Ride on the "South Indian Line"

2 B Continued...
Continuous Melodic Minor ii-V7-i
3 Scale Exercise

'Trane Fare for Slonimsky - A Diminished
Scale Sequence