Why Does This Smell like BS?

[MathOfInsects]

1 hour ago, analogika said:

 

Hang on. 

 

The fourth chord is not a D9 sus 4. The synth bassline does pass through the D, but the chord played by the guitar is a plain Fmaj7 - F E A C E.  There's definitely no G in there. 

 

I don't think you're right about that. I am pretty sure that Am7 stays holy while the bass moves to D, making it (simplest form) Am7/D (which includes the G). 

No?

[benj2017]

Just off the top of my head from having played this tune before, I think the last chord of the four bar phrase alternates between an F major 7 and the D7sus, depending on where you are in the form.

[MathOfInsects]

22 minutes ago, benj2017 said:

Just off the top of my head from having played this tune before, I think the last chord of the four bar phrase alternates between an F major 7 and the D7sus, depending on where you are in the form.

I think in both cases it's that Am7 being kept whole while the bass changes the harmony of it. (In other words, I think it's actually an FMa9 in those times.)

[AROIOS]

2 hours ago, analogika said:

...The fourth chord is not a D9 sus 4. The synth bassline does pass through the D, but the chord played by the guitar is a plain Fmaj7 - F E A C E.  There's definitely no G in there...

I've attached the part where I heard the D9sus4 chord below. To my ears, the G is not played but strongly implied since F# (3rd of D) is omitted. This voicing is extremely common in pop arrangement when the top note of a 9sus4 land on the 5th. That said, D9 is a perfectly fine choice here, it just results in a slightly weaker voice leading to E3.
 

I'm not hearing the F you mentioned in the snippet though. It would turn the chord from dominant to minor, a more significant change than "sus"ing/extending it. That said, the resultant Dm9 would be another perfectly fine choice here, the voice leading is just as strong as a D9sus4 would create.

[AROIOS]

2 hours ago, analogika said:

...Oddly, the Dmaj7 in the fourth bar of the third line is noted as "D-7" in some other fake books. Which is it?

 

I hear a Dmaj7. The Dm7 notation is likely due to the melody hitting an F. It doesn't change the overall sound from major to minor in this context for my ears.
 

2 hours ago, analogika said:

...And in that chart, the Dmaj7 actually isn't available in any of the modes — only the Dm7 is

I think you just pointed out a big hole in the modal interchange perspective of "Beatrice" right there.

[AROIOS]

2 hours ago, analogika said:

...

Here is the chart of "Beatrice" in terms of modal interchange chords:
 

 

So it seems obvious that Sam Rivers actually used modal interchange to come up with the chord structure...

 

The chart brings me back to exactly the problem "confidence" and I mentioned: it's a way to describe the progression, but useless when we try to apply it in the opposition direction.
 

For example, for the 4th chord, why pick bVIImaj7 from the parallel Mixolydian ? Why not use bVIIm7 from the parallel Phrygian? And why stick with Phrygian and Mixolydian the whole chart? Why not use some "tasty" Im7b5 and VIm7b5 from Locrian or Dorian? Is it because the melody sounded somewhat Phrygian or Mixolydian? For all I can hear in the first 4 bars, the melody is 100% diatonic. It only briefly went mixolydian on the 6th bar. Even then, why does a flat 7th automatically suggest Mixolydian or Phrygian? Why not Dorian?
 

I hope you see how the whole thing seem like shoehorning some coincidence onto a grid, and the grid offers no guidance on the "how" for someone who's trying to apply it in writing. I agree with you that it's a creative tool to offer ideas. But the application of the tool just feels like throwing dart around a board and painting a target around the ones that stuck afterwards. For that reason, it's not obvious to me at all that "Sam Rivers actually used modal interchange to come up with the chord structure".
 

By the way, it IS a beautiful progression. Thanks for sharing it.

[analogika]

1 hour ago, AROIOS said:

I've attached the part where I heard the D9sus4 chord below. To my ears, the G is not played but strongly implied since F# (3rd of D) is omitted. This voicing is extremely common in pop arrangement when the top note of a 9sus4 land on the 5th. That said, D9 is a perfectly fine choice here, it just results in a slightly weaker voice leading to E3.
 

I'm not hearing the F you mentioned in the snippet though. It would turn the chord from dominant to minor, a more significant change than "sus"ing/extending it. That said, the resultant Dm9 would be another perfectly fine choice here, the voice leading is just as strong as a D9sus4 would create.

This is the chord I was referring to, but I think @benj2017 is right that they alternate. 

[stoken6]

3 hours ago, ProfD said:

Hopefully, it won't go down the drain as the younger generation of musicians are learning how to arrange using DAWs and watching YouTube tutorials.😎

I suspect that arranging will play second fiddle to sound re-design or re-creation. After all the arrangement of many modern pop songs boils down to vi-IV-I-V and/or Reggaeton. But how to get that snarly swept-formant pad after the drop - we'll spend the next semester on that.

 

Cheers, Mike.

[analogika]

43 minutes ago, AROIOS said:

 

The chart brings me back to exactly the problem "confidence" and I mentioned: it's a way to describe the progression, but useless when we try to apply it in the opposition direction.
 

For example, for the 4th chord, why pick bVIImaj7 from the parallel Mixolydian ? Why not use bVIIm7 from the parallel Phrygian?

Because the melody goes to the G. (Also, subjectively, it sounds better dropping to the "open"-sounding major chord, followed by a minor one half-step down.)

 

 

1 hour ago, AROIOS said:

 

I hear a Dmaj7. The Dm7 notation is likely due to the melody hitting an F. It doesn't change the overall sound from major to minor in this context for my ears.
 

I think you just pointed out a big hole in the modal interchange perspective of "Beatrice" right there.

 

Disagree. In the original, it's Dm. There's two instances (including the very first head) where the pianist passes through the major 3rd, but he instantly moves off the +3 (as if he coolly caught his flub), and all other instances are either decidedly minor, or he doesn't play the 3rd at all. 

 

 

 

43 minutes ago, AROIOS said:

For example, for the 4th chord, why pick bVIImaj7 from the parallel Mixolydian ? Why not use bVIIm7 from the parallel Phrygian? And why stick with Phrygian and Mixolydian the whole chart? Why not use some "tasty" Im7b5 and VIm7b5 from Locrian or Dorian? Is it because the melody sounded somewhat Phrygian or Mixolydian? For all I can hear in the first 4 bars, the melody is 100% diatonic. It only briefly went mixolydian on the 6th bar. Even then, why does a flat 7th automatically suggest Mixolydian or Phrygian? Why not Dorian?

 

I suggested that people were looking at the grid of modal interchange options as a resource for composing, not that they're randomly throwing darts and just picking shit. There's still some actual composition going on. 😉

 

The flat 7 automatically suggests mixolydian or phrygian because, as you write, the melody remains completely diatonic except for ONE instance of the Eb, and ONE of the Ab at the very end. The A remains a constant except for that very last drop. 

The reason this song seems so simple and beautiful despite the harmonies being such a mess of half-steps and weirdness is BECAUSE its structure is comparatively simple, NOT drawing from random chord changes, but gently switching through three scales while making the almost exclusively diatonic melody feel harmonic and simple. 

If you listen to the original, they largely stick to that simplicity, as well. 

 

I agree that the F-7 could be played as dorian or aeolian. Dorian feels weird to me, because the D doesn't really belong IMO. Aeolian is a nice contrast at that point to the phrygian II that precedes and follows it. 
 

 

 

43 minutes ago, AROIOS said:

I hope you see how the whole thing seem like shoehorning some coincidence onto a grid, and the grid offers no guidance on the "how" for someone who's trying to apply it in writing. I agree with you that it's a creative tool to offer ideas. But the application of the tool just feels like throwing dart around a board and painting a target around the ones that stuck afterwards. For that reason, it's not obvious to me at all that "Sam Rivers actually used modal interchange to come up with the chord structure".

 

Nothing about this progression seems or feels random. The flat 7 major chord is necessarily lydian (so a mixo VII), because the A needs to be there… 

 

I'm suggesting it feels that way because it's pretty systematic. 

It's not like it's unheard of for jazz standards to have been composed by systematic approach… "Giant Steps" may come to mind, and certainly modal jazz' basic premise was to come up with new strategies for harmony, beyond "traditional" harmonic concepts. 

 

It would very much surprise me if a modal jazz composition from 1965 did NOT follow some sort of fairly clear structural approach. 🤷‍♂️

 

43 minutes ago, AROIOS said:

By the way, it IS a beautiful progression. Thanks for sharing it.

 

I'm glad you like it. I'm completely enamoured by it, myself. 

[Reezekeys]

Nice track Dave! I've always played a Dmin there also, but because of the mention in this thread I went back to check out the original on Fuschia Swing Song. As you point out, it sounds like a flub by Jaki the first time through the head since he immediately moves from the maj to the dominant 7th. I might be presumptuous here but it sounds like he was having a bad day - just my impression from what he does at the beginning of his solo.

 

Funny thing is that Stan Getz recorded Beatrice, and Kenny Barron most definitely plays a D maj7 there - every time. You know what? I like it more than D min7 - it gives the song an unexpected lift, since the E half-dim to A7 makes has you expecting a D min.

 

 

 

[AROIOS]

5 hours ago, analogika said:

...In the original, it's Dm. There's two instances (including the very first head) where the pianist passes through the major 3rd, but he instantly moves off the +3 (as if he coolly caught his flub), and all other instances are either decidedly minor, or he doesn't play the 3rd at all.

 

I was comparing the Dmaj7 in the lead sheet you posted with what's played in the recording, both at the 12th bar (0:38). And they match (snippet attached below). This is textbook 2-5-1 in D or 7-3-6 (in Gospel terms) in the original key of F. I don't see how modal interchange helped here, unless we shoehorn this viim7-III7-VImaj7 into a F Lydian modal interchange. But then, as you already pointed out, Dmaj7 simply is no where to be found in any modes of F.

This is exactly why I called it a hole in the "modal interchange perspective". viim-III7-VImaj7 is a very popular sound in Westcoast AOR and Pop Jazz, and can easily be explained by the 7-3-6 angle, without relying on any of that modal mumble jumble. Heck, David Foster would even trace that 5-1 relationship all the way up to get a #4-7-3-6, as can be heard at 1:29 in "The Best of Me" (#ivm11-VII7-iiim7-vim7).

Btw, it seems the Dm you heard is from the 28th bar (1:09). But it sounds more like D9sus, and the lead sheet certainly didn't indicate that variation either way.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Josh Paxton]

I had never heard "Beatrice." Thanks for introducing me to a really nice tune.

[AROIOS]

7 hours ago, analogika said:

...Nothing about this progression seems or feels random. The flat 7 major chord is necessarily lydian (so a mixo VII), because the A needs to be there… 

 

I'm suggesting it feels that way because it's pretty systematic....

"Borrowing" a bVIImaj7 chord from the parallel Mixolydian, implies that the original "un-interchanged" chord choice was viim7b5 on the 4th bar. And viim7b5 simply sounds awful in that context. It's hard to imagine that anyone would have chosen that chord, and then looked up the 7th chord in parallel modes, and "borrowed" the one from Mixolydian.
 

It's much more likely that bVIImaj7 sounded good at that spot to the arranger, so it's chosen, simple as that.

As to why it worked for our ears, sure, we can say it's that textbook uplifting "Mixolydian" sound. But that's just like saying a chocolate bar tastes good because its Godiva, when the actual reason is the specific blend of vanilla and cocoa butter.
 

To my ears, 1st, I-bVIImaj7 is not a result of modal interchange of I-viim7b5; 2nd, it works mostly for the same simple reason I-IV, or I-IIm7, or I-V9sus4, or I-bIII69#11 (the "Lydian" chord, b3-1-4-6) works: Voice Leading. The movement from 3 and 5 in I to 4 and 6 in IV, IIm7, V9sus4, bVIImaj7, bIII69#11 etc, is the most fundamental voice leading in tonal harmony.

[analogika]

2 hours ago, AROIOS said:

Btw, it seems the Dm you heard is from the 28th bar (1:09). But it sounds more like D9sus, and the lead sheet certainly didn't indicate that variation either way.

 

Well, they play it another good handful of times, only one of which (from brief listening) includes the major 3rd — as a passing note, and on piano only. Reading on in this thread, it seems that neither am I alone in seeing the original as a Dm7, nor are you alone in wanting to play it as a Dmaj7, especially given the classic IIm V I structure at that point. (Even if the II actually implies a minor tonic.)

 

Your explanation of the bVII is a nice analysis of why it works so nicely; my approach is a suggestion for how he might have come up with it, back in 1964 or so. 
If it pleases you, you’re of course free to assume that the composer just tried a bunch of random chords and pieced them together with voice leading and a melody that somehow tied them together. (It sounds like that’s what you’re saying.) 
 

I'm going to keep assuming (and teaching) that it’s FAR easier to come up with something like the Bb-7 Am7 Bbmaj7 of bars 8-10 with a modal approach that simply switches out modes of F, while limiting the melody to the common tones. 
 

I find this likely a) because that’s what it looks like, and b) because systematic approaches to composition were A Thing at that time (again, I’ll mention “Giant Steps” — a rigidly systematic, visual march through the Circle of Fifths). 
 

I wouldn’t look to the Real Book as the authority on that Dmaj7/Dm7, because for one, it’s in conflict with a number of other collections, for another, it doesn’t match what’s actually played on most of the repeats of the original, and third, the Real Book itself is FULL of errors (as are most fake sheet collections). 

[AROIOS]

5 minutes ago, analogika said:

...a bunch of random chords and pieced them together with voice leading and a melody that somehow tied them together. (It sounds like that’s what you’re saying.) ...

Yup, that's been my personal approach for a while, and essentially the only "rule" behind Gospel harmony as I've come to realize.
 

5 minutes ago, analogika said:

...I'm going to keep assuming (and teaching) that it’s FAR easier to come up with something like the Bb-7 Am7 Bbmaj7 of bars 8-10 with a modal approach that simply switches out modes of F, while limiting the melody to the common tones...

Sure, it's perfectly fine for every one to choose a framework/perspective that makes most sense to them. I was looking for a way to apply modal interchange to my harmony writing and couldn't find much juice there.
 

Btw, it's surely a plausible angle to see Bbm7-Am7 as borrowing ivm7 from the parallel Aeolian. But it's far easier for me to simply see it as chromatic movement before iiim7. This angle immediately offers choices to put before the usual minor chords, e.g. I-biiim7-iim7, I-bviim7-vim7, without any hassle of "borrowing" from Locrian or Phrygian.

[analogika]

The point about that particular movement was that it hits the MINOR IV, moves down to the IIIm, and then moves back up to the MAJOR IV. 
 

Effectively, you’ve challenged my assertion that this piece was probably composed by modal interchange by offering up a different modal interchange solution. Does that count as conceding the point? 😛
 

But yeah, the Bbm7 could come from the aeolian. Not sure if I like the G there instead of the Gb. 
 

Again, my impression is that the beauty comes from simplicity, and adding two more scales (Dorian and Aeolian) adds more and more notes that may or may not work as well in the context. 

[AROIOS]

15 hours ago, analogika said:

...

The half-dimished chord is a II that implies a minor tonic. Resolving that to a major tonic is an unexpected release not dissimilar to a Picardy third, where a piece written in a minor tonic unexpectedly resolves to a major chord...

IIm7b5 seen as 2nd chord borrowed from I Aeolian, as suggested by the original video, is certainly a plausible angle. We can also view it as 2nd chord of I Aeolian Dominant, the 5th mode of melodic minor.
 

Its connection to Imaj7 didn't sound "unexpected" to my ears at all. It results in one of the many strong resolutions utilizing the voice leading (and chromatic motion) from 1-4-b6 to 7-3-5. The other ones include bVII9-Imaj7, bVI6b5-Imaj7, V11b9-Imaj7, IVm6-Imaj7, and bIImaj7-Imaj7. In fact, my mind immediately went to V11b9 upon hearing the IIm7b5 in the original video.
 

The bIImaj7-Imaj7 option is worth noting here, because it came from the voice leading/chromatic motion angle, and simply can't be offered by the Aeolian or Melodic Minor perspectives.

[AROIOS]

46 minutes ago, analogika said:

The point about that particular movement was that it hits the MINOR IV, moves down to the IIIm, and then moves back up to the MAJOR IV. 
 

Effectively, you’ve challenged my assertion that this piece was probably composed by modal interchange by offering up a different modal interchange solution. Does that count as conceding the point? 😛

Sure, I wouldn't exclude the possibility of Jaki or Sam arranging the tune or parts of it with modal interchange in mind. It just seemed easier to come up with the same results using voice leading and good ole tonal harmony with occasional modulation.

[Al Quinn]

I’ve played this song many times and love it! Having read all of this thread I’m struck by how some seem to take what appears to be a cerebral approach to music: using their intellect and tools like modal interchange to compose. If it works for them then that’s great. We’re all different and need to find our own path. For me, it doesn’t do much to explain the impact of the music, but it is interesting in its own way. I guess because my aspiration is to play the music I hear in my head or inner ear I’m coming at the music from a different angle. I’m wondering if the modal interchange approach gives the composer inspiration or permission to use different sounds. I hope it’s the former and not the latter.

 

Hearing Jaki and Kenny reminds me of when I would regularly go see them and other giants of jazz piano play in small clubs in NYC. That was a few decades ago. Such fond memories!

[Al Quinn]

Great performance Dave! Thanks for getting my day off to a nice start 😎

[jarrell]

On 10/11/2023 at 4:11 PM, Dave Ferris said:

Beatrice is a great song, one of my favorites. I've been playing it for over 40 years.

 

A solo piano version I did in one take around 11 years ago when my piano was still playing and sounding in its prime.  

https://soundcloud.com/dave-ferris/beatrice-sam-rivers-solo-piano

 

Really nice contemplative version there, Dave!