Theory Lessons.

[Phil W]

Did you mean the key of Db? In that case the diatonic chords would be Db Ebm Fbm Gb Ab Bbm Cdim.

 

G7 in Bb major would be Bb7 in Db major.

[TimR]

Yes. Sharps for sharp keys and flats for flat keys for me everytime please. My brain goes loopy if I'm in Eb and someone calls a D# chord. Though it shouldn't

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

Ok,my bad! I really meant F to D. That would be up three semi notes. Still going from one flat to two sharp in the key.

 

So, again, G7 (up three semi) to Bb7 or A#7. Which is technically correct. Is there a rule for this sort of thing?

 

Now that that's cleared up, I think Tim gave me what I needed. And hence my keys complaint about changing the A#'s to Bb's in the chording.

[Phil W]

It's not whether it's G7 and moved up 3 semitones that dictates the name as much as the key it moves to. I'm still confused: F to D is down 3 semitones.

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

Well, be it up, down, left, or right, I am going from one flat to two sharps. Three semi-notes. Does that make all the flats sharps now when I change the chording - coming to the "new" chord from the "old" chord is chording it as an A# technically correct or is chording it as a Bb appropriate or doesn't it matter.

 

The direction is confusing becuase the key is going "down" the scale but the direction is going "up" the fretboard. I associate (correctly or otherwise) flat with "down" and sharp with "up" (Bb is one seminote "down" from a B and B# © is one semi "up" from B).

 

Screw the whole picking a whole note or chord and an example. I'm obviously still trying to correct my cranial-rectal inversion.

 

Moot, I need you to get on here and help my self-esteem out!

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

OK, LAST TIME!!! I blow this I'll take up knitting.

 

Song - Girl from Impanema, The

Key - F (one flat)

Transpose - D (two sharps)

Net change - DOWNscale three seminotes (F, E, Eb, D)

 

Several instances of a Gb7(b5) chord (ties the Gm7 to the FMaj7)

DOWNscale three seminotes (Gb, F, E, ______ )

 

Does Eb or D# go into the blank? Why? When would it change?

 

And why would the original music have a Gb7(b5) instead of an F#7(b5)?

[TimR]

D# goes in the blank because you are in a sharp key.

Original has Gb7(b5) because you are in a flat key.

 

However although D# is written it will be interpreted as an Eb chord by everyone.

[jeremy c]

If you are in F and there is a G7 chord (which we could call a V of V chord) and then you transpose the song to D, the second chord will be E7.

 

Please do not EVER think of up and down according to the geometry of your bass. Up and down should always refer to pitch.

 

Where are up and down on a keyboard? They have left and right notes. What about on a voice? A flute? A trumpet? A drum? (drums are tuned either loosely or tightly.)

 

If up and down refer to pitch only, we can all communicate.

 

If you get confused by the geometry of your bass, I recommend hanging by your heels from a chandelier while you practice.

 

Back to the original question. Perhaps your song was in F major and there was an Ab major chord. That chord is not technically part of the key, but so what. When you transpose the song to D the chord will be an F.

 

If your song was in F and there was a Db chord (also not technically in the key) and you transposed the song to D the question will come up as to whether you should call the chord a Bb or an A#.

 

I vote for Bb. I know that D is a "sharp key" (I know, I know, "I'm a sharp key"), and we like to keep sharps together and flats together, but people are more used to seeing Bb chords than they are used to seeing A# chords and I believe that there will be fewer reading mistakes if you write the chord as Bb.

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

Tres bien! Merci!

 

Not really confused by the geometry of the bass. I was a former trumpet player where there is no right/left/up/down. Your point is loud and clear.

 

I've been in the Fortress of Solitude for about six hours stright (a 9' x 7' spare bedroom with a computer, a drum kit, four basses, and upright, two combo amps a keyboard, two shelving units and three layers of sheet music on the floor) as I try and make sense of our song list, transpose our new songs and make some editorial corrections on some older ones using notation software designed primarly for guitars with a printer that's not networking. I should have taken a break first before the inital post, or just tried to keep it simple.

 

That's OK, I know my hard work will be rewarded by endless nattering about chord changes and our keyboardist wanting to rewrite Thelonius Monk AGAIN!

 

I really do know better, but I should have gotten out a piece of paper and wrote everything down first before demonstrating my ignorance.

[TimR]

Is it more likely that it will be something like an inversion of an E6 chord rather than an outright A# chord?

 

or in the case of D# an A6?

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

If you are referring to my "Girl from Impanema" example, I have no idea. All I have is a lead sheet written in a "woman's key". If the band decideds to change the key, I transcribe the entire lead sheet using the software, change the key (key button), transpose the music (transpose button) and change the chording on the song (chord button) by the same number of seminotes - hopefully all in the same direction.

 

I can check with the keys. She is taking lessons from a "jazz guy" and he instructor would certainly know the answer.

[jeremy c]

Is it more likely that it will be something like an inversion of an E6 chord rather than an outright A# chord?

 

or in the case of D# an A6?

 

I doubt that.

 

We have a chord progression which goes F Db C7 F in the key of F.

We transpose it to D and it becomes D Bb A7 D.

It's not a common chord progression (and not particularly unusual either), but if there wasn't an inversion in the original key, there isn't going to be one when it is transposed.

 

If the band decides to change the key, I transcribe the entire lead sheet using the software, change the key (key button), transpose the music (transpose button) and change the chording on the song (chord button) by the same number of seminotes - hopefully all in the same direction.

 

Forget the machine. You'll actually learn what is going on if you do it all by hand....or read the chart onstage and and transpose it on the spot...which I have to do on a regular basis.

 

Start by writing all the chords in all the keys in rows. Then when you have to transpose a song, just look in the row corresponding to the new key. The "out-of-key" chords will provide the challenge and then you can decide whether to use sharps or flats. Pick the one that would be most understandable to you if you had to read the chart.

 

Here, I've done it for you:

C Dm Em F G Am Bo C

C# D#m E#m F# G# A#m B#o C#

Db Ebm Fm Gb Ab Bbm Co Db

D Em F#m G A Bm C#o D

Eb Fm Gm Ab Bb Cm Do Eb

E F#m G#m A B C#m D#o C

F Gm Am Bb C Dm Eo F

F# G#m A#m B C# D#m E#o F#

Gb Abm Bbm Cb Db Ebm Fo Gb

G Am Bm C D Em F#o G

Ab Bbm Cm Db Eb Fm Go Ab

A Bm C#m D E F#m G#oA

Bb Cm Dm Eb F Gm Ao Bb

B C#m D#m E F# G#m A#o B

Cb Dbm Ebm Fb Gb Abm Bbo Cb

C Dm Em F G Am Bo C

 

[Phil W]

Good advice, Frank, you need to know your stuff to check the software's output anyway.

 

Tim, this is jazz, bVI is not unknown in a major key - for instance the Bb7 in Wave which is in D major.

 

bvi chords act as sub-dominants and quite often resolve to V7 chords as in Jeremy'e example so it makes a million times more sense to write D Bb A D than D A# A D!

 

In Girl from Ip I always think of that chord as Gb7b5 rather than F#7b5 - it is acting as a dominant - a tritone sub for C7.

 

Frank

It's better to think of the whole tune as transposing rather than individual keys. So if the whole tune transposes the new chords are names to fit in with the context in their new key - does that make sense. There is still the matter of which enharmonic name to use for non-diatonic chords sometimes but that comes down (AFAIK) to custom and familiarity rather than a set rule.

 

BTW, if anyone tells you to play something a semitone higher, they are always referring to pitch!

 

 

 

 

[TimR]

Thanks Jeremy (and Phil), its making it a bit clearer to me at least now.

 

When talking about chords I would go for

 

C,G,D,A,E,B,F#

and

F,Bb,Eb,Ab,Db,Gb

 

where F# and Gb are interchangeable.

 

I'd pick these chords because although (for example) there is an A# note, there is technically no key signature for A#, only Bb.

 

So in the key of D, even though the Bb chord would be written above the stave, in notation on the stave, I would expect to see the notes written as #s.

 

Is that correct?

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

Forget the machine. You'll actually learn what is going on if you do it all by hand....or read the chart onstage and and transpose it on the spot...which I have to do on a regular basis.

 

Admittedly, I am getting better at this as time goes on. My copy of the song book also numbers the chords which I find easier to transpose on the fly. We bring in new songs and we have to transpose on the spot because of our vocalist's range, then I go home and transpose for the song books. Our keys has it easy; the Yami Tyros has a feature that will transpose on the fly. She plays in "F" and the keyboard automatically transposes to "D". Me, I got to do it the hard way.

 

The computer is required because we keep not only a song book each, but a "guest" book for both C and Eb instruments and I've seem to have taken that responsiblity. We've had some soloists that don't even need the book, others not so much.

 

We may not conduct ourselves as professionals as much as I would like, but damnit, that song book is going to look pro.

[jeremy c]

Professional sax players are supposed to be able to transpose on sight. Give them a C chart and it's their problem, not yours. If they can't do it, they don't get to sit in.

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

Y'know, if my band was "all that" I might be inclined to agree. Due to the venue size and the fact that most of the horn blowers locally are looking for a steady gig (one weekly house gig plus one or two "events" monthly), we get a lot of students - not really a bad thing. Hell, I can't do it all the time with great proficiency.

 

Figured another theory on accidnetals. I'm transposing the standard "Do Nothin' Till You Hear From Me" from Bb (bb) to G (#). That's DOWN three seminotes. Since my software tends to make everything flat in a flat key, I changed the flats to sharps and noticed that I have a few instances were the Bb is in the same measure as a B. Change the Bb's to A#'s, now the natural accidental is no longer requried in the middle of the measure. Make the measure look cleaner.

 

I know this shouldn't matter...

[jeremy c]

It does matter, and now you are writing more readable charts.

[TimR]

Buried earlier in this thread and worth highlighting.

 

...

M=Major

m=minor

d=diminished

p=Perfect

 

D-E is M(ajor)2

D-F# is a M3

D-G is a P4

D-A is a P5

D-B is a M6

D-C# is a M7

D-D is a P8

 

Notice...in the major scale, all the intervals are either Major or Perfect. That's a really good reference point to know.

 

Now...let's look at the notes we left out:

 

D-Eb is a m(inor)2

D-F is a m3

D-G# is an Augmented 4, which equals

D-Ab a diminished 5. These two "enharmonic" (enharmonic means sounds the same, spelled differently) intervals are very important.

D-Bb is a m6

D-C is a m7 (also called a "Dominant Seventh" because this interval occurs naturally in a dominant chord.(A Dominant chord is a chord based on the fifth scale step)

 

That's all the intervals.

...

 

Listing in terms of semitones:

1 m2

2 M2

3 m3

4 M3

5 P4

6 d5 or aug4

7 P5

8 m6

9 M6

10 m7 or dom7

11 M7

12 P8

 

Usually when we speak of transposing we speak of going up, even if the transposing instrument is lower in pitch. So for instance when transposing for Eb sax you are transposing a M6 even though you are writing a m3 down from the piano note. (someone should verify this )

 

This often leads to confusion.

[Phil W]

http://www.geocities.com/sax411/music/transposing.html

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

BUMP!

 

Ok, had to drag out this oldie but goodie, and I'll even throw in the inane question.

 

When does someone who is writing a song make the decision that "Hey, you know what would sound good here? An Ab#11b13! What drives the decision process behind the placement and use of polychords?

 

... my giddy aunt! THAT was priceless!

[jeremy c]

I might use that chord because it has that certain je ne sais quoi that is appropriate at the moment. I used a phrase in another language intentionally in the last sentence.

 

An Ab#11b13 is part of a language. If you don't speak that language, you will never use the chord. If you do speak the language, then the chord sounds right to you when it is in an appropriate place.

 

If you learn songs which use a bigger chord vocabulary than you already know, and you really study the songs to see how the chords fit together, how the melody line goes with the chords, how the inner voices of the chords move as the chords change, and how a different choice of bass notes can result in a new name for a chord, more chords will begin to sound right and even inevitable to you.

 

But mostly I will use a chord in a song because I like the way it sounds.

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

Well, since Rosetta Stone doesn't offer language software for "Polychord", I need to do something else.

 

It appears that jazz is going to be my main genre. I'm turning down bass chairs for classic rock bands (three GIGGING bands in the last six months - remember my kvetching two years ago about not getting called back for auditions?) and I seem to be having trouble getting up with a "jazz guy" for advanced instruction. Would love to break into the smooth jazz!

 

Aside from course work at the local junior college (still a vialbe option for me), any recommendations? I would really hate to show up at a strange jazz club, step up to the bar, smile at the sweet young thing next to me, say something like - "Hey, how about a Abm#5b9" to resolve to the C9 in measure 15?", have a drink thrown in my face and have some old, calloused jazz junkie in the back start laughing and say "That's a Abmb9, you dummy!"

 

Davio? Is that you?

[davio]

You dummy!

 

Kinda OT but since you mentioned smoovejazz, one of my friends from high school is making some waves on the national (and I believe to some lesser extent international) level. Some people have heard of him...Eric Darius?

[davio]

My honest oppinion...? If you want to really start understanding stacked chords, extended chords, etc. and their applications...start really listening closely to jazz solos (especially piano and guitar, but any instrument as long as the musician has a certain level of mastery). Sit down and analyze their chords (it helps to have a transcription if you're not very good at picking it out on your own). Not just the chords, but where they use them and in what context. At first you'll probably just get a few new tricks to keep in your goody bag but if you keep digging you'll gain a whole new understanding.

 

Beyond lessons or classes that's about all I can suggest.

[MartinJW]

Hi Everyone,

 

I was recently studying, and I found a hard copy of this thread in my notes. It was nearly 7 years old!

 

Here's my question:

 

I'm looking for a good textbook do go along with all this, and I have my eye on Mel Bay presents Essential Music Theory for Electric Bass, by Robert Garner (Mel Bay Publications, Inc., 2007, ISBN-13: 978-0786677368).

 

Any thoughts, opinions, suggestions?

 

THANKS, and it's great to visit this forum again!

 

Martin

[Rocky McDougall]

Wikipedia has a wealth of info under "Music Theory" For novice theorist like myself, Jeremy's thread has been wonderful.

Rocky

[davio]

Theory is universal so a book tailored to electric bass isn't necessary. They'll all teach you the same thing...the only difference is how it's presented. If you really want a hard copy of a book, I'd advise going to a book store (Borders, Barnes & Noble, etc.) and looking through what they have to offer to see what kind of format/presentation most appeals to you.

 

Personally, I'd prefer not to spend the money and read about it online. There are tons of free online resources covering all aspects of the subject.

[Phil W]

(Borders, Barnes & Noble, etc.)

 

 

I miss Borders already!

[MartinJW]

Hi Everyone,

 

...[edited]

 

I'm looking for a good textbook do go along with all this, and I have my eye on Mel Bay presents Essential Music Theory for Electric Bass, by Robert Garner (Mel Bay Publications, Inc., 2007, ISBN-13: 978-0786677368).

 

...[edited]

 

I bought this book, and I'm quite happy with it. (Some of you remember books, don't you? These are sources of information that are edited and deemed valid enough to be printed and sold by a reputable 'book publisher'. Sorta like Wikipedia, but often with genuine facts. )

 

All of the theory is written in the context of bass guitar, and the book itself is in a text / workbook style with end-of-chapter quizzes and an answer key in an appendix. It's well organized and builds on itself very nicely.

 

The author's introduction indicates that he intended that the book be used by a music teacher and student in a class setting, and I think it would be ideal for this purpose. (I've had lessons for a number of years, but I'm going to go through the book myself to supplement the excellent education that I've already received from some outstanding music teachers.)

 

For what it's worth,

Martin