Barry HarrisThe method

Chris Parks · Stage 10: Movement

Comping Ideas with 6th Diminished

Episode 30 · 11:07 · On YouTube · In the lesson player

Chris borrows notes from the A flat 6 diminished scale (F minor 7) by holding one note constant while the other three move through the scale of chords. He applies the moving chords to F minor 7 as a II chord in E flat and as the opening chord of All the Things You Are, and argues that Barry teaches improvising with chords, not only lines.

Step by step

  1. 0:00Hear F minor 7 as A flat 6, with diminished chords around it to borrow notes from.
  2. 1:21Play F minor 7 on the middle strings at the 8th fret and the diminished above it, then keep the C and move the other three notes up.
  3. 2:33Keep the C constant through each new inversion; the third chord ends up doubling the C.
  4. 3:09Use it with F minor 7 as a II chord, going to a pretty B flat 7 and resolving to E flat.
  5. 4:58Use it as the VI chord at the start of All the Things You Are, F minor 7 (A flat 6) to D flat 6.
  6. 6:57Any note can be the constant; on guitar, keep the voicings your fingers can manage.
  7. 7:30Move the constant-note chords down the scale too; a dissonant chord resolving to F minor 7 makes a pretty opening.
  8. 8:50When four notes will not fit, use two or three.

Chords and notes in this video

Tap a time to jump to it in the video.

Fm71:21
8fr××Fm7
C3FCE♭A♭
diminished above Fm71:21
9fr××diminished above Fm7
C3GC4ED♭B♭
Ab61:57
10fr××Ab6
C3C4FCA♭E♭
Bb73:42
6fr×Bb7
C2C3C4DBB♭A♭G♭

Barry’s own words on this

10.4 Borrowing9.4 Playing the scale of chords (block chords up and down the 6th dim scale)11.6 Comping9.1 Sixth chords rule

In the course

The tritone’s minorSixth chords rule: minor 7 is major 6, half-diminished is minor 6Drop 2, drop 3 and drop 2 and 4Keeping one note constantAll the Things You AreFreedom and your own voice

Transcript

  1. 0:00Hello and welcome to episode 30 of Things I’ve Learned from Barry Harris. Today I thought we would look at maybe some more ideas on borrowing notes from the six diminished scale. And in this instance, as an example, I thought we would use A flat six diminished. So Ab6, for those of you who don’t know, is also Fm7. So, in using Fm7 we have to think about the diminished that surrounds that,
  2. 0:43which is the E diminished, or the G diminished which surrounds that Fm7. And that’s the notes that we’re going to borrow from. We’re going to borrow some notes from this diminished, and then notes from this diminished. Now a nice concept that I’m sure Barry has talked about, but I started looking at too, is if we take this first F minor 7 chord, and the frets are, and again these are the four middle strings, we refer to this as drop 2 because it’s four consecutive strings. There’s another reason it’s really called drop 2, but we’ll get into that another time.
  3. 1:21But these are going to be 8th fret, 10th fret, 8th fret, 9th fret. So there’s our first chord. Now the diminished above is this diminished, which is 10th fret, 11th fret, 9th fret, 11th fret. But now suppose we said for the F minor 7, we just want to keep that 10th fret or the C. So now we’ll move all the other notes except for the C, which means we have to move the F to G, we have to move the E flat to F,
  4. 1:57and we have to move the A flat to B flat. So it would be this chord, which you kinda know, it happens to be a C7 from the fifth. So now we have this, we have this. Now the next chord for the F minor seven, if we’re gonna do the true, If we were going to do the true inversions would be this is A4, A flat 6, which would be 11th fret, 13th fret, 10th fret, 13th fret. So here’s our chord.
  5. 2:33So now we have this as normal. Now if we take this concept and we say let’s keep the C constant. So we’re going to move the other three notes except for the C. So now here’s your first chord. Here’s your second chord and here is your third chord, which is really pretty. It actually turns into doubling the C’s, which is kind of nice. So now we have this. So let’s say, for instance, we say, well, when do we use F minor 7?
  6. 3:09You could say, well, we use F minor 7 if it’s the 2 chord of the key of E flat major. So here’s F minor 7. Is the 2 chord going to B flat 7 going to E flat major? So if we look at this as a 2 chord, and then maybe we’ll try to play we’ll try to find a pretty Bb7 which could be which could be let’s say
  7. 3:42let’s do this one maybe we’ll do this which could be like a Bb but with an Bm6 above it which would be if I were going to call out the notes So it would be starting from the sixth string, and this would be like, kind of like a drop three, but we’re adding the top note also. So it’s sixth fret, skip a string, sixth fret, seventh fret, seventh fret, seventh fret. And if you want, you can add. And then, you know, resolve it if you want.
  8. 4:18Which is really pretty. So now we have. And a pretty E flat. Or you could play, which is also pretty. Also pretty. Another way you could use it is, let’s say, if we were playing F minor 7 or A flat 6 is the first chord of all things you are. So in this instance, the F minor 7 is not a 2 chord, but it’s a 6 chord.
  9. 4:58Because all things you are is in the key of A flat. So it starts off with it being in, starting on the 6 chord. Now what’s interesting about all the things you are is the chord after F minor 7 is going to be B flat minor 7. which of course Barry doesn’t refer to as minor 7, but he talks about it from its 6, which would be C Db6. So that would be Ab6 or Fm7 going to Db6 or Bbm7. So if we took this concept,
  10. 5:37and we just messed around with the scale, maybe we’ll start on this one. so one two three four or maybe we’ll do a little bit of it um for uh what would it be for b-flat we’ll say that’s the same thing That’s another way to do it for B-flat. So then we could say maybe...
  11. 6:22But these are just two examples to show you how you can mess around with the six diminished scale to create movement within a chord change in a given song. Because a lot of times people say, oh, well, where are you going to use these? These are interesting to look at, but actually when you’re playing a song, how are you going to apply these? Well, these are two very basic ways to apply them. And that’s just with using one note as a constant.
  12. 6:57We could have used any note as a constant note and see what we can come up with. But see, that’s not for me to do. That’s for you guys to do and take a look at it and maybe discuss it and make videos of your own just to see how it comes out. Now, part of the problem that I’ve always had is some of them are much easier to play on piano because you can move two and three fingers without worrying about the position of another finger like we have to on guitar. so what I ended up doing whether this is right or wrong I don’t know
  13. 7:30is just the ones that are more comfortable for me those are the ones I use but in order to find out which ones are comfortable for me you have to just keep taking a look at all the different ones I even like sometimes the C is constant so we did the C staying constant going up the scale but the C you can also go down the scale so you could have started all the things you are using this chord. Oh, I’m sorry. Sorry about that. Which is a really dissonant chord.
  14. 8:05But now I’m back to the regular F-7. So now you’ve got watch. That’s a pretty way to start all the things you are. So, one, two, two. Let’s see. Oh, it was too late on that, but let’s see. But it’s just different ways to show you how to implement these ideas.
  15. 8:50Some of them are hard to get four notes out, that’s why sometimes you only use two notes or three notes and so on. But these are really helpful and really important to developing your own style. And again, as I was emphasizing in the last video, I really feel like it’s a disservice to refer to Barry and his methodology as just in the brackets of the king of bebop or a bebop or the keeper of the bebop flame. I completely understand why people say that, but in a way,
  16. 9:30it kind of shortens what he’s really doing. Barry is really teaching us how to improvise, not only with lines like we’ve been going over, but through chords, to truly improvise with chords. While you’re comping for somebody, or if you’re playing a chord melody, or whatever. And that’s what I really feel like makes his method and his approach so brilliant. So again, those are just Just two little interesting things to try to take a look at and I hope it’s helpful.
  17. 10:11So you know, I wouldn’t mind seeing some people making their own videos of ideas that they have just from Barry’s method or even, and they can even be small little snippets because it’s definitely something that I can learn from. And I think it also helps solidify your ideas. If you really say, okay, I’ll have to put this on video, which means I really have to have it together. Together meaning in your fingers, an understanding of it, and being able to pull it off in a song is really important. All right, so I hope you enjoyed this lesson, episode 30, of just different six diminished ideas,
  18. 10:54and understanding how to borrow certain notes. Until next time, thanks.