Barry HarrisThe method

Chris Parks · Stage 8: Thinking dominant

Soloing with the Diminished

Episode 21 · 13:47 · On YouTube · In the lesson player

Using the opening of What Is This Thing Called Love (Hot House), Chris solos over G half-diminished, C7 and F minor with the four-note diminished chord and the diminished scale. He follows Barry in deriving the scale by lowering each diminished note to find four dominants, then shows Barry’s ways of decorating the diminished with intervals, chromatic fills and triplets.

Step by step

  1. 0:34The changes are G half-diminished, C7, F minor: think E flat 7 down to the third of C, then F minor 6.
  2. 1:09The F minor 6 diminished scale is the F minor 6 chord plus the diminished chord, eight notes.
  3. 1:48Lower each note of D flat diminished by a half step to get four dominants: C7, F sharp 7, A7 and E flat 7.
  4. 2:30Stack those four roots with the diminished chord to get the diminished scale; know why it exists, not just half-whole.
  5. 3:50Practise the four-note diminished in thirds, in flat fifths and in sixths.
  6. 5:13Fill chromatically between any two diminished notes, such as E up to G, on every pair.
  7. 5:51Add triplets with chromatics, always landing on diminished notes.
  8. 7:03Try Barry’s pattern of going up a minor third and using two notes to reach the next diminished note.
  9. 9:44Over the long F minor 6, practise its scale in thirds, triads and four-note chords.
  10. 12:14If the band plays D minor 7 to G7 instead, just think G7 and its tritone.

Chords and notes in this video

Tap a time to jump to it in the video.

Dbdim1:48
𝄢♭♭
C3EGC4D♭B♭
  1. D♭
  2. E
  3. G
  4. B♭
Line5:13
𝄞♯
C4EFGC5G♭
  1. E
  2. F
  3. F#
  4. G

Barry’s own words on this

8.6 The diminished scale as diminished chord + four dominant roots8.3 Four dominants from every diminished chord8.2 A half-diminished chord means the dominant whose third it is9.5 The minor 6th diminished scale and its diminished partner

In the course

The scale every way: up and down, thirds, triads, chordsThink the dominant: put the ii awayScale outlinesA half-diminished means the dominant whose third it isThe family of dominantsThe diminished scale: a diminished plus four tonicsSoloing with the diminishedThe minor 6 diminished scaleWhat Is This Thing Called Love / Hot House

Transcript

  1. 0:00Hello and welcome to episode 21 of Things I’ve Learned from Barry Harris. Today I thought we would discuss soloing with diminished. Now we’re going to use two different things. We’ll use just the four note diminished and then we’ll use what people refer to as the diminished scale. And I’ll show you where both of those things come about. But first, we’ll discuss what song we’ll use to solo. I was going to take the first part of a song called
  2. 0:34What Is This Thing Called Love, or Hot House. And the first chord changes G-7b5 to C7 going to F minor. Now that takes, in terms of scales, E-7 up and down to the third of C. And then an F minor 6 up and down. Now again, if you’re new to this, there’s previous episodes that discuss Barry’s ideas in terms of his six diminished scales.
  3. 1:09But just for a quick example, his minor six scale consists of this. F minor six, the four notes, and then a diminished. The four notes are diminished, and you put those two things together, and you get an eight note scale. So that is what we’re going towards, the F minor 6. The dominant chord that’s going towards that is the C7. So obviously the diminished that goes with the C7 is either, you could say D flat diminished or E diminished is the same diminished. And then we have G, then
  4. 1:48we have B-flat. So here’s our four notes. So the one thing that we should understand is, where do you get the diminished scale from that? And here’s what Barry says. Here’s D-flat diminished. Now all we’re going to do is take these four notes and lower one note at a time to find out where the four dominates are. So here’s D-flat diminished. Lower the D-flat to C, now we’ve got C7. Here’s Db diminished again. Lower the G to F sharp, and you have F sharp diminished. Here’s Db diminished again. Lower the Bb to A, and we have A diminished.
  5. 2:30Db diminished again. Lower the E to Eb, and there we have Eb7. So all those are 7s. So So we got C7, A7, Eb7, and F7. All four of these also make up a diminished. Now if you stack the Db diminished with those tonics of the four dominants, then you get the diminished scale.
  6. 3:10That’s how the diminished scale occurs. That’s the point of it, that’s the reason for it, and it’s much more important for you to understand that than to just think half-step, whole-step, or whole-step, half-step, or however they explain it. Barry’s really adamant about that. So anyway, that’s one thing to understand. So just on G half diminished to C7, you can use that scale all the time. But the thing that I find that he focuses on is just the regular diminished, regular E diminished, the fourth or D-flat diminished, the fourth note diminished.
  7. 3:50So now there’s different ways to practice this diminished. It’s obviously playing it up and down. You could play it, start on a note, go up a third. Which is also pretty. Barry does it, oh you can do it in let’s say flat fifths. So let’s start on this note and then you play this. Sorry about that.
  8. 4:32It’s really pretty too. You can do it in, let’s see, you can do it in sixths. So. Let’s see what the next one is. Let’s see. Which is really pretty. Those are pretty too. So another way he plays it is he likes to do this thing where he says you can put half steps in between. Let’s take those four diminished notes.
  9. 5:13He says make chromatic between E and G. So here’s our normal four notes. E, G, B flat, D flat. He’ll put total chromatic in between E and G. So he’ll play this. Now you can do them on any degree. So you could have said, now I’ll put it between the G and the B-flat. Now I’ll put it between the B-flat and the D-flat. So if you start to think about all the different combinations and where you can put the half steps, it’s great.
  10. 5:51It’s super useful. So for instance, if we’re playing, what is this thing called, love, and we say. Nice little run. Also nice. So that one I went up, the one before I went down. And then there’s this thing where he does with triplets, which is starting on a note and putting in total chromatics between this one and this one.
  11. 6:26Or you could do all of them really. Which is nice. And then he sometimes then backtracks and goes from the first one. He does two in a row and then he comes back up so he’ll say. Which is nice, makes it a total chromatic scale. But still ending on those diminished notes, which is nice.
  12. 7:03So let’s just try to see if we can figure that out. So that’s another nice thing to practice on diminished. He also does this one, which is nice, which is he takes two notes, he goes up a minor third, and then, let’s see, how would I explain this? We did this one before, which is pretty, but he does, now he plays two notes to get back
  13. 7:49to the next diminished note. So he’ll say, then go up another minor third and then do the same thing here. So, let’s see. Let me see if I can do that right. It’s nice. And you can do it right on the G half diminished. Or let’s see, let’s see.
  14. 8:29And throw in F sharp 7, which is nice. It’s really nice. Just regular diminished is fine too. And again, the actual diminished scale, what people refer to as diminished scale. which is really nice. So those are little things that he uses to solo with the diminished, and you can use them anywhere.
  15. 9:02Anytime you have a dominant, you can use them. Really pretty. But the G-half diminished, again, is the E-flat-7 scale, down to the third of C, and then F-minus-6. Now what’s nice about the F minor 6 is you have a lot of time. And some people play there, instead of D minor 7 plus 5, they play regular D minor 7 to G7 going to C major for the next change of the song. But Barry likes to play, he stays with D minor 7 plus 5, which is interesting because then you really are playing G half diminished to C7.
  16. 9:44to F minor 6 and then staying on F minor 6 this whole time. This is still F minor 6 to G to C. So it allows you to do several different things. You can start to practice some of the things that you should know for your minor 6 diminished scale. So the F minor 6 diminished again is this. Now you need to know it in thirds. You need to know it in triads, which is three notes.
  17. 10:21And then the next one’s diminished. And so on. I like doing that one with the middle note repeated. So it would be this. Which everybody’s heard, like Bird, and they like to play this type of pattern. Nice. There’s also, you should know how to play chords, which is four notes. So a third is two notes. Triads, three notes.
  18. 10:54A chord is four notes. Ah, sorry. Also something you should practice. So if we’re thinking about soloing, one way we can think about soloing, at least on that part of, what is this thing called, love, is, let’s see, G half diminished. Now that’s if you’re thinking of G half diminished to C7 and then F minor 6 for that.
  19. 12:14whole time. Like I said, I think Bird just plays regular D-7 to G7, which then you would just think if that’s the point, you would just think F-6 after that point, but then you would just run G7. Because again, in one of the early episodes I discussed it, when Barry sees a regular 2-5, like a D-7 to G7, he just thinks G7 scale.
  20. 12:50So you can think all the things that you can practice on G7, or all the things you can do on G7 to its tritone. And G7’s tritone is a D-7. So you can think anything, any half steps that you normally use. And I’ve seen a few people commenting on the half steps. It’s in an early episode, I forget which one, but you should really check that episode out. It’s super helpful, and especially going forward with these episodes, it might be really helpful to you. So anyway, those are just a few ideas about using a diminished to a solo.
  21. 13:27And it can be on any song, but we just happen to choose, what is this thing called, love, or a hot house. So I hope you’re enjoying these and enjoy practicing your diminished. Thanks. Until next time.