Barry HarrisThe method

Chris Parks · Stage 6: Line devices

A beautiful Sonny Rollins idea: surrounds in thirds

Episode 149 · 10:38 · On YouTube · In the lesson player

After thanking viewers for 30,000 subscribers, Chris takes a Sonny Rollins phrase on B flat 7 that surrounds two notes a third apart and follows Barry’s habit of playing a phrase from every degree of the scale. He varies where it starts in the bar, reverses the surround, applies it to triads and moves it to other keys.

Step by step

  1. 0:40Barry’s habit: take a phrase and try it up the scale, from every degree.
  2. 1:12A surround is a half step below, a scale tone above, then the note; do it on each note of the B flat 7 scale.
  3. 1:46Sonny’s version goes in thirds: surround B flat, then D; then C, then E flat; also try it down in thirds.
  4. 3:06Sonny starts on an ‘and’: surround A flat, the flat seventh, then F a third below, so the second surround lands on the beat.
  5. 3:53Play that down-a-third pair from every degree of the scale.
  6. 4:41Flip it: start on the beat so the second surround falls off the beat; try it on a blues.
  7. 5:54A student’s variation: scale tone above first, then half step below; mix the two orders.
  8. 7:45Do it down triads instead of thirds, from every degree.
  9. 8:50Move it to other keys, such as F7 and E flat 7.

Chords and notes in this video

Tap a time to jump to it in the video.

Bb71:12
𝄞♭
C3ACB♭
  1. A
  2. C
  3. B♭

Barry’s own words on this

6.5 Surrounding notes (approach from above and below)7.5 Rhythmic placement14.2 Every key, every degree, every way

In the course

Triads up and down the scaleTake it up every degree of the scaleFeel the ‘and’SurroundsSonny Rollins’s surrounds in thirdsThe blues the Barry wayLearning together

Transcript

  1. 0:00Hello and welcome to episode 149 of Things I’ve Learned from Barry Harris. And I just wanted to first off thank everybody for supporting me and for supporting the channel. We just reached 30,000 subscribers, which is incredible. What a wonderful feat. And it just shows how important and substantive these Barry concepts are. and the fact that they seem to be connecting with people, which is great, which was the whole point of me starting the channel. So I’m really grateful, and there should be a lot more going forward.
  2. 0:40Now let’s talk about today the thing that I wanted to discuss, which was, you know, every once in a while, I’ll take a phrase, like a Bud Powell phrase or a Barry phrase or somebody’s phrase, and then we try to do it up the scale. like we’ve done it with Bud Pal and this is a thing that Barry used to do whatever you do on a scale you try to take it up a scale it’s nice to do it in fourths you know take a phrase and then just try to copy it in fourths but what’s nice to do is to see if you can do it up the scale so I’ll show you what I mean
  3. 1:12Sonny Rollins did this beautiful thing now it includes really surrounding and doing thirds now I’ll show you what I mean by surround some people would refer to these as enclosures but Barry calls these surrounds So if I said, let’s say, Bb7 scale. That’s our Bb7 scale. Now, to surround each note with a half-step below and a scale tone above. So I’m going to do half-step below, scale tone above, and then the note. So for Bb, I’m going to start with A. It’s pretty.
  4. 1:46With the next note, the C, I’m going to start with B. With the next note, the D, I’m sorry, I’m going to start with Db. and so on. Those are really pretty. So you should be able to do these on every degree. Now, Sonny Rollins played them in the third. So if you say B-flat, surround it, and then you’d surround the D. Now go back and grab the C, and then the E-flat.
  5. 2:21Now go back and grab the D, which is pretty. Next one. And back to the first one. Those are really pretty. You could go down thirds. Really pretty. now what he did that was even better was he started so that’s all on the beat bobby da bobby da bobby those are all on the beat but what’s nice and what i’m really focused on lately is how these masters
  6. 3:06seem to just float effortlessly through the bar they play on the beat or off the beat it doesn’t matter so Sonny Rollins did this particular one where he started on an and so like let’s say I started on the flat 7 so B flat 7 and I’m going to be surrounding the A flat so I’m going to do scale tone a half step below scale tone above and then the fifth so that’s going down a third but the first one I’m going to start on an and so one two three four ah you see how now the first one is on the and the second one is on the beat isn’t that beautiful so now you got one two three
  7. 3:53isn’t that pretty so you should be able to do those down thirds where you do the first one on the and and the second one’s gonna fall right on the beat so let’s start on the second one two three four let’s do the third let’s do the root the root was nice we did the flat seventh now let’s do the sixth so the fourth those are pretty let’s do the fifth to the third one two three four one two three the third tonic the second and the seventh which we did before so aren’t those pretty those are really pretty and I think that’s the one he
  8. 4:41actually does whatever he plays after which is perfect but these are nice things for us to practice. Now, this is the kind of thing that Barry would always bring up. He would say, let’s take a thing and do it on every degree of the scale, which is what we just did. Then let’s try to mess around with the idea. What if we put the first one on the beat? That means the second one’s off the beat. So now let’s start on the second. We’ll do the second and the seventh. So before we did the first one off the beat, that’s nice. But what if we do the first one on the beat? That means the second one’s going to be off the beat.
  9. 5:16One, two, three, four. Two, three, four. Isn’t that pretty? So if we said... That’s a pretty one. So wait, if we said here’s the blues. One, two, three, four. One. that’s a pretty one to do now let’s do the one off the beat though let’s start off the beat we’ll do the same one we’ll surround the second and then we’ll surround the flat seventh but this time
  10. 5:54we’ll start on the end like sonny rollins did one two three four so we’ll scale one those are really pretty so now what if we did now we i brought this up in class at open studio and we had a whole thing on and of course when we go around the class and we talk about one concept for an hour that’s where you can really get into some things so uh jonathan i think um instead of playing a half step below and then scale tone above, he reversed it. So he did scale tone above,
  11. 6:39half step below. See, that’s pretty too. So now you have this one, two, three, four. Let’s see. That’s nice too. But then he reversed them too. He said, I’ll do the first one with the scale tone above, half step below, but then I’ll do the next one normal, half step below, scale tone above. now you have this you see now look at all these variations of things just this one little phrase we have 1, 2, 3, 4 that’s the one that he did
  12. 7:14but now let’s do the normal one that’s the Sonny Rollins one now let’s do both of them with the scale tone above first 1, 2, 3, 4 that’s a nice one too how about if we do like the Sonny Rollins one, but we’ll start on the beat. One, two, three, four. Oh, that’s with Jonathan’s thing on the beat. So let’s do normal. One, two, on the beat. Three, four. That’s
  13. 7:45Bobby B. One, two, three, four. Really pretty. Now let’s do Jonathan’s. One, two, three, four. That’s nice. See, so you see how many variations you could do. Now, we’re going down a third. But what if we, sorry, a third. We’re doing down thirds, but you could do down triads. What if we go down a triad? Let’s do Sonny Rollins’ one down triad. One, two, three, four. That’s a pretty, that’s a pretty one.
  14. 8:17That’s going down triads. So now we have to practice all of them on triads. So here’s the triad from the second. Three, four, from the tonic. from the flat 7th. And what’s nice about this one is the first note is on, I mean, the first one is off the beat. The second one is on the beat. And the third one is back on the end. See how pretty that is? That’s some pretty stuff.
  15. 8:50But it just goes to show you that a nice idea is, yes, we could say, okay, Sonny Rollins on a B flat 7. surrounded the flat seventh and then the ton and then the fifth so now you should be able to do that in every key so whatever it is whatever whatever key whatever key you’re talking about so now let me let me surround the flat set let’s take f7 surround the flat seven that’s nice now b flat we did already uh now e flat the same thing that’s nice to be able to do that for all the different keys. That’s very true. But what I love about Barry’s idea about taking the
  16. 9:31concept up and doing it up from every degree of the scale. Think about how much sense that makes, because normally when we practice a scale, we say here’s the scale up and down, right? That’s fine. Then we say here’s the scale in thirds. But what are we doing on thirds? We’re taking the third and then we’re going up the scale. We’re trying each one up the scale. So it makes sense that you would take a phrase and say, I’m going to try it from every degree of the scale. It’s really special. So actually, even if you don’t get this phrase exactly, just try that concept of taking a thing and then doing it up every degree of the scale. And I’m telling you, you’re
  17. 10:10going to find it’s going to help you in so many ways. First of all, it’s going to help you to see your fretboard so much better. Secondly, it’s going to, it’s going to get your ear to hear things that maybe you wouldn’t ordinarily hear. So that’s another thing. And it’s just fun to check these things out. So anyway, thanks again for the 30,000 subscribers. Really appreciate it. And enjoy practicing this beautiful Sonny Rollins phrase. Till next time.