Barry HarrisThe method

Chris Parks · Stage 9: Sixth chords and the scales of chords

Autumn Leaves with Barry’s 4 Scales of Chords

Episode 69 · 7:24 · On YouTube · In the lesson player

Chris makes a chord melody on Autumn Leaves in B flat from Barry’s scales of chords (sixth, minor sixth, seventh and seventh flat 5 diminished), crediting the guitarist Thomas Eccles for a system that helped him. He harmonizes the melody first in parallel drop-2 chords, then in contrary motion that grows from two notes to three, so the arrangement avoids the usual drop-2 sameness.

Step by step

  1. 0:00Barry practises his scales of chords in parallel, oblique and contrary motion.
  2. 1:11For Autumn Leaves in B flat, learn B flat 6, E flat 6, F7, C minor 6, D7 flat 5 and G minor 6 diminished scales of chords.
  3. 2:35Harmonize the melody: for each note, find the drop 2 chord from the right scale with the melody on top, starting with B flat 6 on the pickup.
  4. 3:15That’s parallel motion; now try contrary motion, starting with two-note thirds that move against the melody.
  5. 3:50Grow from two notes to three, carrying it through F7, C minor 6 and D7 flat 5.
  6. 5:13Even drop 2 alone across these scales gives fresher sounds than the usual chord melody.

Barry’s own words on this

9.8 The 7th diminished and 7th flat 5 diminished scales9.4 Playing the scale of chords (block chords up and down the 6th dim scale)11.3 Mirror image and contrary motion between the hands13.3 Standards worked in class

In the course

Barry’s four scales of chordsParallel, oblique and contrary motionChord melody with the scales of chordsAutumn Leaves

Transcript

  1. 0:00Hello and welcome to episode 69 of Things I’ve Learned from Barry Harris. Today I thought we would discuss using Barry’s four scales of chords to create a chord melody. And in this case we would use the standard autumn leaves to see what we could come up with. So let me just tell you first that the four scales of chords that Barry talks about, he talks about all the time. this several videos on YouTube about it that are just great and in detail and he shows all the different ways to practice it including parallel motion oblique
  2. 0:36motion and contrary motion and I’ve always been aware of it but it wasn’t until this particular youtuber named Thomas Eccles got in contact with me and he has a wonderful YouTube channel called labyrinth of limitations which is just fantastic I’ll link it below and he really he has a very beautiful system of looking at various scales of chords and how he applies it and how he looks at it which is really great and helped me out a lot in terms of my chording and how to
  3. 1:11look at things I always had a problem with it but his system I really seem to understand and I hadn’t seen any other guitar player really talk about it like this before so I’m gonna leave a link in the description about it but anyway we’ll talk about the four scales of chords. The first scale of chord you’re going to need to know is Bb6. Bb6 diminished. The second one you’re going to need to know is Eb6 diminished. So there’s two. Then you’re going to need to know F7 diminished. There’s three. Then you’re going to need to know Bb6 again, back to Eb6 again, then you’re going to need to know Cm6
  4. 1:58diminished, so there’s 4, and then for D7, we’re going to play D7b5 diminished, so there’s 5, so we’ve got Bb6, Eb6, F7 diminished, Cm6 diminished, D7b5 diminished, and then the last one which will be G minor six diminished so the six really so that sounds like a lot but I’ll just show you where I’m going with this so if we take the melody for we’ll play it in B flat so we’ll take the melody for autumn leaves which starts on we’ll take a look and we’ll say that’s B flat six because
  5. 2:35it’s a pickup so we’ll call that B flat six now if I did drop twos in B flat six I got to find my drop two that fits where that’s the highest note so then I’ll just say, and then I played it to a pretty E flat 6, so there we go. Is F7, now I’m going to do it for F7 diminished. Is E flat 6 now? E flat 6 diminished. D7 flat 5.
  6. 3:15Now those are really beautiful, but those are just parallel motions, so I’m taking all drop twos and moving all four notes in exactly the same direction all the time. Now then, there’s contrary motion, where if I take the first note, maybe I’ll take thirds, which would be, in the sixth diminished, these would be thirds, but we’ve got the fifth and the sixth. So, if I’m going to play the melody, it would be this. But if I’m going to do contrary motion, it’s going to be this. So it would sound like this.
  7. 3:50Which are nice, but that always stays two notes. So that’s two notes, two notes, two notes. I’m going to start on two notes, I’m going to move to three notes, then stay on three notes. So let’s try that. Same thing for F7. Same thing. Now Cm6. D7, flat 5.
  8. 4:29again but you see all the little different things that you can do using a contrary motion with Bb6, with F7 diminished. So it just makes the chord melodies much more interesting. Also, it prevents you from playing a lot of, and as a guitar player, I recognize this
  9. 5:13in myself and also in other players, where there’s a million chord melodies for Autumn Leaves, but they all seem to sound the same. We all seem to be, you know, like drop two chords all the time. So this is a nice way to kind of break it up or break up the monotony of normally what is guitar chord melodies. What I love about Barry’s system the most is that even if you only learn, let’s say, your drop twos for all those different scales of chords, those five different ones, you can play the whole song and drop twos, but at least it’s giving you some different sounds that you haven’t heard before. so even if you only get that far if you don’t even get to playing triads or learning how to
  10. 6:02move contrary motion if you just play drop twos that’s going to sound beautiful and that’s i mean that’s really the thing that makes barry’s method so special is that it’s no matter what level you’re on you can use it to create some really beautiful things that is you know it doesn’t sound like oh this is a beginner version of it. It just sounds beautiful. You know, there’s so much to this stuff. And the further along I get with it, the more I realize, well, first of all, the more I realize how much I don’t know about it. And then the more I realize the fact that he’s a master, but really
  11. 6:39it’s even on a higher level than I even thought. So anyway, I just thought I’d give you this short video, but I’m going to link Thomas’s YouTube page in the description. And you should visit it and take a look at it. It’s a lot of interesting things that he does. I mean, he’s a really brilliant person. And the first time I saw it, I saw the brilliance in it, but I had to really watch it a whole bunch of times in order to really get it on my instrument. But it’s definitely worth doing. So I’ll link it in the description. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this
  12. 7:14lesson, which is using Barry’s Four Scales of Chords to create a chord melody. Thanks. Until next time.