Barry HarrisThe method

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

A Beautiful Movement We Never Play

Episode 102 · 10:43 · On YouTube · In the lesson player

Chris shows a bass line that walks down from a major chord through a diminished to the relative minor, then the minor with the 7th and then the 6th in the bass, which is the half-diminished chord. He points it out in several standards and slips it into Autumn Leaves, comping it and building lines with the diminished and the C minor 6 diminished scale.

Step by step

  1. 0:00Learn the movement in E flat: E flat major, D diminished, C minor, C minor 7, then C minor with A in the bass.
  2. 0:42Note that the last chord, C minor with the 6 in the bass, is A half-diminished; the bass walks E flat, D, C, B flat, A.
  3. 1:16Hear it at the end of I Remember You.
  4. 1:50Hear it in How High the Moon and Ornithology, walking down from E flat to the A half-diminished, D7 and G minor.
  5. 2:27Slip it into Autumn Leaves in B flat, walking from the E flat chord to the A half-diminished.
  6. 3:04Comp it at that spot.
  7. 3:44Build lines on it: use the diminished, then treat everything from C onward as C minor 6 diminished.
  8. 4:35Then think F7 down to the third of D into G minor.
  9. 5:24Find it in other songs, like Cole Porter’s I Love You and the start of Like Someone in Love, with two beats per chord.

Chords and notes in this video

Tap a time to jump to it in the video.

Line0:00
𝄞♭♭
C3ACDB♭E♭
  1. E♭
  2. D
  3. C
  4. B♭
  5. A

Barry’s own words on this

9.6 Half-diminished = minor with the sixth in the bass; major -> relative minor -> minor/610.1 Be a movement player13.3 Standards worked in class

In the course

A half-diminished means the dominant whose third it isA beautiful movement we never play

Transcript

  1. 0:00Hello and welcome to episode 102 of Things I’ve Learned from Barry Harris. And today I thought we would talk about this really beautiful change that happens in a bunch of songs. And sometimes we don’t even realize it’s happening, but it’s there. I’ll give you an example. We’ll do it in E-flat. Basically what it is is the major to the relative minor with the 7 in the bass to the minor with the 6 in the bass. So if we’re in E-flat it would be like E-flat major, D diminished, relative minor, C minor.
  2. 0:42Walk down again with the 7 in the bass, so C minor 7, and then walk down again a half step, which puts an A in the bass, which gives you that C minor 6 with a 6 in the bass. Or, as we know it sometimes, as A minor 7 flat 5. So a minor 7 flat 5 is a minor 6 with a 6 in the bass. But this happens a lot. So the bass line would be E flat, D, C, B flat, and then A. Now, there’s some spots where this happens that are obvious,
  3. 1:16and there are spots where this happens where it’s not so obvious. So for instance, if I was playing, let’s say, I Remember You. The last part of I Remember You is, it’s a four major. Right here. The thrill of it all. But right after this half diminished it goes to 4 minor. Then I will tell them I remember you.
  4. 1:50It happens right there. It also happens, so I remember you, it happens at the end. It happens in How High the Moon or Ornithology, like in G. So it says... Right there is where it happens. So once you hit the E flat, because then you’re going to walk down again until you get to the A half diminished to the D7 to go to G minor the first line.
  5. 2:27The second half goes to G major. But it happens there. But the place where I was kind of interested in talking about where it happens is in a spot that I bet you haven’t thought of, or you wouldn’t have thought to use it. Let’s say we were playing Autumn Leaves in the key of Bb. So we know the chords are the Autumn Leaves, C minor, F7, to Bb major, to Eb major, and then to A half diminished, to D7, going to G minor. but what you don’t realize is you could probably throw that in there so if we
  6. 3:04said there it is right there E flat walking you down to the A half diminished so that’s a really little interesting spot so if you’re comping you could say Sounds so pretty there. Try it again.
  7. 3:44It sounds so pretty. So that is a beautiful spot. Now what I like to do is maybe construct lines around that. So I might throw in this diminished and then continue this whole thing as that once Once it hits the C, I might continue that whole thing as C minor 6 diminished. So for instance, if we were playing...
  8. 4:35So I played that whole thing as E flat to the diminished. Now maybe C minor, which would be, in this instance, it says Barry P, but we know this is F7 down to the third D into G minor. So that’s a nice way to think about it. Let me try that one. It’s nice, you just throw that in with the diminished, it’s really beautiful. But it’s this move.
  9. 5:24And it happens, it happens in quite a few songs. But you’re going to find that when you go from the major through the diminished to the relative minor with the 7 in the bass, then to the minor with the 6 in the bass. It happens in so many songs. I think there’s a video of Barry talking about it, and it happens in I Love You, it happens in. It happens in Cole Porter’s I Love You. It happens in a whole bunch of songs. even in spot oh right at the beginning of um of like someone in love if we were playing in e flat so let’s see
  10. 6:12see. It happens right in the beginning of that one. So that’s a nice one too. And you have a little longer time to play that. That’s like two beats a piece of everything, which is nice. So again, the thing I was doing in the beginning is just one beat a piece. This is two beats a piece. So it’s just these beautiful little in-between movements that you don’t really think of playing. I know when I, if I were playing normally Autumn Leaves, I would play the same thing. F7, up and down, Bb major up, Eb major up, and then right away I would start with the F7
  11. 6:55up and down to the third and D. That’s a nice move. That’s beautiful. But when I’m soloing, I don’t know if I would think to play that little spot with the Eb. Let me try to do one, let’s see. Let me try it again. Oh man. Let me try a better example.
  12. 7:44Okay, let’s try that one. So let’s see. Nice one. How about, let’s see. That’s what I meant to do. But I mean, you see, it has me thinking too, man, I don’t even really play that.
  13. 8:23I really need to play that. Let’s see. That’s a nice one. Oh man, there’s so many nice ways to do it. So let’s see. Wow. So you can get there from here. See, most of us would do, play the phrase, and then we’ll
  14. 9:04play a B flat major phrase, and then maybe an E flat, which is nice, running E flat into that D7, which is really pretty. But this is nice, because this is adding this diminished. Wow, it’s really beautiful. So, it’s just a quick video on that little move, which is a major, the diminished, right below it on the major 7,
  15. 9:44going to the relative minor, which would be in this case C minor, with a 7 in the bass, flat 7 in the bass, make it C minor 7, then with a six in the bass which makes it a half diminished it’s such a beautiful beautiful change and it’s really like a beautiful way to look at things and these little ways to look at things is where a lot of these like sometimes you’ll transcribe bird or bud pal and and they’ll come up and you’re saying how did they come up with these notes why i know what scale more or less they’re using but why did they choose those specific notes and a lot of times it has to do with they
  16. 10:23understand these little movements that happen in between. Well, Barry certainly does. So anyway, I hope you enjoyed that little quick lesson on that little move that actually none of us really played, which we really should. So until next time.