Why add a noteChord tones on the beat (the half-step practice model)

Practise putting half steps into scales so you can pick for yourself the spots where they go; generally, Barry said, the half steps go with a note that falls on the beat. He walked through it on a dominant scale run down from its root, where he generally puts a half step between the tonic and the seventh. If you just think of the plain scale, ask which number lands on the next beat. It is the sixth, so the half step goes between six and five. Further down, the fourth lands on a beat, so something has to go between four and three.

The 1998 workshop, part 114:4115:1715:49

Each half step you insert shifts which notes land on the beat, so the next one belongs somewhere other than where it would have gone. Barry had the class work out each new spot in turn: first between the tonic and seventh, then between the five and four. He added that even when you go wrong, a half step put in somewhere can make the line come out right, and played a run with and without one to show it.

The 1998 workshop, part 117:3218:0419:1633:36

When a student’s run started to go wrong and he straightened it out without thinking about a half step, Barry said this proved his point: the student knew an extra note was needed to make the line come out right. You should put a half step in because you feel it is needed, not because someone told you where it goes.

The 1998 workshop, part 120:0220:38

Barry said these half steps are put in so that we can practise rhythm. The rules assume you start on the beat, on ‘one’. If you start on the ‘and’ of the beat, you apply the opposite rule: start the tonic off the beat and you use no half step; start the second off the beat and you use one.

Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 25:22

When a dominant-scale line starts with pickup notes, use the rule for whichever scale note lands on the beat. Go from the tonic to the third and then run down in eighths, and the second lands on the beat, so follow the rule for the second: no half steps. For a triplet start, generally follow the rule for the triplet’s second note: a triplet on the third and fourth takes the fourth’s rule (no half steps); one on the second and third takes one half step. A triplet on the tonic and second is the awkward case: Barry called it an exception, at first giving it one half step because the seventh then lands on the beat, and later saying no half steps.

Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 10:000:321:452:17

Barry called this really important. Run the C7 scale down to the third, A. Started on the beat, it comes out perfectly. Started on the ‘and’ of the beat, you have to put in a triplet on F and G. Play straight eighths and use the triplet only at the one spot where it is needed; you have to feel when. Another way: start on F, run up to C (which becomes the tonic of C7), and put a half step between the tonic and seventh as you come down; done that way, the line went straight down.

Confirmation11:0211:3512:4613:21

Everything is connected, Barry says: if you play a scale and add just one note, there is a note of another scale nearby. To get from a dominant to where it resolves, he simply surrounds the target note.

The 1998 workshop, part 15:436:14

Learn surrounding notes: approach a target from the notes on either side of it. Barry’s example is the fifth of A flat, E flat, surrounded by E and D. In another demonstration he said he already had half of the surrounding notes, so all he had to add was the C and the C sharp.

The 1998 workshop, part 317:33The 1998 workshop, part 113:58

Barry sums up music, and soloing above all, as putting a half step in at the right time and place. He can start at the top of the piano, run down and add half steps to fit any song, such as I Got Rhythm or All God’s Children. Whatever you do, a half step has to go in somewhere to make the line come out right.

The 1998 workshop, part 128:3329:0530:19

Barry has found that audiences react most to diminished notes, because against the harmony they sound wrong and ears respond to wrongness. His advice: throw a little wrong into the line, then make it right. Listeners don’t know what to think, but you have their attention.

Let the body do it2:18