Arnold Schoenberg
composer (classical), theorist
Austrian composer and theorist whose book Barry cites for the rule that lowering each note of a diminished seventh chord gives four dominant seventh chords, a rule Barry says he knew years before he read it there.
- mentions
- 16
- recordings
- 9
- Barry speaking
- 16
What Barry says
Barry credits Schoenberg with the rule that lowering the notes of a diminished seventh chord one at a time gives four dominant seventh chords. From C diminished he gets B7, D7, F7 and A-flat 7, and he calls these four dominants brother and sister.
Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished8:369:10Believe: a talk to musicians20:51Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes3:20Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶300
He says he knew this long before he read it. He learned it years earlier, in the street and from records, when he could not afford Schoenberg’s book, and only later found out that Schoenberg had said it.
Believe: a talk to musicians20:5121:26Jazz schools and the basics3:56A word to guitar players1:081:41Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶300
Barry takes the rule further than Schoenberg did. The roots of the four dominants form a diminished chord of their own, and putting it together with the first one gives the diminished scale. Schoenberg, he complains, never said where the diminished seventh came from; Barry says he has gone back farther.
Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶300Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶401
He also asks why Schoenberg said to move a note down and never up. He has the student raise the C of C diminished instead, which gives C sharp, E flat, F sharp and A: an F-sharp minor sixth chord.
In the Lincoln Center lessons Barry says Schoenberg’s book starts with the human voice: bass, tenor, alto and soprano. He numbers the voices of a diminished seventh chord from the top, soprano 1 to bass 4, and uses that to teach drop 2, drop 3, drop 2 and 4, and drop 2 and 3.
Schoenberg, Barry says, wrote out the C major scale in thirds and then told the reader to learn the other eleven keys. Barry calls that the secret, and says the same goes for his own scales.
Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished2:222:56
Barry feels he should be teaching teachers rather than students, because he has secrets about the music that Chopin and Schoenberg should have told and did not.
In his own words
What Schoenberg said was, if you take a diminished, and lowered it one note at a time, you’ll end up with four dominants... I was doing this long before I read this in Schoenberg’s book.
Stuff that Schoenberg should have said, he should have said... you didn’t tell me where that diminished seven came from. He should have told me that, see, I’ve gone back farther than him, Schoenberg.
The first thing he writes about in his book, he says, I’d like to write about the human voice. So he wrote about the bass, the tenor, the alto, and the soprano.
You know Schoenberg did. He’s slick too. Just like I made you go up to scale in C... Go up to C major scale in thirds. Now he wrote that out. And you know what he said after he wrote it out... In the book he said, now you learned the other 11.
I said, Schoenberg, why would you say move the note down and not move it up?
Every mention
16 moments in the recordings, 16 of them Barry speaking. Each says who is talking.
Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished
Jazz theory, part 2: drop voicings
Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes
Believe: a talk to musicians
- 20:51
Dropping notes of a diminished seventh gives dominants; Schoenberg said it, but Barry learned it first.
Jazz schools and the basics
- 3:56
Clip of the Almeria talk: he did not learn it from Schoenberg (‘North Shore’), couldn’t afford the book.
A word to guitar players
Day one: an introduction to the method
- 13:10
Bilbao class: Schoenberg (‘shurberg’) said lower one note at a time; four dominants follow.
Jazz theory, part 3, with score
Jazz theory, part 2, with score
In the interviews and notes
Barry first credits Schoenberg with explaining the second diminished, then corrects himself: Schoenberg’s rule was that lowering a diminished one note at a time gives four dominants. Barry, who did this before reading it, adds that those dominants’ roots form the second diminished; together they make the diminished scale.
Barry says he should be teaching teachers, not students, since he has secrets Chopin and Schoenberg should have told. Schoenberg explained what to do with a diminished seventh but not where it came from; Barry says he has gone back farther, and that it all comes from religion and order.
Kingstone says Barry took the core of his harmony, the eight-note scales, from classical music, and that when Barry cites theories also found in Schoenberg he jokingly accuses Schoenberg of travelling through time to steal them from him.
Brian de Lima’s thesis on the roots of Barry’s concept of movement lists Schoenberg’s Harmonielehre (1911) and a book on Schoenberg among its references.
Brian Jude de Lima, Reanimating Dissonance: Cultivating the Antecedents of Barry Harris’ Concept of Movement as a Multidimensional Pedagogical Tool for Ontario Post-Secondary Jazz Curricula ¶2567Brian Jude de Lima, Reanimating Dissonance: Cultivating the Antecedents of Barry Harris’ Concept of Movement as a Multidimensional Pedagogical Tool for Ontario Post-Secondary Jazz Curricula ¶1803
Method ideas nearby
Ideas of the method taught in the classes where they come up, with how many mentions fall in each.