Barry’s words

Short stock phrases named after the scale degree that sets them off: whenever a line reaches the fifth you can play ‘the five’, at the fourth ‘the four’, and so on. Barry hummed them for the class to echo, then had them strung together. He taught them on major and dominant scales.

In the method: 6.8 The 5-4-3-2 (and 4-3, 5-4-3-2-1) phrases

The 5-4-3-2-1 phrase0:001:212:353:475-4-3 phrases on Cherokee1:51Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video ¶15

Barry’s name for a pianist who crosses a passage with twelve finger movements where one move would do. He did not believe in fingers: the greater pianist plays five notes with one move. Max Roach’s fast tempos taught him that, and he told students never to worry about fingering.

In the method: 11.4 Play from the body and the arm, not the fingers

Not the fingers: playing from the arm1:09The Spirit of Bebop1:051:38Let the body do it2:51Practising the sixth diminished scales15:34Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶241Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶243

Barry’s count of the major keys a chord type belongs to. A major seventh sits on the 1 and 4, so it is in two keys; a minor seventh on the 2, 3 and 6, so in three: D minor 7 is the 2 of C, 3 of B♭ and 6 of F. The key decides the scale.

In the method: 3.2 A chord on every degree; how many keys each chord type belongs to

Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished4:505:29Jazz theory, part 3, with score5:01Student performances and coaching21:50

How Barry described himself when asked how singing fits into his teaching: what he really taught was phrasing. Most singers start singing the moment they open their mouths, but the first job is to phrase, so that a line sounds as natural as speech, with no big production on the last word.

In the method: 12.3 Phrase like speech; place entries in time; ballads

Interview: Bud Powell and teaching singers15:2416:0216:3517:08

Barry’s name for the basics every player must have all over the instrument: major arpeggios, diminished sevenths, triads, the plain major scale. These are the things students hate most, he said, yet you need them in order to create, and he hated to meet college students who could not play them.

In the method: 3.1 The raw materials

Jazz schools and the basics2:12Believe: a talk to musicians14:40The 1998 workshop, part 31:33Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶511Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video ¶5

Barry’s drill line for the sixth diminished scale. In C the added note, A♭, sits between G and A, and a student in The Hague kept leaving it out, so Barry repeated it: after G comes A♭, after A♭ comes A. He held the class to it again when they took a chord up the scale.

In the method: 9.3 The major 6th diminished scale (a major scale with one more note)

Introducing the sixth diminished scale3:325:586:51

What Barry wanted the left hand to be: moving, not drifting up towards the middle of the keyboard to hold chords, which makes every pianist sound alike. He said he did not believe in chords in the left hand, and while changing between minor sixth chords he told the class to let the left hand do the moving.

In the method: 11.2 Keep the left hand low and make it interesting

Bud Powell’s Oblivion0:000:451:19Believe: a talk to musicians3:073:51Practising the sixth diminished scales12:1212:50

The off-beat between two beats. Barry counted music as one-and-two-and-three-and-four, not just one-two-three-four, and wanted the ands felt as surely as the beats, so that a phrase can start on any of them. He called the beat close to hell and the and close to heaven, and the and of four beautiful.

In the method: 1.3 Feel the ‘ands’

Believe: a talk to musicians30:3431:08Dropping notes to feel every beat5:01The 1998 workshop, part 345:04Student performances and coaching11:06

In Barry’s usage, a triad with its bottom note repeated on top, such as D♭ F♭ A♭ D♭. Four notes stacked in thirds, such as G B D F, make a ‘chord’, not an arpeggio. He named arpeggios by degree: over B♭7, B♭ major on the tonic, F minor on the fifth, A♭ major on the seventh.

In the method: 0.2 Barry’s vocabulary

The 1998 workshop, part 313:02Practising the blues with the horns, part 20:000:341:13Jazz GUITAR Reflections on BARRY HARRIS10:1610:48

What man and woman produce: the three diminished seventh chords. Three goes into twelve four times, so the twelve notes fall into three groups of four. Each of these diminished sevenths takes two notes from each whole-tone scale, like a child of two parents.

In the method: 2.3 The three diminished seventh chords (‘the children’)

Student performances and coaching29:1229:5330:34Believe: a talk to musicians5:366:10

Barry’s basic rule for running a major scale down from the tonic, third, fifth or seventh: one added note between the sixth and the fifth (in A♭ major, between F and E♭). He said the bare scale does not sound like anything, and that you will put a note there a lot. He named the same spot on other scales.

In the method: 5.2 Major scale descending

Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 24:45The 1998 workshop, part 336:00The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit0:52

Putting a note of the diminished chord in place of a note of the sixth chord, then taking it back. You can borrow one note, two, or the whole chord. A student suggested he call a piece built on the idea Borrowing, and he heard what classical theory calls leading tones and appoggiaturas as borrowed notes.

In the method: 10.4 Borrowing

Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes0:000:36Introducing the sixth diminished scale12:2521:36Stella by Starlight18:50Believe: a talk to musicians56:2857:11The C7♭5 scale in drop 2, and a tritone trick2:33Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶27

Barry valued anything that jolts your playing out of its habits: every time he did something that could break a habit, he said, he was doing something right. In the 1998 workshop the tool was the half-step rules, run from different degrees; rules, he said, upset everything, including the phrases you had prepared in advance.

In the method: 0.3 Rules matter more than scales; everything by logic

The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit21:4124:0825:1125:5726:32

Barry’s family words for keys or chords whose roots lie a minor third apart. The keys of C, E♭, F♯ and A are brothers and sisters; so are the four dominants you get from one diminished seventh, such as B7, D7, F7 and A♭7, which grew up together. Who do you play with first? Your brother and your sister.

In the method: 2.4 Minor thirds and key families (brothers and sisters)

Jazz theory, part 1, with score4:23The minor-third family0:00Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished8:168:50Student performances and coaching34:02Believe: a talk to musicians19:43

Barry named chords by the scale degree they start on, as in ‘a chord on the third of B♭ major’: scale notes taken one apart. A half-diminished chord is found on the third of a dominant, so G half-diminished means E♭7. Hearing Monk once showed him that the chord on the third of a key can be a one chord.

In the method: 6.3 Chords as lines

Fast phrases for Perdido0:33Practising the blues with the horns, part 20:34Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 13:244:34Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished3:334:08

Barry’s ‘chord’ is four notes of a scale, skipping every other note, such as G B D F, which most players would call a G7 arpeggio. ‘Chord up’ means play them one after another upward from the named degree: a chord up on the third of B♭ major runs D F A C. He disliked naming chords, since names confuse.

In the method: 0.2 Barry’s vocabulary

Fast phrases for Perdido1:08Practising the blues with the horns, part 20:34Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 26:03Jazz GUITAR Reflections on BARRY HARRIS10:16

A way of running a scale chromatically while its own notes stay on the beats: fill each whole step with the note between, and where two scale notes are already a half step apart, put in the scale note above (C up to G: C D♭ D E♭ E G F F♯ G). Students call it Barry’s chromatic scale.

In the method: 6.10 Barry’s chromatic scale (chromatic runs with chord tones on the beat)

The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit19:5020:31My Chat With Chris Parks From Things I Learned From Barry Harris22:08Frédéric Galliano, Notes on the Method of Barry Harris ¶2123 Reddit users (handles kept per comment), Reddit: first-hand recollections of Barry Harris’s classes ¶139Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶58

Barry’s word for the way he played: chords made by the two hands working together, not a one-note melody in the right hand over chords held in the left. He called jazz two-handed music and said no chord is meant to be played by the left hand alone.

In the method: 11.1 Two hands together

Practising the sixth diminished scales18:4319:32Small chords, not big ones1:05Eyes of the Masters: the first progression2:022:51Let the body do it5:09Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶481

Barry’s open group class, which he kept going instead of giving private lessons: if you wanted a lesson, you came to the class. He called it one continuous class: pianists first, then singers with the pianists accompanying, then bass and drums, then horns, with some singers staying on to improvise. He sang lines and the class played them back.

In the method: 0.1 How a Barry class worked

Interview: Bud Powell and teaching singers18:18Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland15:5116:25The last train to Monk: an interview29:33Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶469

Barry’s call for a diminished chord started on the third of a dominant: run B♭ major up and down to B, the third of G, then go up a diminished from that B to the second of F; or, on reaching A, the third of F, add a diminished there.

In the method: 6.2 The augmented arpeggio and the diminished on the third of the dominant

Practising the blues with the horns, part 11:1219:2920:13The 1998 workshop, part 342:35

Not the half step, whole step pattern most players recite, which Barry called ridiculous, but two diminished chords put together: a diminished seventh chord and the roots of the four dominants that come from it, which form a second diminished. In the scale each diminished note sits between two dominant roots.

In the method: 8.6 The diminished scale as diminished chord + four dominant roots

Student performances and coaching34:42Believe: a talk to musicians4:59Diminished chords0:331:092:18Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶298Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶300

Barry’s proof that the diminished sevenths come from the whole-tone scales: in each one, two notes belong to one whole-tone scale and two to the other. In C diminished, C and G♭ come from the C scale and E♭ and A from the D♭ scale, so the parents cannot be mistaken; they could have come from nowhere else.

In the method: 2.3 The three diminished seventh chords (‘the children’)

Student performances and coaching29:5330:34Believe: a talk to musicians6:10

Barry’s reason for building his teaching on the dominant seventh scale: a dominant is meant to dominate, and the one scale can be made to fit almost anything a player meets. He told a class that believing in sevens means finding a way to play everything with them. To Ted Panken he added that students also need some basic harmony.

In the method: 4.2 Every dominant 7th scale is a major scale

Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 15:51Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶467

A scale call: start on the seventh of the scale and run down it. A call can add where to land, as in ‘B♭7 down to the third of G’ or ‘E♭7 down to the third of C’, two of the calls in his scale map of the last sixteen bars of Indiana.

In the method: 4.1 How Barry calls a scale (tonic to seventh, up/down/up and down)

Practising the blues with the horns, part 10:000:35Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 10:001:07

Barry’s habit with anything new: move it down a half step at a time, so that he knew it everywhere. He said the habit went back years, and in a session on Chopin said you should practise things down chromatically.

In the method: 14.2 Every key, every degree, every way

Practising the sixth diminished scales16:1616:56Chopin, part 17:09

Lower any one note of a diminished seventh chord a half step and you get a dominant seventh on the lowered note; do this to each note for four dominants. Barry learned it on the street before reading it in Schoenberg, and asked why Schoenberg never said to raise the note: that gives a minor sixth chord.

In the method: 9.9 Chords from the diminished

Believe: a talk to musicians20:54Student performances and coaching33:29Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished8:168:50Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes3:103:466:09Jazz theory, part 5: the sixth diminished scale0:47Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶300

Barry’s joke about teachers: the teacher has been in the class the longest, so he is its dumbest member. He also called himself the biggest thief in the class, since he took from everybody, and said young pianists trying to outplay him kept him practising and learning.

In the method: 0.1 How a Barry class worked

Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶145Mark Stryker (Detroit Free Press), Professor of Bebop at 70: Native Detroiter Barry Harris Shares the Secrets of the Jazz Tradition with Students in New York ¶18Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video ¶3

Over any chord, play the scale of the key the chord belongs to at that point in the tune; Barry’s question ‘where does it come from?’ asks for that key. Every C minor 7 is not the same: in B♭ it takes the B♭ major scale, in E♭ the E♭ scale, in A♭ the A♭ scale.

In the method: 3.3 Every chord takes the scale it comes from

Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished4:08Student performances and coaching21:1521:50Stella by Starlight10:4411 March 2016: Stella by Starlight11:00

Barry’s conversion rule: the same four notes make a major sixth and a minor seventh (C6 is A minor 7), and a minor sixth and a half-diminished. He shrugged the first rule off when he met it early; later he saw why it matters: know the sixth chord and you know its scale of chords and where to move it.

In the method: 9.1 Sixth chords rule

Jazz theory, part 6: every major sixth is a minor seventh0:32Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes6:096:457:32Sixth chords and their relatives1:37Barry Harris: Using Major 6 Diminished scale (with Live Transcript)1:00Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶46Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶47Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video Part 2: product page and 156-page workbook table of contents ¶20

Barry’s reminder that a dominant seventh scale has the same notes as the major scale of the key it resolves to: the F7 scale is B♭ major started on F. When he had a class run F7 down from its third to the tonic of B♭, they were simply playing B♭ major.

In the method: 4.2 Every dominant 7th scale is a major scale

Fast phrases for Perdido2:413:16

Barry called the minor third the most important interval of all. The whole-tone scale gives major thirds, but the diminished gives minor thirds, and minor thirds make families: keys a minor third apart, such as C, E♭, F♯ and A, are related, so practising in one means practising in the others.

In the method: 2.4 Minor thirds and key families (brothers and sisters)

Jazz theory, part 1, with score3:404:23The minor-third family0:00

Barry’s warning against learning tunes from fake books: turning to a page and saying you can play it is not knowing the tune. Get the real sheet music instead, though even that has bad things in it, so come as close to the right version as you can; he used to hunt for songs in a library’s card file.

In the method: 12.2 Know the song; learn many songs; find your key

Believe: a talk to musicians43:3344:0744:4945:29

The move Barry said a pianist should probably learn before any other: a minor sixth chord whose moving note slides down a half step to the diminished, then another half step to the dominant it comes from, as F♯ minor 6, diminished, B7, then on to E. He called it the start of music.

In the method: 10.2 First progressions to know

Eyes of the Masters: the first progression0:02Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes3:103:46Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper) ¶42

Barry’s mocking name for pianists who run up and down the keyboard and get praised for their technique. For him real technique was knowing how to deal with space, and its master was Monk, who, he said, never missed a note.

In the method: 11.5 Touch

Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York29:1529:50

One diminished chord with several names in Barry’s teaching: the diminished a half step above the two, the four sharp diminished (D diminished in an A♭ blues), the flat three diminished. He rated it above the diminished a half step below the two, because it takes you to the two and also back to the one.

In the method: 8.7 The diminished as ‘ruler’

Practising the blues with the horns, part 13:003:496:3410:55The 1998 workshop, part 316:21Believe: a talk to musicians37:07Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video Part 2: product page and 156-page workbook table of contents ¶18

The four scales of chords Barry said you really should know: the major and minor sixth diminished scales, which he had before he came to New York, and the seventh diminished and seven flat five diminished scales he found later. In each a chord takes turns with the diminished chord that shares none of its notes.

In the method: 9.8 The 7th diminished and 7th flat 5 diminished scales

Believe: a talk to musicians52:48Movement, not chords: the sixth diminished scales0:00The 23 May Zoom class, part 121:3122:07Jazz theory, part 5: the sixth diminished scale4:104:43Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video Part 2: product page and 156-page workbook table of contents ¶16

Barry’s principle that anything you can do from one degree of a scale, a rule or a phrase, can be done from every other degree. He had players state a rule and then run it from each degree of a scale in turn.

In the method: 5.5 Rules from every degree, ascending rules, several added notes, harmonic minor

The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit17:3718:2919:1421:41

Barry’s routine for a scale, above all the sixth diminished scales: both thumbs on middle C, the hands move out in opposite directions and come back together. Then you fill it in with the chord notes between the two hands. Guitarists, he said, can do it too.

In the method: 11.3 Mirror image and contrary motion between the hands

Jazz theory, part 5: the sixth diminished scale10:1012:26Introducing the sixth diminished scale4:0722:1523:01Practising the sixth diminished scales4:30Howard Rees, Evolutionary Voicings, Part I: Barry Harris Keeps Things Movin’ ¶41

In Barry’s rules, the extra note slipped into a scale run, after one of the notes that fall on the beat; he said the only reason for it is to practise rhythm. Usually it is a chromatic half step, but any note can go between two notes, so he suggested calling it something other than a half step.

In the method: 5.1 Why add a note

Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 24:45The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit1:369:43

The textbook definition of the diminished scale, which Barry mocked wherever he taught. Saying it means nothing, he said: you have to know where the scale comes from, the diminished chord formed by the roots of four related dominants put together with the original diminished, and what it gives you: families.

In the method: 15.2 Bebop, tradition, and what is wrong with jazz education

Believe: a talk to musicians4:5920:17The last train to Monk: an interview30:48Student performances and coaching34:42Interview: Detroit, Bud Powell and the shuffle2:54Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶298

Barry’s image for hands that slip into their favourite grooves unless the mind leads them. The hardest thing to tell, he said, is whether your mind or your habits are choosing the notes. The closest he came to an answer was to think of a rhythm alone, without humming a pitch, and then make notes fit it.

In the method: 1.1 Rhythm comes first

Rhythm before notes2:202:52

Barry’s answer to modal teaching: he played jazz for over seventy years without hearing of Dorian or Mixolydian. When jazz went into the schools, he said, they needed something to teach and make money from, and picked the modes, which to him were not really about jazz at all.

In the method: 15.2 Bebop, tradition, and what is wrong with jazz education

Accepting the Bruce Lundvall Visionary Award2:18Never heard of the modes0:000:32Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶298

The minor sixth chord on a dominant’s fifth, which Barry counted as part of that dominant: F♯ minor sits on the fifth of B, so belongs to B7; D minor 6 belongs to G7. In a filmed lesson he drew the point for practice: if it is B7, practise B7, not F♯ minor 7 to B7.

In the method: 9.7 The important minor and the tritone’s minor (minor 6 dim over a dominant)

Jazz theory, part 7: Monk and Stella by Starlight12:3113:07Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes5:31Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶4Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video Part 2: product page and 156-page workbook table of contents ¶20

Barry’s word for what a hit on the ‘and’ does: it sets off what comes next. The ‘and’ of four, he told a band at the Artists House master class, is like a nice instigation, and a lot of songs lean on it; he reminded the drummer in particular.

In the method: 1.5 The rhythm section

Student performances and coaching11:0611:45

Barry’s name for himself: a habitual bebopper, for good. He saw bebop as the beginning and the end of music so far, so that what remains is to build on it, since he did not think music had gone any higher.

In the method: 15.2 Bebop, tradition, and what is wrong with jazz education

Passing It On0:000:45

Barry’s claim that most of the music grows out of the diminished. Players who know the diminished scale only as half step, whole step, he said, miss most of the music. One thing a diminished seventh gives, after Schoenberg: lower any one of its notes a half step and you have a dominant seventh, so each yields four dominants.

In the method: 2.3 The three diminished seventh chords (‘the children’)

Believe: a talk to musicians4:595:36Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished8:168:50Student performances and coaching31:44

Barry’s core claim: Bach, Chopin, Beethoven and Liszt all learned to improvise, so there had to be a system for it, and jazz carries it on. He said it after tracing the drop voicings to Schoenberg’s four voices, and once called himself a classical rather than a jazz musician, though he said he was not ashamed of being one.

In the method: 15.1 Jazz as the continuation of classical improvisation

Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished0:00The last train to Monk: an interview30:17Interview: Detroit, Bud Powell and the shuffle2:21Jazz theory, part 2: drop voicings5:105:527:18Interview on Italian television6:129:02Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶289

For Barry, knowing a song meant its melody, words and changes. He began asking horn players to learn the lyrics, especially of ballads, after hearing a very good player who would have played one part differently had he known the words, and joked that no singer could scat until she could recite every change and note.

In the method: 12.2 Know the song; learn many songs; find your key

Interview: Bud Powell and teaching singers18:5419:26Practising the blues with the horns, part 117:12Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶289

Barry’s word for how his material hangs together: each step follows from the one before, as the three diminished sevenths follow from the two whole-tone scales. He said all his material was logical, so that no teacher could face him down, and he called the half-step, whole-step description of scales ridiculous.

In the method: 0.3 Rules matter more than scales; everything by logic

Jazz schools and the basics3:233:56Believe: a talk to musicians4:5919:43Student performances and coaching30:3431:10Jazz theory, part 6: every major sixth is a minor seventh2:49

A way to practise chords, or two voices moving together, in pairs of positions: first a wide spacing with the top and bottom notes far apart, then the inversion that brings those same notes close. Short-long reverses the order. In a short clip on chords in the sixth diminished scale Barry has players practise one way, then switch.

In the method: 9.4 Playing the scale of chords (block chords up and down the 6th dim scale)

Long-short practice on sixth diminished chords0:00Master class, part 2: technique and dedication4:49Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶39Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶40Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper) ¶207Vera Marijt (research coach Jarmo Hoogendijk), Barry Harris: Exploring the Diminished (MA research paper) ¶210

Barry’s name for the two whole-tone scales, on C and on D♭. In his creation story God, still lonely after making the world, made man and woman; in music they are the two sixes you get when two goes into twelve. They give the major thirds and the dominant seventh with a flat or a raised five.

In the method: 2.2 The two whole-tone scales (‘man and woman’)

Student performances and coaching27:2728:0028:3329:1230:34Jazz theory, part 1, with score4:23Believe: a talk to musicians5:36

The sixth diminished scale with a flat third: in C, C D E♭ F G A♭ A B, a minor sixth chord taking turns with the same diminished chord. Barry noted it holds the harmonic minor scale plus a sixth, a note jazz needs. Know each minor sixth’s partner at once: B♭ minor 6 means A diminished.

In the method: 9.5 The minor 6th diminished scale and its diminished partner

Introducing the sixth diminished scale4:425:20Borrowed diminished notes on All the Things You Are6:246:59Movement, not chords: the sixth diminished scales0:00

Monk’s name for the half-diminished chord, which Barry took up: play any C minor notes over an A and you have A half-diminished. The name also shows the way in, by a move Barry said everyone should know: major, relative minor, then that minor with its sixth in the bass, as E♭, C minor, C minor over A.

In the method: 9.6 Half-diminished = minor with the sixth in the bass; major -> relative minor -> minor/6

Believe: a talk to musicians22:2823:1723:5524:38Borrowed diminished notes on All the Things You Are13:1411 March 2016: Stella by Starlight11:36Stella by Starlight9:52Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶54

As two jazzguitar.be forum players report it, one of them a former student, Barry’s name for his scale over a minor ii–V: the dominant scale a minor third above the V, run down to the V’s third. Over G half-diminished to C7, Barry ran E♭7 down to E, the third of C, and said the result is F harmonic minor.

In the method: 4.3 Minor

The 1998 workshop, part 30:000:42jazzguitar.be members (usernames kept per post), The Barry Harris scale for ii V in Minor (jazzguitar.be forum thread) ¶3jazzguitar.be members (usernames kept per post), Barry Harris’s opinion of harmonic minor scale? ¶22jazzguitar.be members (usernames kept per post), Official Barry Harris Thread (jazzguitar.be forum thread) ¶2967jazzguitar.be members (usernames kept per post), Official Barry Harris Thread (jazzguitar.be forum thread) ¶2968

Barry’s name for doing the same thing with each hand, one hand reflecting the other. He gave it as one more way to practise a scale, and in Rome told a student that whatever one hand can do the other should do too, because you have the mirror image. He also pointed out a mirror in a Chopin passage.

In the method: 11.3 Mirror image and contrary motion between the hands

Practising the sixth diminished scales6:557:35The 2016 workshop, part 3: Monk’s tunes, not his style24:4825:2526:04Chopin, part 16:32

Barry put rhythm above everything: the whole universe is built on it, and if one thing got out of rhythm it would all collapse. For an improviser that means thinking of a phrase’s rhythm before its notes. When a trumpeter hummed him a phrase over the telephone, his answer was: give me some rhythm first.

In the method: 1.1 Rhythm comes first

Rhythm comes first0:00Rhythm before notes1:101:472:52Student performances and coaching19:2519:58

Barry’s measure of a player: the best is the one who knows the most ways to play something. Four notes in one position can be played in 24 orders, and he wanted every inversion and combination known; since nobody can practise every way, the ways come from rules carried in your head.

In the method: 6.4 Arpeggio inversions and permutations

The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit33:46The 1998 workshop, part 313:0213:3614:44

What diminished notes say, in Barry’s words. Borrowed into a chord, they are restless and ask to be moved, and they go home, usually back to the chord tone they replaced. Even a major seventh chord, he said, is really a sixth chord with one diminished note in it, so that note wants to move too.

In the method: 10.4 Borrowing

Introducing the sixth diminished scale12:2521:36Practising the sixth diminished scales3:16Jazz theory, part 6: every major sixth is a minor seventh0:32Believe: a talk to musicians56:28Diminished chords3:37

How you get from one place to the next, as against the chords themselves. Coleman Hawkins told Barry he played movements, not chords, and Barry made it a rule: be a movement player and know all the movements. His scales of chords grew from this; his second workshop video drills sixth, sixth, sixth instead of ii-V-I.

In the method: 10.1 Be a movement player

Be movement players1:09Jazz theory, part 2: drop voicings1:07Movement, not chords: the sixth diminished scales0:00Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶401Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video Part 2: product page and 156-page workbook table of contents ¶20

Barry’s names for his dominant-scale rules, counted by added notes. Running down from the tonic, third, fifth or seventh, the first rule is one half step, between the tonic and the flat seventh; from the third, fifth or seventh, the second is three (3–2, 2–1, 1–♭7). From the second, fourth or sixth: none, or two.

In the method: 5.3 Dominant 7th scale descending

Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 20:001:151:512:24

What Barry called his philosophy: he would rather be one of the few than one of the many. If he suddenly became popular, he said, he would think something was wrong and change his style. He said it before attacking the big-chord, one-hand playing he heard at schools everywhere.

In the method: 15.2 Bebop, tradition, and what is wrong with jazz education

Small chords, not big ones0:000:331:05

The half-step rules assume a run that starts on the beat. Start the same run on the ‘and’ and Barry used the opposite rule: the tonic, which takes one added note from the beat, takes none, and the second, which takes none, takes one.

In the method: 5.4 Off the beat, pickups and triplets

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

Barry’s reminder that one key is only a start. Schoenberg, he said, wrote out the C major scale in thirds and then told the reader to learn the other eleven: that is the secret, and it goes for Barry’s scales too. He sent a student home to come back having practised the other eleven keys.

In the method: 14.2 Every key, every degree, every way

Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished2:252:58Coaching Zohar Cabo5:15Know the chords on the scale7:42

Barry’s starting point: the twelve notes from C to B are the musician’s whole world, and every other scale is drawn from them. You can get an Egyptian or Arabian scale out of the chromatic scale but not the other way round, so the chromatic scale is the most important.

In the method: 2.1 The chromatic scale is the source of every scale

Jazz theory, part 1, with score7:288:08Music is like math0:000:37Student performances and coaching28:00

Barry’s octave switch inside a line: hit the first note of a diminished or chord where it is and play the rest an octave lower. He called the diminished ‘a pivotal thing’, and taught pivoting so horn players, with fewer octaves than a piano, can keep a phrase going as long as a pianist.

In the method: 6.7 Pivoting

Practising the blues with the horns, part 112:0412:4113:1713:5614:3215:40

Barry’s reason to reach for a dominant’s relatives first. The four dominants that come from one diminished chord are brothers and sisters, so with C7 the family is A7, E♭7 and F♯7. Practise running each into the others, A7 into C7 and back, and stack family triads over the dominant: it sounds right, he said, because it is family.

In the method: 8.4 Playing with the family

Jazz theory, part 3: four dominants from one diminished8:509:34Student performances and coaching34:0234:4236:06Introducing the sixth diminished scale13:45

Barry set practising, which mostly means drilling what you don’t know, against practising playing: sitting down alone and playing one tune right through in tempo, so that you are playing every day even when gigs are few. Monk, he said, would play one tune in tempo by himself for 90 minutes.

In the method: 1.2 Swing by yourself; hold the time

Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York27:3028:0728:40Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶130

Barry’s word for the diminished chord’s say over where the music goes. Modulation starts with the diminished: you may mean to go to one key, but the diminished can take you to another, since the four dominants that come from it lead to four keys a minor third apart.

In the method: 8.7 The diminished as ‘ruler’

11 March 2016, part 2: the diminished as ruler2:39Tomasz Białowolski, Barry Harris, Rome 11/03/2016 (transcription of a class video) ¶94Tomasz Białowolski, Barry Harris, Rome 11/03/2016 (transcription of a class video) ¶95

Barry’s 1998 workshop refrain: a few rules, chiefly where to add a half step as you run a scale, matter more than the scales themselves. The rules should become second nature, applied from any degree and governing your playing. His example: A♭ major run straight down sounds like nothing until a half step goes between F and E♭.

In the method: 0.3 Rules matter more than scales; everything by logic

The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit0:000:5217:3733:46The 1998 workshop, part 335:1936:00

A sixth diminished scale played in chords, the sixth chord and its diminished taking turns up and down, so that every chord you play belongs to a scale and you know where to move it. Learn the scales of chords, Barry told guitarists in Almería, and the instrument hangs together as one scale rather than separate chords.

In the method: 9.4 Playing the scale of chords (block chords up and down the 6th dim scale)

Introducing the sixth diminished scale2:23Practising the sixth diminished scales0:00Jazz theory, part 4: borrowing diminished notes6:457:32Believe: a talk to musicians52:48Chords become scales8:59

The name in the workbook for Barry’s workshop video, and among his students, for a tune turned into a chain of plain scale calls with a direction and sometimes a landing note, such as ‘B♭ major up and down to the third of G, F7 up and down’ in a B♭ blues. He wanted that known before anything hip.

In the method: 4.4 Scale outlines

My Chat With Chris Parks From Things I Learned From Barry Harris21:01Practising the blues with the horns, part 24:074:46Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video ¶17Howard Rees’ Jazz Workshops, Blues in F - Scale Outline ¶2

Barry’s name for the note usually called the ninth. Showing Bird’s line on the tritone of C, F♯7, in Embraceable You, he said he would rather not call it a ninth but a second. His exercises name it the same way: play the tonic, then the second up chromatically to the third.

In the method: 8.9 Bird’s devices

Bird’s tritone line on Embraceable You0:000:32Tritone lines on Indiana and Embraceable You4:01

A rule Barry gave for any dominant or major scale: coming down, when you reach the fourth, play the second instead and climb chromatically to the third. He sometimes added that from the third the line can go chromatically down to the tonic, and used the figure in place of a tonic too.

In the method: 5.7 Coming down to the fourth

The 1998 workshop, part 31:10:061:10:431:12:47Tritone lines on Indiana and Embraceable You4:024:43

Barry’s word for a chord held in the hand as one grip, such as A flat minor six. To play it in several places on the keyboard you keep the shape and move it from one position to the next; the hard part is that move. Start working the fingers, he said, and there is no shape left.

In the method: 11.4 Play from the body and the arm, not the fingers

Let the body do it3:254:004:36Not the fingers: playing from the arm0:34

A frequent instruction in Barry’s classes, to players as well as singers: sing the scale or phrase as you play it. He taught by singing or playing licks that the class had to play straight back (‘repeat after me’), and said this showed them what improvisation is.

In the method: 12.1 Everybody sings

Practising the blues with the horns, part 10:35Dropping notes to feel every beat3:09The 5-4-3-2-1 phrase1:102:55The last train to Monk: an interview29:33

The second of two sixth chords Barry played against a major chord, built on its fifth: for E♭ major, B♭6 beside E♭6, the six on the tonic. The six on the fifth brings the major seventh and the ninth, the other the sixth and the root. For pretty chords, play one and add a single note of the other.

In the method: 9.2 Two sixth chords for every major chord (6 on the 1, 6 on the 5)

Two sixth chords against a major key0:040:38Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶38

Barry’s personal scale: a major sixth chord plus the diminished chord sharing none of its notes; in C, C D E F G A♭ A B, a major scale with an added note between fifth and sixth. He called it the real major scale, nine degrees instead of eight. It holds the dominants of the key and its relative minor.

In the method: 9.3 The major 6th diminished scale (a major scale with one more note)

Introducing the sixth diminished scale1:121:512:23Jazz theory, part 5: the sixth diminished scale8:289:02Believe: a talk to musicians55:17

Barry’s ideal for piano chords: a few notes, often just three, blended between the hands, not the big chords most pianists play. Being a bebopper, he said, does not mean big chords at the top. A listener hears the movement, not the number of notes; the first little thing to learn is a sixth chord for a major chord.

In the method: 11.1 Two hands together

Small chords, not big ones1:052:13Introducing the sixth diminished scale0:41Passport: teaching a blues by ear6:497:2513:4314:18

For Barry, the pauses in a solo, like the little pauses in speech. Space is not emptiness: young players who play on and on, gulp a breath and dive back in know nothing about it, and pianists have to breathe too. Real technique, he said, is knowing how to deal with space.

In the method: 11.5 Touch

Student performances and coaching9:049:5410:30Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York13:0629:15

To approach a target from both sides, the note above and the note below, before landing on it: E♭, the fifth of A♭, is surrounded by E and D. Barry used a surround to reach the first note of a chord, and said every note has something around it.

In the method: 6.5 Surrounding notes (approach from above and below)

The 1998 workshop, part 317:33Chords and the diminished, in The Hague3:33Giant Steps in the piano class5:27Diminished chords2:18

Every player is responsible for swing: you cannot depend on the bass player or the drummer to swing for you. If you had to play alone you would still have to swing, and Barry asked that of himself. He called it the secret, and recalled grasping it when Erroll Garner sat in at a Birdland jam session.

In the method: 1.2 Swing by yourself; hold the time

Swing by yourself0:000:36Swing by yourself0:00Interview: Detroit, Bud Powell and the shuffle13:3914:13Vocal workshop: swing it yourself2:18

The bone in the arm that Barry pointed to as the place the piano is played from. Piano teaching, he said, has stressed the little drop of the fingers into the keys, but the movement that matters goes sideways across the keyboard, and neither the fingers nor the forearm can make it.

In the method: 11.4 Play from the body and the arm, not the fingers

Not the fingers: playing from the arm0:000:34

Barry’s drill for feeling every part of the bar: play a phrase over and over, taking one more note off its front each time so it starts on each beat and each ‘and’ in turn, then add the notes back one at a time, staying in time throughout.

In the method: 5.8 Rule drills in time

Dropping notes to feel every beat0:000:522:325:06Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 26:37

Barry’s instruction for runs: the body, not the fingers, carries the hand across the keyboard, and where the body wants to go, the hand goes. The fingers, he said, cannot get to the body, and cannot get you over the piano by themselves.

In the method: 11.4 Play from the body and the arm, not the fingers

Let the body do it0:37The Spirit of Bebop1:05

Barry’s name for a drummer’s lone accent on beat four, which he said he detested. If the drummer also hit the ‘and’ of two before it, he would go along, since that is salsa; it was the four by itself he could not stand, though he granted that Philly Joe Jones had a ball with it.

In the method: 1.5 The rhythm section

The lone accent on four1:402:172:51

Barry’s verdict on the ii chord. The minor chord before a dominant is that dominant’s important minor, part of it, so if it is B7, practise B7. The pianist can play his ii-V while the horn player works on the dominant and its tritone. In class he named twos only because horn players needed some harmony to hold on to.

In the method: 8.1 Put the ii chord away

Interview: Detroit, Bud Powell and the shuffle19:2019:56Practising the blues with the horns, part 13:003:49Jazz theory, part 7: Monk and Stella by Starlight12:3113:07Tritone lines on Indiana and Embraceable You0:001:104:40

Barry’s call to feel groups of three running against the four beats: six against four. Even while counting one-and-two-and, on a ballad and above all when soloing, he said you should be thinking six; then you become another drummer. He believed Bird knew the six, which is why nobody could imitate his ballads.

In the method: 1.4 Triplets and thinking in six

Believe: a talk to musicians31:0831:4732:2132:58Student performances and coaching13:2714:0716:2919:25

On a dominant seventh scale, the arpeggios built on the tonic, fifth and seventh: in B♭7, B♭ major, F minor and A♭ major. Barry said he hated naming them, since a chord is just the scale played skipping every other note, and added the augmented arpeggio as another pretty one.

In the method: 6.1 Arpeggios on every degree; the three important arpeggios of a dominant scale

Practising the blues with the horns, part 20:000:341:13

Barry’s advice to use notes that sound wrong, such as diminished notes, and then resolve them. Audiences react to wrong; when you then make it right, they don’t know what to think, but you have their attention.

In the method: 6.6 Chromatic pickups and the well-placed half step

Let the body do it2:202:55

Added to a scale call, it names the landing note: instead of finishing on the scale’s own tonic, the line ends on the third of the chord that follows. ‘B♭ major up and down to the third of G’ comes back down and stops on B, the third of G, a half step above B♭.

In the method: 0.2 Barry’s vocabulary

Practising the blues with the horns, part 11:12Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 10:001:07Practising the blues with the horns, part 24:46Half-step rules on the dominant scale, part 26:03

Barry’s name for a drill he put the pianist Eli Yamin through on camera: play in four keys a minor third apart, C, E♭, F♯ and A, starting from C. Those keys, he explained, are all related, so practising in one is practising in the others.

In the method: 2.4 Minor thirds and key families (brothers and sisters)

Jazz theory, part 1, with score1:512:263:404:23

Barry’s reminder that lines must not be all eighth notes: use triplets, above all sixteenth-note triplets, which he told players to practise always and called the most beautiful of all. He said most young players could not even imagine one, and nicknamed Freddie Hubbard ‘Trip’ to push him to play triplets.

In the method: 6.9 Triplets in lines (eighth- and sixteenth-note)

Student performances and coaching12:1725:0225:35Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York12:3213:06

In Barry’s usage, the dominant a tritone away from a given dominant, its partner in the same family: F♯7 for C7, D7 for A♭7. While the pianist plays the ii-V, a soloist can play on the tritone, as Bird did on Indiana. Barry wanted horn players to practise a dominant into its tritone, and the tritone into the I chord.

In the method: 8.5 The tritone

Student performances and coaching35:18Tritone lines on Indiana and Embraceable You0:001:102:334:014:405:50Bird’s D7 line on Indiana0:344:375:13Bird’s tritone line on Embraceable You0:00

The minor sixth chord on the fifth of a dominant’s tritone, a half step above the dominant’s root: A♭ minor 6 for G7. The workbook to Barry’s second workshop video pairs it with the important minor and calls it the ideal altered scale for V7 to Imaj7. On Out of Nowhere, Barry ties F minor over E7 to E7’s tritone.

In the method: 9.7 The important minor and the tritone’s minor (minor 6 dim over a dominant)

Tritones on Out of Nowhere0:55Barry Harris (on video); Howard Rees (producer, The Barry Harris Workshop Video Part 2: product page and 156-page workbook table of contents ¶20Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶23Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶24Jazz School Online (Howard Rees), Glossary of Terms ¶25

Barry’s term for runs thrown off without planning: you just go ‘swish’ and something is played, without caring if a note comes out wrong. It must still be kept in time and not yanked. Played with that reckless abandon, he said, a run makes an audience gasp; there is no time for fingers.

In the method: 11.4 Play from the body and the arm, not the fingers

Let the body do it1:121:452:182:51

A scale call: start on the tonic and run up to the seventh, then stop. Every called scale runs from the tonic to the seventh, never tonic to octave, so ‘B♭ major up’ stops on A and ‘B♭7 up’ on A♭. Barry wanted the calls played in time and in eighth notes, not quarter notes.

In the method: 4.1 How Barry calls a scale (tonic to seventh, up/down/up and down)

Practising the blues with the horns, part 10:000:3514:32Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 10:00

A scale call: run from the tonic up to the seventh and straight back down, without touching the octave. In Barry’s classes whole tunes were laid out as chains of these calls, such as his B♭ blues, which includes ‘B♭ major up and down to the third of G’, and the last sixteen bars of Indiana.

In the method: 4.1 How Barry calls a scale (tonic to seventh, up/down/up and down)

Practising the blues with the horns, part 10:0014:32The 1998 workshop, part 2: breaking the habit27:07Practising the blues with the horns, part 24:074:46Scales on Indiana in A-flat, part 11:07

Barry’s creed for improvisers: scales make the music, and chords come from scales, never the other way round. So a soloist thinks in scales instead of spelling out each written chord; he said you cannot learn improvisation from knowing chords on the piano.

In the method: 7.1 Think in scales and phrases, not chords

Rhythm changes: scales, not chords6:136:48Around Giant Steps, part 20:34Be movement players0:00

Barry’s verdict on learning from Monk: his playing is too unorthodox and personal to study as a method, but his tunes, ballads like Ruby, My Dear and ‘Round Midnight among them, are works of art. He would not advise anyone to study Monk’s playing, and would not try to play like him himself; play his songs, he said.

In the method: 13.4 Monk’s and Bud’s tunes; learning from records

The 2016 workshop, part 3: Monk’s tunes, not his style0:001:292:50Interview: Bird, Hawkins, Monk and New York25:0725:40