Drawing connections between jazz and Renaissance counterpoint. A strong theoretical explanation while simultaneously making counterpoint, which can seem boring if taught in the wrong way, highly relevant in a modern context. Nice work sir. Very well done.
For all of those who don't know what 9ths, 11ths, and 13ths are, they are basically 2nds, 4ths, and 6ths, but in a scale an octave above the previous scale.
They don't have to be an octave above. You can stack them along the other chord tones. They are just called 9/11/13 because 2/4 imply suspended chords. And 6th chords only include the 6, not 9/11. 13 includes both 9 and 11 (which could be omitted in the voicing). For example: C6 = C E G A C13 = C E G Bb D F A Cmaj13 = C E G B D F A
Being a bass player and classically trained musician, but with not a lot of jazz experience, I love your bass videos. It's rare I learn musical things on RU-vid videos. So thank you very much. Glad I subscribed.
Adam Neely, you are gods gift to self taught musicians. Seriously, I just spent the last year I college being talk down to by academic musicians touting their superior methods. and through your videos, I learned more in a month than I did in that year. never stop dude
Adam - as someone who has always been desperately seeking (but always failed!) a path to improvisation, this lesson of yours is an ABSOLUTE eye - sorry! - ear opener! I now have a definitive path upon which to walk. Thanks a million! Now back to the shed...
I used this on a solo for a recording recently and couldn't be happier. The results are brain shattering. Thanks for having such great content on your channel.
Hey Adam, actually cantus firmus started even before the Renaissance, with medieval polyphony, around the 12th century . Gregorian chant was monodic at first, then some monks added an ornemental voice to the usual melody which was slowed down. Cantus firmus was born ! Source : I'm actually studying this for my exam that's next week Keep on the good work !
Great lesson not just for bassists but for every improvising musicians. I would like to see some stuff about rhytmical ideas and phrasing from you, it can be very interesting. I think you have talent in the field of complex music teaching not just in bass.
I really liked the 'avoid' notes bassline and If you could do a video completely devoted to teaching how to use "dissonant" or non-key notes i would watch it a dozen times tbh
Can't (canto?) wait until you get your well-deserved 1M subs, Adam. Your research, curiosity, diligence and (hard won) ability to distill complex concepts into high-yield material are so impressive. I send folks from pros to non-musicians to your channel.
I really love your videos man. I've been playing Bass for more than half my life now. I started off taking lessons and learning theory but I always had a pretty good ear for music. I was kind of stubborn and angsty (14 year olds am I right?) and I didn't like the structure of theory, same old story "music should be about freedom" So I'm mainly self taught, by ear and now im sitting down and starting to really educate myself about music. Weird things start to happen, like suddenly I have words to describe things I've been doing for years. The more I learn about theory the more I feel like I understand what Im doing. That understanding leads to confidence in my ability and is really helping to make me a more solid musician.
Adam, I'm a basement musician/writer/producer (Mostly DAW with writing but some on guitar), and I've been struggling to re-gain interest in making music for a couple years now. This video, as well as a few others of yours has lit a fire within me that has been dwindling dangerously low. Thank you so much man!! You earned the fuX outta this sub!
Although playing "red" notes sound almost like your playing wrong stuff, it's really fun to create that atonal feeling. Against a full chord on a piano it might be harder, but if your playing with some 2 wind instruments or fewer voices creates a interesting feeling of tonality evasion. Or at least is a great excuse to use when you actually miss something. Great lesson as always Adam! Looking forward to next monday.
Brilliant Adam. I guess a lot of us do this subconsciously but to put a process to it just makes it so much nicer! Will practice this more in the future!
2:57 Absolutely love this statement regarding the relationship of music and it's parallels to the Universe/Nature. I truly believe everything we feel can be boiled down to these basic essences and constants in the Universe. Congratulations on a fantastic channel, and really well-presented videos!
A word of warming for young players. At 6:21, that is _not_ an F-sharp half-diminished that is being played. Rather, it’s an E major triad over F-sharp. Alternatively (albeit, somewhat loosely), it can be interpreted as an F#7sus. By avoiding the flat 5 (and flat 3, for that matter) in the accompaniment, we can safely play the natural 9th in the melody, sure, but the chances that this will happen spontaneously in a real-life situation are pretty low. The rest of the chords will sound okay either as played or as written; it’s only the F#m7b5 that you have to worry about.
+Ast A. Moore You can "safely" play a natural 9 over m7(b5) chords, it's voiced all the time in chords by pianists, especially in post bop situations. It's certainly not diatonic, and it falls heavily in the "green" category of notes (it's quite a spicy note), but its used all that time. That exact Cantus Firmus - the natural 9 of the IIm7(b5) resolving to the b13 of the V7 resolving to the 9 of the tonic I minor chord is a common voice leading pattern thats associated with Bill Evans. The particular voicings I used on the piano - E/F# going to F/B - yes, technically not the full chords, but they're very modern substitutions for the F#m7(b5) going to B7.
Adam Neely No argument here from me. I just felt that a warning would be appropriate. After all, if people fire up their BIAB or iReal Pro, enter the chart, and play a G# on the F#ø7 (expecting it to sound as smooth and open-ended as in your example), they’ll be in for a surprise. :-P
I very much like the red notes, the classic Autumn Leaves jazz theme and the Precision sound in the intro. I'm exploring this rather difficult terrain on my own but very slowly, curious but lazy as I am. Thanks for this very inspirational vid.
Great lesson, Cantus Firmus loose... I was first introduced to this concept developing 2nd chair harmonies for orchestral clarinet, pretty dry stuff. This is a very fresh look at the stodgy old tomes. Thank you!
A useful and fun demonstration of a really interesting concept - thank you for making this! The best part for me was seeing 'colour' spelt correctly :D
+Stephen Lafferty You might have noticed that it was actually spelled both ways in this video, at different times. This was entirely on purpose, I swear.
@Stephen: Best part of the comment section for me is seeing the word "spelt" spelled and used correctly. :D @Adam: I'm sure he would swear it was on purpose. :P
Speaks with an American accent, but spells colour correctly....we're gonna get along just fine, Adam! Also, dat dissonance was lurrvely...but 'm a BM head, so....yeah... Omar Rodriguez-Lopez is basically as pop as I go, and Beethoven is anathema.
I have been playing the bass on and off for a long time and I (think!) I know my theory. This video was the most insightful education piece I have seen in a long time! Subscribed sir! Good job!
Adam thank you so much for making these videos. I can always bet on you coming up with the most out there stuff, so thank you for wading into those murky waters and showing us what you caught. I will comment and like as much as I can and hope everyone else does too if they've learned from your videos. Keep it Neely, man.
Super curious: in a melodic/theoretical sense, why do you think about those non-butter notes as 9/11/13 rather than 2/4/6? They aren't really extensions unless you have the first octave of a chord underneath them right? Wouldn't it be easier on a single line instrument to think of them all as 1 though 8?
No, in jazz, with some very sparce exceptions (Cm6 for example), larger extensions of chords are always labeled as 9, 11, and 13. It's because if you wrote a Cm13 in root position, the chord tones would mostly be spaced in thirds of each other with the root on the bottom, and the D, F and A would sit on top of the C, Eb, G and Bb. If you scrunched them all together, the chord would become very dissonant. Now, different positions will set the 9 next to the root (like in 'add 9' chords), but it is still called the 9 because of its placement in root position.
I understand that, and that makes sense as to why they are labelled as such in chords. But Adam isn't talking about chords, he's talking about soloing. So wouldn't it makes more sense to think of your solo in scale degrees 1-8, rather than thinking of it as extensions to a chord that you're not playing?
+Clayton Rego Music I know what your saying, but having two different sets of labels for the same notes within the same type of playing would be a tad convoluted. Besides, in your solos, especially this kind of soloing, it's chord tones you're aiming for, so you would use the same labeling system as chord tones.
+Clayton Rego Music Also, a lot of it is due to tradition. The best players all use that terminology and have for years, and there's a mutual understanding as to what this and that mean, so there's little reason to change it. Plus, just about every professional jazz musician on the planet would think you were pretty silly.
+Clayton Rego Music Anyway, thanks for the discussion! This is a subject where I really actually had to think. I like that. And also, thanks for keeping it civil. Props!
So even with my little knowledge of music theory and chords, everything you said made perfect sense. You really drew out the 'secret' to bass soloing for me that I've been missing for a long time. Thanks for the video!
great videos Adam. I have played sax for many years but learned very traditionally and so thought more linear with my music (actually counted steps) but since picking up bass I have started to see more readily the relations of intervals. I am finding your videos very helpful to apply to all my instruments
The tag on the end is one reason a lot of people hate jazz and classical players, they are snobby, even to each other. There's always some kind of dick measuring contest with musicians, and with the 'elite' genres it happens constantly.
Paul Thoresen Plenty of Prog metal players do it too, If it isnt in 11/16 they dont want to know. What I find amusing about elitists is they forget plenty of musicians CAN play what they play, they just CHOOSE not to to give say vocals more room to breathe or make it so non musicians can join in, or to give say guitarists the option of jumping around on stage. What I'm trying to say is they neglect the style of performance/method of audience envolvement aspect of certain genres. For example, people going to a punk/metalcore gig are going to want to yell the words jump about and blow off steam. Not watch how many notes you can play in 10 seconds. Plus it would be really difficult as a musician to be energetic and yet intricate and accurate over jazz runs in those situations. Plus it would not give the audience what they came for. But thats just my opinion.
Paul Thoresen if you don't know your shit why would I want to regularly play with you, even though yes your playing music and that's good, but wouldn't you act like a "snob" to if you were constantly getting better and leaving others in the dust, even Lebron James is a douche bag dude.
dude your videos are very informative specially this one. thank you so much for the insight and knowledge provided in this video and all the other ones. this video has really helped me answer some of the questions ive had about soloing. thank you and keep up the awesome work!!!
Amazing video, I love your channel having found it a few days ago. It is very useful even as a guitarist and general musician. Keep making great content.
Try using a minor pentatonic scale, but flatten the 5. This is one of the japanese hirajoshi scales (taken from tunings of the koto). It uses the flat 5 like in the blues scale, but unlike the blues scale it omits the standard 5th and remains a pentatonic. The sound is definitely eastern though and you can twist a few brains around by switching between them quickly before anyone notices. You could also take the minor pentatonic again and sharpen the 3rd, I call this the Jeff Beck scale (don't remember the real name atm). Both are really easy to learn since they're just one note different than the most common blues and rock scale.
Jonas Charif Try mixing blues scale material with dominant scales like the Mixolydian, Lydian dominant, Mixolydian b13, altered (super locrian), whole tone, half whole diminished etc. Throwing in dominant elements with minor - often alternating between the two several times in seconds - can give some pretty interesting solos while still sounding bluesy
i had watched your video where you explain chord scales. It was so helpful then, and then I saw this video of yours. You are such a wonderful teacher. Subscribed. :). Best wishes!
You're quite a clever clogs Adam ..... very interesting ideas done in your own unique way .... nicely presented in that sharply edited way of yours. Greetings from London UK
Fernando Soares Alves FUCKIN' A, 'MURICA! Seriously though, it always drives me crazy to see pretentious discussions on the spelling of "color" without taking Latin into account. people really need to direct that douche energy into legitimate avenues, like publicly shaming people who use the (not) word "irregardless." Man I just want to murder people who use words like that.
With a good keyboardist and a fun effect on the bass for the solo, you can do fun stuff. The challenge is always to make it fit into the composition's sound.
I've been listening to "jazz snobs" saying this for years, but when I would question them further, they clammed right up (honestly made me wonder if they even knew what they were actually saying tbh)... and finally someone actually explains what it is instead of just trying to "sound" smard. I also appreciate that you put it out there for the world to see that it was a thing long before jazz was a thing. Many jazz musicians like to think jazz invented all "good" music. Humility is one of the greatest human qualities and most people can't even see why, let alone practice it. So I humbly ask... Could you please make a "humility in jazz" video for jazz snobs to learn from? I promise to learn as much as I can from it also. Thank You. ^_^
Excellent video. I was a music major in college (20+) years ago and then ended up being a web developer. I think I've learned more from your videos (and Rick Beato's) than I ever learned in my college music classes! (BTW people need to pick up on the fact that you know how to pronounce "Fux"; you're just being funny.)
Very Cool Adam, i've been playing Jazz bass for years ( and i mean traditional, just playing the bass line & head ), i've just started to work on Bass Chord Melody's and i'm finding that the guys who have studied composition and counterpoint have the edge.
Speaking of avoid notes, inn my Little Suede Shoes when the I chord goes to a dominant seventh Bird leads up to the root with a major seventh, and after the IV chord goes to minor he still plays the major third in the melody, and he still makes it sound good. It was in something called Sketch-Orks.
You bring up a good point at the end(in addition to the awesome cantus firmus shoutout in the rest of the vid) and I think the wisest course of action is to learn every single standard in all of the "original" keys and then learn them in all the rest of the twelve keys, and listen to the album and use your audiation and transcribing technique to make your own fake book with every song you learn in all twelve keys that you probably won't need to use because you've trained yourself so hard in the process of creating it. That's my goal, anyway.
Alex--you hit the nail on the head. The musical goal of life? In time, in tune, in style, in all 12 keys, at all tempos (mm=50 to mm=300). If you need to work on hearing these scales and/or chords, sing all chords and their accompanying scales around the cycle of fifths. Start with the easy ones, and work your way up to the hard ones. There's a lot of time in a car commuting that can be used this way.
Nice!!! I tried to read Fux when I was in my Music Undergrad on my own, but I didn't see the application as clearly; I like your process and connections you make!!
Cool approach, Adam! Felix Salzer, in his book "Counterpoint in Composition", expanded this thinking to further realms. There, he shows how to use the canti firmi (and first specie counterpoint) to establish the pivotal points of music structure, and then, expand the whole musical fabric from there. A must see!
Great lesson, I'm not a bassist but can still apply this method to soloing on guitar for sure..sometimes it's hard to break the norm of our ears being trained to butter, when we want to make bread...thanks again.
I enjoy just about all your videos, but I would love more like this: theoretically interesting, with historical context, and great practical applications
![Cool jazz soloing technique - the Cantus Firmus Method [ AN's Bass Lessons #20 ]](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
