All of Me: Tune of the Month, June '06

capilano-gypsy

Seems like Jack's busy, or we didn't support his efforts enough. I'm going to try and contribute by doing this.



That's the chart, courtesy of Nuages de Swing.

Here are some ideas to create harmonic movement, utilizing diminished passing chords:

C6/9, Ddim, Ebdim, C/E
E7 (typical extension would be b9, some use natural 9), F#dim, Gdim, E/G#
A7 (b9), Bdim, Cdim, A/C#
Dm6, Edim, Dm/F, Dm6

etc.. etc.. Apply the same concepts to chords that follow.

Since there are a lot of dominant chords, you can have fun with reharmonizing those as well. Try what's called a V into ii-V: if you have an E7 chord, replace it with one bar of Bm7 and one bar of E7. If you have a dominant that resolves to a minor chord, make sure it's a iim7b5.

C6/9 / / / | / / / / | Bm7 / / / | E9 / / / |
Em7b5 / / / | A7b9 / / / | Dm / / / | / / / / |

Whenever you have four bars of a minor chord, you can do a "line cliche" where the root decends chromatically: Dm, Dmmaj7, Dm7, Dm6. I recommend having the "melody" being the decending line, that is, use a voicing that starts with the root as the top voice and move it down chromatically.

Soloing ideas? Not too good at this but some off the top of my head:

C6/9 arpeggio, Fdim arpeggio over E7, Bbdim arpeggio over A7, D dorian or Dm6/9 arpeggios over Dm.

You can also add some interest by playing a Bb dominant idea over E7 (tritone sub). This usually works most effectively when the idea doesn't have too many chromatics and is more or less simple arpeggation. For an A7 arpeggio, Eb7 is the tritone sub. You can also add extensions to the tritone sub, but they should always be natural, with the exception of a #11. On Bb7 (TT sub of E7), they would be C (9th), E (#11 or b5), and G (13th). The reason for the natural extensions is that they are actually all of the altered extensions on the original dominant chord, which adds harmonic interest (i.e. sounds hip and outside).

I'll see if I come up with more ideas but I don't want to irritate my wrist anymore - onset of tendonitis perhaps?

Hope someone finds this useful.

Jack

Hah! I almost posted something last night asking if people wanted to take a monthly turn at doing this! Sorry for the delay, but this month has been absolutely nuts with gigs, Django in June, etc., and I've been putting off the Tune of the Month...All of Me was actually one of the tunes I was going to put up soon, so I'm glad you chose it, and thanks for taking the initiative.

Here's the rhythm track from Nuages de Swing:
http://nuagesdeswing2.free.fr/sons_play ... _of_me.MP3
And Dennis' transcription of Django's 1940 take:
http://tinyurl.com/o6cnw
And two basic versions of the head:
http://www.visi.com/~mpv/charts/All%20Of%20Me(C).pdf
http://www.guitar-primer.com/Charts/Chart-6020.html

One thing I'd like to see in your post is some tab examples (for chords or solo lines); I think a lot of people really need to see fingerings to understand what you mean, especially for those that don't have a lot of theory under their belts. Feel free to add, everyone!

To add my little bit, we've been using a real bare bones intro lately:
Em7 | Eb7 | Dm7 | Db7
repeat, then chromatic run up from G to the opening C chord. Roots all on the A string, rhythm is open to interpretation...

Best,
Jack.

Jack

And for you rhythm players out there (which should mean ALL of us!), Michael offers a great lesson here on walking bass and chords using All of Me as an example. A tune like this, where the chords tend to change only every two bars, is a perfect place to get started on this style of playing. Once you learn it here you'll be able to apply it to all kinds of tunes. Here's the lesson:
http://tinyurl.com/z2wjq
Great stuff, and a bargain to boot. Check it out.

Best,
Jack.

capilano-gypsy

Here's a simple 6/9 arpeggio based on the 6/9 shape with the bass in the sixth string. It's what Django uses to start his solo on [i]I'll see you in my Dreams[/i]:
[code]
----------9-7--
--------9------
------8--------
--8-9----------
---------------
---------------
[/code]
That's just something simple, but you can apply it to other chords, if you want minor, just lower the third (8th fret E note) a half step and voila! minor6/9.

[code]
-------------------7-10--9--------------
-----------------9-----------10-8--------
--------7-9-10---------------------9--7--
---6-9------------------------------------
-7-----------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------
[/code]
The above is an E7b9 arpeggio connecting to an A7. Use it as a base to develop your own ideas. The key to proper "connecting" of the arpeggios lies in the D (b7th of E7) resolving a halfstep down to the 3rd (C# of A7). This concept can be applied to connecting other chords and makes for a line that outlines the harmony.

joef

Interesting stuff.
Check out the melody and see how there are sus chords ( eg bars 7 and 11 ) and also a nice min7b5 at bar 29 ( should be an Ab melody note in the pdf of the head ).
For the last 8 I would play :
F6 | Fm6 | Cmaj7 Gm6 | A7 | Dm7b5 | G7 | C Ebdim | Dm7 G+ |

regards
Joe

Rookie

Hi,


I have a little problem, I know several way to grab for example a Gdim, but I am quite shure that it's quite important which position I choose.



It would be great, if you could post the positions of the chords you want the reader to use



Thanks in Advance


GreetZ Rookie

djangology

you can do a "line cliche" where the root decends chromatically: Dm, Dmmaj7, Dm7, Dm6

by the way, I believe this is called a "voice lead"

capilano-gypsy

E7, F#dim, Gdim, E/G#:

-
9-10-11-12
7-8--9--9
9-10-11---
7-9--10-11
-

Something like that... Please, experiment with other voicings as well.

And no, that's not called voice leading. Voice leading is when you move from one harmony (chords) to another using the least possible movement. For example, moving from an A7 to a Dmaj7 chord would involve leaving the A and C# notes while moving the E to a D and a G to an F#. Line cliche is when there's once voice moving chromatically in a chord.

Jack

[quote="capilano-gypsy"]Voice leading is when you move from one harmony (chords) to another using the least possible movement. For example, moving from an A7 to a Dmaj7 chord would involve leaving the A and C# notes while moving the E to a D and a G to an F#. Line cliche is when there's once voice moving chromatically in a chord.[/quote]

True enough, but in a tune like this a 'line cliche' and 'voice leading' may end up being the same thing, when you're doing the cliche on an Am chord, you're heading to a D7 (aka Am6) with a minimum of movement. It's true though that they aren't always the same thing...a nice example of voice leading is the classic descending motion of this outro in

-----------------------------------------------------------
--10------9----8---8---7-----------------------------------------
--7-------7----7---7---6---------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------------
--9-------8----7---6---5----------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------------

or the descending chord sequence in Cherokee-I think I wrote it out somewhere else-which you can play almost chromatically, throwing in a lot of b5 and b9 notes to connect one chord to another...

When one hears 'line cliche' mentioned on the forum, it almost always refers to a Root/7/b7/6 movement. Anyway, blah blah blah, you guys already know that-good to see Jon posting again!

Best,
Jack.

Ando

Jack

Another way to think about this harmonically is that the "line cliche" is simply one way of prolonging tonic harmony. You're moving from a root position chord to its first inversion. Functionally, the diminished chords are just passing chords. There are other kinds of chords you could use, but I'm too exhausted to suggest any off the top of my head.

As a soloist, I'd prefer these diminshed passing chords not be stated all the time by the rhythm player. I make use of them myself, melodically, and after a while, the line cliche' just loses its tension-building effect. Lately I've been listening to a rhythm player for example who just flat-out overplays, often using these devices, and it's a miracle his horn players haven't brained him yet. Tone deaf! Oblivious to soloists! Endless random doo-wacky-doo variations! Ugh.

A rambunctious, uncontrolled rhythm player is a soloist's nightmare.

But that said, carry on.

capilano-gypsy

Ando wrote:

Jack

Another way to think about this harmonically is that the "line cliche" is simply one way of prolonging tonic harmony. You're moving from a root position chord to its first inversion. Functionally, the diminished chords are just passing chords. There are other kinds of chords you could use, but I'm too exhausted to suggest any off the top of my head.

As a soloist, I'd prefer these diminshed passing chords not be stated all the time by the rhythm player. I make use of them myself, melodically, and after a while, the line cliche' just loses its tension-building effect. Lately I've been listening to a rhythm player for example who just flat-out overplays, often using these devices, and it's a miracle his horn players haven't brained him yet. Tone deaf! Oblivious to soloists! Endless random doo-wacky-doo variations! Ugh.

A rambunctious, uncontrolled rhythm player is a soloist's nightmare.

But that said, carry on.

This is even more off the mark in terms of what a line cliche is... What you're describing are simply "passing diminished chords".