What he missed out from this story is that much later he discovered that he had, in fact, misheard Miles that night. What Miles actually said was "Don't play the bottom notes". So Herbie's "revelation" actually came from a misunderstanding!
That's really interesting, I've heard this Herbie anecdote several times (it's become a sort of 'jazz fable') but didn't know this. Really interesting though, I think many jazz players will relate to this because I, personally, seldom if ever really put too much thought into the range I'm playing in at one time.
@@xxczerxx I noticed that recently I've been playing in the lower 3 octaves or the middle 3 octaves of the piano. Lately I've been deliberately shifting my positions up and down the keyboard, hands close together and wide apart. It's become quite freeing, leading me to thinking of new ways to express chords and use the full range of the piano.
I was jamming on bass and felt that same frustration. It was boring me to the extent that I tried busting out only to play dissonantly, and that didn't move the music forward at all, so I stopped playing the root. I created more space that way, for sure, plus I did feel less frustrated and worse, bored and not in the groove.
2:02 I realized if I left out the 3rd and 7th notes in the major seventh chord, that would leave only the 1 and 5, so… the next day, I woke up and wrote Smoke on the water, and the rest is history.
it's theorized but not confirmed by anyone. and we'll probably never know what he said exactly. I believe he actually did say "butter" notes. butter, as a slang word, can mean something predictable; when you know something is going to go exactly the way you want and plan. so avoiding the obvious and not planning ahead could be stated as "avoid the butter". edit: ok, apparently Herbie confirmed that Miles did say "bottom notes". ah well.
What would Miles Davis have meant by "not playing the bottom notes?" Not playing the roots? In fact rootless voicings had been developed a few years earlier by Davis and Bill Evans.
@@hambourghini5023 It makes far more sense as a pianist because you will hear a lot "dont play the bottom or bass notes'.. when you are a young chap playing you have a tendency in quartets or when you add a bass player to still want to play bass as a piano player.
This story has been told a million times, but this version hits different. He's so against vibing other jazz musicians, it's extremely wholesome. Jam with your friends, share, grow with them. Make music. That's jazz, man. 😎
@@Checkmate1138 to "vibe" someone means that you insult other musicians because of their mistakes instead of giving them advice. I think that's what op meant
Agreed and well put DrewBias. The practical musical idea was just the start. Herbie developed a much bigger idea, as you pointed out: be open, learn from your mentors, share with your peers and students, so we all grow together.
Perhaps. But the "rut" is always relative to the individual musician. That's the point; we all hit a wall once in a while, but we can surely overcome it when we look at the problem from a different perspective.
Herbie is a great speaker and the delivery of this talk is really quite superb. This is a great example of how people - who have truly made it to the top - have no need to prove themselves but rather will channel their energies into empowering others. His demonstrating how his interpretation of the moment opened up a new harmonic world can inspire the rest of us (who can fully identify with finding ourselves from time to time in a musical rut). Herbie’s touch, itself, coaxes uniquely beauty musical tones out of the keyboard - what a wonderful gift to us.
@sueromanick8631 If memory serves me this is an excerpt from his intro to a lecture he gave at Harvard University. The entire lecture is awesome and informative th-cam.com/users/results?search_query=Herbie+Hancock+Harvard+lecture+series
I thought he went back to Miles later, who said, "I was trying to tell you not to play the BOTTOM notes!" The fact that Herbie found his way to a new sound because of a game of Telephone is an omission that adds a bit of humor to this story.
Instructive I nsight, too. That any miscommunication happened between Herbie and Miles on this is ultimately proven wrong! Whatever Herbie was supposed to have heard from Miles that night, he actually heard!
This lecture opened all the floodgates for me. It doesn’t matter if he mishearded “butter” instead of “bottom”: it really works! You sound absolutely different from this moment on.
Herbie Hancock is a musical genius, as are the great players he has played with over the years. BIG respect and grattitude for his music over the years. Its great to get lessons from the great man himself!
Such a gentleman and I appreciate such kind words!! I always wanted to study jazz but had to go to work. Now I have time to study and I love the philosophy that all have a place and can help each other. The tones are a gift from God that we can all enjoy.
Thats the spirit of music. You can't hide what you found unless you want no one to hear it. No matter if you found a new scale a new melody, if it touches you deeply others will feel it too. Feel the same way about getn out of a rut, you gotta try something drastically new to force you into a new way of thinking about the thing. Applies everywhere but with music and art I always feel the most liberation and progression
When covid hit I decided to buy a piano so I could learn to play & read music, got myself a tutor when I realised it wasn’t as easy as I thought 😆 I shall save this video so when I learn to read & play I shall return to relisten when I can understand it. I feel his words but have no idea of what he is talking about lol Big shout out to all those beginners ❤️ 💜
Learn your basic scales (major, natural minor, melodic minor, harmonic minor) and mentally number each note as you practice starting from the root, 1-7, and start over at 1 as you reach each octave. There’s a lot more that goes into it, but those are the numbers Herbie’s referring to. A basic understanding of assigning each note in a scale a number is square one in understanding music theory, and makes communicating with other musicians easier in the long run.
I've been playing piano non-professionally for almost 30 years and every year I seriously approach it I learn something new. There's always more to learn but that's part of the joy.
What’s important I think is that you enjoy it. You can try deconstructing some of your favorite music. There are many tutorials showing exactly what notes to play. It’s important to start playing enjoyable stuff right away as opposed to practicing scales and things like that for too long.
'Only a great master can provide a path to finding your own true answers'. Mr Hancock has put into words what I feel about my singing mentor, this is spot on.
That goes for all improv. We are all taught the "butter notes" but the key is having the musical guts to challenge yourself & push for something new & strange. You take off your training wheels. Miles entire career was about this. He was the opposite of say a Lous Armstrong who had an infinite vocabulary of butter notes. Miles didn't depend on the scales & theory. He actually played around them. His melody lines are notoriously exotic & surreal. The other master of this is Thelonius Monk. He applied the theory to time as well as the notes & chords. His tunes have an almost absurdness to them. Twisted in a good comfortable way. Herbie is The Master because like he said he didn't throw away his normal style of playing he continued to use it. But he integrated Miles advice into his thinking. His work is a perfect balance of butter & non butter notes.
Timely message for me. I'm currently in a creative doldrum. I feel Herbie is really talking about being creatively vulnerable which is extremely difficult for most musicians because we can be afraid of 'mistakes'. Like he said, we need the courage to experiment and explore.
more like the begin of another great chapter of herbie hancocks success. this one sentence from miles to a friend has reached 100s of thousands people. and we are grateful and shall continue to pass our foundings and help
Wow. He's been there. The big Hancock has felt, what we all feel and felt. And he made it out of there the way it should be. With an idea. A new view on things for new root of ideas, creativity and feel. And he felt, what we can all feel again if we lost it: freedom in music.
Herbie is one of the most gifted and innovative creative forces in the history of recorded music. I'm in awe that he could remain so humble as to find inspiration in such a relatively simple concept. Looking back, he influenced me to do a lot of the same in expanding voicings. But I never would have been able to break it all down to that straightforward of a statement.
I love this guy, what a great lesson. I've been in these ruts too, but the other way around by using too much quartal and quintal harmonies, avoiding minor and major 3rds and 7ths. But they have their place in my music now and I'm glad I decided to use them again. That's great when he said "If it came from Miles it must mean something."
Herbie used to show up right as we were closing Ian’s back stage in BH all the time. He’d play, he’d tell me crazy stories. Good times!!! Rock on Herbie 🙏✌️👍
Beautiful! I feel another shift inside of me, taking root and I'm excited. I particulary appreciate the comments around, "the ethics of jazz". Let us hope that these ethics spread throughout the world of music and musicians. :-)
So this comment was the genesis for his switch into his free spirit improvisation style. I was always amazed by drastic evolution in his playing from the earlier days with Miles Davis to what it eventually became
Fantastic testimony I was researching Herbie Hancock since I started to learn piano after playing bass this is priceless ... I need again to go learn why MIles Davis ( who I had the privilege to see him live 3 times ) is so so great !!! One of the most relevant video I came across o ( I subscribed ✍🏾! )
As a drummer I completely understand. Sometimes it's about the restraint of not playing something rather than playing something. Kind of like a conversation, sometimes it's what you don't say that makes the biggest statement in the conversation.
Reading from the comments that his whole revelation came from a misunderstanding, and I'm really liking that because that's such a jazz thing! Jazz is all about "wait, maybe the "wrong" note is actually a more interesting idea than the "right" one" and this fits so perfectly in that.
It's hard to explain creativity. Sometimes I feel stuck like that, always doing the same thing, over and over, and it's not a knowledge problem. And sometimes, some good ideas come out of nowhere. On the other hand, I think you can't play well if you don't have great ideas. Everything begins on your own imagination. If you don't feel good with yourself and with the world, you can't have good ideas. One must be completely free from any laws and let the ideas flow. You never think what's the first note of your solo, you simply begin it. I notice that I play better when I listen deeply to my self, my true nature, when me and the universe become one. When I reach this perfect and delicate state, I don't even need to think about anything. Everything flows naturally. 🙏❤️
Play whatever notes the situation calls for. Sometimes you need to play the bottom notes or the thirds and sevenths for reinforcement, other times they are not necessary. Esp in a band setting you should avoid bottom notes or you will encroach on your bass players territory and risk messing up the rhythm bed. I also think it's important not to lose sight of the thirds and sevenths as they provide anchor points for the listeners, and if you omit them too much, the song will lose its tonal center and structure and be difficult for people to follow and enjoy. This raises the question a great pianist once asked me: "who do you play for?" food for thought
The music of Faso is an inexhaustible source of sweetness. It allows us to plunge deep inside ourselves and at the same time resonate with our fellow man, Yé Lassina Coulibaly❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
Creative Harmony would be a better title to this. He is talking about ambiguity in harmony, since leaving out the defining notes of chords implies rather defines tonality and provides opportunity creative improvisation. This sound world has been around since Debussy and Scriabin.
There's so much tension in the thirds and sevenths but they establish the chord so well, while he's playing the other intervals it sounds so clean and pure but i don't really know where i am?
but what this really teaches you is that by giving yourself a limitation when improvising, you have to find a different way to play what you originally were going to, evoking new vocabulary or a new type of sound, and I do this all the time when I am feeling stuck. I don't blame myself, because it's easy staying on the safe side of things, but this is JAZZ and it's always about experimentation. The best jazz musicians I know still learn things to this day!
Basically, other notable music educators like Dan Haerle have also stated this concept, but it's an "outside playing" analogy for chord structures instead of what we're normally used to with improv lines. That is, quartal structures or others that omit the 3rd and 7th provide a more abstract vagueness of the "mode" or "tonality" so to speak at that specific point in the tune in question (which of course contains several modes within, with one or more overarching tonalities, overall key centers). But, it just means thinking in terms of modes instead of traditional jazz/bebop which puts heavy emphasis on the chords and the 3rds and 7ths which boldly define them to the ear---painting analogy, think of a caricature displayed in bold lines vs. a pencil sketch with light marks that doesn't clearly define the image, or the whole image. Rootless voicings of Bill Evans are another example of this style. Modes were the Cool West Coast Era of Mr. Davis, but also Bill Evans, McCoy Tyner, Chick Corea, etc. "Butter" notes might refer to the easy obvious note picks, since butter cuts easily.
Oh My I found this in the right time.. I always try to keep the rules in check with my Chord melodies on my guitar..This is a authorization to freedom.. :-)
What he missed out from this story is that much later he discovered that he had, in fact, misheard Miles that night. What Miles actually said was "Don't play the bottom notes". So Herbie's "revelation" actually came from a misunderstanding!
THIS IS JUST GREAT
It’s still valuable because it led to a shift in his thinking which was what he needed. Very cool.
That's really interesting, I've heard this Herbie anecdote several times (it's become a sort of 'jazz fable') but didn't know this.
Really interesting though, I think many jazz players will relate to this because I, personally, seldom if ever really put too much thought into the range I'm playing in at one time.
@@xxczerxx I noticed that recently I've been playing in the lower 3 octaves or the middle 3 octaves of the piano. Lately I've been deliberately shifting my positions up and down the keyboard, hands close together and wide apart. It's become quite freeing, leading me to thinking of new ways to express chords and use the full range of the piano.
I was jamming on bass and felt that same frustration. It was boring me to the extent that I tried busting out only to play dissonantly, and that didn't move the music forward at all, so I stopped playing the root. I created more space that way, for sure, plus I did feel less frustrated and worse, bored and not in the groove.
2:02 I realized if I left out the 3rd and 7th notes in the major seventh chord, that would leave only the 1 and 5, so… the next day, I woke up and wrote Smoke on the water, and the rest is history.
"Smoke on the Water" uses 4ths, or inverted 5ths in the guitar riff.
✌🎶
@@themesenbergmethod6816 i find usually not in its notorious novice arrangement
Miles actually said “dont play the bottom notes” and Herbie misheard it as butter notes but it did launch him into a new improvisational style.
it's theorized but not confirmed by anyone. and we'll probably never know what he said exactly. I believe he actually did say "butter" notes. butter, as a slang word, can mean something predictable; when you know something is going to go exactly the way you want and plan. so avoiding the obvious and not planning ahead could be stated as "avoid the butter".
edit: ok, apparently Herbie confirmed that Miles did say "bottom notes". ah well.
What would Miles Davis have meant by "not playing the bottom notes?" Not playing the roots? In fact rootless voicings had been developed a few years earlier by Davis and Bill Evans.
Ash Thakur I think he meant the bass notes, can’t confirm though
@@hambourghini5023 It makes far more sense as a pianist because you will hear a lot "dont play the bottom or bass notes'.. when you are a young chap playing you have a tendency in quartets or when you add a bass player to still want to play bass as a piano player.
Devin Michael Roberts Yeah that’s what I was thinking too
“only a great master can provide a path to finding your own true answers” what a quote, herbie is a generational talent
This story has been told a million times, but this version hits different. He's so against vibing other jazz musicians, it's extremely wholesome. Jam with your friends, share, grow with them. Make music. That's jazz, man. 😎
Against vibing? What does that mean? Don't you mean FOR vibing?
@@Checkmate1138 to "vibe" someone means that you insult other musicians because of their mistakes instead of giving them advice. I think that's what op meant
Agreed and well put DrewBias. The practical musical idea was just the start. Herbie developed a much bigger idea, as you pointed out: be open, learn from your mentors, share with your peers and students, so we all grow together.
@@demonhunter5478 since when did vibe have negative connotations?
@@kiongoziv not in general ,but in jazz it kind of does but it can also have multiple meanings so it's kind of a mess
Mr Hancock’s ‘rut’ is the pinnacle to which many of us reach...true genius
Perhaps. But the "rut" is always relative to the individual musician. That's the point; we all hit a wall once in a while, but we can surely overcome it when we look at the problem from a different perspective.
@@Checkmate1138 Very true!
Seriously. I wish I could be in a “Hancock rut.”
this couldn’t have found me at a better time
Feel the same way, herbie is a great teacher
*a butter time
me too , right on time
i didn't want to put a like on your comment but i couldn't help myself
Yes! Alohas
The Yoda of Jazz
Wow I really love that quote "reach up while also reach down".
Herbie is a great speaker and the delivery of this talk is really quite superb. This is a great example of how people - who have truly made it to the top - have no need to prove themselves but rather will channel their energies into empowering others. His demonstrating how his interpretation of the moment opened up a new harmonic world can inspire the rest of us (who can fully identify with finding ourselves from time to time in a musical rut). Herbie’s touch, itself, coaxes uniquely beauty musical tones out of the keyboard - what a wonderful gift to us.
@sueromanick8631 If memory serves me this is an excerpt from his intro to a lecture he gave at Harvard University. The entire lecture is awesome and informative
th-cam.com/users/results?search_query=Herbie+Hancock+Harvard+lecture+series
I thought he went back to Miles later, who said, "I was trying to tell you not to play the BOTTOM notes!" The fact that Herbie found his way to a new sound because of a game of Telephone is an omission that adds a bit of humor to this story.
Yes, we saw Herbie's lecture at the Monterey Jazz Festival a couple years ago, and he told the rest of the story exactly as you remember it.
th-cam.com/video/eRkgK4jfi6M/w-d-xo.html
Aloha
You are right.
Instructive I nsight, too.
That any miscommunication happened between Herbie and Miles on this is ultimately proven wrong!
Whatever Herbie was supposed to have heard from Miles that night, he actually heard!
Herbie dropping that wisdom as usual. The master.
Yea how many times can he tell it. You can tell he never chatted with Miles like mates.
This lecture opened all the floodgates for me. It doesn’t matter if he mishearded “butter” instead of “bottom”: it really works! You sound absolutely different from this moment on.
I hate TH-cam because I’m watching videos that are way out of my playing ability but once I find myself in this blockade I won’t forget this video.
"Only a great master can provide a path to finding your own true answers."
Herbie Hancock is a musical genius, as are the great players he has played with over the years. BIG respect and grattitude for his music over the years. Its great to get lessons from the great man himself!
Such a gentleman and I appreciate such kind words!! I always wanted to study jazz but had to go to work. Now I have time to study and I love the philosophy that all have a place and can help each other. The tones are a gift from God that we can all enjoy.
Miles Davis to Herbie Hancock:
"Don't play butter notes."
"What?"
"Do Hindemith."
HAHAHA!
The machinations of his mind are an enigma.
Thats the spirit of music. You can't hide what you found unless you want no one to hear it. No matter if you found a new scale a new melody, if it touches you deeply others will feel it too. Feel the same way about getn out of a rut, you gotta try something drastically new to force you into a new way of thinking about the thing. Applies everywhere but with music and art I always feel the most liberation and progression
When covid hit I decided to buy a piano so I could learn to play & read music, got myself a tutor when I realised it wasn’t as easy as I thought 😆 I shall save this video so when I learn to read & play I shall return to relisten when I can understand it. I feel his words but have no idea of what he is talking about lol Big shout out to all those beginners ❤️ 💜
Check out piano with jonny. Might be a little advanced, but if you like jazz, he's really good at showing simple concepts.
Learn your basic scales (major, natural minor, melodic minor, harmonic minor) and mentally number each note as you practice starting from the root, 1-7, and start over at 1 as you reach each octave. There’s a lot more that goes into it, but those are the numbers Herbie’s referring to. A basic understanding of assigning each note in a scale a number is square one in understanding music theory, and makes communicating with other musicians easier in the long run.
I've been playing piano non-professionally for almost 30 years and every year I seriously approach it I learn something new. There's always more to learn but that's part of the joy.
I teach piano. Everyone learns differently. I teach kids based on the white keys and start with improvising then take it from there.
What’s important I think is that you enjoy it. You can try deconstructing some of your favorite music. There are many tutorials showing exactly what notes to play. It’s important to start playing enjoyable stuff right away as opposed to practicing scales and things like that for too long.
'Only a great master can provide a path to finding your own true answers'. Mr Hancock has put into words what I feel about my singing mentor, this is spot on.
Such a profound, layered lesson. Thank you Mr. Hancock!
That goes for all improv. We are all taught the "butter notes" but the key is having the musical guts to challenge yourself & push for something new & strange. You take off your training wheels. Miles entire career was about this. He was the opposite of say a Lous Armstrong who had an infinite vocabulary of butter notes. Miles didn't depend on the scales & theory. He actually played around them. His melody lines are notoriously exotic & surreal. The other master of this is Thelonius Monk. He applied the theory to time as well as the notes & chords. His tunes have an almost absurdness to them. Twisted in a good comfortable way. Herbie is The Master because like he said he didn't throw away his normal style of playing he continued to use it. But he integrated Miles advice into his thinking. His work is a perfect balance of butter & non butter notes.
One of my heroes! Thank you Herbbie for taking our music to the next level UP.....while reaching down.
This Man. I wish he could live forever and ever! 👊🏿🖤
He’s trying!
Timely message for me. I'm currently in a creative doldrum. I feel Herbie is really talking about being creatively vulnerable which is extremely difficult for most musicians because we can be afraid of 'mistakes'. Like he said, we need the courage to experiment and explore.
Herbie Hancocks's biography:
Herbie: my playing sucks... :C
Miles: don't play the bottom notes.
Herbie: what, BUTTER?!?! HOLY SHIT!
The end
more like the begin of another great chapter of herbie hancocks success. this one sentence from miles to a friend has reached 100s of thousands people. and we are grateful and shall continue to pass our foundings and help
Wow. He's been there. The big Hancock has felt, what we all feel and felt. And he made it out of there the way it should be. With an idea. A new view on things for new root of ideas, creativity and feel. And he felt, what we can all feel again if we lost it: freedom in music.
Thank you for your dedicated honesty. Marvelous!
That was Beautiful, I never thought of it that way, 👊🏾
Herbie is one of the most gifted and innovative creative forces in the history of recorded music. I'm in awe that he could remain so humble as to find inspiration in such a relatively simple concept. Looking back, he influenced me to do a lot of the same in expanding voicings. But I never would have been able to break it all down to that straightforward of a statement.
Wonderful message for life! Thanks grandmaster Hancock
I love this guy, what a great lesson. I've been in these ruts too, but the other way around by using too much quartal and quintal harmonies, avoiding minor and major 3rds and 7ths. But they have their place in my music now and I'm glad I decided to use them again. That's great when he said "If it came from Miles it must mean something."
excellent! I am allways overwhelmed by the openheartedness and kindness of this humble genius!
Herbie used to show up right as we were closing Ian’s back stage in BH all the time.
He’d play, he’d tell me crazy stories.
Good times!!!
Rock on Herbie 🙏✌️👍
Love how he describes 7ths. Can tell you where you’re going, or it might be where you end up.
Beautiful! I feel another shift inside of me, taking root and I'm excited. I particulary appreciate the comments around, "the ethics of jazz". Let us hope that these ethics spread throughout the world of music and musicians. :-)
So this comment was the genesis for his switch into his free spirit improvisation style. I was always amazed by drastic evolution in his playing from the earlier days with Miles Davis to what it eventually became
A maestro breaks down what we cannot even think. What a wonderful find. Bravo.
Fantastic testimony I was researching Herbie Hancock since I started to learn piano after playing bass this is priceless ... I need again to go learn why MIles Davis ( who I had the privilege to see him live 3 times ) is so so great !!! One of the most relevant video I came across o ( I subscribed ✍🏾! )
I was on stage that night with Miles, Ron and Wayne... enough said man...
Herbie. Also a legend...
...and Tony Williams. In his heyday. What a group!
A brilliant and humble man. His best quote is when moving forward, bring others with you...share your knowledge.
As a drummer I completely understand. Sometimes it's about the restraint of not playing something rather than playing something. Kind of like a conversation, sometimes it's what you don't say that makes the biggest statement in the conversation.
This is great. a classic example of ''its just as important what you don't play as what you do. Thanks .Great video
take a shot everytime someone comments "MiLeS aCtUalLY SaID DoNT PlaY Teh BOTtoM NoTess"
🥴
I've seen Art Tatum solo transcriptions that contain so many 'butter notes' that Herbie would have a fit. An absolute fit.
Great talk! I learned something...thankyou!
Herbie Hancock is a beautiful human being.
Oh my gosh I needed to hear this so bad.
Thank you for posting.
You sir are beautiful Mr. Hancock! Thank you for your music and respect for our ears and our souls! God bless and be well! I have spoken!
Such an inspiring story...Always think outside the box,that's how the best sounds come about
Fantastic!
Reading from the comments that his whole revelation came from a misunderstanding, and I'm really liking that because that's such a jazz thing! Jazz is all about "wait, maybe the "wrong" note is actually a more interesting idea than the "right" one" and this fits so perfectly in that.
It's hard to explain creativity. Sometimes I feel stuck like that, always doing the same thing, over and over, and it's not a knowledge problem. And sometimes, some good ideas come out of nowhere. On the other hand, I think you can't play well if you don't have great ideas. Everything begins on your own imagination. If you don't feel good with yourself and with the world, you can't have good ideas. One must be completely free from any laws and let the ideas flow. You never think what's the first note of your solo, you simply begin it. I notice that I play better when I listen deeply to my self, my true nature, when me and the universe become one. When I reach this perfect and delicate state, I don't even need to think about anything. Everything flows naturally. 🙏❤️
What a great lesson - thanks!
Only a genius can (mis)hear such a vague instruction and search deeper to find new styles of playing. Incredible!
An incredible musician and an outstanding orator
LOVED seeing both Miles (YEARS ago) and Herbie play!
Just don't know how BADLY I need this.
3 years of a playing RUTT!
Great Video! Herbie is one of the best
This is real wisdom of life, beautiful!
❤
Gotta love Herbie. What a guy.
❤
"the ethics of jazz" love it!
love it!!
Play whatever notes the situation calls for. Sometimes you need to play the bottom notes or the thirds and sevenths for reinforcement, other times they are not necessary. Esp in a band setting you should avoid bottom notes or you will encroach on your bass players territory and risk messing up the rhythm bed. I also think it's important not to lose sight of the thirds and sevenths as they provide anchor points for the listeners, and if you omit them too much, the song will lose its tonal center and structure and be difficult for people to follow and enjoy. This raises the question a great pianist once asked me: "who do you play for?" food for thought
I don’t know how Herbie could have misunderstood Miles’s advice, since everyone knows that Miles had a perfect speaking voice. 😉
Rimshot.
Absolutely enlightening!
so helpful-a bit above my level, but still, so helpful. ty
THANK YOU!!!
Fantástico. Always. Thnx, Master
7 minutos pero un msj que dura para la eternidad , que maestro davis y que maestro herbie
Wow! How wonderful......
The music of Faso is an inexhaustible source of sweetness.
It allows us to plunge deep inside ourselves and at the same time resonate with our fellow man, Yé Lassina Coulibaly❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
This was top notch. I loved it
This is gold.
Creative Harmony would be a better title to this. He is talking about ambiguity in harmony, since leaving out the defining notes of chords implies rather defines tonality and provides opportunity creative improvisation. This sound world has been around since Debussy and Scriabin.
Yeah but he experienced and thus explains this in an organic manner. To reduce the concept back to pure musical theory is missing his point.
wonderful information for me currently
That's great
Wonderful!
There's so much tension in the thirds and sevenths but they establish the chord so well, while he's playing the other intervals it sounds so clean and pure but i don't really know where i am?
Thank you.
You can be in awe of the genius of Miles Davis, but here, the genius of Herbie Hancock expresses a love that he has attained.
Herbie is a quality human being/musician.
but what this really teaches you is that by giving yourself a limitation when improvising, you have to find a different way to play what you originally were going to, evoking new vocabulary or a new type of sound, and I do this all the time when I am feeling stuck. I don't blame myself, because it's easy staying on the safe side of things, but this is JAZZ and it's always about experimentation. The best jazz musicians I know still learn things to this day!
I needed to hear this mark my words you will hear from me Derryl Allen - Covd impressions
Thanks !
this has all been recommended to us
Love the ethics of jazz
Basically, other notable music educators like Dan Haerle have also stated this concept, but it's an "outside playing" analogy for chord structures instead of what we're normally used to with improv lines. That is, quartal structures or others that omit the 3rd and 7th provide a more abstract vagueness of the "mode" or "tonality" so to speak at that specific point in the tune in question (which of course contains several modes within, with one or more overarching tonalities, overall key centers). But, it just means thinking in terms of modes instead of traditional jazz/bebop which puts heavy emphasis on the chords and the 3rds and 7ths which boldly define them to the ear---painting analogy, think of a caricature displayed in bold lines vs. a pencil sketch with light marks that doesn't clearly define the image, or the whole image. Rootless voicings of Bill Evans are another example of this style. Modes were the Cool West Coast Era of Mr. Davis, but also Bill Evans, McCoy Tyner, Chick Corea, etc. "Butter" notes might refer to the easy obvious note picks, since butter cuts easily.
Amazing how a simple reinterpretation can birth an entirely new suite of possibilities
Oh My I found this in the right time.. I always try to keep the rules in check with my Chord melodies on my guitar..This is a authorization to freedom.. :-)
Totally inspirational ! Wisdom
fantastic!
I can’t tell if the 3 or the 7 or the whatever is missing! He’s just a freaking genius!! 🎹🎹🎹🎹🎹
Really inspiration the butter note
Fabulous!
magic scale!
This is so underappreciated
I love you
Undisputed LEGEND
Herbie is a true musician in every aspect. Funny, Listening to him, his voice sounds exactly like the actor Bernie Casey.