Well, we've covered the basics of improvisation vocabulary, chords and scales, grammar, the way harmony moves, content, the stories that we tell in our improvisation. Let's turn our attention now to the songs that we play. these are important, we don't choose them lightly we choose them, because we personally like something about the song. And we want to show it to the listener. So, in much the same way, you know might do the same thing if you have a visitor come to your house. To see your new house, and you would, for instance, walk them over and show them the view from the window of the garden. And then take them into the new kitchen and show them this fancy new refrigerator that you've got and so on. Well, we want to do the same thing with the songs that we play. There are elements in the song, that the composer used to create it. for instance we might want to show them in the first section of the song there are guidelines that dominate the, the music. And in the second section they're chromatic genes, chord changes that are going on. we, we want to, that's the thing, those are the kinds of things we want to show to the listener. Just like we would in in showing somebody around out house. We want to, you know, have, help them learn what's going on in this composition even if they don't understand literally what a guideline is we want want them to hear it. And understand that that's an important element in the song. There is another element to songwriting. The composer is not only using compositional, you know, techniques. But there is also what you might say is a mood or a character that every song has. And this is sort of like, compare this to what an actor is, is handed when he takes on a new role in a play. Maybe in today's play, he plays a witty, sophisticated, funny character who's very energetic and full of laughs. And next week's play, he may play a sad, melancholy character who has a lot of problems. So the actor, you know tries to stay in character. During the performance of each play and make sure that the, the mood and feel of that character comes across to the audience. And we do the same thing with the song, every song has some kind of mood to it and some kind of personality. It may be a bright, you know, quick and dancing kind of piece or it may be a very peaceful, beautiful piece, or it may be a dark, sad, minor piece. every song you play will have a character, and you'll want to know consciously, what it is, and say, okay, my, my job is to show this song to the listener. I'm going to show the listener the compositional elements that are in it and, I also need to show them the mood that the piece has. And what it's, what it's feeling is like. And, that's something that, you know, I think about trying to stay in character, just the way an actor tries to stay in character when they're acting a part. I try to stay in character with that song not only when I play the melody, chorus, but also when I improvise on it as well. So let's take a look at a song, this is written by a friend of mine, composer Carla [INAUDIBLE] It's called Ojos de Gato. It means eyes of the cat. And we're going to walk through this song. I'm going to play it on the piano and talk about the different elements of the song. So that by the time we're finished with it we'll have a lot of things at our disposal, things that we can feature. When we play this song to help sell it to the listener, who listens to us play. [BLANK_AUDIO] I'm going to play Carla's song, Ojos de Gato, and the first time I'll just play it all the way through. And we're going to, then, get a sense for what kind of song it is, what mood it has, and so on. So, here goes. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] . Okay, so we can draw some conclusions. it's a short piece, and it's got a very simple melodic theme, [MUSIC] that keeps repeating throughout the song. it's a slow, straight eight, kind of bossa nova time feel. And in terms of mood it's kind of melancholy and sad. It's in minor for the first half of the song, so I think that kind of is a useful description of the song, so as we get ready to play more on it. So, the next thing we want to do is take a look at the chord scales, make sure we, we know which scales we're supposed to be using on these chords. And in fact, we have a bit of a question right here on the first chord. [MUSIC] because normally on an A minor chord symbol, we would be, want to see what is happening with the sixth. Is it the natural sixth? [MUSIC] Or is it a lowered sixth? [MUSIC] And it turns out that both of them are there in the music. So we have to decide which one is more important. So is it the F natural? [MUSIC] Or is it the F sharp? [MUSIC] Well, one piece of evidence is that the F only lasts for one beat, but the F sharp goes for the whole two bars. So, that tells me, anyway, that it's going to be [MUSIC] the F sharp is going to be the note we'll want. And that makes it the Dorian scale on that A minor chord. Next we have an F major. And the question is, is it going to be Lydian with a B natural or Ionian with the B flat. Well, there's a B natural in this scale, before it. So, that's going to carry over into the F major chord and make it Lydian, [MUSIC]. When we get to the B flat chord over A, again its Lydian the raise four is right there in the melody. [INAUDIBLE], [MUSIC]. Right? And now we come to another unusual situation. look at the harmony first. It's a D minor with a natural 7 in it. So, it's one of those scales that doesn't occur too often, it's the melodic minor. [MUSIC]. [MUSIC] It's not as common as the ten common scales that we covered in the second week, but it does come up occasionally. So, that's the chord, but meanwhile she's done something in the melody. [MUSIC] She's managed to work in a major third on a minor chord in that melody. Now, we accept that, it sounds harsh but we've none the less accepted it's not the wrong note because we've gotten used to this pattern in the melody. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] See, because we've gotten used to it, even when it comes in kind of on the harsh side, we say, oh yeah, we're, we've heard this before. We know this is what's supposed to happen here. So, that's the chord scale's, it's going to be the D minor [MUSIC] melodic minor. Now, we switch now to [MUSIC] C7 flat 9 over B flat. What does it sound like to you? It sounds like a diminished chord, very obviously, and if you look at the notes in the scale, in the chord, and the notes in the preceding. you can see that we're going to want symmetrical diminished [MUSIC] because there's a A natural here that's continues, wants to continue on into the next one. So, this is going to be C7 flat 9 over B flat with [MUSIC] with symmetrical diminish scale. [MUSIC] Next, we come over to B over B flat. Well, very quickly we see that the F natural [MUSIC] is the raised 4. So, that makes it Lydian. Same is true of this one. [MUSIC] Again, we have the Lydian. [MUSIC] Raise, raise four in the, right in the melody, and even on the last measure of B-flat major. [MUSIC] Again it's Lydian. So, those are all the chord scales for the song. Now we want to determine how the song breaks down. what are the sections, does it Break down into four bar, or eight bar phrases just what is going on compositionally? So, I'm going to play it all the way through, and you try to determine, how long is the first section, or a second section, and so on. How does it break down? Here we go. [MUSIC] . [MUSIC] [MUSIC] So, what do you think? How long is the first section of the song? for me the answer is eight bars. usually the sections represent a chord progression that runs its course and comes to rest, and then it feels like we're starting something new. Well, that section can be a 2-bar phrase, a 4-bar phrase, an 8-bar phrase, they're almost always even numbers of bars. Occasionally, you'll find a 3 bar phrase or a 5 bar phrase. But most of the time, they're even numbers of bars. 2, 4, or 8. In this case, the 8 bars kind of go together. And let's look at what's, going on there. first of all, there's a pedal. [MUSIC]. [MUSIC] So that's one thing that we notice compositionally. There's an A pedal to that whole eight bars. Also let's look at how the scale, chord scales change from one chord to the next. The first one, [MUSIC], the A minor Dorian. When it goes to the F Lydian, there's only one note changes. [MUSIC] That F sharp becomes F natural, and then when we go to B flat Lydian, again, only one note changes, the B natural goes to B flat. [MUSIC] [SOUND] And then, [SOUND], we get this rich melodic minor to kind of conclude this progression. So, that's what's going on, those are things we can feature during the first 8 bars of the song. In the next section, it's also 8 bars. We have, also, a pedal [SOUND]. [MUSIC] Alright. So so once again, we have a pedal that's just featured. And we have now major sounding chords, instead of minor [MUSIC]. [MUSIC] Sounding, we instead have this rich sound then we have a B major. So, it's a brighter more major sounding section that leads us back to the top. [SOUND] To go back to the minor again. So, that gives us a lot to work with in this song when we get in front of a band and we're going to solo on it. there's lots of compositional things that we can feature and we also of course want to feature the overall mood and style of the piece. We're going to play simple melodies that are lyrical and, leave lots of space between phrases, just the way Carla did with the melody, when she wrote the song.
