Playing Changes: Modes or Chord Tones

[Giant Steps]

I'm just wondering what people's approach to soloing over changes is? It seems like more people these days are taking a modal approach than a chordal approach.

In my opinion one should learn how to play changes using harmony first and than apply modes to the structure that's already learned. I learned the modal approach first and am now learning the chord tone approach and in my experience it would have been MUCH more helpful to solo with chord tones first. Guitar players are extremely obsessed with modes so that's what I was exposed to.

Good Cheese,
-GS-

[Coypu]

I hardly know anything about theory and I was wondering what basics I should learn before I attempt to learn to improvise solos. (I'm a bassplayer).

[Nicholas]

I have only relatively recently started learning jazz, & I was finding it difficult to work out how to follow the chord changes. I would often find myself trying to inprovise in the key of the piece. I tried & am still trying to use modes & the chord tones. Using licks & transcriptions of solos has also proved very enlightening & probably most improtant method. The only drawback of these nevertheless very necessary approaches is that they take many hours to progress very far.

I receltly got this book called 'Basic Mediantic' by Werner Pöhlert. It presents a framework for improvising over chord changes by using minor pentatonic scales only. The scale used is not necessarily based on the root note of the chord but may be based on the other chord tones. Since the pentatonic scales are so easy and are often the first thing people learn, this system provides an almost instantaneous way to play over any chord changes.

I have searched the net for mention of Pöhlert or his 'Basic Harmony' system and have found little & some misconceptions. This system would not be best used as the only method & it does eventually need to be analyzed & compared to contentional theory & licks. What it does doe it provide an excellent framework within which the soloist can move and expand while still knowing where some of the best notes over the chords are.

Ultimately the best learing tool of all is playing and anything that can get you soloing with the changes more quickly can allow your ear and rhythm to develop. As far as this goes singing and whistling along to jazz albumns of many different stlyes really helps to.

I hope this is useful, has anyone else used Pöhlert?

P.S. A word of warning, Pöhlert's books are questionably translated from German. On top of this Werner himself although possibly some kind of freaky genius is also clearly insane and reding the book is a trip. However the actual system is quite simple & ingenious.

[tichmak]

The best way in my experience is to learn the changes man,bebop scales that fit over coz essentially bebop is lines made up from chord tones and their alterations.if you just learn modes,you become just a mechanical player with no soul.listen a lot and learn the language,everything else will come with time.

[jazzypaul]

In my mind, for the expert player anyway, is to be able to do both. Play the changes, know the changes, and then use the modes to float over the changes.

Just my thought.

[clifton]

Before I became disabled, I played tenor sax professionally. I learned chord changes first and highly recommend that others do the same. I don't believe you can use modal or scalar substitutions and have them sound good until you're comfortable making the changes.

[Phil Kelly]

my advice would be to learn to negotiate the changes first, in that they constitute the "lingua franca" of traditional jazz and bebop. When you have fluency in this skill ( as well as learning all the various scales that work over given changes so you're not just running mindless arpeggios over the chords),the step into modal playing will bevome easier ..

basically, modal playing is a matter of utilizing scalar materials over a longer harmonic rhythm ( this means the RATE at which the chordal basis is changing..in earlier jazz forms , it usually is one or two chords per bar regardless of tempo ) In modallly based music an impled MODE ( or scale) may continue for 8/16 measures before changing ..( i.e. So What) In a way , it seems like much less confining that jumping thru the hoop of traditional changes, but the onus is upon you to create intersting SCALAR lines ..which is an art unto itself!

my .02 worth ..:)

[BeboppinFool]

I'm new here. But I like the question. I'm thinking that Charlie Parker gave the best "advice" here . . . learn as much as you can about music and then when you go to play, forget it all and just blow. That sounds hazy, I know, but it really is true.

Have you spent a lot of time at the piano messing with chords and voicings and trying out scales and various notes over the chords? That is all I knew when I got started . . . I have a long way to go, no doubt, but that sure was a good starting point for me. In fact, Dizzy Gillespie was a big proponent of sitting down at the piano to figure stuff out. Could be that's a good answer for you.

Rich Willey

[LectricGuitarDude]

With a new tune, I try to learn the chord tones first. I learn the changes, and a soloing tool at the same time.

When playing chord tones, chromatically approach them from above or below. It fills it up, and still defines the chord.

Use arpeggio substitutions. Those are always interesting.

Scales are important as well, although with me there is a tendency to overplay. Arps solve that problem.

[Monty Stark]

Originally posted by BeboppinFool
I'm new here. But I like the question. I'm thinking that Charlie Parker gave the best "advice" here . . . learn as much as you can about music and then when you go to play, forget it all and just blow. That sounds hazy, I know, but it really is true.

Have you spent a lot of time at the piano messing with chords and voicings and trying out scales and various notes over the chords? That is all I knew when I got started . . . I have a long way to go, no doubt, but that sure was a good starting point for me. In fact, Dizzy Gillespie was a big proponent of sitting down at the piano to figure stuff out. Could be that's a good answer for you.

Rich Willey
you (& bird & diz) are absolutely right, of course

after all, the object is to play what you feel - what you hear - with conviction... expressing what you know

[yawuh]

I read an interview with guitarist John Etheridge somewhere where he recommended focusing on the chord tones, with all the other notes (chromatic enclosures, etc.) just being connective tissue. As a guitarist who has had some ups and downs in trying to learn jazz soloing, this was maybe the most helpful advice I've ever read. The scalar approach of course has its place, and a soloist in full bloom is never resigned to any one tactic, but I do tend to err on the side of chord tones nowadays and it's helped a lot. Guitarists in particular find it easy to scoot around with scales, but how interesting is that to the listener? Or to the player, for that matter.

[Jakeweiser]

I didn't learn starting off using scales or chords but threw motific development and rhythmic paterns to form a solo with unity. I have since tried to go back to that after learning Chords and Modes.

I think a lot depends on the tune, style and tempo. Faster tunes I think and of course Bop is all about the Chord tones and "making the changes" however finding different ways to run through them can be challenging. The problem a lot of times with scalar sounds are that you miss the money notes when the harmony passes by.

all i have to say is practice your Rhythm Changes lol

[Kryssi]

I love Rhythm Changes...
I- vi - ii - V....
So catchy!

I usually approach things modally. I depends on the tune really. I wouldn't approach some tunes modally because it would just be inefficient. But... most things modally.

[yawuh]

Here's that excerpt of the John Etheridge (guitar) interview I've got...I found this passage illuminating.

-------------------------------------------------------------

"A lot of the emphasis on scale study is slightly misplaced, especially when it comes to playing over changes. Something I always mention is that jazz improvising employed no scales until the middle 60s. That's when rock and jazz improvising started merging and it became scalar. It was John Coltrane and Miles Davis who, in the late 50s, started using scales as opposed to chord tones. I bought Miles' Kind of Blue album in 1972 and read the liner notes where it talks about scales and I thought: But you play music with scales - that's what you do isn't it?. I hadn't clocked it at that stage, but basically, before that everybody was playing chord tones and passing notes. If you listen to Joe Pass or Wes Montgomery and guys like that, they're playing chord tones and everything else is a passing tone embellishment, really. And that applies to everyone up to George Benson who is the last player in that tradition - not including the players who have now retrospectively revived it. If you go and listen to a jazz guitarist now, he might be playing in that way, but in the historical sense that line finished with George Benson.
"A lot of people going to guitar schools over the last 15 years have learned scales and they find it difficult to apply that kind of thinking to playing be-bop or straight jazz. It doesn't sound right; I mean, it can sound great, but it doesn't sound the same. The point is, if you're playing over a lot of changes and you think of chord tones, it's easier to get around things because you've got the visual shape of the chord on the fingerboard - that's how people like Joe Pass played. Django Reinhardt never played a scale! I used to think that Charlie Parker was playing scales. In fact, Parker's a classic: acres of passing tones all the time and it's all thought of as chord tones with passing notes; the minute you clue in to that there's no problem."


But you'd agree that a modal approach to playing has its place?


"Of course, but everyone seems to have learned modes in a most confusing way. Today at the workshop we were talking about D7 and the appropriate scale for that chord and someone said, "Oh, that's the G scale starting on D!" but that, to me, is a complete mistake. If you think like that you'll immediately get confused because if you're thinking in terms of another parent scale every time you've got a scale it can get very confusing.
"There's nothing wrong with saying that D7 is the same as G, but when you're improvising and you're trying to think quickly and clearly, you don't want a lot of clutter in your head. I used to have problem with the minor7~5 chord; I came to theory pretty late, I'd already done a lot of playing before I learned any theory. But I could never think what to play over a minor7-5. So people used to say, "Oh just play the major scale a semitone up" But when I got to it, I'd just stop! I'd be thinking: Oh, that's the major scale a semitone up - but by then it had gone by. The main problem with that method is that your ear is hearing a Bm7i5 and your mind is saying C. It causes so much anxiety in your mind because you're hearing a B and that's why it's so important to play all the scales from the root. In other words, you play a B Locrian, if that's the one you're going to use, starting on B. You might as well forget that it's the same as C because it doesn't sound anything like C!
"All this transposition thing is a total waste of time; you've just got to learn the scales as they are and then you can really use them.”

[Seba]

I learned it all by the through the scalar (modal) approach, ie Mark Levine's "the jazz piano book", in fact I think it's got al lot of advantages, most of them already mentioned in this thread. The key is to think "key" IMHO. First you analize the sort of chord: is it a dominant chord=> it can only be the fifth mode of a major key
is it a minor seventh=>80% of the times it will be the second mode of a major key. Altered (both 13th and 9th)=> just play the melodic minor scale of the note a half note above the root of the altered chord. only an alteration on the 13th (#5)=> play the whole-tone scale beginning on the root
Only an alteration on the 9th=> play the half-whole-note scale begiining on the rooth
Diminshed=> play the whole-half-note scale beginning on the root

....

[Monty Stark]

music exists in time --- so get a picture in your mind of how the scale is changing through the changes --- (i guess that’s why they call them “changes”)

watch the scale - sometimes it doesn’t even change, like of course, BbMajor9 is the same thing as Gm9

90% of what you play is just 2 scales --- major and diminished (chromatic doesn’t count)

melody is intervals, anyway... concentrate, play what you hear

[subcitizen]

I think that it's a tactical error to just try to associate certain scales with chords.....when i'm soloing over changes the primary things i'm thinking about are the chord tones, primarily the 3rd and 7th, and how i can connect them so the changes make sense in the most melodic way. When you're soloing you have to get into the idea that you're actually playing the chord....not playing a scale over a chord. It's a lot easier to think "Dm7" than "Dm7 = D Aeolian or Dorian". Of course i still use those scales for color, but the chord tones are the main things to focus on. A great example is John Coltrane's solo on So What, which i'm transcribing right now. The first probably 5 motifs he plays are based on the 1, 2, m3, 4, 5, and 7th of the Dm chord. (D, E, F, G, A, C) and the Dm arpegio descending and ascending...just as simple as that. And it sounds dead on. So i think you should add scales for color but if you want to sound dead on, make sure you play the chord tones.

-andrew

[Seba]

Originally posted by subcitizen
I think that it's a tactical error to just try to associate certain scales with chords.....when i'm soloing over changes the primary things i'm thinking about are the chord tones, primarily the 3rd and 7th, and how i can connect them so the changes make sense in the most melodic way. When you're soloing you have to get into the idea that you're actually playing the chord....not playing a scale over a chord. It's a lot easier to think "Dm7" than "Dm7 = D Aeolian or Dorian". Of course i still use those scales for color, but the chord tones are the main things to focus on. A great example is John Coltrane's solo on So What, which i'm transcribing right now. The first probably 5 motifs he plays are based on the 1, 2, m3, 4, 5, and 7th of the Dm chord. (D, E, F, G, A, C) and the Dm arpegio descending and ascending...just as simple as that. And it sounds dead on. So i think you should add scales for color but if you want to sound dead on, make sure you play the chord tones.

-andrew

the chord tones are automatically part of the scale you could play, so I don't see any reason why I should limit myself to only playing the chord tones when there are many more notes available to me. I think chord changes are good to practice for beginning musicians, but overall there are far more advantages to scalar playing. You not only get a wider choice of notes, but you'll also get far more insight in harmony...

[Jakeweiser]

I have to disagree with Monty, I think the Chromatic scale is of upmost importance to practice and really have it under your fingers. As an ear training and a great way to hit some hip outside sounds. If you want to use a scale, use the Chromatic scale. It's the hippest one out there;)

As for trane he was the king. Looking at all that stuff from kind of blue and you'll see that he's playing changes over the modal chords as he reharmonizes everything in sight, much more prevelant later on (Love Supreme era) but KoB he was still doing it (much like LectricGuitarDude was talking about). I always heard him as linear in a scale wise way but came to relize that they were just passing notes for the chords. I guess that's all a scale is, or you could see a scale as just a fully extended chord.

Everyone thinks and hears about it differently. It's all to do with the style you are playing. If you are playing 50's Bop then you should focus on how they played, Chord tones with Passing chromatic tones on Dominant chords. If you are playing 60's - and out then scales become more prevenant. I don't think that guys out there today who play modally think anything about chords at all (maybe the compers) they know the sounds they are after and if in the woodshed they associate that with a chord patern to practice then go nuts.


But also, just shut your eyes and blow

[subcitizen]

I'm not saying that you should limit yourself to just playing chord tones, but i'm saying that if you want to sound really on those should be the real target tones for your soloing....they're like the skeleton, and then the scales and modes are like the skin...you can't really effectively not consider on or the other, they're both vital...but the chord tones are what give everything the structure.

-andrew

[Seba]

Originally posted by subcitizen
I'm not saying that you should limit yourself to just playing chord tones, but i'm saying that if you want to sound really on those should be the real target tones for your soloing....they're like the skeleton, and then the scales and modes are like the skin...you can't really effectively not consider on or the other, they're both vital...but the chord tones are what give everything the structure.

-andrew

I understand what you mean, and I think you're right in a way, but let me give you an example:
suppose this chord sequence during a tune: Gm7 Fm7
In 90% of the times, I'll play an A (2nd) on the Gm7 in order to go chromatic to the Ab (3rd).
I think the thing really is to emphasize modulations, and often you won't use a chord tone

[Monty Stark]

A on a Gm7 chord is the ninth:smokin:

[Seba]

Originally posted by Monty Stark
A on a Gm7 chord is the ninth:smokin:

I thougt when you mean "I play chord on Gm7", that you can play G(root)-Bb(third)-D(fifth) and F(seventh). I'd see the ninth as a part of the (F majord) scale rather that the chord. As I've always learnt it through the scalar way op playing, you could please elaborate on what you mean with playing "chords"?

[Monty Stark]

Seba - you can play any note you want on a Gm7 chord --- like, you could play a "wrong" note, say an Eb, and hold it and it will resolve to the 7th on the Fm7 chord in your example

it's just naming convention to call the note A on Gm7 the ninth (Gm9)

[Seba]

Originally posted by Monty Stark
Seba - you can play any note you want on a Gm7 chord --- like, you could play a "wrong" note, say an Eb, and hold it and it will resolve to the 7th on the Fm7 chord in your example

it's just naming convention to call the note A on Gm7 the ninth (Gm9)

of course I know the A on a Gm7 is the ninth, but what are you trying to say? When I play A on a Gm7, I'm playing scalar and not chord right?

[Monty Stark]

no, you're playing the most delicious sound there is on a minor chord - the 9th

[Monty Stark]

i guess what i'm trying to say is, in your example of playing A on Gm7 to Ab on Fm7 --- i'm saying, i'd rather you go to almost any other note than Ab --- Bb, for instance

going from the delicious 9th to the mundane minor 3rd (a half step while the root moves a whole step) sounds wrong to me even though it's right

[Seba]

Originally posted by Monty Stark
i guess what i'm trying to say is, in your example of playing A on Gm7 to Ab on Fm7 --- i'm saying, i'd rather you go to almost any other note than Ab --- Bb, for instance

going from the delicious 9th to the mundane minor 3rd (a half step while the root moves a whole step) sounds wrong to me even though it's right

as I said, I tend to emphasize modulations as much as possible in my solo's. Half steps are an excellent choice for that matter IMHO
but we're getting far off-topic here

[bubber]

I posted a thread with excerpts from a blindfold test with Tony Coe that discusses modal and chord based improvisation elsewhere on this forum - as kind of comment to some of the questions raised here.

[PsychedelicFuzz]

I'm kind of a unique case. My first experiences with improv were solely based on the arpeggios and the blues scale...later came the major and variations of minor pentationics...and I learned to build more complex scales outward from those.

I think the best apporach is to figure out what key the progression suggests and play in that key. If notes are altered, you figure out how they relate to the key and work them in.

[LectricGuitarDude]

Originally posted by Seba
the chord tones are automatically part of the scale you could play, so I don't see any reason why I should limit myself to only playing the chord tones when there are many more notes available to me. I think chord changes are good to practice for beginning musicians, but overall there are far more advantages to scalar playing. You not only get a wider choice of notes, but you'll also get far more insight in harmony...


I disagree. Chord tones may be part of the scale tones anyway, but playing chord tones make it more interesting to the listener. The chord tones give it shape. Once the chord tones are known, you can play whatever you like. There are no such things as 'wrong' notes. This is where the chromatic scale comes in.

I don't think it's a good idea to think 'chormatic scale'. But rather understand, that at the end of the day, whatever you chose to play, you are playing on a chromatic scale. The trick is to emphasise the chord tones (as opposed to limiting yourself to them).

People who think strictly scale-wise, tend to play unintersting lines. People who play scales (chromatic or otherwise), who emphasise the chord tones, sound quite good. To my ears anyway.

Also, you don't have to stick to the obvious arp choice (ie the same as the chord). For example: EbMaj7, AbMaj, BbMaj arps over Cmin7 chord. Fmin7 over Dm7b5. EbMaj, F#Maj over A7 and so on.. Also there are '4-note groupings' which I find interesting.


Although I think scales are important, I wouldn't disregard chord tones simply because 'chord tones are automatically part of the scale'.

[lone_wolf]

Chromatic is the way to go; you've always got the same twelve tones available to you, no more, no less, over any chord in any key. Just make sure you hit the right ones on the accented beats.

[Monty Stark]

:laugh:

[Noah Peterson]

I agree with Monty's earlier positions on play what you hear and feel.

To quote Charles Ives "My God, what do notes have to do with music?"

[Monty Stark]

amen

[Seba]

The trick is to emphasise the chord tones (as opposed to limiting yourself to them).


I can agree with that conclusion. But after all, even that depends on context and personal interpretation. As I said, my first "concern" when soloing is trying to accentuate modulations because that IMHO sounds so good (can be a problem on tunes like "So what" though:) )

[Monty Stark]

yeah, 'so what' is a tune you really DO want to "accentuate modulations" on because they happen so infrequently, (into and out of the bridge). notice on the og how miles goes early and trane goes late. and how cannon is thinking minor 9th chord tones instead of freely playing the mode

wow! now that i listen to it again, cannon is just thinking 7th chords!

[Noah Peterson]

yeah man.... but you can get sick on "so what". Harmonic & melodic minor modes is the jumping off point. You can complete reinvent the harmony with a clever use of modes. Sometimes I like to use pentatonics to fool the ear into thinking your hearing an A-7 over D. Which then gives you a tri-tone to play with when you hit the Eb section - which opens up everything in the world diminished, augmented, whole tone and if you're already using a flat 9 on the D-7 you have the root of the bridge and you can start to get into triad pairings (assuming you're using an A blues or the d-7alt (the Gb works on d- blues and is diatonic to the Eb). I like to get into harmonic modes and go for a middle easternish grind.

And since you have a D-7 & Eb-7, you're not really getting a modulation. It's a modal shift which really behaves differently. You can put a ii V i in there or a tri-tone substitute to the Ab while you're on the d-7 going into the Eb-7 and get an impression of a modulation. But hey... you can really do whatever you want on that tune. That's part of the appeal of it.

As for what to accenct. Accent the silence. It's music too.

[Monty Stark]

i hear you, noah --- i clicked here (http://www.noahpeterson.com/sic.html)

man, your performance schedule is killer
congratulations

[JazzRules]

The best way to solo over changes is to break chords down into groups of 2 to 3 chords and ask yourself what key contains those 2 or 3 chords. Very few jazz tunes stick to the key indicated by the key signature.

[Phil Kelly]

a large part of ones approach to soloing ( or composition for that matter ) in a harmonic context depends upon the rate of harmonic change ( or harmonic rhythm )

It the changes are going by at a pace of two per 4/4/ bar ..you're going to probably be using ( eiither consciously or unconsciously ) a goal note or modified arpeggiated approach ..

when the "rate of changes" expands to one ( or more ) bars per change, the scalar approach ( including the alternate and associated pentatonics etc ) begind to work more easily

when the" rate of changes" expands to eight/sixteen or more per harmonic area ..you ARE playing modally ..and as long as you occasionally refer to the characteristic notes of the mode, you can pretty well explore almost any inside or outside series that you choose..

( i.e.: D mixolydian >hot note lowered7 >diminished scale > major scales based on the d dim chord:( Dma Fma Ab ma Bma,,all the notes are contained in the half/whole step asc.dim scale )

and so on ...

[jazzguyfromnc]

Wow guys what a great thread. I'm new here, and it's great to see a discussion so close to what I'm doing. :)

I basically think everyone's points they've made and their methodologies are great. And it's really gonna boil down to doing what's best for the individual.

What I do is get a handle on the changes, and piddle around with how different scales interact with one another in the context of the tune I'm playing. My main goal is to swing, though. Yeah you've got to follow the changes, but I try not to be overly mathematical with it, because for me it takes out the soul.

Make sense?

:p

[bubber]

Sounds very sensible to me

[JSngry]

Feel the rhythm and shape of your phrase first and then fill it in with the right notes. Doing it vice-versa is a recipie for all kinds of bad things.

ANY harmonic approch sucks if there's no good phraseology going on.

If you feel your rhythm and shapes strong enough, and know where all the notes are on your instument, you're on your way. If all you know is the notes, you might as well stay at home.

Just my opinion.

[edrowland]

Modes or chord tones -- they're both the same, once you've got enough chord tones. D13 -- that's 7 notes, including a the usually problematic 4th as an avoid note. D7#11: well. There are seven notes that go with that too. Dmaj7: think DMaj13, and you're there. etc.

Don't kid yourself that guide tones (3rd and 7th) are enough. They're not. You need all the rest of the alterations to build really interesting melodies.

You really need to go beyond straight chord tones. You also need to know where all the "pretty" and interesting notes are: the 9th always and often; the 11th on top of minor chords; 6ths, especially with top of maj7ths or 9ths. And where all the really agressive notes belong (+5, +9, b9, etc). And by the time you've got all those notes, the only note that's left is the avoid 4th, which you can fill in by getting used to the sound of both the 4th and +4th, and learning where and when to use them.

As you can tell, I learned through the chord tone route, and filled in the modes later. I still play a box system (scales are mentally conjured around the same frame chords that I would use for comping). However, I am currently working hard on relearning my modes as scales because having those scales at my fingertips improves the way I play long scalar lines. I've spent a good part of the last year learning modes as scales instead of modes as decorations on chords, and it's been worth it. I'm still filling in some of the melodic minor and harmonic minor modes, although most of the common major and minor modes are there now.

I do think that learning modes as extended chords is great for my playing too. It means that I do know where all the sweet notes are, and I can grab them without thinking about it. It also means that I can play extremely angular lines (much more so than just arpegiation) with great ease.

I think there are important advantages to both chordal and scalar approaches, and I think knowing both is a good idea.

[Phil Kelly]

the notion of "avoid notes" ( I think a Berklee generated term ) is in many cases a good basic concept ..but there are times when the 4th degree in a major scale / mode is usuable:

1. if you are constructing a melody where a suspension /anticipation/ approach tone is applicable ..

2. In the case of the hexatonic blues scale : 1/b3/4/b5/5/ b7 etc ..all these notes are acceptable over dominant 1 , 4 ..and sometimes 5 chords ..

[edrowland]

Originally posted by Seba
I understand what you mean, and I think you're right in a way, but let me give you an example:
suppose this chord sequence during a tune: Gm7 Fm7
In 90% of the times, I'll play an A (2nd) on the Gm7 in order to go chromatic to the Ab (3rd).
I think the thing really is to emphasize modulations, and often you won't use a chord tone

A *really* interesting example. (Assuming these chords are in the middle of a progression). I'd almost always play Gm7/Fm7 as IIIm, IIm -- which means Ab on the Gm7, instead of A. This particular progression would be one of the few cases where I deliberately and conciously and always play IIIm instad of dorian, just because I've been burned too many times by playing the wrong 6th on the Gm7. The 6th of IIIm -- Eb -- on the Gm7 sounds great, whereas playing the E even as a passing note is, in my experience, painful.

I also really need to comment on a post following this one. Somebody talking about thinking bout the Gm7 as just root, 3rd, 5th, seventh. Noooo!!!! Gm7 is nice. Gm9 is nicer. Much nicer. Gm6/9 is beautiful (for guitarists: 3 x 2 3 3 5, with the 6th string usually not fretted or played). An Gm11 ( 3 x 3 3 1 x) is a stunningly pretty chord too. All of these will sub nicely over Gm7, and should be subbed often. So. When you see Gm7, you need to know where the 4th is (a favorite bop note on m7, and my favorite too). And the 6th. And the 9th. Because all of those notes sound great -- even better than 3rds and 7ths, which are nice, but just plain lazy. Sure. It's probably easier for guitarist. But when you see that Fm7 (not the Gm7 which is really a different beast imho), I really think that the Bb (and the G, and the D) should be there shining like a beacon as a good places to rest no matter what instrument you play.

I think that's one of the significant benefits of chordal approaches over scalar approaches. With scalar approaches, it's far too easy to think of Fm7 as F G Ab Bb C D Eb F (in that order, heaven forbid, although descending too, but that's harder). With a chordal approach you think of Fm7 as something like this: Bb: great note (IV); G nice note (9); D, good note (6th) which is a little scary because of it's tendency to train-wreck on IIIm ; Ab, Eb: ok notes; F, C: boooring. (For what it's worth, I think I'm going through a transitory phase wrt/ the scariness of m6ths, so you can disregard that bit).

[PsychedelicFuzz]

Originally posted by Phil Kelly
the notion of "avoid notes" ( I think a Berklee generated term ) is in many cases a good basic concept ..but there are times when the 4th degree in a major scale / mode is usuable:

1. if you are constructing a melody where a suspension /anticipation/ approach tone is applicable ..

2. In the case of the hexatonic blues scale : 1/b3/4/b5/5/ b7 etc ..all these notes are acceptable over dominant 1 , 4 ..and sometimes 5 chords ..

This reminds me of a record I was listening to the other day. One particular lick just smacked me in the face and when I went to transcribe it, it was just the tonic triad with the 4th used as an approach tone to the 3.

[TrumpetBoy]

Whilst I agree with the theoretical concepts being discussed in terms of scalar and chordal approaches, I wonder if we're not missing a vital part of how many of the greats learned tunes - by ear.
Approaching a tune by scale or chord tones is all very well to allow you to sight read a tune with a band but in that situation you are going to sound like you are playing more scales and chord tones and less melody - particularly as a less-experienced improvisor. If you have time, it can be very helpful to find a tune you like and get (or preferably transcribe) a copy of the melody. Play that along with a recording of the tune and then try to find your way through the chords of the song by ear with no visual reference. Obviously it's easier for some songs than others.
Then if you come to a copy of the chord sequence you already have an aural reference to the shape of the harmony thus giving you a better chance to transcribe and filter your own phrases.

At the end of the day, we're all striving to play what we hear in our minds so why not trust what we hear?

[yorkjazz]

...absolutely. Two words will do it:
Listen
- to as much music as you can and try to really "hear" whats being played.
Practice
- all the time you can spare, for the rest of your life.
There are no substitutes for these two.

[Monty Stark]

yeah, it seems to me, you have to play what you FEEL as well as what you think

otherwise, you'll be doing what the crate digger dj / hip hop culture calls, "noodling" (and, i guess, every other culture)

intr.v. Slang noo·dled, noo·dling, noo·dles

To improvise music on an instrument in an idle, haphazard fashion.