France Travel Journal. Day 1 (Tues, 31 May) - Narbonne

Just some quick notes to jog our memories in the future. Look to French Kate for the real stuff.

Zeus wanted to remind us that we were in his land, so decided to remind us what travelling was really about:

1/ We went to the tourist office to purchase an all inclusive museum pass, and discovered all the site in Narbonne that we came here to see were closed on Tuesdays!

2/ We stopped at Monoprix to buy picnic supplies (a knife, paper napkins, paper plates) and my Barklay's credit card was refused.  Kate's is ok, but there's a Barclay branch in Arles, and we're going to stop tomorrow and see  if we can find out what the problem may be.

3/ Because nothing was open in Narbonne, we decided to visit FontFroid instead. This is a monastary not far from Narbonne.  The map was very misleading, and a 15 minute drive took over an hour.  We were never lost, but Slyvie TomTom was.

On the other hand, we stopped at the local marche, and bought some fresh cherries, a dry sausage, and 2 local cheeses.   The market was typically French, and a delight to the senses.

Musical interlude: Narbonne was the birthplace of singer Charles Trenet. You probably know him by these (careful, may be ear virus.)

 

Frank Zappa

From Stravinski to Zappa?

There are supposed to be some Rite of Spring themes in here somewhere.

Rites of Spring

We just bought tickets for the Bad Plus performance of the Rites of Spring.

As a warm-up, here's the Bernstein recording, which seems to be considered the most evocative of the revolutionary original performance.

As a curiosity, listen to the repetitive F-chords.  There are supposed to be something like over 100 in that first movement.  (Or at least I think it was an F.?)

Final project

The final project for the jazz theory class mentioned previously is to create a 'song', built around a specific chord sequence.  Here's the sequence:

             9
Cmaj7   #11
             13

                       9
 B-flat maj7 #11
                     13

A min7

D-flat maj7

E min7

F maj7

E min7

D-flat #5

G-flat minor

                6
F min7     9

E dim7

E-flat maj7

B min7

A min7

G maj7

F maj7

A maj7 (add 13)

C maj7/E-flat maj7

The instruction was to 'keep it simple' !*

I'm actually making progress, using a midi-based piece of software called Finale, which allows me to compose without being able to play. I'll provide a sample later.

Theory. Modes, Part Two point five (2.5)

A couple of posts back I asked myself (and any readers) the following question: w
hat are the I, II and V 7th chords of F major?


Here's the answer:
I.     F major 7th
II.    G-7, aka, G minor 7th
V.    C7, aka, C dominant


The logic goes like this. For 7th chords,
- the I chord is always major, thus consisting of a major 3rd and a major 7th,
- the II chord is always minor, thus consisting of a minor 3rd and a minor 7th,
- the V chord is always a dominant, thus consisting of major 3rd and a minor 7th.
The actual note values are:


F major 7th
  - F, A, C, E

G minor 7th

  - G, B-flat, D, F

C dominant 7th
  - C, E, B-flat, G

OK, so what does this have to do with modes?  Still working on that.

Modes, illustrated

To go with the theory from the previous post, here are two examples of modal jazz.  This means that the improvisations are built from modes, not from sequences of chords.

First, what is probably the most famous modal jazz piece:  'So What', from Miles Davis' album Kind of Blue.

And next may be the first piece explicitly composed on modal principles:  'Milestones', from the album Milestones, also by Miles Dave, recorded about a year earlier (1958).

I

Theory. Modes, Part Two

I don't feel my attempts to understand modes has yet resulted in a coherent model, but here may be another piece.  This follows up on the question of how 7th chords come from modes.

It seems to go something like this.  A7th chord is constructed by assembling everyone other note of a mode.

Working through an example in the key of C...

C major 7 consists of C, E, G, A.  For this mode (remember that major = Ionian mode), the intervals between C and E is a third, between C and G is a perfect fifth, and between C and is a perfect seventh.

Because it is built off the first mode of C it is designed as a I chord (roman numeral one).

A chord build from the second mode of C (the Dorian mode) consists of D, F, G, B.  Because of the place of whole steps and semitones in the second mode, the interval between D and F is a minor third, between D and G is a perfect fifth, and between D and G is a minor seventh.

Because it is build off the second mode of C, it is designed as a II chord.  It is D minor 7.

And so on, but in particular, a chord built from the fifth mode of C (Mixolidian mode), consists of G, B, D, F.  Again, using interval relationships, this chord consists of a minor third, a perfect fifth, and a minor seventh.

Thus, this chord is designed as a V chord, and is G dominant.

To generalize...

Major 7th chords consist of a major 3rd and a major 7th
Minor 7th chords consist of a minor 3rd and a minor 7th
Dominant 7th chords consist of a major 3rd and a minor 7th
(They all contain a perfect 5th).

This is true for all keys.  Here's a test for the reader.

What are the I, II and V 7th chords of F major?
Of F dorian?

Answers to be followed in a later post.

Oh, and why is this important?  The chord sequence II-V-I is the most common chord sequence in jazz.