Amer. Truth be told and in perfect theory too, that the 'big 4' beat and the five note pentatonic colors of ancient Native American melodies, often sung or sounded on flutes, have now thousands of years later become the foundation pitches of two Americana genres; the blues and a new improvisational and song composing paradigm becoming a next portal for the development of a modern jazz. While the blues has been around for a while now, this new jazz concept came about in the later 1950's and has ever continued forward. And its this primary 'Amer' span of a couple of thousand years of history that creates our overall timeline structure to study the global evolutions of the pitches that shape our entire style spectrum of our combined AmerAfroAsiaEuroLatin musics of today.

Instant replay. And again, its 'theory true' that these same 'Amer' pentatonic group of five melody notes, which create a pairing of the major and minor tonalities woven together as 'relatives' simply by sharing one set of identical pitches, we can also find these same notes today in a modern jazz motif that became a pivotal moment in Americana musical history (globally too). In our modern jazz these melody notes are each supported by their own individual chords (nothing new there :) that motored by a fast, four beat rhythm, create a new modern pentatonic improvisational palette / approach for the Americana modern jazz improvisor.

Afro. African American song contributions all through our Americana centuries include vast collections of blues and spiritual songs, both of which are often pentatonic pitch based, the blues leaning to minor and spirituals to the major. Both rhythm based on the 'big 4' though newly syncopated with '2 and 4' and quite often formed by the four bar phrase's poetry metered to the 'iambic pentameter' rhythms of the English centered languages, these songs have become these eight and 12 bar forms for songs have become essential to Americana singers, players and dancers delight.

Afro Jazz drumming. In Afro drumming, often referred to here as being 'the motor', we find artists who are as robust in their physicality as their mental acuity as the artform often asks for; i.e., demands, a physicality in performance gauranteed to break a sweat. Its ancient polyrhythm riffs, mixed into the 4/4 'Amer boom boom boom boom', was and is also the motor of marching parade musics of the 1880's to today. Combined, these rhythms foundationed the magical swing rhythms first invented in the U.S.A., pioneered by Louis Armstrong. Swing rhythm is pure joy to create as an artist, a driving rhythm that bring smiles, get toes tappin' and has gotten folks up on the dance floor ever since cats first figured out swing's organic magic ( accent 2 and 4 :).

Asia. The musics of the Asia continets are generally of a free flowing and floating nature. No need for the 'big 4' or stacks of arpeggio pitches sounded together. Historically, five notes still wins the day for creating sweet melodies on various flutes while now ancient unfretted string axe's arpeggiate triads in support often using a slide to 'talk' a note into the mix. Pedal tones are generally sounded throughout; root and fifth and in octaves, are reminiscent of the 'drones' so cool and common in the musics of India. Jazz saxophonist John Coltrane fell in love with 'drones and pedal tones' toward the end of his career.

In the Japan's the Taiko drummers are the thundering feature. Their history goes back thousands of years and practioners maintain ancient guidelines as they create new, modern compositions. Many Asian artists have passionately embraced the Euro classical music traditions as well as the modern jazz of the Americas.

Euro. All through our first half millennium of Americana history as a blended populous in the Americas, we've had the 'Euro' originated system of 12 pitches (there's a rumor going around some parts of academia that there was some sort of piano ~ keyboard instrument, that survived 10 weeks at sea, on the MayFlower, I believe :) Thus, giving us the lines and changes (melody and chords) all along now these last 500 years or so.

All that glorious array of harmony; those precisely tuned, stacked up pitches sounded together into chords, to aurally (emotionally) support any melody note's mood and groove all helping to aurally tell the story of songs. A system of harmony fully capable of supporting all of Americana's myriad of styles, genres and grooves.

To create this harmony in our modern ways, we must have a core of the seven diatonic pitch scale, as this creates for us the traditional sense of a key center. This theory kabooming evolution, from the pentatonic to diatonic; from a five to a seven note group, is achieved by mixing in two new pitches to the original five notes; which add two 1/2 step intervals into the group of 7.

That these melody pitches, arpeggios and chords easily mix together endlessly into new textures and fully supporting single note melody lines of our songs is the 'theory resource' of pitches that we enjoy today; the ancient 'Five' fills in two new notes and becomes the modern tuned 'Seven' of the diatonic realms, with all residing within the chromatic 'Twelve.'

Latin. A bit more recent addition to the Americana music history s is the addition of all things 'Latin', which also centers on time, rhythm and its syncopations, often for creating dance steps and dance forms, which have brought folks of all our melting pot of cultures in communities together, in the shared joys of dancing through musical time with the red hot spicy, near the equator steamy Latin rhythms.

Latin influences also bring the Spanish language into our vocabulary of rhyming words and phrasing of lyrics and melodic ideas, while rhythm players bring claves, timbales, guiro's and lots more to 'motor' the groove along for singing and dancing. 'Latin' dance is huge in the Americas, as most everyone involved smiles big or breaks a sweat motoring things along; as things do get hot very quickly :) Language is rhythm too, and mixed into English language rhythms, Latin improvisors find a whole new sense of swing with 'even 1/8's and its influence of the advanced time concepts of 'forward motion' evolving their lines; aiming ever further and further ahead to the cadential points in their songs with an 'eveness of 1/8th notes' that will swing beautifully.

Modern tuning. All of the above is achieved with these ancient pitches as they all can be tuned both in their original ways and in today's modern math / equal tempering ways, which is a refinement of tuning precision that enables these notes to be sounded consonantly together; as a melody, as arpeggios, which implies a 'chord' that's sounded by a streaming of individual its pitches as melody notes, or triads and chords; combining from three to 12 notes all sounded together (as on a piano), with near any combination of instruments.

Surely a composer's dream come true, the entirety of all the above resources 'in tune' available from each of our 12 unique pitches, with unlimited mix and match, the quick borrowing elements between keys to jazz it up, to gradually change keys through successions of chords or modulate right off of one chord in any tempo, these theories and musical elements all combine to create today's Americana's modernized palette based upon the ancient musical pitches / colors. Cool ? Or ... just how cool is that ? :)

Quick review. Foundationally, our system of theory today comprises 12 pitches. The pentatonic five ~ 5 usually centers the remaining 7 (of the 12) pitches into a key center that generally creates the composing architecture of songs for folk (kids), country and the pop styles and genres. Flipping the number of pitches around while retaining a key center; now to seven and five notes, we've now the diatonic seven note scale ( major / minor ) for melody and chords, interspersed with the five non-diatonic blue notes, which double as both 'blue' notes in melody and the color tones for building bluesy, jazzier chords.

Melody. Thus, Americana music's melodies easily express with pitches tuned 'naturally', which include the blue note (s) special tunings, providing the Americana pure 'blue hue', a weave of melodic color easily found throughout most of the melodies, songs and improvisations of the Americana collective songbook.

Chords. That we also have a loop of pitches that require a very high precision of tuning to properly (aurally in tune) function together and create our chords, their bass line stories, progressions and cadential motions for telling stories, through all 12 paired key centers simultaneously is remarkable indeed.

This gives the artist a consistent aural rock (bass note) and hard spot (chord) to lean their natural tuned pitches and blues lines into and helps in making collaborating with many instruments and artists a breeze all while everyone gets to play how they each hear their own version of 'in tune' together.

'#'s of pitch theory' ~ musical style. With our many styles of music across a wide spectrum, understanding the music theory that creates these songs can initially be based on the musical elements that have traditionally created the songs, and more specifically; how many different notes are involved in creating any musical component; a riff, a melody, # of pitches in the chords, beats in a rhythm pattern et all. Our spectrum of styles can look like this. Example 1.

'# of pitches ~ triads (3) and chords (4+).' There's the 'two pitch 5th's of the metal styles, the '3' note triads in folk and country, the '4 note' dominant 7th flavored chords for blues, '4 and 5 note' major 7th chords for gospel, pop and bossa nova, and the blues funk and jazzier '9' color tones above a triad; the 7th's, 9th's, 11th's and 13th's, and their alterations, for creating those 'Hollywood jazzy chord voicings.' Thus empowered, we can jazz up any harmony the AmerAfroAsiaEuroLatin library of stories in song can imagine, all the styles, genres, subgenres and the ever expanding catalogue of the now 'new' that is happening everyday.

We can study J. S. Bach. Americana formal academia loves the Euro master of mostly triadic diatonic changes of the maestro J.S. Bach; an early pioneer of tempered tunings as applied to the piano forte keyboard. Dating to the early 1700's, as the 'piano / forte' key mechanism came into production, Bach exhausts the complete harmonic resource with the Baroque style of his day. We use the same triads today and the same system of pitch organization and harmony principles. And quite frankly, have used this Euro diatonic harmony since America as its own country was first getting started.

Just one ~ 'jot' :) Know that an indepth study of one Bach keyboard song, or a choral or two, becomes a game changer for understanding the music theory harmony of all the Americana musics. The one selection included in this e-book is 36 bars of crystal clear melody, arpeggios and chords. And a thorough study can be a game changer for anyone; I know it was for me especially for learning the magics of how to spell out the letter name pitches of triads / chords as they live within a key center. Once the diatonic 'realm' was mastered, arpeggiating (spell out) the pitches of any blues / jazz chord was a snap (took about a month of dogged study to master all the chords and their colortones through all the 12 keys.)

'# of pitches for melody.' While there's some give and take here, it all kinda runs the same; there's numerical magics as with the chords; the more different notes in a melody line will tend to move us along our music style spectrum. And the more different pitches in a melody, the more involved the stories tends to get. Songs for kids are a few pitches, so easy to learn and always remember. Folk and country is usually 5 or 6 pitches so pentatonic colors, pop and bossa 6 maybe or 7, so the diatonic scale, and from 7 to 12. we're leaning way towards the jazz horizon line of our Americana spectrum of styles.

Author's note. Don't recall ever seeing this sort of 'melodic philosophy' in another discussion though the idea of the 'other five pitches' is super common in the jazz guitar world of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Rhythm ~ syncopation ~ # of beats / subdivisions. In Americana's musics, rhythm rules the dancefloors, where the cultural weave of all American peoples come together to share in a common 'time' together. Our AmerAfroAsiaEuroLatin combinations each have their own unique languages and way of speaking, thus the melodies of their stories capture the rhythm of their native language. Once in place, all else of musical time, rhythm and syncopations naturally fall in with the rhythmic nuance of a language (s), each with its own 'local slang magic' too ! These rhythms shape the dance steps of the larger dance forms of each of the AmerAfroAsiaEuroLatin cultures. Passed from generations forward through history, we inherit traditional language based music 'grooves and dances' which inspire us to create new ones today.

Diatonic melody + chord progressions / by style. Thinking of our style spectrum in broad strokes so; folk, country, blues and rock ... and pop to hip hop are mostly about constructing elements along a diatonic basis; so three chords and the truth or the mixing of the 'diatonic 3 and 3' rule the day; that blending of the major / minor ~ 'One, Four and Five' diatonic triads of any chosen key center, the weaving of these six chords creates the Americana chord progressions of like a half a gillion great American songs, ranging from folk essentials all through to the Hollywood super orchestrated with strings pop arrangements and stylings, while the gospel hues are always right nearby from within these same pitches. Alter or borrow a chord or two from a close key center and our pitch resource and theory, for creating most of our Americana musics, share this theoretical foundation.

And then there's blues (theory). The 'blues' in theory is the trickiest discussion in this book. For most of the theory of everything with diatonic 'pitch organization' kinda goes out the logical (structured) window. One saving theory grace with the blues is the '12 bar' blues form, for telling stories and shaping them into songs. One side of today's blues is based in the 12 bar form and its exclusive use of three dominant 7th chords; the One, Four and Five chords of a chosen diatonic key center, for creating the tension / release of this song form. All of these chords are built as a three note triad and added blue seven, becoming four note chords. This 'add 7' evolution is a theory game changer in many ways as it creates a tritone interval between the major 3rd and blue 7th in a blues styled V7 chord.

Original blues songs could have been just a four bar phrase repeated for each new line of verse. Termed a 'modal blues' its where our history can start us off. There's an eight bar song form that is found in gospel music, which comes from the earlier 'spiritual'; vocal songs often written with a 'call and response' dialogue, common in both work and church songs.

While historically the blues has gone through some dramatic style evolutions and metamorphosizing changes, its 12 bar form is still solid today as it was 100 years ago. And folks will usually know it, dancers too, as there's many cliches now embedded in the style which helps everyone to follow along.

That 'blues is the roots and everything else the fruits', according to "Howlin' Wolf, we can hear the blue notes and thus blues hue all through our Americana spectrum of styles. Artistically crafted, the blue notes can find a way into all our styles. Historically and spiritually, the indigenous Americana blues is a foundation of jazz. And in jazz, the theoretical complexity goes kaboom in many directions, yet at its historical core every pitch and chord in its evolutions has a theory basis and perfect closure, every pitch accounted for, just as Euro classical music scores, yet with the freedom of improvisation with all of the same musical resources, a sort of 'no holds barred' in how we each can develop our own art and musical 'voice' and signature with no limits allowed.

And then ... there's jazz (theory). Jazz theory and its evolutions over the last century include a library with stacks of music for dancing. And there's a stack of 'music for listening. ' They weave their elements together of course, and in the 'listening jazz', there's the additional evolutions of theoretical complexity. In understanding this evolution of the theory, especially its harmony, as the support for single line styled melodic improvisation, it creates key parts of the 'school curriculum' of formal academia, and is the central theory dna that runs stem to stern through the structure of this e-book.

In theory. So while folk, blues, pop, rock and country rely mostly on the seven diatonic chords for composing songs, in jazz we use all seven and can jazz it up by place a passing chord in between each of the diatonic positions; One through Seven. So now we have a 'sharp One diminished chord between the diatonic One chord and Two.

C to D becomes C C# D ... etc.

This happens on all the five spots between the diatonic seven. So with just the root letters we have;

C D E F G A B C

becomes

C C# D D# E F F# G A A# B C ...

Well, that looks chromatic huh ? And in theory, each of these five, four note 'passing diminished 7th chords' also represent four dominant / V7 chords and four different diatonic 'half diminished chords' (Seven), and along with the diminished colors, these are the chords we use to 'jazz up' the more diatonic approach of the chord progressions of the folk to pop spectrum. They theorize chord substitution principles that can help build out the basics of a '145' into something never quite heard before.

New melodic options. And as we jazz up a chord progression we also provide our improvised melodies with new options and directions. In our studies here, this complexity goes hand in hand with the degree of challenge; to improvise our music knowing of its existing boundaries and looking to go beyond. Listening to music plays a big part in this discovery process, perking our curiosity to discover 'what was that' sound.

And in the improvisors world, and prolly true for any artist in all the disciplines; to get fresh with an inspiration of a new idea, to banish current boredom with a new challenge of discovery, find something new and cool to explore that might expand our palette through sifting through the theory of ____, can come like a breath of fresh cool air on a hot summer's day, to energize and inspire us to continue our search.

Searching. And that's where the theory comes in; for with it we can gradually increase the complexity of everyday chord progressions that then increase the challenge our intellect ... to create artful melody lines that weave right on through the jazzed up chord changes of a song.

'C#' / # i diminshed 7th ~ 'C# E G Bb' becomes

C7, Eb7, Gb7 (tritone sub) and A7 (V7 of ii)

History tells us that cats would preceed each chord with its diatonic Two chord, creating the 'Two / Five' chord cell that dominated chord progressions for a couple of decades. So now we have;

'G-7 / C7 ~ Bb-7 / Eb7 ~ Db-7 Gb7 ~ E-7 / A7'

These four 'cells' and the melodies that will generate are theoretically available to 'sub' in for the '#i dim 7 / C#' diminished 7th chord. So, a kaboom to those artists that look to exhaust the resource, to search to wherever to find new coolness for their own improv voice.

Jazz harmony also includes all of the 'color tones' / tensions / extensions that are available with the 12 pitches. And on piano, where a lot of music gets composed, there's little restriction of how the notes can be placed together to create the desired effect. In tertian harmony, chords build in 3rd's;

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

'C D E F G A B C' ... becomes

1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15

'C E G B D F A C' ...

The 'C' major scale becomes the 'C' major arpeggio from which we spell our chords. Its with these additional notes that we can jazz up any triad or chord that comes along in a song or progression.

There's 'quartile' harmony, so chords built up in 4th's, built both with diatonic and non pitches with chords then moved chromatically or in a cycle such as whole step / half step, that creates a 'blurring' effect of the chord and its forward motion within a chord progression. For example;

C D E F G A B C ... becomes ... C F B E A D G C

stack 4th's ~ C E A D G / C A D G C / C E A D G B

These sorts of voicings support melodies created in 4th's, a thoroughly modern and challenging sound to master. So, as we jazz up the complexity of the combinations of pitches, based initially on the purely diatonic, triad palette, we increase the challenge in performing the music. That there's a wide allowance for improvisation with the jazz language to find one's own signature, there's a lifelong search and continuing challenge for those so impassioned to create something new of their own by believing that 'all music was once new.'

Evolving with V7b9 substitutions. As with the 'passing diminished' chords described above, there's also a fully diminished 7th chord in a V7b9 chord, for 'G7';

1 3 5 7 b9

'G B D F Ab' becomes four V7 chords

G7 / Bb 7 / Db7 / E7

When we add a 'b9' to any V7 chord, we kaboom the theory of where historically our chord substitutions organically have grown out from. As V7 has motored a lot of blues, the addition of 'b9' brings that wee bit deeper blue of the diminished color to bare, which we theorists then divvy up into four separate leading tones and V7's, and both building up four '2 ~ 5's for these four chords, or modally approach these V7 substitutions from their diatonic Two chord, so four Dorian scales for tonal convergence to a resting point.

Pairs of '2 / 5' looks like this;

'D-7 / G7 ~ F-7 / Bb7 ~ Ab-7 / Db7 ~ B-7 / E7

The parent scale Dorian group of pitches;

'D' Dorian / 'F' Dorian / Ab Dorian / 'B Dorian

Once this theory is in place, it's worth exploring its history through the songs, written by the cats who discovered these chord substitution pathways.

And back to V7 of the blues. A next evolution to be applied, once the written changes of a standard song are mastered, evolves the whole improv tamale by simply place a V7 chord before each written chord change. This addition usually brings an increase in tempo too; creating that 'blur' of gradually shifting colors whirling on by, quite exotic really, both to perform and behold.

And lastly, we just go back to our blues roots and make all of the written chords a dominant, V7 chord type jazzing it up with the 'b9' substitution properties and diatonic and altered color tones, also to find the modern sounding guide tone lines that still often wheel on through cycle of 4th's styled bass line stories all potentially chromatically enhanced to fit the mood.

And for melody. Once the fundamental diatonic scale and its modes, its arpeggio and building chords is under the fingers, and improvising melody lines both 'over and through the changes' is understood, there's the melodic minor substitutions which follow generally along the 'V7b9' principles with a unique group of pitches; still minor in flavor of its lower tetrachord but leaning major in its upper tetrachord. There's the Lydian Chromatic Concepts that basically swap a Lydian group for the Ionian and build a complete system for composition and improvisation on the Lydian mode / scale.

Back to the source. And lastly here in this e-book's discussions there's the return to the ancient pentatonic colors, but now in modern scheme and built into a 'pentatonic modality' that shapes a system of modes based on five note / pentatonic groupings. Like the diatonic and Lydian Chromatic, the pentatonic approach creates another unique and rather complete palette of aural colors for improvising our musics.

"Giant Steps." First initiated by John Coltrane's "Giant Steps", we discover Coltrane's new improv approach to soloing through changes whereby each chord in a progression can have its own parent, pentatonic hued scale. In the succeeding years, from 1960 onward, artists gradually a 'pentatonic system' for improvising over and through the entire spectrum of jazz harmony.

Play the melody. While there's a near endless array of melodic, chord substitutions and their parent scale choices to discover, the shedding studies of intervals, sequence and permutation and all the puzzles that emerge, combine to develop the artist into being a solid melody player all by playing the melody of a song.

For way back there was; play the 'theme' and improvise 'variations' of it. In Euro musics there's a fascinating musical evolution to discover whereby 'suggested' rules to pairing up pitches into chords dictated where the melody took them, termed counterpoint; 'point (note) to point', which also had its own set of guidelines which often determined 'where and when' to modulate and shape 'written out' improvisations.

That playing melody just feels good, for we as the lead, surely the dancers and listeners of all stripes and spots too, sounding out the line is just a joyous thing to do. So ... fear not the melody and just learn it :)

Rhythm ~ syncopation. Saving the best for last, and also most challenging, the eventual mastering of time and swing provides the essential start point. A metronome's clicks can foundation this development. Any rhythm imaged can then be sounded out; play from your heart be singing the lines you want to play :) Cool ...?

Author's note. Music theory and jazz theory in particular, can provide a sort of endless puzzle to the curious minded, for as the message matures as an artist evolves, so can the complexity of nuance in mixing music's essential jazz colors, providing a career long exploration of search and discovery of new coolness to express the 'art in our hearts.'

"It's amazing how much you can learn if your intentions are truly earnest."

Ways to start. Any beginning theorist can begin their studies in any number of fundamental spots. Once engaged by picking a skill to learn or topic of interest, from that point forward till ya run out of juice, pure curiosity energizes the creating your pathway through the foundations of music theory.