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RE: An Interesting URL for All You LD Jazzheads Out There . . .
Title: Message
Very 
cool, Ted. It really illustrates how difficult it is to improvise over that 
tune.  A friend of mine, Mark Levine, has a book, "The Jazz Theory Book" 
that provides a lot of analysis like this. In fact, page 352 of that book breaks 
Giant Steps down into further details of these tonal centers: I chord in B, V-I 
in G, V-I in Eb, ii-V-I in G, etc, etc.   It's basically taking the 
standard ii-V-I format of jazz standards and turning it into one butt kicking 
tune.  That song scares the hell out of me. I've only played it as a ballad 
live, never at 300 bpm. At least Giant Steps is analyzable like this. Other 
more modern jazz tunes, such as by Metheny, Pat Martino, Jaco, etc...are crammed 
full of slash chords, synthetic chords, polychords, etc, which make it difficult 
to find the tonal centers.
 
I 
think there could be a program that does what you ask.   It would 
have to look at the song as a whole and make some decisions on chord functions 
based on pre-defined criteria. For instance, a minor chord followed by a 
dominant chord is probably a ii-V in most jazz charts, but it could be the ii 
chord of one key, and the V chord of another, or it could be a ii chord in 
one key, and a secondary dominant chord in the same key. I bet the program 
would do well with most of the tunes in the standard Real Books.  Analyze 
the head melody over the chords and it becomes easier, because the melody will 
provide hints on chord function.
 
Thanks for sharing! It was fun watching 
that.
 
Kris
 
p.s. 
 I just blew the dust off of some clips of me playing some cover and 
original jazz tunes. The cover tunes are Goodbye Porkpie Hat (by Mingus) 
and Footprints (by Wayne Shorter) live...Goodbye Porkpie Hat is another 
tune that has some interesting tonal centers.  The other three are 
originals of mine.  I added the sheet music to one tune, if anyone wants to 
try it out!
 
  
  Hi Ho!
A jazz guitarist friend of mine that i used 
  to work
with/for sent this the other day. Its a URL for a
website that 
  diagrams the tonal centers of
Coltrane's "Giant Steps" in real-time. Check 
  it
out. It's very interesting.
http://www.heplaysjazz.btinternet.co.uk/giants.html
Wouldn't it be 
  really, really cool if there was
a computer program that could "listen" to 
  any
live musical input and similarly diagram it?
Best 
  regards,
tEd ® kiLLiAn
"Different is not always better, but 
  better is always 
  different"
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Ted 
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