The Raised Fifth

charlyg · Post by **charlyg** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 5:32 pm

I learned trombone in high school so I read music reasonably well. I have never developed my ear properly but I ain't too bad for a praise band bass player, I just need the chord charts in front of me. The one advantage I would give to having the chart,it allows me to roam a bit more than if I was concentrating on where we are going. We only practice 45 mins before church and about 3 times at night during the year,so not much pportunity to train the ear!

I try to improve by buying method books and such, but usually, I get to a spot I don't understand and the book goes back on the shelf. I have never played along with "records" and gave it a try for the first time this week. I'm pretty bad but slogging along.

All that to say, I met a fellow bassist at Cozy's who wants to learn to read music and I want to learn some blues chops! So, we got together today ant I played along with BB on the Thrill is Gone. I had an issue because of the I IV V progression. I learned about the raised fifth and now my bass line fits!

It's not a specific Ric topic, but I also "saw" the pattern on a straight blues in E up the neck.I used to do it in open position and I was doing the turn around wrong. It works much better to go below the root as compared to going up to the next E for the turn around. Of course, with just one lesson, I may be all wet!

Wanna talk some "theory"? Well, at least blues theory? I'm still not sure how far afield we should go with the topics.

charlyg · Post by **charlyg** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 5:41 pm

I screwed up the turn around explanation. You obviously can't go below the root of E, I meant the root of the 5 chord and and go down instead of up

charlyg · Post by **charlyg** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 5:42 pm

I didn't intend the pun, bummer! There must be a line to go with a setup like that!

rictified · Post by **rictified** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 5:48 pm

For one thing Charlie, "The thrill is gone" is far from being a standard blues blues bass line, that bass line is kind of a rolling bass line, every note is doubled, he does two 1/8th notes where most people would have done one 1/4 note and yes there is a raised 5th in it, in the key of E it would be called a C haha! Gerold Jemmott did that whole album and was quite the bass player.
If you really want to learn blues try some Muddy Waters, early BB King, Howlin' Wolf, Jimmy Reed, and Sonny Boy Williamson, those were some of the greats for straight blues. Then there's swing which is also a lot of fun, all sorts of stuff like that. But the Thrill is Gone album is not exactly a good place to start, although you will usually play that at 99% of blues jams.
Also I practice to the radio, I know many songs as a result. I think it's a great way to practice and learn how to think quick, also you won't become a lead bass player that way either.

rictified · Post by **rictified** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 5:55 pm

Also many songs don't change on the turn around, they just stay on the one. Willy Dixon who was probably the greatest blues bass player who ever lived (upright most of the time) used to stay on the 1 during the 4 a lot, but that only works with an upright, sounds strange with an electric. Listen to anything with Willy Dixon playing bass, that includes most of the Chess stuff including early Chuck Berry. In fact he wrote half of the famous blues tunes that many rock n rollers covered and stole.

charlyg · Post by **charlyg** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 6:01 pm

Hey Bob, now you got my juices flowing. I picked up the rhythm very quickly but as soon as the first turn came I was done for. I will take your advice. I have a blues channel on the digital cable so there you have it. It figures I would pick what seems easy. The E blues thing is straight ahead. It's an old thing my Dad taught me when I bought my first Harmony archtop back when I was a "wee lad"!

charlyg · Post by **charlyg** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 6:07 pm

I have been reading books on the history of the blues and now I have moved on into the playing of it. I was VERY disappointed when I found the number of songs ripped! Change a couple of words and there they go!

The raised fifth thing reminds me of an issue I have with the praise band. When they play a suspended chord, my root seems to clash a bit. It could just be me, because I have a tough time with chord inversions. They sound dissonant to me and it's like fingernails on a chalk board. I want the ROOT at the bottom.

I know, music would be boring!!!

rictified · Post by **rictified** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 6:52 pm

The root shouldn't change on a suspended chord and should sound good, although you could play an inversion yourself depending on where the chord is in the song which would be the 5. Maybe they're not playing the sus right?

charlyg · Post by **charlyg** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 7:15 pm

A suspended is just adding the 4th if I understand what I think I thought I might have understood at one point? Got that?

lars · Post by **lars** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 12:29 am

The 4th is not just added. The chord instruments (guitar and keyboards) must replace the 3rd with the 4th. If they play the 3rd and the 4th together it will sound dissonant, as they are only a half step apart (in major chords).

Playing only the root: you will loose a lot of the essence in a lot of songs if you play only the root. Many songs are totally dead if you don't play G in a C chord or a G in a F chord. Have you heard the motown song: "What becomes of the brokenhearted?" If you play only the root in that song, it's ruined!!

markmez · Post by **markmez** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 3:28 am

For 'The Thrill is Gone' forget the 'blues scale', and play in the natural minor scale ( aeolian, if you will ).

I'll usually play an octave of the root over a suspended chord. Seems to work well.

markmez · Post by **markmez** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 3:29 am

Oh, Happy Birthday Paul! You are why 90% of us play bass!

charlyg · Post by **charlyg** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 3:49 am

I was pretty sure but not 100% that the third was removed in a sus but I wasn't sure so tried to "mask" it! I only play praise music(only 5 or 6 songs a week) anymore, haven't played rock/pop in a band since 73! I need to develop my ear so that means listening to a TON of blues. Oh bummer!!!!!!!

I do the octave thing myself. If something sounds discordant, I always try the octave and it usually blends better than what I was hearing.

My immediate goal is to have enough chops to get up on Monday nites at Cozy's blues jam.

edski · Post by **edski** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 4:27 am

There's quite a bit of differences with suspended chords...some call replacing the 3rd of a major triad with the 2nd a "Sus2", some just consider it a Sus4 on the fifth (Vsus4 in "Nashville" notation). Sometimes there are 7ths involved, so you can better pin down the "root" od a suspension better sometimes, and sometimes it's hazy.

But my contention is that is part of blues/rock - creating ambiguity. Common Practice for centuries was relying on the V-I cadence...to me rock relies a bit more on going the opposite direction on the circle of fifths, and IV-I becomes more important player in cadences.

Just as in Bach's time it was common to "borrow" from the Dominant key (the fifth) and introduce the V of V (in the key of C this would be a D major triad), blues and rock tend to borrow from the sub-dominant (the IV chord), and create what some call the IV of IV. In C this is a Bb triad, and is more frequently called the bVII. Substituting a bVII for the V in a common I-IV-V leads to A LOT of tunes...

For an example of this with a Rick connection, let's look a Hush by Deep Purple. It's clearly in C, but since it's a C7 we already have the influence of the sub-dominant creeping in (the Bb note in the C7 can be considered to be "borrowed" from the key of F). The "na-na na na..." part goes to Ab - Eb - Bb - F...in classical theory this was an abomination of sorts, but in blues/rock it falls into our ears as just a jump across the circle of fifths (backwards, so circle of fourths if you want to call it that), and then a sequential dropping of the chord by fourths...layering the "IV of IV" notation it cen look kind of convoluted...using subscripts on IV looks too mathematical for most. Looking at in terms of the circle of fifth makes (to me) the most sense. Using "0" as the root, and "-1" a movement by fourth from the root, and "+1" a movement of a fifth, we can see the progression in "Hush" as:

(0)7......(-4) - (-3) - (-2) - (-1) - (0)7

How would I notate it for my guitarist?

bVI - bIII - bVII - IV

If he could deal with "Nashville" notation. So in the end I just write out the chords, and hope the theory lessons sink in somewhat. Over the last 8 years he's absorbed some. I guess starting on piano at age 3 1/2 warps your perception of music!

rickfan60 · Post by **rickfan60** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 4:29 am

Aren't blues progressions ususally i, iv, v and not I, IV, V? That is, aren't blues tunes usually in minor keys? In that case, the raised 5th is really the 4th degree (C) of the relative major key (G).