Wednesday, February 1, 2012

The 30 Day Blues

This is the first of 30 blues heads I will be writing this month.  I decided to "start simple", using the Sonny Rollins tune, "Sonny Moon For Two" as my model.  "Sonny Moon..." consists of 3 identical phrases, comprised of a descending blues scale (minus the #4 scale degree).  At first I tried doing the opposite by creating three ascending blues scale phrases.  It worked, but in the end I modified my line a bit so that my first phrase ended on E flat instead of B flat.  The E flat anticipates measures 2, 6, and 10, and provided some more harmonic flexibility in these measures. I included some optional rhythm section hits in measure 4.  Here it is:





One down, 29 to go.

4 comments:

  1. Earl, your math is off. 29 days this month.

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  2. Brandt, in my previous post I clarified "for the month of February plus March 1st". I thought you knew that I NEVER make mistakes. :)

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  3. Ahh. I must read and review.

    I've always been intrigued by February 29. Birthday of one of both of our former students, Mark Obolewicz.

    I'm going to suggest you make a simple eBook of the .pdf copies of each song.

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    Replies
    1. I had forgotten that Mark's BD was on Feb. 29th. Does that make him 6 years old?

      Good suggestion. When the 30 songs are completed I will compile them on my web site in downloadable PDF format.

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