[Dixielandjazz] Flatted Fifths: the rest of the story

[Don Mopsick]

Rob McCallum writes:

<<Okay, why are so many people simply against flatted fifths?????  Is it
that
they have come to represent something different, or do people just hate the
way the interval sounds?  Are there any traditionalists that regularly
utilize flatted fifths or are they simply considered wrong notes to be
avoided at all costs??>>

There is nothing inherently wrong with the flatted fifth as an interval,
Others have pointed out that it is an essential element of modern music used
by many pre-war composers and improvisers such as Bix Beiderbecke, George
Gershwin, etc. It's the way that it's used in "modern jazz" (bebop) that
makes it one of the harmonic devices to be avoided by those of us who have
made it our life's work to preserve the authentic pre-war jazz sound. I am
referring specifically to the tritone substitution. (The tritone is another
name for a flatted fifth, known in the Middle Ages as the interval of
Satan).

For example, in the first half of "Sweet Georgia Brown," the original
changes (in the key of F) are:

D7 /// | //// | //// | //// | G7 /// | //// | //// | //// | C7 /// | //// |
//// | //// | F /// | // C7 / | F /// | A7 /// || etc. or something like
that.

The typical bebopper would play:

D7 /// | //// | A-7 /// | D7 / Ab7b5 / | G7 /// | etc.

The root of the Ab7b5 substitute is a tritone away from D.

The tritone sub is the most obvious, glaring harmonic difference in harmonic
treatment between pre and post war jazz. There are others that are more
subtle--note in the example above the use of the minor 7th (A-7 to D7),
creating a 2-5-1 where the original was 5-1. Here's another: Boppers
routinely substitute the b7 dominant for the 4 minor, but the prewar way of
doing it was freqently to play a half diminished on the 2, notated as 4
minor 6 with 2 in the bass. For example, in the 25th and 26th bars of
"Louisiana," the original was something like this (in the key of Ab):

Db /// | Db-6/Bb /// | Ab /// | F7 /// | etc.

The bopper plays:

Db maj 7 /// | Db-7 / Gb7 / | Ab /// | etc.

There are many other pre-war devices that boppers don't even bother with and
would consider "corny," such as the use of the flat-5 diminished as a
passing chord resolving to the dominant:

G7/D / Db dim / | G7/D /// |

My point: bebop is a STYLIZED form of jazz, especially in the sense that the
rich harmonic language that existed before WWII was glossed over, codified,
and judged by its acolytes to be "hip" and therefore superior. It's this
arrogant attitude that bothers me--not the "innovations" themselves pointed
out above, which I believe were first worked out by Dizzy Gillespie in the
early 40s. Discovering and playing the original changes to standard tunes is
like peeling back layers of paint and plaster from a beautiful 19th-century
building to reveal the richness of the original stonework underneath.

So, Rob: again (we have had this conversation before), bebop is NOT all
there is to jazz, and that's what we who play the old jazz are all about.
There are many, many other differences in basic approach, so many that one
can say that bop is not as close a cousin to authentic classic jazz as one
might think.  It's up to us as historians of the music to appreciate and
present the original sound in its purest possible form. The difference
amongst us here is how far that purity should be taken, and that's a matter
of taste.

My solution is to rest on one historical point, say around 1936 or so, and
approach the standards and hot jazz tunes the way a hot player of the day
would have--and there were certainly already substantial revisions by then
of earlier songs from the Tin Pan Alley days. Again, my point: in 1936 one
would NEVER hear the gratuitous tritone subs, 2-5-1's  that one hears now
coming from legions of today's dime-a-dozen, masturbating bebopping
"hipster" dorks.

mopo