I've Got the World on a String, Melodic Analysis

Introduction to Melodic Analysis

Welcome to Jazz Piano Skills. I'm Dr. Bob Lawrence. It's time to discover, learn, and play jazz piano. Well, we're in week two of our study of I've Got the World on a String, which means it's time for melodic analysis. And you know, one of the biggest mistakes jazz students make is thinking that learning a tune means learning the chord changes. And yes, harmony is critically important. That's why we start with it. In fact, last week, during our harmonic analysis study of I Got the World on a String, we spent a great deal of time examining the form, chord movement, harmonic function, common progressions and voicings. Why? Well, because understanding the harmonic foundation of a tune is absolutely essential. But here's the reality harmony, listen carefully, harmony supports melody. And melody is the music. And you know what? That mindset changes everything. Because people do not walk away from a performance humming the chord changes or humming the chord voicings. They walk away humming the melody. The melody is what gives a tune its identity, its personality, and honestly, its emotional impact. Which means if your understanding of a tune stops with the harmony, then your understanding of the tune is incomplete. And this is why week two of every month is dedicated entirely to melodic analysis. Because we need to do much more than just the harmony. And we need to do much more than just simply playing the notes of the melody. We need to understand how the melody actually works. So this week with our melodic analysis of I've got the world on a string, we are going to, as always, we're going to transcribe the melody to the best of our abilities. We're going to dissect that melody into phrases. We're going to identify the entry points and destination points of those phrases, the target notes, if you will, and begin really paying attention to how melodic motion moves through the harmony. Because you know what? Melodies are not random. Just like improvisation is not random. Great melodies move intentionally. They travel somewhere. They resolve somewhere. They breathe rhythmically. And the more aware you become of that movement, the more musical your playing becomes. But as always, our melodic analysis does not stop there. Because another critical skill of study in any melody is learning how to present that melody in different musical settings. In other words, can you play a melody as a ballad? Can you play it with a bossa fill? Can you play it with a traditional swing groove? Because the melody should not feel rigid regardless of the setting you are playing it. In fact, it should feel natural within that setting. So today we we're gonna take a deep dive into the melody of I Got the World on a String and begin learning how to hear it, how to understand it, how to present it musically. And in order to have success doing that, we need to circle back around to something that should govern everything that we do when studying music, when practicing music, when playing music. And of course, I'm talking about the seven musical facts. And at jazz panel scales, these are not just ideas. They are they are actually the foundation for organizing our musical thought. And honestly, the more you study music, the more you begin to realize that everything, everything always comes back to these musical facts, to these musical truths. So let's review them. Fact number one, music is the production of sound and silence. And of course, sound being our primary sounds, major, dominant, minor, half diminished, and diminished. Fact number two, when sound is produced, it's produced two ways, harmonically and melodically. And fact number three, when sound is produced harmonically, we're playing chords, we're playing voicings, right? Harmonic shapes. Fact number four, when sound is produced melodically, we're playing scales, we're playing arpeggios, melodic shapes. Fact number five, when we play scales and arpeggioles, we can only move in one of two directions, right? Up or down, that's it. And fact number six, we decorate or we camouflage our scales and arpeggios with tension or chromaticism to enhance that motion. And then finally, fact number seven to make all of this interesting, musically expressive. Facts one through six, fact number seven, to make it all interesting. Guess what we do? We add rhythm. Now, here's why this matters so much. These seven musical facts simplify music. These seven musical facts organize music. And these seven musical facts help you stop thinking in scattered ideas and instead start thinking musically. Because here's another fact. Without this kind of clarity, practice becomes random. You jump from concept to concept to video to video, to tune to tune, without really ever understanding what's actually happening musically. I see it all the time. But when you understand these musical facts, everything starts connecting. Harmony makes sense, melody makes sense, improvisation makes sense, rhythm makes sense, and most importantly, most importantly, your practicing begins to make sense. Your practicing begins to have direction, which is exactly why melodic analysis is so vitally important, because melodies are not random collections of notes. They are melodic shapes moving directionally, moving rhythmically, through harmony. In other words, melodies perfectly illustrate the seven musical facts in action. And this is why these seven facts should absolutely govern everything that you do when studying and when practicing music. Every exercise, every tune, every phrase, every improvisational idea. Because if your practicing reflects musical truth, these seven musical facts, then your playing improves naturally. So today's gonna be a great day. We dive into the melodic analysis of I Got the World on a String, and we're gonna see these seven musical facts reinforced through everything we do today. So, but before before moving on, I want to take a moment to welcome all of you first-time listeners to Jazz Piano Skills. If you're new to the podcast, you're new to jazz piano skills, I want to welcome you and want to encourage you to become a jazz piano skills member, because everything we do here, the structure, the clarity, the organization is found within your Jazz Piano Skills membership. As a member, you have access to the complete weekly podcast episodes, right, including all the demonstrations and lesson content. The first half of every podcast episode is free for everyone to enjoy. The second half of every podcast episode with the demonstrations and lesson content are exploration of the downloadable educational podcast packets, the illustrations, the lead sheets, and the play-alongs, those are that's available for members. As a member, you also have access to a full library of courses that you can find at the Jazz Panel Skills website. Now, these courses are designed to be sequential, very practical, sound-based, uh, focusing on harmonic, melodic, and improvisation skills. Uh as a Jazz Panel Skills member, you also have, as I like to say, a reserved seat in the weekly masterclass that I host every Thursday evening, 8 p.m. Central Time. I know it's not the best time for everyone. However, as a member, you have access to all of the video archives. Every masterclass is recorded so you can watch at your convenience, and you can watch as often as you wish. As a jazz panel skills member, you also have access to our online Jazz Panel Skills community, which hosts a variety of educational forums available for discussions and questions and support. It's a fabulous community that you will want to be part of and you will certainly enjoy as well. And then finally, as a jazz pianel skills member, you have direct access to me for support whenever you need my guidance. So check it all out at jazzpianoskills.com and of course become a member. Once you get to the site, if you have any questions, please let me know. Do not hesitate to reach out to me. I'm happy to spend some time with you and answer any questions that you may have and help you in any way that I can. Everything at Jazz Piano Skills is designed really with one goal in mind to help you discover, learn, and play jazz piano in a very clear, structured, and meaningful way. Now, uh one other uh one other announcement. If you are already receiving the weekly Jazz Piano Skills blog, fantastic. If you are not, I encourage you to join the email list, which you can do easily at the Jazz Piano Skills homepage. Uh but every weekend I publish a written recap of the week's lesson designed to reinforce what we're learning and to help you stay organized and to keep you moving forward in your development. So again, this comes out every weekend. Make sure that you are part of the email list, and you can uh sign up very easily at the Jazz Piano Skills website on the homepage. All right, let's move on to the question of the week. And this week's question comes from Susan McGuinness, living in Atlanta, Georgia. And Susan asks, Dr. Bob, I can usually learn the notes of a melody easily using my ear and poking it out, as you like to say. That's right. But when I play it, it still sounds stiff and mechanical and not conversational, as you have stressed in various episodes. My question is rather simple. How in the world do I make a melody sound musical, conversational, and relaxed? Well, Susan, great question. We have dealt with this in the past, and you know what? It's it's honestly, it's got to be in the top five questions that I think every student uh wonders about. Every student is seeking the answer answer to. So it's a fantastic question, and honestly, I think it's one of the most important questions a musician can ask, to be to be honest with you. So, you know, because learning the notes of a melody, this is so important. Learning the notes of the melody, of a melody, is not the same thing as learning the melody. I'm gonna say that again. I don't want to make sure that's clear. Because learning the notes of a melody is not the same thing as learning the melody. And and that's where many players get stuck, right? They memorize the notes, but they never study how the melody actually moves. They they play note to note. It's like uh that's like reading one letter at a time. They play note to note instead of phrase to phrase, as we'll do here a little later with I've got the world on a string. So um when that happens, I guarantee you the melody is gonna sound very stiff, uh, this the melody is gonna sound very mathematical, the melody is gonna sound very mechanical. So let's let's try to simplify this the best we can. A melody becomes musical, expressive, relaxed, or conversational when you begin hearing it as a collection of phrases, and those phrases moving toward destination points, right? So when you begin hearing a melody like that as a collection of phrases, and within those phrases, destination points, wow, then you start to pick up on that every phrase begins somewhere, and every phrase travels somewhere, and every phrase resolves somewhere, right? So those destination points, entry points, destination points within the phrases, I like to call them target notes, are what what give the melody shape, it actually illuminates the tension and also the resolution. And of course, meaning. And once you begin hearing that within um the phrases, then the melody stops sounding like isolated notes and starts sounding like musical conversation because you're no longer reading one letter at a time, you're no longer playing one note at a time. But you know what? There's there's another layer to all of this as well, and that's rhythm. We have spent a lot of time talking about that in previous podcast episodes. Rhythm because the same melody, right, played with a ballad feel or a b bassa feel or a swinging feel becomes completely different music. And here's why, because rhythm gives the melody life, and depending on those grooves, depending on those temples, is how you're going to rhythmically approach that melody. So you should never practice melody really um as a static exercise. Melodies need to breathe, and as you mentioned, Susan, they need to be expressive and conversational. So they need to move, the conversation needs to move along. And this ties directly back to our seven musical facts. Melody is shape, melody is directional motion up or down, melody is rhythmic expression. And and the more aware you become of those realities, the more musical your playing becomes. So, Susan, uh here's what I want you to begin doing this week. Don't just memorize melodies. Study the phrases, just like we're gonna do today. Study the phrases of whatever tune that you happen to be working on. If you're working on I've got the whirl on a string, fantastic. If you're working on something on your own, wonderful. It doesn't matter, right? The process is gonna remain the same. So I want you to study the phrases, identify where the phrases are within the music, where they begin, where they end, where's where is the phrase going? Where how does it resolve? Practice shaping the melody, identifying or seeing the shape of the melody rhythmically as well, right? And experiment with different feels. So important. And again, we're going to be doing this today. Experiment with different feels. A ballad, I always like to do the traditional jazz feel uh grooves, right? A ballad groove, a basic groove, a swing groove. Um, because that's if you can be expressive within the various grooves, conversational, improvisational with the melodies, um, that's how your melodies become natural. That's how your melodies become musical. Not by not by playing more notes, um, and not certainly not by playing note to note, but by understanding how the notes move in phrases. And again, that's exactly what we're going to be exploring today with I've got the world on a string. So, Susan, great question. Uh, again, it's one of the top five questions I think uh that every jazz musician, every jazz student has and is looking for the answer to. And I hope that um I hope my answer provides some clarity for you. Um if you're a jazz piano skills member and you're following along and you're gonna be doing the melodic analysis with us today, then I think it's gonna be become even uh clearer for you, okay? So um anyway, again, great question. I hope that helped. If not, if more clarification is needed, please let me know. Okay, so today we are going to discover I've got the world on a string melodically. We are gonna learn the melody by ear. We're gonna transcribe it to the best of our abilities. We're gonna identify the phrases and the target notes within those phrases. And we are gonna play I've got the world on a string, supported by our voicings from our harmonic analysis last week. And we, of course, are going to explore that melody of I've Got the World on a String using three standard jazz treatments: a ballad, a basa, and a swing. So, as I always like to say, regardless of where you are in your jazz journey, a beginner, an intermediate player, an advanced player, or even if you are a seasoned and experienced professional, you're gonna find this Jazz Piano Skills Podcast lesson exploring I've got the world on a string to be very beneficial. Okay, so we go through this outline quickly every every week because it's so important. It's an outline of our approach to studying and learning to tune. And again, we approach it the same way here at Jazz Piano Skills. Genre makes no difference. I know we focus on Jazz standards, but if we were doing a rock tune, maybe we'll do that one day. A rock tune, a pop tune, a country tune, folk, RB, something, you know, outside the the jazz genre to kind of prove this point that we would go about learning that tune in the exact same way. Number one, always, regardless of genre, listen. Listen to as many uh performances of the tune as you possibly can. And I'm talking about from uh performances by professional musicians, amateur musicians, makes no difference. Uh vocalist, instrumentalist, pianist, anyone performing a tune that you are wanting to study, that you are wanting to learn, you should be checking out. But as you do your listening, you can then dive into a harmonic analysis as we do every single month here. We look at the form, the changes, the harmonic function of the changes, common harmonic movement of the changes. We then look at various ways to voice the chords using traditional block voicings and uh inversions. We look at traditional shell voicings, contemporary shell voicings, and of course two-handed structures. We then, as we're going to do to do today, we turn our attention to a melodic analysis, we transcribe the melody, identify phrases, target notes within the phrases, and we look at various treatments of that tune. And then finally, we uh dive into an improvisation development where we will look at melodic pathways, motif development, chord scale relationships, and of course the addition of uh chromaticism and tension as well. So, again, the the approach is the same. Listen, harmonic analysis, melodic analysis, improvisation development. Every single week we have a killer listening list that is put together for us by Lisa, uh does a fantastic job. Uh, and that list uh does exactly what I just mentioned uh a little while ago. Everyone from professional to amateur musicians, vocalist, instrumentalist, pianist, uh, to help us really dive into the tune that we are studying. So the educational agenda for today is as follows. Number one, we are going to listen to definitive recordings of I've Got the World on a String. Number two, we will transcribe the melody to the best of our ability of I've Got the World on a String. Number three, we are going to look at my suggested fingerings for this great jazz standard. And number four, we will identify the melodic phrases found within I've Got the World on a String as well as the target notes within those phrases. And number five, we will apply our voicings from last week, our harmonic analysis. We will apply those voicings to I've got the world on a string. And then we'll wrap everything up with exploring three standard treatments. Again, our classic ballad, basa, and swing groove. So if you are a jazz panel skills member, I want you to hit the pause button right now. I want you to take just a few minutes to access and download and print your podcast packets, the illustrations, the lead sheets, and the playlists. Again, your membership grants you access to this material, and you should have this material in your hands when uh listening to podcasts to get the most out of it. And of course, you should have this material sitting on your piano or music stand while practicing at home as well. So grab lead sheet one and let's dive in. Let's take a look at how we are going to approach transcribing the melody of I've got the world. Thank you for listening to Jazz Piano Skills. The remaining premium content of this episode is available to Jazz Piano Skills members at Jazz Piano Skills Podcast.com. Visit jazzpianoskills.com to learn more about membership privileges and become a Jazz Piano Skills member. Thank you.