mode: C blues — C D Eb F# G Bb C
melody: d r (ri) m f s l (li) ta t d’ (<— this is a bit much, I know)
form: AA’A’’A’’’
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 4|4
other recordings:
Loggins & Messina, C blues
Emmylou Harris, Bb blues
John Prine, B blues
There are times when no one is playing the flat seven in the tonic. There are many times where we have B natural and E natural. Such is the variety and changing nature of the blues. We like to have pat formulas, like the one listed under “mode” (which I list for improvisation purposes), but the truth of the matter is more apparent in the messiness of what is listed under “melody.” Scales are very artificial constructs, though they occasionally appear “verbatim” in songs (“Joy to the World” comes to mind…). The true sense of a scale/mode/tonality/style comes in how it actually ends up being used. A real education is to be had in slowing down this track and trying to imitate Berry’s delivery as closely as possible, whether you are singing or playing an instrument.
This a longer version — twice as long, to be exact — of the counterpoise inversion.
mode: C blues — C D Eb F# G Bb C
melody: S L TA d r (ri) m
form: ABA’B’
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 4|4
other recordings:
James Booker, C
Johnny Rivers, C
Phoebe Snow, D
The blues. Possibly the most important musical development in the past 150 years. It has certainly become the predominant sound-world of music making today.
In the blues, we have a situation where the notes of the melody are not fully represented in the harmonies — in fact, they clash, but in a way that somehow sounds right. So have a C major chord with a flat seventh degree, like a dominant chord, except it’s clearly the tonic — when naming the chord we still say “C dominant 7” anyway. In the blues scale, there is no E natural for the C major chord; there is no B natural for the G major chord (with the flat seventh degree, this time functioning more like a dominant).
This is where chord nomenclature starts to go horribly wrong. Part of the issue is that there is only so much you can fight centuries of habit. These names were already available and so people just used them, even though “dominant” stopped meaning what it was originally supposed to mean. Much in the same way that we use “octave” — which, yes, way, way back in Greek antiquity was separated by eight (uneven) steps — even though we now separate the octave into twelve steps (dodecatave is a bit unwieldy…). Think about the last four months of the year and how the number changed, but not the name. Old habits die hard.
In modern times, it has become important to separate “dominant, the chord function” from “dominant, the chord flavor.” I wish it were easier and Tagg’s new terminology helps a lot, but has not spread to the point of standardization. It’s not that traditional Euroclassical concepts of harmonic function need to be thrown out — they actually still have good use in musics that have roots in both European and African musics (basically, most “popular” styles that have come out of the Americas since colonialism and slavery), but they most definitely need to be enhanced and modified, just as they have been throughout its history. We do not analyze Josquin like we analyze Bach, we do not analyze Philip Glass like we analyze Mahler. But as each composer pushed the boundaries of what was considered musically acceptable in Classical music, the theory expanded to include those examples. While there are definitely conservative strongholds in some areas of academia who feel music that is not purely from the Euroclassical tradition is not worth studying, for every one of those there are progressive strongholds expanding the canon. In this case, more is more.
Now. All that said, the melody to this song has a lot of slides and more speech-like pitches (as we heard in Life During Wartime, for example), which is a hallmark of the blues style. I hear this song as using mostly E natural — not a blue note — when C7 is in play.
In terms of form, this is a less common 8-bar blues, as opposed to the usual 12. But isn’t that what rock ’n’ roll was supposed to be? Straight to the point. Short and punchy.
Start Wearing Purple (2004)
Gogol Bordello
Gypsy Punk, New York/Ukraine
key: A minor
Euroclassical function names: tonic dominantTagg: tonic counterpoiseRiemann: t D or D7scale degrees: i V or V7chord names: Am E or E7
*Ukulele does not have E in open position. It only has E7.
chorus:
Am E
|////|////|////|////|
E A
|////|////|////|////|
verse:
Am E
|////|////|////|////|
E Am
|////|////|////|
mode: A minor — A B C D E F (F#) G (G#) A
melody: l t d r (ri) m f l’ t’ d’ r’
form: chorus — AB; verse — AB’;
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 4|4
This is, well, an unusual song. I don’t think the under-12 set would relate to it much, but I think it’s pretty rad (full disclosure: I am not under 12.).
In the chorus, we have our old new-friend, the counterpoise inversion. In the verse, we have a counterpoise sandwich, but the crusts are cut off of the second slice of bread, so to speak. Uneven phrasing is not so common anymore, but it does crop up from time to time (cf. Little Bird).
Euroclassical function names: tonic dominantTagg: tonic counterpoiseRiemann: t D or D7scale degrees: i V or V7chord names: Am E or E7
*Ukulele does not have E in open position. It only has E7.
Am E Am
|:/ / / / :|
mode: A minor — A B C D E F (F#) G (G#) A
melody: l t d r m si l’
form: round/canon — AA’BC
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 4|4, 2|2, 2|4
other recordings:
Esther Steward, E minor (paired with “Rose, Rose”)
Mark Gilston, E minor (instrumental)
Some people perform this with si, the raised seventh scale degree, and some perform it with so. If the latter, then this becomes a song with a minor v instead of a true dominant. This, of course, is a matter of taste. We will explore songs that use i and v, but not right now.
Like “Canoe Song,” this is a canon or round and actually has the same chord progression, just in a different transposition.
This is also one of those songs I know from singing in choirs and being a music reader. I could not find any recordings in the key I usually teach it in, most likely because I decided to transpose it to fit my “I want two songs in each key” needs. I found recordings that were a) too long, because no one needs to hear this for over three minutes, and/or b) sung in an over-emotional, tragic, lots of vocal slides way, and I feel this should be sung in a mostly clean, Early Music way. I guess I am picky.
San Toki (????)
folk, Korea
Elizabeth Mitchell
key: A major
Euroclassical function names: tonic dominantTagg: tonic counterpoiseRiemann: T D or D7scale degrees: I V or V7chord names: A E or E7
*Ukulele does not have E in open position. It only has E7.
A E A
|:////|////|////|////:|
mode: A major/ionian — A B C# D E F# G# A
melody: drmfsd’
form: AB
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 4|4
other recordings:
The Chinkees, E
Kyung Hun, G (performed with a drone)
Elena Moon Park, A
I try to use two examples for each key and chord pair. I will fall off the wagon, so to speak, because I simply haven’t been able to find more songs in certain keys. So there isn’t much here musically that we haven’t seen before, but it is always good to find songs in other languages. The Kyung Hun version is probably the most traditional (…aaaand the Chinkees, as you might suspect, is perhaps the least!), much of the world’s music being accompanied by drones as opposed to chords.
Life During Wartime (1979)
Talking Heads
New Wave, USA
key: A minor
Euroclassical function names: tonic dominantTagg: tonic counterpoiseRiemann: t D or D7scale degrees: i V or V7chord names: Am E or E7
*Ukulele does not have E in open position. It only has E7.
verse:
Am
|:////|////|////|////:| 4x
chorus:
E
|:////|////|////|////:| 2x (last time 4x)
mode: A minor — A B C D E F (F#) G (G#) A
melody: S l d r m si
form: verse — AAAA ; chorus — BBBB;
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 4|4
other recordings:
Staples Singers, C minor
In this song, we have much longer stretches of any one chord than we have previously seen. The chorus really sounds some other place to be (counterpoise) and doesn’t sound much like a traditional dominant. The length of each chord diminishes the sense of tonality a little and creates more of a feeling of two tonic poles, two places that are visited.
Because the melody is very close to simply talking, the pitch set is fairly small. One could argue that the chorus is really A’ — the melody is basically the same shape as the verse: mostly si-m to the verse’s d-l incantations.
Tenement Yard (1976)
Jacob Miller
Reggae, Jamaica
key: A major
Euroclassical function names: tonic dominantTagg: tonic counterpoiseRiemann: T D or D7scale degrees: I V or V7chord names: A E or E7
*Ukulele does not have E in open position. It only has E7.
A E
|:////|////:| loop
mode: A major/ionian — A B C# D E F# G# A
melody: Sdrmfs
form: call-and-response; AA’
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 4|4
other recordings:
The Jolly Boys, F
Here’s another controversial one. Unfortunately, the only reason I wouldn’t use this with children is “smoke him pipe in peace.” It’s easy to say, “Relax! It just references a pipe!” But I fear too many parents would make the very obvious connection between reggae, pipes, and weed and not be happy about condoning such things.
There is another fear, and perhaps this one is worse. The vocal delivery and slang that makes this song so enjoyable to sing would probably just be perceived as ridiculous nonsense by most kids, thereby missing the really important part of the song: the message. The police, and therefore, the government won’t leave a regular joe in peace (i.e., there are worse things than smoking a pipe, weed or no…). This is always a problem to be vigilant for. And that’s why I keep going back and forth about whether I green-list this song for teaching.
In somewhat less controversial areas, this is one of our few examples in which the whole song is a tonic-dominant shuttle. In fact, it’s our first whole-song shuttle! I hinted at them in the very first post, but did not go into detail. As we shall see in future posts, reggae is chock full of shuttles, but usually tonic-subdominant and occasionally tonic-supertonic. Let’s see what Mr. Tagg has to say about shuttles, since he made up the term. Shuttles are made of:
two chords, which have
equal duration (and therefore importance), but
neither is longer than what is perceived as “the extended present” — meaning, in musical terms, no longer than a phrase, and
repeated in this way at least twice
I am not much of a reggae fan, but when soliciting ideas from friends for two-chords songs, one of my comrades-in-klezmer told me when it comes to two-chords, reggae is where it’s at. And boy howdy, was he right! I’ve found a bunch of songs, much like this one, that are very simple and very powerful.
Fidel Castro (1959)
Lord Invader
Calypso, Trinidad
key: F minor
Euroclassical function names: tonic dominantTagg: tonic counterpoiseRiemann: t D or D7scale degrees: i V or V7chord names: Fm C or C7
Fm C
|////|////|////|////|
C Fm
|////|////|////|////|
mode: F minor — F G Ab Bb C Db (D) Eb (E) F
melody: SI l t d r m f l’
form: call & response; ABA’C
meter: duple
suggested time signature: 2|2, 4|4
Smithsonian Folkways decided to put this song on a recording of “children’s songs.” I am still a bit baffled as to why, but I use this myself in teaching, all the while hoping someone does not take issue with it. Perhaps the good people at Smithsonian also felt its two-chordedness and repeated melody made it easy to play and sing. Also: counterpoise inversion. But in all seriousness, we as teachers do need to choose our controversies wisely. The lyrics start off sounding almost pro-Castro. As the lyrics go on, it sounds less pro-Castro. It’s always worth creating space for a good, productive discussion about highly controversial people like Castro. Teaching in an international setting like I do, you are going to encounter people on all sides of the argument. A song like this one can be a center around which the discussion works: Who is Castro? Why would a Trinidadian write this song? At that point in history? Why would Lord Invader choose the form that he did for his lyrics? What are the lyrics saying? What are they implying?
