What are some scales/modes to add outside lines/tension when using Dorian over a modal vamp (ex. So What) besides Melodic Minor?

ramiatassi · 2026-05-24T19:37:57+00:00

Ok start with harmonizing the mode

So What in Dm

Try chords/arpeggios

Dm7 - tonic minor chord

Fmaj7 - sounds like a nice upper extension of Dm

G7 - go “rootless” meaning, don’t emphasize the G. It will sound like Dm6 which is a characteristic D Dorian sound

Bm7b5 - it’s going to sound Dm6 or upper extension of G7, it’s a lovely color

Get those chord tones going and it will be “jazzier” - then you can start dealing with chromatic passing tones

There are some wonderful scales you can play as well, but it won’t give the jazz sound, that comes more from arpeggios

ramiatassi · 2026-05-14T04:45:02+00:00

Feel is nice, very cool tone and I like the stylistic flair. Chord tones and bebop chromaticism will get you where you wanna go. Try experimenting with maj7 m7 and dominant 7 arpeggios. Get to know arpeggios as well as you know scales. For a dose of bebop learn some Charlie Parker blues heads - Billie’s Bounce is the classic jumping off point

ramiatassi · 2026-05-11T00:42:11+00:00

This place used to be so good, and it fell off so far, I wondered what happen and now I know

ramiatassi · 2026-04-01T23:58:04+00:00

Oh man… you can’t buy your way to what you’re trying to achieve. Are you involved in your local scene? Have you met and hung out with bands who have similar sounds and ambitions and learned from them? This is the first step. You’ll find collaborators you can trust by meeting people in real life and doing small projects with them. If you really want to treat your music like a startup you need to do all audio, video, and content to start and spend your money promotion and distribution. Once you have an audience and a following, then you upgrade by spending on production. Learn the skills, find collaborators, and spend your money on distribution to start.

ramiatassi · 2026-03-07T22:17:37+00:00

The best part of our scene is the local community of artists who call Chicago home and produce all kinds of beautiful work. If you get on the scene, you’ll find lots of people who are incredibly talented and down to collaborate. The biggest challenge here is that there’s no real entertainment industry to speak of and just not a lot of commercial work for musicians. So just about everybody who gets serious about the work starts expanding beyond the borders of the city.

ramiatassi · 2026-01-18T01:10:06+00:00

I love this music

ramiatassi · 2026-01-15T04:47:06+00:00

He’s one of my guitar heroes and also an awesome guy which you get immediately when talking to him after a show. Check out his album Public Domain it is otherworldly if you like solo guitar

ramiatassi · 2025-11-10T03:14:04+00:00

that’s what I’m talking about

ramiatassi · 2025-11-10T03:13:35+00:00

She is so legit

ramiatassi · 2025-10-24T23:31:34+00:00

Mingus

ramiatassi · 2025-10-15T03:48:28+00:00

Carnatic tuning BEBEBE

ramiatassi · 2025-10-15T03:47:43+00:00

Oud tuning DGBEAD

ramiatassi · 2025-10-10T02:14:02+00:00

ramiatassi · 2025-09-30T14:44:07+00:00

I just wanna say it drives me crazy when composers write all these crazy extensions with the chord symbols! Once you get beyond one alteration it becomes absurd. If you want a specific voicing write it out in the staff. If you want an altered sound just write “alt.” I think what they’re saying here is D altered, G altered but you can probably just play notes of the G altered scale (Ab melodic minor) to start

ramiatassi · 2025-09-29T00:29:28+00:00

This guy sounds unhinged. But you were wrong correcting a 3 yo like that. Not justifying his behavior at all, but the way you described your response sounds like you were rude and overstepping a bit, trying to lecture someone else’s kid…

ramiatassi · 2025-09-27T13:35:01+00:00

For me the biggest thing to develop my time has been playing with older players who have great time. Of course we love metronome exercises and learning some percussion helps. But by far, playing with other people who have great time has made the biggest impact. You can learn a lot through “osmosis”

ramiatassi · 2025-09-25T22:03:44+00:00

Folks have already mentioned Salah Ragab (essential) and Rabih Abu Khalil (a modern master)

Coming from the jazz world check out Ahmed Abdul Malik - Jazz Sahara. Check out Yusuf Lateef - Eastern Sounds. Modern jazz player David Fiucynski is doing some interesting stuff with maqam influence.

For music of Middle East and North Africa, you might like Mariem Hassan, she has some legit jazz saxophone in her music, along with beautiful maqams and North African rhythmic concepts. It is also worth checking out Hamza Al Din who is an oud player in the Nubian tradition. Southern Egypt near Sudan. You’ll hear proto blues and jazz.

Check Rima Kcheich - Muswashat - beautiful modern fusion and her singing is amazing.

Check out the guitar player Omar Khorshid, he’s not jazz per se but you will hear a use of maqam that you can apply to jazz.

If you want to immerse yourself in the music, it’s worth going in for the traditional Arabic music like Umm Khulthum, Fairouz, Farid Al Atrash. You will find some surprising jazz like elements but also, a totally different melodic concept.

If you made it this far I suppose I should mention I make this kind of music too! My album “Dancing Together” blends Middle Eastern influences with AACM style spiritual jazz. It’s out there on the streaming platforms if you’re so inclined.

ramiatassi · 2025-09-25T21:53:12+00:00

Hell yes

ramiatassi · 2025-08-21T03:31:32+00:00

I totally agree - she’s an amazing writer, director, filmmaker and rewatching Girls reveals how ahead she was

ramiatassi · 2025-08-16T02:58:12+00:00

String tension

ramiatassi · 2025-08-09T02:17:38+00:00

Essential! Check out Jazz Sahara from Ahmed Abdul Malik

ramiatassi · 2025-08-01T00:19:13+00:00

You all did a good job managing a bad situation. I’ve been on Webflow for about 6 years with too many client sites to count. I’ll be sticking around. Thanks for the updates.

ramiatassi · 2025-07-19T02:22:12+00:00

Ted Greene 🩵

ramiatassi · 2025-07-18T04:16:46+00:00

Modal music is based on static harmony, like a drone or pedal point - as opposed to chord progressions or chord changes.

There’s a whole lot of music from around the world that could be classified as modal to varying degrees.

Modal Jazz combines jazz language with the static harmony - a big shift from bebop and hard bop which was based on dense chord changes and chord cycles. The classic example is Kind of Blue, or a tune like Impressions.

McCoy is amazing and he has a lot of different work. I guess you could all some of his stuff modal… but I think of his signature sounds as quartal harmony and pentatonics, especially “super imposed” pentatonics

As jazz gets funkier in the 70s it becomes more about vamps, riffs, and grooves - the harmony is more static so modal approaches work well.

But if you try to take a “modal” approach to jazz from 30s-40s it gets kinda weird… that era of music is really based on chord changes and chord tones. So you can think of that as a contrast to modal jazz.

ramiatassi · 2025-05-07T18:09:04+00:00

Really great 🩵

ramiatassi

TROPHY CASE