Oriental Jazz Improvisation - Microtonality and Harmony

Oriental Jazz Improvisation - Microtonality and Harmony is a comprehensive comparative study that explores the incorporation of Turkish, Arabic, and North Indian scales and modes into jazz improvisation and modulation. The book includes a multitude of scales and modes from these music cultures, along with their transpositions. These scales and modes are essential for any musician interested in South-Western Asian or North Indian music. Besides, the book delves into numerous scales and modes from other cultures' folk music, such as Greek rebetiko, Bulgarian wedding music, or Jewish music, highlighting parallels and similarities among these diverse music traditions.

Each scale and mode is presented in its purest - microtonal - form, including the exact interval values in the particular tuning used in the classical Turkish, Arabic, or North Indian music tradition. Additionally, the basics of the respective music theories are imparted. Further, the genuine scales and modes are transcribed into the equal temperament and several practical techniques are shown how to apply them in a jazz context. Also, a variety of useful methods are demonstrated of how South-Eastern European Romani people and Jews use some of those scales and modes in improvisation. It further explores how scales, which may appear identical but exist under different names in various music cultures, are applied differently in these traditions. Scales that can date back to ancient Greece or even as far as Babylonia.

This book is going to make you neither a Turkish, Arabic, nor Indian musician; but it surely will broaden your musical vocabulary.