Better sax solos with diminished patterns

 Have you ever wondered how modern jazz players like Michael Brecker, Bob Berg, or Chris Potter get such a contemporary sound out of their diminished scales?

In this lesson you’ll learn how to play better sax solos with diminished patterns. So let’s get into it.

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The Diminished Scale

The diminished scale is a really popular sound in jazz improvisation. And for those of you who haven’t come across this scale before, it’s basically an eight-note scale that is built up of: tone, semitone, tone, semitone, tone, semitone. 

 

And there are two versions of it. There’s one that’s called the Whole Half  because it starts on the first note with a whole tone. And then if you start on the second note, you’ll be starting semitone, tone, semitone, tone. And that’s called the Half Whole Diminished. But ultimately they’re exactly the same structure. 

Now these became really popular in the post-bop period. So players like Sonny Stitt, John Coltrane and then Phil Woods use this scale a lot in their improvisation. But they always use it in a certain way.

Now, because it’s got this symmetry to it- these tones and semitones – you can create really melodic, and beautiful patterns out of it that repeat and repeat and repeat. And that’s really nice to hear and really melodic. 

Examples of diminished patterns

Here’s just a small selection of those kinds of patterns. 

This means that it’s really identifiable. As soon as you hear it, once you know it’s the sound of the diminished scale.

Now, if you move forward to the modern players like Brecker, Bob Berg and Chris Potter, then you’ll notice that this sound is really well masked. Now, they’re using this scale all the time too, but it’s really hard to identify. 

So in this lesson, we’re going to look at four key ways that these players change the diminished scale to make it sound much more edgy, vertical and modern. 

More learning with Sax School Online

By the way, if you’re unsure about the diminished scale in general and want to know how to play it better on saxophone, there’s an entire course based on the diminished scale and how to get it into your playing inside Sax School Online. Including:

• how to play the actual diminished scale
• all the different variants of it
• how to start improvising to play better sax solos with diminished scales.

You can get access with our 14 day free trial,  so check out that lesson. 

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Method 1: Break up those intervals

So let’s look at how to create better sax solos with diminished patterns that sound more modern.

Method one is to break up those intervals. So instead of constantly getting the sound of tones and semitones repeating after each other, we’d like to break this up and get some different intervals within that structure.

And the most simple way of doing this is to actually leave out some of the notes. So we could leave out four of the notes and just end up with four left, or we could leave out three of the notes. 

And that’s what we’re going to do today. We’re going to leave out three of the notes. So eight minus three leaves five. And what we’ll end up with is a pentatonic based on the notes of a diminished scale.

So in this first example, we’re going to take a Bb diminished scale. Now remember that this could be called Bb, C#, E, or G whole half diminished scale, but it could also be called C#,Eb, F#, or A half whole diminished scale. They’re exactly the same structures.

And remember, there are only three of these structures to learn across your entire saxophone. 

So just for the purposes of this lesson, we’re just going to call it the Bb diminished scale. 

Okay, so we’re going to just leave out some notes. So let’s leave out the second note C. Let’s leave out the F# and let’s leave out the A. So we’ve left out three notes. We’ve got five notes remaining. Let’s see what that sounds like. 

Now you can hear that just playing that out of context, it has a really different sound to the basic up and down diminished scale, and these really pretty symmetrical patterns that kind of stick to the intervals that are built within it.

So let’s hear it in the context. I’m just going to play it over the dominant chord in a 2 5 1 progression. 

You can hear that it gives a really specific, unique, and quite modern sound. 

Another example of this method

Now let’s try a different one. Let’s leave out the C, the Bb, and the G this time, and we’ll get a slightly different structure. Let’s see what that sounds like.

Once again, you can hear that it really changes the sound of the notes of the diminished scale, just leaving those notes out. And it gives a completely different flavour to the previous one we did. Let’s hear this one in context as well, over that II V I.  

Method 2: Add some extra notes

In method one, we left out some notes. In method two, we’re going to add some extra notes.

So we’re going to add an extra chromatic note between the notes of one of those tones.

And this is a really effective way of changing the sound as well.

So in this example, I’m going to take every tone within the diminished scale, and I’m going to add a passing note between them. Let’s see what that sounds like. 

Now, even though that idea is based on the diminished scale, you’ll notice as I play it through my range, I’ve actually played every single note of the chromatic scale. So it kind of changes the vibe of the sound and helps mask that regulated tone, semitone progression that we get through the scale. 

A different version of passing notes

Let’s try a slightly different version of that. This time I’m still going to put the chromatic passing note between one of the tones, except I’m going to connect it to a little bit more of the scale. And this actually sounds a little bit like the beginning of a bebop scale, if you’ve ever come across those.

Let’s just see what that sounds like. 

You can hear, once again, that changes the character of the diminished scale.

Now let’s hear both of those in the context of a 2 5 1. 

More resources

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Method 3: Using disruptive shapes

Now both those methods involved adding or subtracting notes from the actual structure of the diminished scale. But what if we just want to use the diminished scale as it is, without adding or taking anything away?

Well, a lot of these patterns repeat every minor third. That’s the structure of the diminished scale, and a diminished arpeggio for that matter.

Now, what if we were to take shapes from the scale that were so jarring when we moved them around in the usual minor third interval movements that a lot of these patterns are created from, that actual individual melodic cells were so abstract and jarring to our ears that we barely recognize the sound of the diminished scale. You’ll find particularly Brecker using this idea all the time.

We’re going to look at two versions again of this.

Now, the first one’s really interesting. Basically, we’re going to find the interval of a fifth, which occurs four times within the diminished scale. So let’s say an A to an E. And then inside that interval is the interval of a fourth – the Bb and the Eb.

So you’ve kind of got a fifth with the fourth on the inside of it.

Now, another way of looking at the notes is that this creates, we’ve actually ended up with two tritones, a semitone apart (a tritone is an interval made of 3 whole tones or 6 semitones). In serial music, this is called a Z-cell, which I imagine Brecker may have used to discover this shape in the diminished scale.

Brecker did a lot of study of composition and probably came across this idea and realized it was a cell within the diminished scale.

So we’re going to take this Z cell idea and we’re just going to move it in minor thirds. Bear in mind, when I get to the end of this little pattern, I will have played all the notes of the diminished scale as part of this series. 

So you can hear with that, that it makes your mind go absolutely crazy. It sounds so strange and angular when you play it. Yet, I’m just using the notes of the diminished scale.

So let’s hear that in context over a 2 5 1. 

Now, there are some great voicings that piano players use from the diminished scale as well. Voicings refers to the placement of notes within a chord structure. This next example is one of those voicings, just turned into a melodic cell idea.

So, if we were to start within our Bb diminished scale on the Eb, you’ll notice that below that we’ve got a minor third – the note C.

Below that, there’s a fourth -the note G.

 And below that is another minor third – the note E.

So the outside areas of this shape create a major 7 shape, which is quite a jarring sound once again.

And also you’ll notice if you add these notes together, you’ve got a C major triad and a C minor triad within those notes. So it’s quite a confusing aural shape. It’s both major and minor. It’s got some really sharp intervals in there.

So let’s see what this one sounds like. 

And now let’s hear what this sounds like over a 2 5 1 in context. 

Method 4: Mix the 3 methods

If you want to make your diminished lines sound even more contemporary using these three methods, you can mix together the three methods in one melodic line.

Or, you can alternate the direction of your melodic cells. 

So you could have one idea for one of these methods going upwards, followed by a different method from one of these ideas going downwards. And that creates real tension, and really helps to once again, hide the traditional sound of the diminished scale within your lines.

So let’s have a listen to a couple of examples of that. 

Try this for better sax solos from diminished patterns

So definitely try out these techniques to play better sax solos from diminished scales.

• Leave some notes out
• adding some chromatic passing where those tones are,
• finding some really angular shapes within the diminished scale.
• Combining these methods together.

Which one was your favourite sound out of the selection we looked at today?

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