THE

“ARTISTS”
TRANSCRIPTIONS
&
ANALYSIS
KENNY DORHAM
“Blue Spring”
“Falling in Love with Love”
“Shifting Down”

WOODY SHAW
“Blue Bossa”

RANDY BRECKER
“I Can’t Get Started”

TOM HARRELL
“Five”
“Blues”
 CHAPTER EIGHT

Kenny Dorham
[McKinley Howard Dorham]
1924-1972

I want to do a book on some of the musicians that I feel were bypassed…like Kenny
Dorham. Most people know Kenny during his whole life time never got the accolades and
never got the roses that he should have received for all that he gave us.
Jackie McLean

The “uncrowned trumpet king”

Art Blakey

Kenny Dorham was a musician’s musician. Universally admired and respected by his peers
and fellow trumpeters.
Mark Gardner

Kenny Dorham’s name is “virtually synonymous with ‘underrated’.”

Gary Giddins

The most ‘poetic” of trumpet players

Dan Morgenstern

Kenny Dorham remains a giant, belonging on any short list of trumpet immortals
Samuel Chell

Jazz masters, musicians and historians all agree that Kenny Dorham (KD) was
overwhelmingly underappreciated within jazz history. Critics and reviewers point out that
he was “Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro,
Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan. Kenny Dorham's abilities as a composer
and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day”.

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While a work on KD the composer or KD the historically important jazz trumpeter, would
have been appropriate I have been compelled to unearth yet another area on KD that
remains untapped, unexplored and unheralded. That is, KD the harmonic innovator. Most
attributes of his portfolio are well known; his intimate, original trumpet sound and
masterful bebop change playing abilities and his legendary composing contributions.
However, less mentioned is his ability to “turn on a dime” and exude muscular technical
facility and upper range utilization when desired. It is unusual that these qualities
mentioned are delivered by a trumpeter of intimate almost fragile sound. Take a listen to
some of the ridiculous up-tempo facility he exerts on “Just One of Those Things” with the
Max Roach Quintet 1957 or his upper register capacity on Horace Silver’s “The Preacher”
pasting a high G within his line (beginning of his 2nd chorus). Transcribing KD solos in my
youth was an integral part of my jazz education. He was my most important early model
for classic, bebop change playing abilities. Through a plethora of transcribing my ears
began to pick up appropriate bebop vocabulary and phraseology. I eventually began to
speak the “language” of bebop using arpeggios, select chromatics, appoggiaturas and most
importantly the concept and principles of constructing lines that reflect the chord of the
moment through the sounding of primary chord tones on beats one and three in 4/4. Most
of these cerebral lessons where picked up aurally through the transcribing of KD and
others.

The list of jazz trumpet titans in paragraph one are a who’s who in jazz trumpet history.
However, the manipulation of harmonic tension and release that KD was utilizing during
the late 1950’s and early 1960’s on select recordings, set him apart from his peers as an
important jazz trumpet harmonic innovator.

The following three KD transcriptions demonstrate a unique and remarkable ability to

manipulate consonance and dissonance with pin point timing and precision. Harmonic
innovations such as these were unique to jazz trumpeting of the 1950s.

Recordings and Selections:

Blue Spring (Riverside 1139)

Recorded in 1959
Blue Spring

“BLUE SPRING” – Recorded on Blue Spring the album, 1959 (Riverside 1139) Sidemen:

See transcription.

In example number one, a short three chorus 12 bar blues solo, we see the mind of a kind of
harmonic scientist as work. KD selects the same calculated moment in each chorus to
introduce his harmonic magic. All three choruses implement calculated dissonance in
measure four (G7) which resolves to a consonant chord tone on the down beat of bar five.
This is one of his favorite spots for tension release implementation on the blues.

Chorus #1

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The harmonic tension begins on beat four of measure three with a superimposed G#-7
arpeggio leading into to the fourth measure over the original G7. The G#-7 (dorian) is a II-
7 of C#7 which is a classic Tritone substitution for the original G7 found in a typical blues
fourth measure. KD descends in thirds down G#-7 dorian until beat three where he
introduces a couple beats of diatonicism in G7 which craftily resolves the entire experience
linearly by half step to the b7 (primary chord tone-consonance) with pin point precision on
the downbeat of the C7 in measure five. This all happens in a matter of seconds. It is
essential that the reader hear the original recording to fully take in this seamless fluid
tension and release moment. On a more visceral note, as a teenager, hearing these choice
harmonic moments literally took my breath away.

Chorus #2
The dissonance lasts for two beats in measure four this time. Notice how he begins to
outline a traditional D-7 on beat one and two (typical in bebop to approach V7’s by their
II-7s) then introduces the dissonance on beats three and four. Again G#-7 is the
superimposed temporary color which resolves by half-step to the primary chord tone of a
natural five this time of C7 on the downbeat.

Chorus #3
Finally we get a very pure tritone sub superimposed over the entire fourth bar of G7. A
short II-7 V7 in the form of G#-7 C#7 is clear outlined in measure four. This material is in
essence a perfect short II-7 to V7 in the key of F# Major. It even resolves to the primary
chord tone of a major third in F# on beat one of measure five by halfstep. This is part of
the beauty of dominant quality tritone subs; the 3’s and 7’s are the 7’s and 3’s of the
dominant chord a tritone away. For example if one superimposes the notes of F#7 or the II-
7 that would typically precede it (C#-7) over a C7 one taps into colorful extensions; b9, #9,
#11, and b13. These colorful extensions have the capacity to bring dissonance colors into
the mix. The degree of dissonance is partly continent on what the pianist or guitarist is
doing on the chord of the moment. Dominant chords are a favored chord quality to
introduce dissonance on, particularly if they resolve down a fifth to a root that functions as
a I (V7 to I).

Final thoughts:
Notice the seamless transition into the moments of dissonance in all three choruses and
equally seamless transition to consonance on the other side. All the final chord tone
resolutions (consonance) are by half step (strongest interval pull). The solo is highly
organic; blues drenched, utilizes tasteful repetitive motives that development, features his
unique interest in the use of extended triplets, and finally introduces orderly, calculated use
of tension release with the tritone substitution. Maximum excitement is finally introduced
in the finally chorus by introducing traditional bebop lines packaged in streams of
sixteenth notes.

One might attempt to make a case that perhaps he was “just” superimposing an altered
dominant scale over the moment for color (1, b9, #9, 3, #11, b13, b7). While I agree that the
majority of note choices fit with an altered dominant scale, the G#-7 is clearly outlined in

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arpeggio (chorus number one) and parent scale (chorus number three) usage. Also the
inclusion of the F#, which is leap to, really locks in the G#-7 minor superimposition.

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Coltrane Time (Blue Note CDP 7 84461 2)
Recorded in 1958 originally a Cecil Taylor recording entitled STERIO DRIVE
Issued as COLTRANE TIME in 1962
blues also known as Shifting Down” recorded four years later on Cecil Taylor recording
entitled Sterio Drive released on Blue Note as “Coltrane Time” in 1962,

Like Someone In Love

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Tension attributes:

1. Colorful Diatonic scale utilization on Dominant nomenclatures released by

chordtone time.
-Lydian Dominant

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 -Wholetone
-Altered Dominant (b9, #9, #11, b13)
-Diminished Dominant (b9, #9, #11, 13)
-Hybrid/Synthetic (combinations of the above scales)

1. Superimposing nomenclatures/tonal centers over existing nomenclatures.

-Tritone substitution

Tension Release Together:

Traditional Bebop
-one to four beats tension then release

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In the follow pentatonic examples notice the fluidity of pre and post pentatonic material
from the artists.

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