Glossary of Jazz Terms

Technique: the ability of instrumental and vocal musicians to exert optimal control of their instruments or vocal cords in order to produce the precise musical effects they desire. Improving one's technique generally entails practicing exercises that improve one's muscular sensitivity and agility.

Tenor: The voice above the bass, often that played by the thumb of the left hand. Not a Jazz term.

Tetrachord: A four-note portion of a scale. For example, the diminished scale is composed of two tetrachords with identical interval constructions.

Third stream: A term coined by Gunther Schuller in the early 50s. The supposed confluence of Jazz and classical music.

Thumb line: The Jazz term for 'tenor' (q.v.). A line played by the pianist's left thumb.

Timbre: [pronounced tamb'r] Tone quality, characteristic instrumental sound. Not especially a Jazz term, but note that timbre is one of the basic dimensions of music along with rhythm, melody and harmony. Students sometimes have trouble developing a real Jazz timbre. For the piano the word 'touch' is more usual.

Time feel: (1) The subjective impression of which time unit constitutes one beat and how long a bar is. May or may not correspond to the written music. (2) The emotional quality of the rhythm.

Tonic minor: A scale / chord with a minor 3rd and a major 6th and 7th, generally used for the tonic or home chord in minor keys. Distinguished from other minor chord functions.

Top: The beginning point of each chorus, the first beat of the first measure.

Trad: (Traditional) the Jazz style of the of the early 1900s, known retrospectively as Dixieland. Used a marked 4/4 beat, triadic harmony, 'sectional' tunes (with numerous separate sections), simultaneous improvisation, largely I - IV - V type harmonies, etc.

Trading 4s (or 8s, 2s): A form of discontinuous drum solo in which 4 measure sections are alternately played solo by the drummer, and by the band with another soloist (who goes first). The latter can be one particular soloist throughout, or it can cycle through the different instruments. Also, two different instrumental soloists can trade 4s with each other, such as the trumpet and the sax. This is called a chase. Trading 4s usually goes on for one or two choruses.

Transpose: To write or perform (a composition) in a key other than the original or given key, most often to accomodate the range of a vocalist or another instrument.

Triad: (1) Concretely, a chord of three notes - the root, 3rd and 5th - played together in close position in one of the three inversions. (2) Abstractly, a chord with a root, 3rd and 5th but no 7th. Might be decorated with the 6th or 9th. Triadic harmony is characteristic of Dixieland and rock.

Tritone: The interval of three whole steps, i.e. an augmented 4th or diminished 5th.

Tritone substitution: See 'Substitution'. The substitution of a chord whose root is a tritone away. In turnarounds it's common to do this for any of the chords.

Tune: A single Jazz composition or Jazz performance, a piece. The word 'song' is frowned on.

Turnaround: A sequence of chords, or the portion of a tune that they occupy, that forms a cadence at the end of a section of a tune, definitively establishes the tonic key and leads back to the opening chord of the next section, or to the top. Typically the turnaround chords are I - VI - ii - V, with half a measure apiece. With possible substitutions and alterations, the variations are infinite. There are also entirely different progressions possible. If the opening chord of the next section is not a I chord, the turnaround must be suitable. Learning to negotiate turnarounds is essential to making a coherent solo. It's often effective to play a phrase that starts partway through a turnaround and continues past the beginning of the next section.

Up: In a fast tempo.

Upper structure: A triad used in the upper register over a chord of a different root, such as an A major triad over a C7 chord. From the standpoint of C7, the A triad consists of the 13th, the flat 9th, and the 3rd; at the same time it has the unified sound of a major triad.

Vamp: A simple section like a riff, designed to be repeated as often as necessary, especially one at the beginning of a tune. Also a constantly repeated bass line over which a solo is played.

Verse: In many older standard songs, an introductory section, often rubato, that leads up to the 'chorus' or main strain, which is the tune as generally recognized. Jazz players (and fakebooks) usually omit the verse, though singers like to use them.

Voice: Any one of the melodic lines formed by the flow of the music. The bass line and the melody form the two outer voices, and the tones in between may, to a greater or lesser extent, form melodic lines of their own called inner voices.

Voice-leading: Getting the succession of harmonic tones in the inner voices to form coherent melodic lines of their own, or, at least, to move in a smooth, mainly step-wise motion. The perfection of voice-leading was in Bach, where 4 or more independent melodies can mesh to form perfect chordal harmony.

Voicing: A particular arrangement of the notes of a chord in which chosen harmonies color the tone.

Walk: In bass playing, to play mostly one note per beat, making a smooth, continuous quarter-note line. A fulfillment of the time-keeping function of bass playing, which many bass players have transcended since around 1960. The pianist can also walk with his left hand.

West Coast School: A much criticized label for the 'Cool' style (q.v.) as it was taken up in California in the early 50s by mostly white players, like Dave Brubeck, Gerry Mulligan, Chet Baker and many lesser figures like pianist Russ Freeman. In addition to the typical features of cool Jazz, the style experimented with 'classical' instruments and complex counterpoint.

Whole-tone: A 6-note scale, of which there are two, made up entirely of whole-step intervals, or the harmonies derived from it. Used by Debussy and suggestive of 'impressionism'. In Jazz, associated with Thelonious Monk and explored in a number of hard bop originals.

Woodshed: To practice diligently. Also 'shed'.

X: 'Time'. Thus ' 4X ' on a chart means '[play] four times'