Giant Steps
John Coltrane and Tritone Substitutions
My latest two posts have been about music.
The first was about the tritone substitution. With this substitution, the root moves as far as possible—you could say it takes a giant step—but the notes in the chord move very little.
And speaking of giant steps, the second post was about the song Giant Steps. Although the chord changes are challenging to improvise over, there aren’t that many chords, and they follow a surprisingly simple pattern when you list them all.
Enjoy!
Brilliant connection between the tritone sub mechanic and the song title itself - the root taking a "giant step" while voice leading stays minimal is such an elegant paradox. What most people don't apreciate is that Coltrane's changes essentially create a symetrical division of the octave into major thirds, which is why the pattern looks so clean visually even though it sounds harmonically dizzying. I played jazz piano for years and "Giant Steps" always felt like the chord changes were fighting me until I saw the geometry laid out like this.