My recordings are often born out of an attempt to put theory into practice. In this case I used a diminished chord as a passing chord and, at another instance, as a secondary functioning dominant resolving onto an Am chord (G#dim or Fdim, Ddim, Bdim - they all contain the same four notes). The song is in the key of C, and I recorded it today.
Why Back Home? It was my first impression after hearing the complete song; something like returning to the port after a long voyage, or simply home after a long journey (quite appropriate in my case).
Each of the three mixed tracks was played on a different guitar: LP and strat for the BT; HB FusionT tele for the solo line.
Thank you very much in advance for listening; I hope you’ll like it.
13 Likes
Nice! Super chill jazzitude. Lots of unexpected twists and turns musically. Well done, sir!
2 Likes
Oh, thank you for the nice music, Tomasz! 
Always a treat!
reminds me I’ll have to search for my Chet Atkins/Mark Knopfler album, because this reminded me of it.
1 Like
Tomasz
I quite enjoyed this piece although I couldn’t detect any tension / resolution between the diminished and minor chord and there was little dynamic variation. There were many pretty, musical phrases and everything was very well played.
Brian
1 Like
Always a pleasure to hear you play, Tomasz
1 Like
Hello Tomasz!
I think I have finally run out of words to describe the beauty of your originals!!!
WAIT!!!
Sublime!!! I haven’t used Sublime before!!!
Such a pleasant vibe & I totally get the Back Home Feeling!!! Like walking up the lane, birds singing up in the tree branches, sun shining through the clouds & then you see your cottage sitting next to a bubbling brook…
I truly enjoy everything you post & listen often!!
Thank you for sharing this gem!!!
Tod
2 Likes
To you all: @CT @dominique7 @beejay56 @jvlynch @CATMAN62 : Thanks a million, guys, your comments are my greatest support and encouragement. Creating music gives me incomparable satisfaction, and that feeling is further enhanced when I’m not the only one who likes a piece I’ve recorded We all play mostly for fun, and enjoy it, but appreciation by fellow-guitarists gives unbelievable motivation to try harder and make our music better.
Brian - that’s correct, no immediately audible tension there; the G#dim I play goes in place of an E7 dominant chord that is usually played at this point as a common transition from G to Am. That’s why I used the term ‘resolving’; not necessarily in terms of tension-resolution.
Not much dynamic variation? That’s correct, too. Peace, quiet, tranquility are the feelings I was trying to convey.
Tod - I really don’t deserve it! Truly! Thanks a lot, you make me believe I didn’t waste time recording this piece.
2 Likes
Very nice! I always enjoy your melodies, but in this one is was the two guitars in the background that caught my attention. Harmonically very interesting, and they compliment each other very well. Great track!!
1 Like
Lovely, and the diminished chords sit in the flow just right. Really nice to listen to, thats the main thing.
1 Like
@dfrazz @Curlypaul David, Paul - thanks so much, guys, for the kind words. It always gives me a great pleasure when my musical expression is perceived and understood, and it’s just what your comments clearly indicate.
Cheers!
1 Like
Enjoyed that Tomasz, nicely played. I think it might be interesting to find a way to end the piece more definitively rather than fading out, but that’s just me!
I’m sure you know this already, but for those who don’t the connection between the secondary dominant and dim7 chord is fascinating and worth highlighting. Baroque musicians liked the move to the vi chord via it’s secondary dominant - in this case E7 to Am. However were a bit frustrated that one note in E7 didn’t move. All notes except the root move just one or two semitones which is why the resolution sounds so good, however the E note appears in the Am so stays static. What they did was to take the root and move it to the minor 2nd - which they can do as E is the iii chord (albeit with a major 3rd in this case). Now when the chord - an E7 with no root, but a flat 2 moves to Am, all the notes are shifting a little so the sound is even more resolving. The struggle to legitimise this new chord as a G#dim7 brings rise to the weird use of the bb7 in it’s spelling, but I find it easier to think of it as an E7 with a b2 and no root. So when you want that dim7 sound you can simply take the secondary dominant chord and just raise the root one semitone.
One interesting corollary of this (and the symmetry of the dim7 chord) is that if you take any diminished 7 chord and flat any single note in it you get some sort of dom7 chord.
I love music theory 
4 Likes
Wow! Paul–that’s a truly remarkable comment, very valuable not only for me, but also for the folks who listened to the piece and read my explanations not being quite sure what exactly is going on there.
Thanks a lot for your time taken to perform such great in-depth analysis. I try different solutions in my playing to make it more interesting, often based on intuition and what my ear dictates to me, but some knowledge of the music theory helps a lot.
Thank you so much again!
1 Like
Nice work Tomasz. I enjoyed that.
I agree with Paul about having an ending rather than fade out, but it’s a matter of personal preference.
All your guitars sound great, especially the HB.
Nice to have the music theory explanation from Paul too.
1 Like
Thanks for listening and the kind words, erionstrings
The sophistication of your creations is steadily increasing! Lovely work Tomasz!
1 Like
@twistor59 Phil–thanks a lot for the kind words, very encouraging, really. Unfortunately every increase mus reach its ceiling level… I feel it and I know it that at some point I stopped developing as a guitar player and have begun to walk in circles. On the positive side–I’ve come to terms with it, and the realisation certainly won’t stop me from playing
Not sure I agree - I was hearing something more in your phrasing in this composition.
1 Like
You may be right about that… I simply started paying more attention to phrasing as a critical component of any piece of music. But I’m gradually running out of ideas when trying to record an original. Also, I don’t think I’ll ever improve my technique beyond and above my current level, even though I do learn new elements of theory, just out of pure interest.
1 Like
You so often bring something interesting, ear-pleasing and original Tomasz. Bravo.
1 Like
Richard–I do appreciate your comment; your support, just as every one else’s in this community, is very important to me. Thanks