) to help players navigate the upper register with the same ease as the standard range. Practical Application Versatility
Shifting the brain from thinking "Dorian scale" to thinking "stacks of fourths and minor sevenths."
While we cannot republish the entire PDF here, the core exercises of the Eddie Harris method are well-documented. If you want to replicate the method, you need to practice the following: eddie harris intervallistic concept pdf
Several jazz magazines ( DownBeat , JazzTimes ) ran features on Harris in the late 80s/early 90s summarizing the Intervallistic Concept. Back issues of these magazines are often scanned as PDFs on the Internet Archive. Search for "Eddie Harris DownBeat interview intervals" rather than the book title.
Because The Intervallistic Concept was self-published by Eddie Harris and has been out of print for various periods, many jazz musicians share scanned PDF copies in academic forums, private Google Drives, and saxophone communities (like Saxontheweb). ) to help players navigate the upper register
Instead of thinking about the notes between the root and the octave (the scale), Harris forced players to think about the space between notes—the interval. He believed that melody is not a stream of adjacent notes, but a series of leaps (intervals) that create tension, release, and architecture.
Because physical copies of the original book are exceptionally rare, searching for an "Eddie Harris Intervallistic Concept PDF" has become a rite of passage for saxophonists, brass players, and avant-garde jazz instrumentalists seeking to break free from conventional playing habits. Who Was Eddie Harris? Back issues of these magazines are often scanned
The is a comprehensive, three-volume pedagogical method designed to break musicians free from traditional scale-based improvisation. Originally published in 1971, this 321-page work is considered a "thorough and creative workout" for instrumentalists seeking to master non-linear, interval-centric melodic language. Core Philosophy: The "Eddieisms"
Playing wide intervals allows a soloist to imply complex upper extensions (9ths, 11ths, 13ths) very quickly. Instead of spelling out a C Major 7 chord as C-E-G-B, an intervallistic approach might leap from C to B, then drop to F#, instantly injecting a Lydian (#11) flavor without sounding like a standard scale runner. 4. Extreme Registral Flexibility
Shifting away from standard scales to focus on larger leaps (like 4ths and 5ths), similar to Harris's famous composition "Freedom Jazz Dance" .