Double enclosure – Improvisation method, taken from the first phrase of Django’s Tiger

The first phrase of Django’s Tiger is so beautiful that I just had to understand it.

It makes it easier to see it over the following chord shape:

For each note of the chord, Django uses an enclosure, which is a half tone below the chord note (target) and one tone above the chord note (target):

In the first phrase of Django’s Tiger, Django extends this idea onto two strings and adds more tension to the musical sentence.

In this phrase, Django uses a half tone approach below the 3^rd degree, then one tone above the 6^th degree, and then resolves the tension to the 6^th and then to the 3^rd degrees.

The numbers in the following picture demonstrate the chord degrees and not the fingering.

Now here is an exercise that I came up with using this idea. In this exercise, you will learn how to master this idea in a systematic way over a major chord, in three positions. We will use three inversions of the A major chord. The first example is in the following shapes:

The exercise uses two notes at a time. For each pair of notes, we play a note that is a half step below the lower one and a note that is one tone above the upper one.

Once you understand this principle, you can apply it to any chord shape you like and to any pair of notes that you like. The notes you choose may be chord tones, but they can be tensions as well – 9^th, 6^th and so on.