John Coltrane's Tone Circle
40 comments
·September 3, 2025rectang
schwartzworld
Not only does it cycle through a ton of keys, but wind instruments like the sax require unique fingerings and embouchure changes in each key. It’s not nearly as hard on a guitar.
rectang
“Quantity has a quality of its own.” — Karl Marx, or maybe Coltrane.
asimpletune
Absolutely. And Central Park West is a good example of the same concept but slowed down.
ghostpepper
If you don’t have the time (or the musical background) for the full article, this short YouTube video touches on some of the same ideas in a much more condensed and accessible version:
basisword
Thanks for sharing! I've been playing music for 30 years but my theory knowledge is pretty bare bones. That video was really accessible but still got the point across in enough detail.
tshaddox
> Thelonious Monk once said “All musicians are subconsciously mathematicians“.
I haven’t heard that one. I think I prefer this one, attributed to Leibniz:
“Music is the pleasure the human mind experiences from counting without being aware that it is counting.”
shermantanktop
On the bandstand, there's usually a ton of highly aware counting going on. 24 bars of rest! followed by 8 bars of rest! and then 16 bars of latin feel! now back to 8 of swing!
On top of that there is definitely some feel and intuition going on. But for a band to play non-trivial music, everyone is counting unless they know the material cold, and even then they are probably counting at times.
tshaddox
Indeed, as a long time fan of prog metal and tech death I'm quite aware of the importance of counting (and the existence of people whose counting abilities far surpass my own)!
But I think the quote is also referring to casual enjoyment of music where the counting might not be deliberate.
shermantanktop
Right, I should have spelled that out - the listener gets to count subconsciously only because the players are counting very consciously.
Playing music has changed my listening, and not necessarily for the better. I'm sometimes counting or listening for structural and composition elements in a way that can be distracting from just enjoying the sound/vibe.
ryandvm
"Music is math for people that don't like numbers"
-- some movie I don't recall
svenmakes
As a musician I wanted to hear the notes on the diagram so I made a little tool to do so: https://coltrane.sven.zone
lucasgonze
Mathy look at the topology and some stuff about Yusef Lateef: https://medium.com/@lucas_gonze/coltrane-pitch-diagrams-e25b...
chrisweekly
Fascinating, well-written piece. Thanks for sharing! I plan to revisit it more closely when I free up (probably while listening to A Love Supreme -- arguably the greatest jazz album of all time).
Amorymeltzer
Just finished listening to it yesterday! My first time with it, excellent stuff, but not topping Mingus Ah Um! I've been on a Jazz kick since listening to an episode of Kirk Hamilton's Strong Songs podcast about John Williams[1]—which was an excellent listen and I learned tons—that touched on Jazz and Mingus in particular.
1: https://strongsongspodcast.com/blogs/episodes/s05e05-john-wi...
IAmBroom
You meant to say "Kind of Blue", I'm sure.
Else: Deringers at noon. Bring your second.
navbaker
My favorite music podcast, You’ll Hear It, uses “is it better than KOB” as one of their album review metrics!
bryanlarsen
The Davis / Coltrane collaboration Kind Of Blue significantly influenced Coltrane's later works like the OP's Giant Steps and parent's A Love Supreme.
Of which you're undoubtedly aware; I'm just explaining the inside joke in your second line to others.
P.S. Kind of Blue is also my favorite.
chrisweekly
I did qualify it with "arguably". Kind of Blue is, IMHO, the other viable candidate.
skvmb
This is pretty solid, I try to use this method all the time.
In my opinion the underrated "Get Your Greasy Head Off The Sham" by Breastfed Yak is jazz at it's finest.
glompers
Without more prominent melody or harmony I could not find what is finer about it than conventional approaches to jazz. Could you please elaborate on what its quality is?
skvmb
To be honest, I am not a jazz musician or even a jazz fan. When I do record music I have better progress when holding myself to a standard or a set of limitations to work within. It gets the brain going to find new solutions to fit within a self-imposed framework.
cwmoore
As you follow the circle around, as if a sprite, there is a butterfly flapping its wings.
yubblegum
See also: Arcana V. Music, Magic & Mysticism. Ed: John Zorn, Hips Road 2010
https://archive.org/details/zorn-john-ed.-arcana-v.-musician...
freejazz
Any particular chapter in this issue of Arcana?
josefritzishere
Listen to Giant Steps. The man was a genius https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xy_fxxj1mMY
ForOldHack
Absolutely, exquisitely, undeniable. I didn't get a lot of what it was until I was relistening to Al Davis in reverse chronological order. I also in a fit of recognition saw how Vernon Reed played homage to him. ( And that took a few decades )
coliveira
Coltrane wrote that song because he didn't have to play the harmony... he played the easy part. /s
rectang
I chuckled, but at the risk of getting slapped with thatsthejoke.gif, Tommy Flanagan falls back to playing chords at the end of his piano solo. Comping on Giant Steps is easier than soloing.
pessimizer
Nothing upper-middle class people love more than worshiping dead black Americans, while treating their descendants like dangerous parasites. They were so cool, such genius! I can't wait to be the authority on them, and make more on redefining them than they ever saw in their lives, or to buy the new product that no black American makes a dime from.
One day, every black American will be gone, and all that will be left of them are statues that everybody holds in very high regard.
rectang
Deification of artists in theory writing is commonplace, as is aspiring to be seen as an authority. The subject matter could have been Mozart, or Picasso — you'd see the same phenomena.
I agree that we have some distance to go in ensuring that wealth moves to the communities that created the art and the value, but absent evidence that this author has been "treating their descendants like dangerous parasites", I think they're catching strays from you.
sealthedeal
You ok man? Having a bad day?
shermantanktop
GP is describing a well-known phenomenon that spans countries, cultures and history: majority culture having a love/hate relationship with minorities, with extraordinary individuals on one side and diffuse fear and hatred on the other. Go read Othello's speeches.
So I know what they're saying. Do you not?
krapp
Not every instance of white people liking or consuming black culture is that of a racist parasite trying to bleed the culture dry though. Sometimes white people just like stuff, and their interests overlap (as in this case with esotericism and music.) Culture works that way for everyone. The author doesn't seem to be trying to redefine anything or whitewash John Coltrane or what have you.
rdtsc
> Nothing upper-middle class people love more than worshiping dead black Americans, while treating their descendants like dangerous parasites.
I know, right? It's those Dutch folks living in Bulgaria hating black American descendants again, eh? /s
So, to be serious, do you have evidence that Roelant Hollanderr is treating black American descendants as "dangerous parasites"? Those are pretty hefty accusations. I haven't found anything on their website, but I am sure you have some solid evidence somewhere.
rectang
While the critique of this author seems unjustified, I think we do well to grapple with issues like this and not dismiss them outright. The problem is real, even if this may not be a good example.
KerrAvon
Grapple with what, though? Abstract Whitey loves Coltrane and Satchmo and hates every Black person born since? It's not a coherent theory to begin with.
Also, if the current regime is in a position to fully eradicate all the blacks and browns, the statues will all be of Confederate generals and Trump family members, not black people.
A few months ago, I was studying Giant Steps and I came across the “Giant Steps is actually very simple (yes, really)” video by Dave Pollack. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd75Mwo4JNo
Pollack argues that the main reason that Giant Steps is such a high mountain is because it is traditionally played at such a ferocious tempo. Slow it down, and the Coltrane Changes become fairly ordinary ii-V-I substitution progressions.
I’m persuaded. I love Coltrane, and I’ve listened to the Giant Steps album countless times. The Coltrane Changes are very nice, but in the line of other jazz theory such as tritone substitution, the deceptive cadence, and so on.
The main thing with Giant Steps is that to play it like Coltrane does you have to practice it to death, accumulate a vocabulary of riffs, and gain facility at improvising over sophisticated changes moving at a speed that other tunes won’t have prepared you for.
EDIT: I originally posted the wrong link, to Giant Steps slowed down 30%. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ilbrDJy9-98