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"Yoko's Thing" is a colloquial term used to describe an exercise which Yoko Kawaguchi, a long time student of Barry Harris, created in a moment of inspiration while exploring the C7b5/dim scale.

Barry greatly approved of this exercise, and often played it in class and had Yoko play it in many public occasions.

Chart 1 shows the basic principle of playing the chromatic notes between a C7b5 chord and a Bdim7 chord. This principle can also be applied to 7/dim, major6/dim and minor6/dim scales.

Chart 2 shows the exact way in which Yoko embellished the basic idea, in a way that passes through all the fundamental chords in Barry's "cosmological" harmonic system:

Chart 1     



Chart 2