Music
The song is known for its use of the "Hendrix chord" (dominant 7 #9) played as the first chord after the introduction. This chord structure was often used in jazz by artists such as Horace Silver in the early 1960s, but was not used in rock on a regular basis. The intro itself is notable for its prominent use of the distinctive tritone interval, also used commonly by jazz musicians. It is sounded when Hendrix plays an E7 #9 (low to high: E, G#, B, D, F##) on the guitar while the bass plays a B flat (and its octave). The guitar solo is played through an Octavia, an effects pedal that increases notes by one octave. The effect was developed by Roger Mayer, an acoustical and electronics engineer, and Mayer claims he made it in cooperation with Jimi Hendrix.
Read more about this topic: Purple Haze
Famous quotes containing the word music:
“See where my Love sits in the beds of spices,
Beset all round with camphor, myrrh, and roses,
And interlaced with curious devices
Which her apart from all the world incloses!
There doth she tune her lute for her delight,
And with sweet music makes the ground to move,
Whilst I, poor I, do sit in heavy plight,
Wailing alone my unrespected love;”
—Bartholomew Griffin (d. 1602)
“It is from the blues that all that may be called American music derives its most distinctive character.”
—James Weldon Johnson (1871–1938)
“And in the next instant, immediately behind them, Victor saw his former wife.
At once he lowered his gaze, automatically tapping his cigarette to dislodge the ash that had not yet had time to form. From somewhere low down his heart rose like a fist to deliver an uppercut, drew back, struck again, then went into a fast disorderly throb, contradicting the music and drowning it.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)