Dayna Stephens on "Deeper Than Happy"

Along with Walter Smith III, Dayna Stephens is one of my favorite tenor players under 40 — his record The Timeless Now is excellent, and I'm planning to pick up his latest release soon. Dayna's also on Linda Oh's new record, Initial Here, which was released in May and features Fabian Almazan and Rudy Royston. One of my favorite tunes on the record is an original by Linda entitled "Deeper than Happy," which includes a duet of sorts between Dayna and Fabian—they play around each other over the form, sort of like trading, but it's much more serpentine and fluid than trading phrases usually ends up sounding. I'm still working on transcribing Dayna's lines over the tune, which are incredibly free and relaxed, but also internally complex with regards to rhythm and phrasing. Check out the transcription, and pick up a copy of Linda's record if you haven't already: 

 

The way that Dayna incorporates alternative fingerings into his lines is really distinctive (mm. 8-12). A lot of the vocabulary is rooted in pentatonic, but rhythmic complexity within a line makes the phrases sound fresh and buoyant (mm. 22-4)

 

 

 Check out how Dayna delays resolution in mm. 41-2 while anticipating chord changes at other times (m. 51).

 

Descending contour as a motif (mm. 83-87).