John Elliott: Part 4

John Elliott was a jazz pianist, performer, arranger, and educator. He spent his career in Kansas City. His private students included players of many different instruments. Piano, guitar, horn players, pretty much anything. He called what he taught, "The Theory of Harmony." 

In Part 1 I told of the years (1979-1986) that I studied with John Elliott. John was a formative influence; by far THE most important person in my musical development. He also proved to be a complicated and sometimes difficult individual.

In the first section of Part 2 I told of the post-lesson years from 1986 until 1991, and of how I continued a relationship with him during those years, and how I used him as a positive as well as a negative role-model for my own teaching.

In the second section of Part 2 (1991-2001) I talked about the series of events that led to the publishing of my method book, Vertical Truth: Chordal Mechanisms for the Guitar. John was retired and we had no contact during those years. But due to the fact that well over 50% of the book is directly attributable to him, plus my gratitude and respect for him, our sometimes contentious relationship picked up again in 2001.

In Part 3 (2001-2013) I told about the ups and downs of my relationship with John relative to my book. I obtained his approval for the use of his method, and was willing to share the credit and the copyright, as well as the money, but he was conflicted about his name appearing on the covers of the books. That was when I learned about his “contractual obligation.”

He told me that he had signed a contract in the sixties that obligated him to share half the money with someone else should he ever publish.

He stubbornly refused to identify this person; only that he was local to Kansas City and still alive. That was 2001.

I told John I wasn’t afraid of this person, whoever he was, and would fight him if he came after me. I know I am well within my rights concerning my book. Nevertheless, John felt it was safer if his name was not on the cover or the notice of copyright.

I inferred that it was this “contractual obligation” that sabotaged John from ever publishing.

Since that conversation with John in 2001, I moved on with publishing and promoting my book and have been waiting for someone to come out of the woodwork claiming a 50% stake. It hasn’t happened.

Book sales are now almost nonexistent anyway, thanks to the internet and file-sharing. I have rewritten and reformatted most of the method to be more functional for the internet environment. With each iteration, I get further and further from John's presentation, which renders any distant potential copyright issues even more remote.

Now with all that in mind, here’s the latest development:

On October 12, 2025, I attended the Kansas City Guitar Show. I ran into Leo Bud Johns. Leo is a friend and keyboard player. We've done a few things together here and there over the years.

The conversation turned to John Elliott. Leo never studied with John but in 1967 he took an eight-week music theory course at a local community center. He says that course is one of the foundation stones on which his piano playing rests. The class was run by John Elliott and Steve Miller (not the rockstar/guitarist Steve Miller).

Steve Miller was a local jazz multi-instrumentalist and band leader. His pedigree is impressive, including a full scholarship to the Juilliard School of Music in New York. He came to Kansas City originally to get a Masters degree and to play with the Philharmonic. A short bio can be found here.

Leo said the class was mostly taught by Steve Miller; John showed up only a couple of times, which makes sense because 1967 is within the timeframe that John was the house pianist in the main showroom at the Kansas City Playboy Club. Plus he was likely teaching a full load of private students so I can’t imagine him having the time to teach a theory class at a local community center on top of all that.

Leo told me that he might still have the book from that class in his basement somewhere. It was just a 3-ring binder of mimeographed pages.

I told him if he could find it I would be interested in taking a look at it. I’m always interested in anything written or used by John.

The very next morning Leo texted me and said,

“Found it!”

He sent me a couple of pictures. One was this:

Notice the copyright at the bottom of the page. Holy crap! Steve Miller!

At first, I thought the handwriting was John's, but after a prompt from my friend Stan Kessler who disagreed, and comparing this to my lessons from John, I now think Stan is right; the handwriting is not John's. So, I assume the handwriting is Steve Miller's.

This is the same kind of homemade staff paper, created on a typewriter, that I have from a book labeled, "By John Elliott 1950's."

I talked at length about that book HERE. Before Leo sent me the above picture I had never seen that kind of homemade staff paper anywhere other than from John; perhaps it was more common-usage than I was aware.

I didn't personally know Steve Miller, but I know plenty of people who did and so I did some research; the consensus among those I talked to is such that yes, Steve Miller could’ve done something like that.

I’m not making any judgement here. There must’ve been a good reason John signed that contract, though he regretted it later. Just the fact that John and Steve Miller were teaching this class together indicates that there was a working relationship between them.

So, again, no judgement.

Miller died in 2012. John Elliott died in 2013.

I told Leo,

"I have to look at that book!"

A couple of days later I went over to Leo's. We had a great time together and Leo graciously allowed me to take the book home, with the promise to return it to him. Leo said something that totally resonated with me,

"This book has absolutely no value whatsoever and yet it's priceless."

Upon closer inspection, several pages had the same notice of copyright:

It’s obvious that these Notices of Copyright were added after the fact - I’m thinking by Steve Miller. I say that because John's last name, in every instance, is misspelled; it should be, "Elliott" - two "t's."

So, I would guess the handwriting in general is Steve Miller’s. The methodology appears to be John's. I must qualify that by saying this is all a piano-based presentation and I didn't study piano with John. Guitar music does not involve bass clef and the voicings are different. Still, the theory is the same.

John would be the first to say that he didn’t teach anything unique; all the theory was already known. That may be true but I would disagree when it comes to John's teaching for the guitar. John had a unique method for applying already-known theory to the guitar.

One thing that John told me in 2001 was that he wasn’t sure the contract applied to the guitar stuff; it might only apply to the piano stuff.

There are other pages the content of which suggest that the methodology is not John's.

John did not teach "Six Qualities or Types of Seventh Chords." He taught 5 types of seventh chords. What is here called "Major 8th" is simply a triad with the root doubled. John did not include that as a "7th Chord" in any of his lessons with me.

Another thing I noticed was that this page is labeled, "Circle of Fifths" and yet the movement is a Circle of 4ths:

When I studied with John (1979-86), he never called it a "Circle of Fifths." When he said, "Drill around the Circle" he meant the Circle of Fourths. That makes me think that this is Steve Miller’s work. There's another place in this book where the term "Circle of Fifths" denotes counter-clockwise movement (notice the arrow) around the Key Circle, which is a Circle of Fourths.

I suspect the arrow is Leo's. I also suspect the letter names are Leo's. They are not John's handwriting, nor do they match what I am calling Steve Miller's handwriting. However, "Circle of Fifths" appears to be (presumably) Steve Miller’s handwriting.

Notice that all the pages that do not reflect John's methodology do not have the Notice of Copyright on them. It seems reasonable to conclude that this book is a combination of John and Steve's work, and Steve felt compelled to add the Notice of Copyright to pages where he was using John's material.

I found something else that's kind of bizarre. There's a page with a list of popular tunes that has a partial copyright notice.

It looks to me that it's likely John Elliott's name was on this but ran off the bottom of the page. And it's typed instead of handwritten like the others.

Furthermore, why copyright a song list? I played many of these tunes with John as part of my lessons with him. But it gets weirder. On the back of the above page was this:

Either John's name (notice the two "t's") was on the previous page and was erased or whited out but bled through, or was on the next page and imprinted on this one.

If we assume a bleed-through, the 2 positions of his name on the previous page makes no sense at all. If we assume an imprint from the following page, well, there is no "John Elliott" on the following page; the following page is a chart for the tune, "Fools Rush In."

Also, if you zoom in on the mirror-image name, both of them, you can see a “shadow-image” just below it. What would cause that?

I have no idea what to do with this. Was his name on the previous page erased? Or is there a missing page? Who knows? Not me!

So...according to what John told me, the "contractual obligation" occured "in the sixties." The person responsible was local (Kansas City) and still alive in 2001.

The signs point to Steve Miller; "Copyright Steve Miller and John Elliot 1965."

I can never be 100% certain of course, unless that contract, or a legitimate copy of that contract, shows up.

At any rate, I don't think that anyone coming out of the woodwork and claiming copyright infringement is an issue anymore. If it ever was, that is.

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