New jazz tunes to learn

[dallasblues]

Hey everyone. I've been taking jazz guitar lessons for a few months now and have been working on some pretty complex (to me at least) chords and patterns. We've only worked a couple of songs, per se. We're currently working up Benny Goodman's (with Charlie Christian) "Flying Home". My instructor asked me to get together 5 more songs to bring next week for us to take on. I've played guitar for over 22 years but jazz is entirely new to me. Can anyone recommend some standards that a jazz newbie might be comfortable tackling? Thanks.

[Drumbler]

See my reply under "What to learn" thread.

[jmstritt]

You want to find a balance of tunes that you NEED to know and tunes that you WANT to learn. What kind of tunes do you like? Swing, Blues, BeBop, Ballads, Latin?

I would try to start with some tunes that have a few ii Vs that way you will get used to that chord progression which is one of the most common in jazz.

[jmstritt]

Off the top of my head, 5 good newbie-ish jazz tunes...

Satin Doll
Blue Bossa
Alone Together
Blue Monk
Solar

That's a pretty good mix,.

[jtizzle]

Learn something in Rhythm Changes. Oleo is a pretty common tune you'll play at any jam session. All The Things You Are would be another great one to do.
These are two good things to learn. R.C. and ATTYA are pretty simple songs that you can play over at a beginner level, but also at an advanced level you can find some crazy things to do with the changes.

[jmstritt]

All the Things You Are is pretty tough if you are a real newbie. It is however definitely a standard and a tune that you MUST learn eventually (Of course you could say that about over 100 tunes ;-) ).

For what it's worth, Charlie Parker said that all you really need to know is Rhythm Changes, Blues, and Cherokee in all 12 keys. Kind of hard to disagree with THE MAN himself! ;-)

[jdaguitar2]

Four, Tune Up, West Coast Blues, Autumn Leaves.

[Greg Brouelette]

Originally Posted by jdaguitar2

Four, Tune Up, West Coast Blues, Autumn Leaves.

Good choices. I also think that All The Things You Are is pretty complex for a beginner.

Autumn Leaves is great because it only uses 2 scales (It almost uses only Em but there's one spot where you use the harmonic minor over the B7)

Blue Bossa is great because it harmonizes over just 3 scales. Also, the chord progression makes sense. It has a very obvious minor ii V i and then a standard ii V I

All Blues. A classic blues.

Four. It can be a challenge to solo to with those descending ii V's but what a great sounding tune.

I worked through the lessons I got from this web site on Wes Montgomery's "Four on Six". That's quite an accessible tune.

Wayne Shorter's "Footprints" is a great minor blues tune.

"Street of Dreams" by Sam Lewis and Victor Young is a beautiful tune. Check out the version by Wynton and Ellis Marsalis from the album "Standard Time Volume 3"