Analysis of Pat Metheny's All the Things You Are

[jazz4jesus]

Would some one please help me analyse the first 8 measures of Pat Metheny's All the Things You Are solo on the following link? I think this comes under the cataglory of what in the world was he thinking and why does this work? Thanks for any help.

I think the chords are Fm7 / Bbm7 / Eb7 / Abmaj7 /
Dbmaj7 / G7 / Cmaj7 / /



All the Things You Are

[Gabe2099]

i wish i could have the knowledge required to help you there, however, i'm still a beginner in this theory stuff and reading notation.

it's a bit sad, though, 'cause Pat Metheny is a particular hero of mine.

[reventlov]

I had a look at this, and was a bit baffled until I noticed the double bar line at the beginning of bar 3, and realised that the chord sequence you quoted starts from there! It made a lot more sense after that!

[jazz4jesus]

Thank you rev, I feel a little bit of a "duh" coming on here in that I feel a little dumb for not having noticed that myself. It makes more sense now.

[ZzaJMarc]

I learned the four first choruses of that tune this session, and i remember pat played really out at a lot of place. His pick up line is very cool too, its a kind of C altered lick with a Load of passing tones everywhere!

[sc06yl]

This was a heavy rendition of that tune. I remember driving to a gig with the bass player and we were listening to this album. He was like "this tempo is terrifying, we dont have to play it this fast right?"

[volcom596]

I think the chords are Fm7 / Bbm7 / Eb7 / Abmaj7 /
Dbmaj7 / G7 / Cmaj7 / /

.....So this song starts out in Eb major. The first chord is the ii or m7 of the key, you use the f dorian scale over it. The song then does a ii7 V7 I IV so you can use the Bb dorian, Eb mixolydian. Ab major, and Db major scales. All these chords come from the key of Ab so you can just think in that key if you are getting started in improvising. The song then changes to C major and does a V7 I in the key of C major. So in these seven bars there are three key changes, from Eb major to Ab majorto C major.

[franco6719]

Now, I may be "wrong" here, but I think you can treat the Fm7 as a I minor chord and use melodic minor on that instead of Dorian. All the rest stays the same.

[reventlov]

It's more common to think of the Fm7 not as chord ii in Eb or as a I minor, but as chord vi in Ab - that makes Fm7-Bbm7-Eb7-Ab a sequence of vi-ii-V-I. There's no real 'right' or 'wrong' here but that seems more convincing to me than the two alternatives above. It also makes the line a lot easier to play! In general, jazz players concentrate so much on ii V and I that it's easy to forget that there are other chords too, and vi isn't really that unusual.

[Goofsus4]

At 280, I'm not sure it really matters what notes you play just as long as you resolve to something that makes harmonic sense when you finally sit on something for a second.

[franco6719]

"It's more common to think of the Fm7 not as chord ii in Eb or as a I minor, but as chord vi in Ab."

No, that's true. It's within the key center. I was just throwing out an alternative possibility.

[Av's Dad]

I counted eight different tonal centres or key changes in that tune. For the initial Fm7 chord, I play on an F natural minor, so treat it as the VI of Ab. Metheny is just out there, though.

Gary

[milkmannnv]

Without getting into any scale substitution,the first 5 bars are in Ab major,bars 6 and 7 are in C major.