Top 5 favorite jazz tunes to improvise over?

**Jazzpunk** · 02-15-2011, 09:26 PM

What are your top 5 favorite jazz tunes to improvise over and why?

**wizard3739** · 02-15-2011, 10:41 PM

I couldn't name just five because my favorites are constantly changing.

1.) Triste - great melody and nice changes for bossanova.
2.) Ceora - another great bossanova melody with chords that are really fun to substitute.
3.) Almost any of the old standards (The Great American Songbook) produced for broadway shows because the melodies and chord progressions are most pleasing to my ears and are a pleasure to play and study.
4.) Ballads in general because, IMHO, they allow more freedom of expression and personal taste than other forms of music.
5.) Jazz blues in almost any format because, IMHO, they are the easiest form of jazz to learn and get into a groove.

wiz

**Jazzpunk** · 02-15-2011, 10:46 PM

Originally Posted by wizard3739

I couldn't name just five because my favorites are constantly changing.

I figured it would be tough for the more experienced players here to name just 5 but I didn't want it to become everybody's top 50 songs and have most of them be the same lol.

'Top 5 at the moment' is good too!

**JonnyPac** · 02-15-2011, 10:52 PM

I like thesea lot... There are more of course. I write original things I like to solo over most of the time. Standards are not something I pull from regularly anymore.

Stella By Starlight
Lots of good changes, MM stuff, secondary chords, minor ii-V's, etc. Sounds good slow or fast.

Gloria's Step
Balls to the walls MM changes and parallel stuff. It's pretty too.

Juju
Whole tone and non-functional changes. 3/4 swing is fun.

Summertime
I play the Miles/Gil Evans version, and also the Bill Evans MM/cycle version from How My Heart Sings. Both nice.

On Green Dolphin St
I dig the modal interchange throughout. Latin to swing is nice too.

What is this Thing Called Love/Hot House
I dig the simple but mixed changes. The CP jam session was what got me hooked. I want to learn the subconscious-lee head for it someday too.

**ksjazzguitar** · 02-15-2011, 11:03 PM

I'll go with "Stella" too. "There Will Never Be Another You," "On a Slow Boat to China," and "ATTYA." Round it out with any med-up blues.

Peace,
Kevin

**mr. beaumont** · 02-15-2011, 11:19 PM

I love jobim tunes...there's always some little twist that takes you out of your comfort zone. This week, I'm rediscovering "wave."

I never tire of "stella by starlight." For the record, when shedding this tune there's parts where I think chord tones, and parts where CST makes more sense.

I recently recorded it, and "someday my prince will come" is a fave...plus, 3/4 is fun!

Round midnight is one of those tunes where you can adress the changes or just think bluesy and melodically, and get good results both ways. Definitely a tune I never worry about running out of ideas on.

Hmmm...let's pick a good #5. How about another monk tune-- "straight no chaser." I love playing way outside on this one, "playing drunk," I call it, and then resolving with a good old blues lick.

Ask again tomorrow for 5 completely different choices

**Tom Karol** · 02-15-2011, 11:39 PM

OK, I'll give it a shot:

Bluesette
ATTYA
Autumn Leaves
There Will Never Be Another You
This Could Be The Start of Something Big

Hard to stop there, but I've used up my 5.

Edit: Oh yeah, I'm supposed to say why. Well ... I don't really know. I guess I just like ii-V of ii-V of ...!

**P4guitar** · 02-15-2011, 11:55 PM

I tend to get stuck on, or savor, a few tunes for a couple of months or so then move on. Right now the main ones are:

Like Someone in Love
Dolphins Dance
In Your Own Sweet Way
Goodbye Pork Pie Hat
Lonely Woman

**saponsky** · 02-16-2011, 11:05 AM

-Wendy
-Autumn Leaves
-Take Five
-Satin Doll
-My Funny Valentine

Why? Well because I'm just getting started in the jazz world of improvisation and those are the tunes I've managed to figure out so far ;-)

**lindydanny** · 02-16-2011, 11:39 AM

Don't have a top five (limited experience), but I had a hoot the other night soloing on "All of Me". There's an arpeggio thing in the second phrase of the verse that is just plane fun to me.

~DB

**wolflen** · 02-16-2011, 11:46 AM

love for sale - porter can do a melody..but his lyrics are magical

just one of those things - porter again - this could be the blueprint for a standard

all blues - miles - and it is ALL blues..everthing you could ask for...cliches in 6ths..minor feel cadence and in 6/8 time..

blue in green - more evans than miles - a study in sparse melody and mood creation..

good bye pork pie hat - mingus - very strong melodic statements with blues dripping all over them -- i can here hendrix do this one

**jeffstritt** · 02-16-2011, 11:48 AM

Stella, Donna Lee, The Night Has a Thousand Eyes, Grand Central, Blue in Green.

**errandboyforrhythm** · 02-16-2011, 01:50 PM

Anything that makes me play the blues is my favorite

**abracadabra** · 02-16-2011, 02:36 PM

Billie's Bounce
Satin Doll
Autumn Leaves
ATTYA
D-Nat Blues

actually, those are the only five I can do so far.

**lkmuller** · 02-16-2011, 02:47 PM

Wave (one of my favorites)
Bluesette
Have You Met Miss Jones
Just Friends
Giant Steps (still workin' on this one, lol)

**MarkRhodes** · 02-16-2011, 02:47 PM

--Parker's Billie's Bounce or KC Blues
--Cottontail (-my favorite mid-tempo rhythm changes head, but I also like Seven Come Eleven and Oleo)
--ATTYA (-not that I'm good at this yet, but I work on it every day now)
--Autumn Leaves
--Harold Arlen's Between The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

**jayx123** · 02-16-2011, 02:55 PM

Stella
ATTYA
Have you met miss jones
Hassan's Dream
Round Midnight

**newsense** · 02-16-2011, 03:04 PM

Great thread ! Certainly 4 of my top 5 have already been listed plus lots of others that I should now go away and try.

But .... why is it that the vast majority of these tunese we love to play were written before 1960 ?

I guess its probably a question that has been asked before in this forum, but I'd like to hear some views.

What was my 5th favourite ? - "Little Wing", but owing as much to Gil Evans as to Hendrix.

**MarkRhodes** · 02-16-2011, 03:18 PM

Originally Posted by newsense

But .... why is it that the vast majority of these tunes we love to play were written before 1960 ?

"They don't write 'em like that anymore."

**Jake Hanlon** · 02-16-2011, 06:21 PM

Falling Grace - The Changes, the Melody and the Form are all priceless
Alone Together - I feel like I know this tune as if I wrote it.
Stella by Starlight - The Changes, so many quick modulations and shifts of motion, and the melody is one of the best!
Blue in Green - My favorite ballad at the moment.
Emily - it has all the progressions you find most common in the Music, it works in 3, 4 and 5/4 and at many different tempos all presenting new challenges.

**P4guitar** · 02-16-2011, 06:51 PM

There are:
6 "Stella"s,
5 "ATTA"s,
4 "Autumn Leaves",
3 "Blue In Green"s,
2 "Have You Met Miss Jones" and "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat"s
1 Partridge in a Pear Tree....not really

I was thinking there would be more diversity. Maybe this is why jazz is losing its audience, we're all playing the same tunes.

**Jake Hanlon** · 02-16-2011, 06:54 PM

i suppose Standards are standards? I assumed that was the OP's meaning. Otherwise I'd pick all my own compositions but keep Falling Grace

**P4guitar** · 02-16-2011, 06:57 PM

Originally Posted by Jake Hanlon

i suppose Standards are standards? I assumed that was the OP's meaning. Otherwise I'd pick all my own compositions but keep Falling Grace

Well that's a fair point. However my point is slightly different in that out of all the 'standards', this group picks so many in common.

**Jake Hanlon** · 02-16-2011, 06:59 PM

probably because they are great pieces of Music.

**P4guitar** · 02-16-2011, 07:01 PM

That and something else, they appeal to guitar players in particular. My horn and piano buddies seem to prefer other material. So why these tunes are popular with the fretboard crowd makes an interesting question.