Top jazz standards to learn?
- MStarke
- Posts: 1031
- Joined: Jan 01, 2019
I am finally getting a bit more serious about learning/feeling more comfortable with jazz improvisation.
What would be your top standards to learn and familiarize with?
I am a little biased towards nice ballad style songs, but obviously that's not everything...
What would be your top standards to learn and familiarize with?
I am a little biased towards nice ballad style songs, but obviously that's not everything...
- Enelson
- Posts: 38
- Joined: Mar 26, 2018
Given the vast number of tunes that can be considered standards, I suggest that you get started by getting a fake book and let your listening tastes guide you.
I have always been an avid listener, so I either recognized song titles in my fake books or recognized melodies when randomly playing tunes in one of the Real Books.
Choose tunes in different styles that you like. Even if you are drawn to ballads, I’m sure there are other styles you enjoy listening to. That will be essential to keep your motivation up as you seek out various recordings to play along with as you really learn the tune. If a song is listed in a fake book, chances are others consider it worth knowing.
If you enjoy classic albums by Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Stan Getz, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Dexter Gordon, Jobim, Wayne Shorter and/or Art Blakey, to name a few, than you will find tunes that other people know and enjoy playing.
Last but not least, seek out others you can play with to cement what you are learning at home and to help guide you in a prioritization of tunes to learn.
Have fun with it!
I have always been an avid listener, so I either recognized song titles in my fake books or recognized melodies when randomly playing tunes in one of the Real Books.
Choose tunes in different styles that you like. Even if you are drawn to ballads, I’m sure there are other styles you enjoy listening to. That will be essential to keep your motivation up as you seek out various recordings to play along with as you really learn the tune. If a song is listed in a fake book, chances are others consider it worth knowing.
If you enjoy classic albums by Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Stan Getz, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Dexter Gordon, Jobim, Wayne Shorter and/or Art Blakey, to name a few, than you will find tunes that other people know and enjoy playing.
Last but not least, seek out others you can play with to cement what you are learning at home and to help guide you in a prioritization of tunes to learn.
Have fun with it!
- robcat2075
- Posts: 1867
- Joined: Sep 03, 2018
My expertise in jazz improvisation is minimal, but when i was in jazz bands the very frequent notation I would see on the parts was "Rhythm changes" meaning it uses the chord changes of Gershwin's "I Got Rhythm"
[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhythm_changes]Rhythm changes
So, if the topic is "jazz improvisation" and "top standards"..."I've Got Rhythm" seems to be an important item.
So, if the topic is "jazz improvisation" and "top standards"..."I've Got Rhythm" seems to be an important item.
- Posaunus
- Posts: 5018
- Joined: Mar 23, 2018
[quote="Enelson"]Given the vast number of tunes that can be considered standards, I suggest that you get started by <U>getting a fake book and let your listening tastes guide you</U>.
I have always been an avid listener, so I either recognized song titles in my fake books or recognized melodies when randomly playing tunes in one of the Real Books.
<U>Choose tunes in different styles that you like.</U> Even if you are drawn to ballads, I’m sure there are other styles you enjoy listening to. That will be essential to keep your motivation up as you seek out various recordings to play along with as you really learn the tune. If a song is listed in a fake book, chances are others consider it worth knowing.
... seek out others you can play with to cement what you are learning at home and to help guide you in a prioritization of tunes to learn.
<U>Have fun with it!</U>[/quote]
Excellent suggestions, Everett!
I have always been an avid listener, so I either recognized song titles in my fake books or recognized melodies when randomly playing tunes in one of the Real Books.
<U>Choose tunes in different styles that you like.</U> Even if you are drawn to ballads, I’m sure there are other styles you enjoy listening to. That will be essential to keep your motivation up as you seek out various recordings to play along with as you really learn the tune. If a song is listed in a fake book, chances are others consider it worth knowing.
... seek out others you can play with to cement what you are learning at home and to help guide you in a prioritization of tunes to learn.
<U>Have fun with it!</U>[/quote]
Excellent suggestions, Everett!
- whyking
- Posts: 21
- Joined: Aug 09, 2022
If you really want to impress people in jam sessions with your jazz improv rizz you should learn Blue Bossa annd Autumn Leaves. I notice that I get a lot of questions about my playing and generate a lot of interest whenever I suggest those pieces. Don’t worry about Coltrain. You can also do the Chicken but not everyone knows it. And don’t be afraid to take the first solo, trombone is the best solo instrument!
- MStarke
- Posts: 1031
- Joined: Jan 01, 2019
All great advice, thanks all!
I've got rhythm and Autum Leaves have been "on the radar" already, Blue Bossa is a good one also.
Althoough I am not sure how much I will be able to really "impress" soon ;-)
I really want to get beyond that feeling of complete uselessness when a solo comes up. I would say I am a pretty competent jazz section and lead player (and also get that feedback), but want to get that gap a bit closed.
I've got rhythm and Autum Leaves have been "on the radar" already, Blue Bossa is a good one also.
Althoough I am not sure how much I will be able to really "impress" soon ;-)
I really want to get beyond that feeling of complete uselessness when a solo comes up. I would say I am a pretty competent jazz section and lead player (and also get that feedback), but want to get that gap a bit closed.
- cmcslide
- Posts: 130
- Joined: Apr 01, 2018
The blues should be another one at the top of your list. So many tunes are based on the twelve bar blues, even more than rhythm changes. Think of songs like Now's the Time, Blue Monk, Sonnymoon for Two, Blues by Five, and many more. Listen to One O'clock Jump and try to cop some of the feel and maybe some background figures. The blues really informs everything you do in jazz!
- Matt_K
- Posts: 4809
- Joined: Mar 21, 2018
Agree - weirdly enough, I often see people who don't know many blues or rhythm section tunes. I suggest being able to play these VERY WELL first; especially several of the ones commonly played in F and Bb (Blue Monk, Now's The Time, Bag's Groove, Billie's Bounce, Tenor Madness, etc.) and C minor (Sugar, Mr. PC, etc.) and a few Rhythm Changes (I Got Rhythm, Anthropology, Oleo, Lester Leaps In, etc.). It's very "safe" to call these tunes as others will likely know them, and being good at blowing over the common Blues/Rhythm Changes stuff will help with other tunes as well, as the patterns are pretty transferable somewhat universally.
- Brady
- Posts: 9
- Joined: Sep 23, 2019
Quite a few years ago I stumbled upon a website of "300 tunes to know prioritized" and it has been saved in my browser bookmarks ever since. Great reference and it will really help you out. <LINK_TEXT text="https://thewoodshedmusic.com/2015/01/30 ... tegorized/">https://thewoodshedmusic.com/2015/01/300-tunes-to-know-prioritized-categorized/</LINK_TEXT>
- VJOFan
- Posts: 529
- Joined: Apr 06, 2018
The tunes in this video are all ones that I played in my university combo or in the house band I hooked up with in Korea. It's a good list that covers a lot of styles within "standards".
<YOUTUBE id="FFhVfj22LG4">https://youtu.be/FFhVfj22LG4?si=rcoaCLanltNh_LQk</YOUTUBE>
<YOUTUBE id="FFhVfj22LG4">https://youtu.be/FFhVfj22LG4?si=rcoaCLanltNh_LQk</YOUTUBE>
- EriKon
- Posts: 636
- Joined: Apr 03, 2022
I've written a jazz standard repertoire list several years ago when I started teaching at universities. I've put quite some thought into the selection of tunes. This is what I came up with for tunes that I would recommend to start with and learn. Learn the head, learn the chords and try to memorize the tune, so that you don't need the sheet music anymore. And most importantly listen to them. Check out different versions.
- fiddlefestival
- Posts: 18
- Joined: Feb 01, 2025
That video is truly impressive, although it gets into a number of tunes that I think are fairly obscure - tunes I haven't played yet in half a century of playing jazz. Blue Bossa and Autumn leaves are perfect beginner songs, so yes to those, but unlikely you'd impress anybody being able to improvise over those. Erik's list is not bad for starters, I'd substitute a few, but this works. What would I substitute? Maybe All the things you are, Manha de Carnaval/Black Orpheus (so you have one bossa that doesn't scream beginner), Sweet Georgia Brown (if you lean towards earlier tunes), Take 5 (more popular among audiences than players for sure) instead of bye, bye, mood, word. Then I recommend some contrafacts, because you get double/triple or more bang for learning the chords. Contrafacts are different melodies that work over a set of changes, as in Erik's first two. Many bebop tunes, for example Ornithology (How High the Moon), Scrapple from the Apple (Honeysuckle Rose, just a different bridge), dozens more. Even if it has to be trombone, say JJ Johnson: Teapot (Sweet Georgia Brown), Turnpike,Copping the Bob, Jay Bird (I got rhythm), 100 Proof, Flat Back (What is this thing called love), Naptown (indiana),
- AndrewMeronek
- Posts: 1487
- Joined: Mar 30, 2018
[quote="Enelson"]Given the vast number of tunes that can be considered standards, I suggest that you get started by getting a fake book and let your listening tastes guide you.[/quote]
Having started out this way myself, I actually disagree. Fake books are handy as a reference tool but for actually learning to improvise, I think that it's better to seek out recordings for you to emulate and play along. And it doesn't have to be a complete take: if you really like Curtis Fuller on Blue Train, you can focus on his solo and not worry right away about Coltrane's.
EVERY great jazz improvisor went through this process of listening, internalizing, and playing along with recordings. It's hard work, and very effective.
Once you get to the point where you want to find ways to expand your improvisational vocabular beyond what you're getting out of your favorite recordings, THAT's when you start to use the Fake Books to create exercises that you design to break yourself out of familiar patterns.
And never trust the Fake Books, either. ALL of them have errors.
Having started out this way myself, I actually disagree. Fake books are handy as a reference tool but for actually learning to improvise, I think that it's better to seek out recordings for you to emulate and play along. And it doesn't have to be a complete take: if you really like Curtis Fuller on Blue Train, you can focus on his solo and not worry right away about Coltrane's.
EVERY great jazz improvisor went through this process of listening, internalizing, and playing along with recordings. It's hard work, and very effective.
Once you get to the point where you want to find ways to expand your improvisational vocabular beyond what you're getting out of your favorite recordings, THAT's when you start to use the Fake Books to create exercises that you design to break yourself out of familiar patterns.
And never trust the Fake Books, either. ALL of them have errors.
- MStarke
- Posts: 1031
- Joined: Jan 01, 2019
Again thanks for all the inputs! E.g. Erik's list is kind of the level of expectation that I feel I can handle currently. And this will bring me much further than where I am now.
- jacobgarchik
- Posts: 358
- Joined: Oct 27, 2018
geared towards the serious student
<LINK_TEXT text="https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-546-c ... rt-1-blues">https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-546-core-repertoire-part-1-blues</LINK_TEXT>
<LINK_TEXT text="https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-457-c ... -standards">https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-457-core-repertoire-pt-2-standards</LINK_TEXT>
<LINK_TEXT text="https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-546-c ... rt-1-blues">https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-546-core-repertoire-part-1-blues</LINK_TEXT>
<LINK_TEXT text="https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-457-c ... -standards">https://iverson.substack.com/p/tt-457-core-repertoire-pt-2-standards</LINK_TEXT>
- Enelson
- Posts: 38
- Joined: Mar 26, 2018
[quote="AndrewMeronek"]<QUOTE author="Enelson" post_id="289225" time="1763342503" user_id="194">
Given the vast number of tunes that can be considered standards, I suggest that you get started by getting a fake book and let your listening tastes guide you.[/quote]
Having started out this way myself, I actually disagree. Fake books are handy as a reference tool but for actually learning to improvise, I think that it's better to seek out recordings for you to emulate and play along.
[...]
And never trust the Fake Books, either. ALL of them have errors.
</QUOTE>
I agree very much with the importance of listening and playing with recordings. I alluded to this in my post, but was focusing on the OP's question "Top jazz standards to learn?", even though Markus was really looking for a concrete list. I wouldn't try to dissuade a novice from using a fake book to get a grasp of the jazz standard repertoar and make it easier to get together with other interested people to blow through tunes.
I also agree that fake books are only one tool available for musicians that want to learn about jazz and that learning to improvise is something much bigger and more complex. I also think that fake books are definitely overly relied on by many novices. (Finding errors in fake books can be a charming way to gauge one's own development, but just by listening and playing with great recordings one also realizes how many different ways the same tune can be interpreted and that the fake book version might not be the most common version on record.)
This thread peaked my interest because of my recently rekindled interest in developing my own personal repertoar of jazz standards and other music. I can feel a certain level of superficiality when going from one one-off gig to another. Even though I really do my best to dig into the material at hand, I may never play that particular music in that constellation again once the gig is over. This is a common situation for most trombonists, of course. I don't get to perform pieces from my "personal repertoar" very often, but working on and expanding this repertoar is a lot of fun and keeps up my motivation.
Given the vast number of tunes that can be considered standards, I suggest that you get started by getting a fake book and let your listening tastes guide you.[/quote]
Having started out this way myself, I actually disagree. Fake books are handy as a reference tool but for actually learning to improvise, I think that it's better to seek out recordings for you to emulate and play along.
[...]
And never trust the Fake Books, either. ALL of them have errors.
</QUOTE>
I agree very much with the importance of listening and playing with recordings. I alluded to this in my post, but was focusing on the OP's question "Top jazz standards to learn?", even though Markus was really looking for a concrete list. I wouldn't try to dissuade a novice from using a fake book to get a grasp of the jazz standard repertoar and make it easier to get together with other interested people to blow through tunes.
I also agree that fake books are only one tool available for musicians that want to learn about jazz and that learning to improvise is something much bigger and more complex. I also think that fake books are definitely overly relied on by many novices. (Finding errors in fake books can be a charming way to gauge one's own development, but just by listening and playing with great recordings one also realizes how many different ways the same tune can be interpreted and that the fake book version might not be the most common version on record.)
This thread peaked my interest because of my recently rekindled interest in developing my own personal repertoar of jazz standards and other music. I can feel a certain level of superficiality when going from one one-off gig to another. Even though I really do my best to dig into the material at hand, I may never play that particular music in that constellation again once the gig is over. This is a common situation for most trombonists, of course. I don't get to perform pieces from my "personal repertoar" very often, but working on and expanding this repertoar is a lot of fun and keeps up my motivation.
- Wilktone
- Posts: 720
- Joined: Mar 27, 2018
[quote="MStarke"]What would be your top standards to learn and familiarize with?[/quote]
I can list tunes I know and play, but the best standards for you to learn are going to be dependent on your playing situations, background, goals, and current abilities. If you're planning on taking some solos with a big band, then start by learning those tunes. If you're planning to sit in on jam sessions, go to those sessions and see what the local musicians are playing.
I've used this list with my college classes several times. I like that with each standard listed they have a bit of history, links to classic recordings, and links to a play-a-long track/chord changes to practice.
<LINK_TEXT text="https://www.learnjazzstandards.com/blog ... d-to-know/">https://www.learnjazzstandards.com/blog/50-jazz-standards-you-need-to-know/</LINK_TEXT>
It's been alluded to above, but not explicitly stated that when you are learning tunes you should be studying the common patterns. Don't try to memorize individual chords, find the patterns. ii-V-I comes to mind immediately, but there are many different types of chord patterns that standards use. Looking at changes more broadly like this is very useful for improvising over the changes as well as for learning other tunes.
My recommendation is to pick a few tunes (in different styles/grooves) to learn really well first. Knowing five tunes very well is better than learning 10 tunes sort of. Getting those first few tunes really nailed will transfer to learning new tunes faster and better in the long term.
Dave
I can list tunes I know and play, but the best standards for you to learn are going to be dependent on your playing situations, background, goals, and current abilities. If you're planning on taking some solos with a big band, then start by learning those tunes. If you're planning to sit in on jam sessions, go to those sessions and see what the local musicians are playing.
I've used this list with my college classes several times. I like that with each standard listed they have a bit of history, links to classic recordings, and links to a play-a-long track/chord changes to practice.
<LINK_TEXT text="https://www.learnjazzstandards.com/blog ... d-to-know/">https://www.learnjazzstandards.com/blog/50-jazz-standards-you-need-to-know/</LINK_TEXT>
It's been alluded to above, but not explicitly stated that when you are learning tunes you should be studying the common patterns. Don't try to memorize individual chords, find the patterns. ii-V-I comes to mind immediately, but there are many different types of chord patterns that standards use. Looking at changes more broadly like this is very useful for improvising over the changes as well as for learning other tunes.
My recommendation is to pick a few tunes (in different styles/grooves) to learn really well first. Knowing five tunes very well is better than learning 10 tunes sort of. Getting those first few tunes really nailed will transfer to learning new tunes faster and better in the long term.
Dave