I Ranked 27 So-Called “Beginner” Jazz Songs

[00:00:00]Today, we're going to be ranking popular jazz standards based on how beginner-friendly they are. James and I were just looking at this list online of the 50 most essential jazz standards for beginners to know, and we were kind of perplexed by some of them. So, we thought, let's just stop for a second and hit record, and let's go through this together. We're going to be ranking these from A tier to D tier, but for any that really stand out, we're going to put up here in a special category called bird tier, named after the goat, Charlie Parker. Uh the first tune is on Green Dolphin Street.

[00:00:32]>> [music] >> The melody is actually pretty nice and simple, but the chord voicings require you [music] to know some of these fancy chordal uh fourths voicings. So, for that reason, I'm going to put it in B tier. Okay, next, Take the A Train.

[00:00:47]Man, Take the A Train might be bird material, but I don't think I'm going to put it in A just cuz there is a couple secondary dominants in there, but this one gets called at jam sessions all the time. Body and Soul.

[00:01:05]All right. Uh this is kind of tricky.

[00:01:08]You know, this is one of my favorite ballads to teach early on, but there's a lot that you kind of got to know before you're ready for it yet. There's a lot of these kind of advanced upper structure [music] voicings and stuff that work really well over this tune.

[00:01:19]It's definitely not at the bottom. Let's put it in C tier, in the middle.

[00:01:22]Billie's Bounce.

[00:01:36]I remember how it goes. Now, definitely, this is a D tier tune. This actually, as bebop tunes go, this one's pretty approachable, but it's definitely not for beginners. There Will Never Be Another You.

[00:01:50]>> [music] >> This is a tough one. The chords are [music] kind straightforward on this tune. I think it's really approachable, but I'm going to put it in the B tier.

[00:02:02]Yeah, My Funny Valentine is an interesting pick. We're doing this one in my live workshop with members now, and I picked it as a rather beginner-friendly tune. But as we've gotten into it, I've realized it's actually kind of tricky in some spots.

[00:02:14]There is some minor harmony stuff that is not super intuitive or requires you to know like several different minor scales and things like that. It's kind of tricky.

[00:02:29]>> [music] [music] >> Footprints [music] by Wayne Shorter. Who the hell put Footprints on a beginning jazz list? The D tier instantly.

[00:02:52]>> [music] >> So What, made famous on Kind of Blue, is a kind of tune that a lot of people want to learn how [music] to play. And it makes sense, it's a great tune. And it is a modal tune, so it does have some like prerequisites of other harmony you need to kind of master first before you can approach it. But that said, as modal tunes go, it's kind of approachable. I mean, there's only really two different modal sounds to get your head around. So I'm going to put this in B tier, although I would be pretty hesitant for a true beginner to really look at this tune.

[00:03:20]Okay, Freddie Freeloader is an interesting pull. Even though it's from Kind of Blue, and a lot of people want to learn how to play it, I think it's way more approachable than So What.

[00:03:31]>> [music] >> You know, I think I'm going to put this in the bird tier, the top. It's such an important tune to know. It's a simple blues in B flat. I think it's approachable for almost anybody.

[00:03:44]Definitely 100% a tune that every beginner should know.

[00:03:54]Who the hell is making these beginner lists? Stella by Starlight is an amazing tune, probably one of the most important ballads ever written. But, for beginners, straight to the D tier.

[00:04:04]There's just no way.

[00:04:09]>> [music] [music] >> Duke Ellington's Caravan is a really interesting choice because in one sense it's only really got two chords, at least in the A section. It's got this kind of C7 altered to a F minor 6.

[00:04:31]>> [music] >> But, it's actually considerably harder than it looks. For one, the first 12 measures are all the same chord. It's all just that C7 chord. So, you've got to figure out what to do with it. But, it's also a little bit more of an exotic minor sound with some kind of interesting scales to think about. I don't think this is for beginners, but I'm certainly not putting it with Billie's Bounce or Stella by Starlight.

[00:04:50]So, we're going to put it in C. I really hope we're going to find a couple more good ones in this list. So far these have been kind of tricky. Okay, Nearness of You is a good pull. Probably the first ballad that I would teach anybody how to play.

[00:05:02]It's in an easy key, F. [music] Most of the chords all kind of fit the key signature. There's a couple secondary dominants, but it's very straightforward harmony and the melody is pretty simple.

[00:05:11]>> [music] [music] >> I'm really teetering between A and B here. My instinct is telling me to go [music] A, but I know from teaching this tune a bunch that there's this tricky kind of thing in the coda.

[00:05:38]This A half [music] diminished to D altered. I do think it's approachable, especially with our chord voicings method, but even so, man, I don't know.

[00:05:48]I think I'm going to put it in B tier. I might change my mind and bring it back up. All right, what's next?

[00:05:55]No, I'm just kidding.

[00:05:56]Nobody would be that mean. Definitely would be D tier, but it's not even on the list. Okay, seriously, uh Fly Me to the Moon.

[00:06:04]>> [music] >> Fly Me to the Moon, you know, I'm kind of sick of it. It's overplayed. It's kind of old-timey. It seems like everybody who's learning how to play jazz learns this tune first. But, it's probably for good reason. Honestly, it's in C major. All of the chords, except for one. I think there's a secondary dominant in there to the sixth. But, basically, everything is just a chord made up of the C major scale. I want to put it in bird tier, especially for my older students who like this kind of old-timey music. I'm not sure I would teach it to a kid, though. It's just kind of boring.

[00:06:38]>> [music] >> I was waiting for this one. It's a classic, one of the first tunes people look for when they buy their first real book. Definitely [music] A tier. The only reason I'm not putting this in bird tier is because it's got a couple key centers that it moves between. And it's got this interesting uh tritone substitution.

[00:06:58]Did we [music] put Take the A Train in A tier? I think we did. Yeah. So, just like with A Train, I think this is totally approachable for anybody. You're just going to have to think about a couple measures here and there. [music] All right, Cantaloupe Island is a tune that every beginner needs to get into their fingers at some point. I don't think it's near the top of the list, but maybe one of your first five or six tunes. It gets called a jam sessions quite a lot. And if you can play the kind of signature riff, you can hang out in the jam session all day. And there's actually you can solo over the whole thing using just two blue scales. So, I even think it's like a good tune to learn how to solo over top of. But, if you're brand new to the piano, this riff and the coordination between the hands can be kind of tricky. But, I just made a video teaching you how to play this song 3 days ago. So, you can go to the channel and get it step by step if you want. I'm going to put it in the B category.

[00:07:50]>> [music] >> I have a lot [music] of students who come to me wanting to learn how to play Night and Day, and I definitely think it's one that you could get to maybe in your first 6 months or so. Um because for the most part it's circle of fifths and simple 5-1 progressions, but there's some interesting chromatic movements, some interesting things to consider in the way the voicings go. I think I'd probably wait for 6 months or 8 months or so before you jumped into this tune, but it's definitely not like Anthropology or Confirmation or Giant Steps or something like that. So, I'm going to put it in the C tier.

[00:08:24]>> [music] >> Alone Together might be one of the most important minor tunes for a beginner to learn. I So, I we got to have at least one minor tune in the bird tier, right?

[00:08:36]So, it's going to be Alone Together or Softly as in a Morning Sunrise, or maybe Summertime.

[00:08:42]Maybe Summertime? Does anyone know Summertime's on the list? You know what?

[00:08:45]I'm going to do it. I'm going to put Alone Together in the bird tier. It's just a perfect tune to learn the swing language. I think we can handle the half-diminished chords. All right, Misty. Yeah, of course Misty's on here.

[00:09:03]Misty is probably [music] the tune that draws more people to play jazz than any other. And so, I really want to put it near the top of the list cuz I want to encourage as many people to come play as possible. But realistically, it's probably not a tune that you're going to play in your first 6 months of playing. There's probably a simple way that you could teach this tune like using simple shell voicings.

[00:09:28]If we did it that way, it might be like a B tier, but honestly, I think I'm going to put it C tier. Because the reason everybody wants to learn how to play Misty is cuz they want these big >> [music] >> Bill Evansy kind of voicings, right?

[00:09:41]Man, I wish I could put this higher up, but I think I have to put it C tier.

[00:09:49]C Jam Blues, a 12-bar blues in the key of C with the simplest melody of all time, and it's just a great swingin' tune with tons of amazing recordings to inspire you. 100% goes [music] in the bird tier. All of Me is probably one of the first three or four songs that I would teach you if we did lessons together. It's so versatile [music] in terms of being able to play it in different styles and tempos. It has secondary dominants in there, which gives us a few interesting new things to talk about. All around, I'm going to give this one a solid A tier.

[00:10:22]Summertime by George Gershwin is a great minor lullaby from Porgy and Bess. I stand by what I said earlier, I think Alone Together is the right minor tune to put in the bird tier. So, we're going to put this one [music] right here below it in the A tier.

[00:10:42]>> [music] [music] >> I'm probably going to get some flak for this cuz All the Things You Are is probably like the most important song for you to know if you want to go to a jam session. It gets called literally every time. But honestly, [music] I don't think it's one of the first like five tunes you should learn. There's a lot of 2-5-1s in here, a lot of different key centers. [music] If you're going to improvise over top of it, that's a lot of different scales to learn how to navigate. [music] Again, super important. I don't want to de-emphasize how important it is to learn this song. So, for that reason, I couldn't put it in bird tier. [music] And honestly, I'm not sure I could put it in the same tier as Take the A Train.

[00:11:28]I think it's harder than that. I'm going to put it here in B tier, but let me know down in the comments if you think I'm nuts.

[00:11:34]>> [music] >> Autumn Leaves >> [music] >> Bird tier if there ever was one, no doubt about it. Might be the first one >> [music] >> on the list.

[00:11:51]Blue Monk is next.

[00:11:53]And I think Blue Monk is probably another bird tier. It's a pretty simple tune, a 12-bar blues in the key of B flat. The melody is very simple.

[00:12:02]I think it's really important that beginning players today acquire the taste of Monk early on. And this is a simple enough tune that you can start to put in some of those quirky little Monk moments.

[00:12:12]Okay, [snorts] the last one on our list, The Girl from Ipanema.

[00:12:19]Is this the only bossa we had today?

[00:12:21]No, we had Blue Bossa earlier. [music] That's right.

[00:12:28]But I don't think Girl from Ipanema is that great of a beginner tune. And it's not because the tune is not approachable for beginners, because the chords are not that challenging. There's a couple quirky moments, like this G7 flat five, but we can get our head around that. The bossa nova rhythm, yeah, it takes a little bit of coordination, a little bit of time, but again, I think a beginner could get their head around that, too.

[00:12:49]The reason that I don't think it's great for beginners is because there's so many like unique Jobim things that are in this harmony and the melody. I think you'd spend a lot of time getting your head around some of the unique things inside Girl from Ipanema, and then it just wouldn't be that useful to you in the other tunes. I can teach you how to play all of these songs or any jazz standard that you want. At Jazz Library, we have three main courses that teach you chord voicings, comping rhythms, and improvisation. Between those three, you'll be able to pick up and play in any jam session that you want, or you'll be able to play these solo at home just for yourself. All of those are available for a one-time purchase at jazzlibrary.com. But in the meantime, I've picked a couple other videos here for you on YouTube to help you take the next steps.