Autumn Leaves

Autumn Leaves is one of the most recognizable jazz standards out there. Let's take a look at a rendition of it here.

Notice that we are swinging our eighths for this song, but the majority of the notes are quarter notes. So only apply swing when we're playing eighths.

Between each chord here, we have what's called a walking bassline. Common in jazz, the bassline here frequently steps outside the scale and circles the notes. We can get away with this because the tension is resolved each time the next chord is played.

Look at how the bass notes work their way to the next chord ahead of time.

If you're having trouble getting started with this piece, try learn the chord shapes first, and playing through them all. Afterward, you can add the walking bassline back in.

The first ending is a complex upward movement through 6th chords and Fully Diminished chords (and is not part of the original tune), but if we just focus on the main theme's resolution to G Minor, it's quite easy to comprehend!

If you want to make sense of this, make sure you're familiar with your Minor Diatonics.

Our progression here is as follows:

Cm7, F7, Bbmaj7, Ebmaj7, Am7b5, D7, Gm

In scale degrees, our Root Notes of each chord are:

4, 7, 3, 6, 2, 5, 1

There's a clear pattern there! It's a series of 2-5-1 progressions working it's way downward.

4-7-3 is a 2-5-1 resolving to the 3rd scale degree.

3-6-2 is a 2-5-1 resolving to the 2nd scale degree.

Finally, we have a proper 2-5-1 resolving us to the 1st scale degree, our Root, the tonal center.

Keeping things nice and simple, all of our chords are diatonic here, except for one. You can probably guess which one. 

Our 5 chord, the D7, is borrowed from the Major Scale, giving us a stronger resolution to our G Minor, as we've seen extensively by now.

The whole chord progression laid out in notation is as follows:

ivmin7, bVII7, bIIImaj7, bVImaj7, iimin7b5, V7, i

Jazz theory is a shockingly complicated world, but Autumn Leaves is a great example of a bit of jazz that can be easily understood with a more basic level of understanding.

Keeping an eye out for 2-5-1s one of the easiest ways to pick apart jazz progressions for yourself, and you can apply it to your own chord progressions to instantly add a more sophisticated feel.