Body and Soul Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis | Niels Dalgaard
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Body and Soul
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Johnny Green · 1930 · D♭ major · AABA, 32 bars

Body and Soul — Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis

The ballad players use to prove they can play ballads, and harmonically the densest eight bars of 1930. Two complete ii-V-I cadences before the first phrase is over, and a bridge that modulates a fourth away and back.

ii-V-I

Chord progression

Analyzed excerpt

Section: A1 · Bars 1–4

Ebm7 Ab7 | Dbmaj7 Bbm7 | Ebm7 Ab7 | Dbmaj7

This is a short excerpt, not the full chart. The composition dates from 1930 and is old enough that it is very likely in the public domain in the United States, which is why the excerpt runs longer here — but copyright status varies by territory and by edition, so treat that as context, not as legal advice.

The books behind this page

Every one of these tunes is assembled out of the same handful of harmonic resources. Jazz Harmony is those resources, explained in the order in which they build on each other.

Start here Project 03 · Harmony

Jazz Harmony

From tradition to the expectation framework · For any instrument Project 05 · Harmony

Harmonic Narrative

A practical method for creating and understanding harmonic progressions through expectation Project 04 · Jazz guitar

Jazz Guitar Comping

Creating direction through harmony, rhythm and the expectation framework

Harmonic analysis

Key
Db major
Tonal center
Db
Confidence
High
Chords analysed
7
ChordRoman numeralFunctionWhat it is doingConfidence
Ebm7iiPredominantEbm7 is the ii chord of Db: the classic predominant. It prepares the dominant and almost always moves to it.High
Ab7V7DominantAb7 is the dominant of Db. Its third and seventh form a tritone, and that tritone is what makes the tonic feel due.High
Dbmaj7ITonicDbmaj7 is the tonic of Db. It is where the progression is at rest.High
Bbm7viTonicBbm7 is the vi chord — the relative minor. It shares three notes with the tonic and often replaces it.High
Ebm7iiPredominantEbm7 is the ii chord of Db: the classic predominant. It prepares the dominant and almost always moves to it.High
Ab7V7DominantAb7 is the dominant of Db. Its third and seventh form a tritone, and that tritone is what makes the tonic feel due.High
Dbmaj7ITonicDbmaj7 is the tonic of Db. It is where the progression is at rest.High

What the analyzer found in it

ii - V7 - IEbm7 - Ab7 - Dbmaj7

A complete ii-V-I in Db. Predominant, dominant, tonic: the sentence jazz harmony is built out of.

I - vi - ii - VDbmaj7 - Bbm7 - Ebm7 - Ab7

A I-vi-ii-V turnaround: the four-chord loop that sends a section back to its beginning.

ii - V7 - IEbm7 - Ab7 - Dbmaj7

A complete ii-V-I in Db. Predominant, dominant, tonic: the sentence jazz harmony is built out of.

V - IAb7 - Dbmaj7

The progression closes with an authentic cadence in Db.

High, medium and low next to each numeral are judgements about musical context, not probabilities. A low rating marks a bar that can honestly be read more than one way. How the ratings are decided →

Why this example matters

Numbered against Db major, the excerpt is ii – V7 – I – vi. Inside those 7 chords there is a complete ii-V-I and a turnaround. Take the roots away and keep the third and seventh. In Ab7 that is C and Gb. Those two notes decide where the progression is going, and hearing them move is worth more than naming the chords. Autumn Leaves, All The Things You Are and Tune Up use the same device, which is the argument for learning it once properly rather than three times by accident.

How the rest of Body and Soul goes

In a key with six flats, which alone accounts for part of its reputation, and with a bridge that modulates to a key a considerable distance away and then works back through a series of cadences. The A sections move harmonically almost every two beats. The combination — an awkward key, a fast harmonic rhythm and a bridge in unfamiliar territory — is why it became the standard by which a saxophonist’s command was measured, a role it has held for the better part of a century.

Body and Soul on record

Johnny Green wrote it in 1930. Coleman Hawkins recorded it in 1939 in a version that plays the melody almost not at all, improvising through both choruses instead — an approach so unusual at the time that the record is routinely described as the point at which the tenor saxophone solo became an art form in its own right. Every subsequent version is measured against it, fairly or not.

Analyze this progression

Open these chords in the analyzer and change them. Move one chord, substitute a dominant, take the ii away — the reading updates and tells you what you just did.

Open in Jazz Harmony Analyzer →

Related

ii-V-I

What this device is, and the other standards in the library that use it.

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Autumn Leaves

Joseph Kosma · 1945 · B♭ major / G minor

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All The Things You Are

Jerome Kern · 1939 · A♭ major

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Tune Up

Miles Davis · 1953 · D major

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Jazz chord progressions

The families every standard is assembled from, with examples from the library.

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