Desafinado Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis

Chord progression

Analyzed excerpt Valid harmonic variant

Section: A · Bars 1–4

Fmaj7 | G7 | Gm7 | Gb7

Published versions of this tune disagree more than most: bar 4 is a tritone substitute here, and other charts print the unaltered C7 in its place.

This is a short excerpt quoted for analysis, not the full chart, and this composition is very likely still in copyright. Published versions and recordings disagree with each other about the rest of the tune, and often about these bars too.

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

Harmonic analysis

Key

F major

Tonal center

F

Confidence

High

Chords analysed

4

Chord	Roman numeral	Function	What it is doing	Confidence
Fmaj7	I	Tonic	Fmaj7 is the tonic of F. It is where the progression is at rest.	High
G7	V7/V	Dominant	G7 is functioning as V7/V: a secondary dominant. It is the dominant of C, not of the home key, so it borrows the pull of a V-I and points it at V instead.	Low
Gm7	ii	Predominant	Gm7 is the ii chord of F: the classic predominant. It prepares the dominant and almost always moves to it.	High
Gb7	subV7	Dominant	Gb7 is a tritone substitute for the dominant. It shares its tritone with C7 and slides down a semitone into F.	Medium

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 F major, the excerpt is I – V7/V – ii – subV7. Inside those 4 chords there is at least one secondary dominant and a tritone substitute. Take the roots away and keep the third and seventh. In G7 that is B and F. Those two notes decide where the progression is going, and hearing them move is worth more than naming the chords. Blues for Alice, All Blues and So What use the same device, which is the argument for learning it once properly rather than three times by accident.

How the rest of Desafinado goes

A song about singing slightly out of tune, written so that the melody keeps landing on notes that sit awkwardly against the chord underneath — the joke is built into the harmony rather than described by the lyric. The form is long and irregular by standard measure, and it modulates more than any other bossa in common circulation. Several of its chords are approached by tritone substitution, which is why a chart of it looks more complicated than the piece sounds: the substitutions smooth the bass line, so the ear hears steps where the page shows leaps.

Desafinado on record

Jobim wrote it in 1959 with a lyric by Newton Mendonça. It was among the first bossa nova pieces to reach American listeners, through Stan Getz and Charlie Byrd’s 1962 album Jazz Samba, which preceded the Girl from Ipanema sessions and started the commercial wave. The title translates roughly as “out of tune”, and the song was written partly as a reply to critics who said bossa nova singers could not sing.

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 →

Desafinado — Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis

Chord progression

The books behind this page

Jazz Harmony

Harmonic Narrative

Jazz Guitar Comping

Harmonic analysis

Why this example matters

How the rest of Desafinado goes

Desafinado on record

Analyze this progression

Related

Secondary dominants

Tritone substitution

Blues for Alice

All Blues

So What

Jazz chord progressions