One Note Samba Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis

Chord progression

Analyzed excerpt

Section: A1

Dm7 | Db7 | Cm7 | B7 | Bbmaj7

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

Bb major

Tonal center

Bb

Confidence

High

Chords analysed

5

Chord	Roman numeral	Function	What it is doing	Confidence
Dm7	iii	Tonic	Dm7 is the iii chord. It shares three notes with the tonic, so it often works as a softer stand-in for it.	Medium
Db7	subV7/ii	Dominant	Db7 is a tritone substitute — subV7/ii. It carries the same tritone as G7, the real dominant of C, but resolves down a semitone instead of down a fifth.	High
Cm7	ii	Predominant	Cm7 is the ii chord of Bb: the classic predominant. It prepares the dominant and almost always moves to it.	High
B7	subV7	Dominant	B7 is a tritone substitute for the dominant. It shares its tritone with F7 and slides down a semitone into Bb.	High
Bbmaj7	I	Tonic	Bbmaj7 is the tonic of Bb. It is where the progression is at rest.	High

What the analyzer found in it

iii - subV7/ii - iiDm7 - Db7 - Cm7

A ii-V-I where the dominant has been replaced by its tritone substitute: Db7 in place of G7. The bass walks down by semitone into Cm7.

ii - subV7 - ICm7 - B7 - Bbmaj7

A ii-V-I where the dominant has been replaced by its tritone substitute: B7 in place of F7. The bass walks down by semitone into Bbmaj7.

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

In Bb major the excerpt reads iii – subV7/ii – ii – subV7 – I. Inside those 5 chords there is a tritone substitute. Play it slowly with only two voices — the third and seventh of each chord. In Db7 those are F and B, and watching where that pair goes next tells you more about the progression than the root movement does. The same device turns up in Blues for Alice, All Blues and So What, in other keys and at other tempos.

How the rest of One Note Samba goes

The melody of the first section is a single repeated pitch while the harmony moves underneath it, descending chromatically, so the same note is reinterpreted against each new chord — the title is a literal description of the compositional device. The second section does the same thing on a different note. It is the clearest demonstration available of the fact that a note has no fixed meaning, only a meaning relative to what is sounding under it, and the piece exists mainly to make that point.

One Note Samba on record

Jobim wrote it in 1960 with Newton Mendonça. It was among the bossa nova pieces that reached North America through the early-1960s Stan Getz recordings, and its premise is simple enough that it is often used with beginning students to introduce reharmonisation before they have the vocabulary to discuss it.

Analyze this progression

Take these bars into the analyzer and interfere with them. The fastest way to learn what a chord was doing is to remove it and read what the analysis says instead.

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One Note Samba — Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis

Chord progression

The books behind this page

Jazz Harmony

Harmonic Narrative

Jazz Guitar Comping

Harmonic analysis

What the analyzer found in it

Why this example matters

How the rest of One Note Samba goes

One Note Samba on record

Analyze this progression

Related

Tritone substitution

Blues for Alice

All Blues

So What

Jazz chord progressions