Rhythm-a-ning Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis

Chord progression

Analyzed excerpt

Section: A1 · Bars 1–4

Bb G7 | Cm7 F7 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7

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

Medium

Chords analysed

8

Chord	Roman numeral	Function	What it is doing	Confidence
Bb	I	Tonic	Bb is the tonic of Bb. It is where the progression is at rest.	High
G7	V7/ii	Dominant	G7 is functioning as V7/ii: 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 ii instead.	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
F7	V7	Dominant	F7 is the dominant of Bb. Its third and seventh form a tritone, and that tritone is what makes the tonic feel due.	High
Dm7	ii/ii	Predominant	Dm7 is the ii of a secondary ii-V. Together with G7 it prepares C, so the pair tonicizes ii without leaving the key. Also readable as iii.	High
G7	V7/ii	Dominant	G7 is functioning as V7/ii: 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 ii instead.	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
F7	V7	Dominant	F7 is the dominant of Bb. Its third and seventh form a tritone, and that tritone is what makes the tonic feel due.	High

What the analyzer found in it

ii - V7Cm7 - F7

A ii-V pointing at Bb, which never arrives. The preparation is complete, the resolution is not.

ii/ii - V7/ii - iiDm7 - G7 - Cm7

A complete minor ii-V-i in Cm, with the half-diminished ii and a dominant that borrows its leading tone from harmonic minor.

ii - V7Cm7 - F7

A ii-V pointing at Bb, which never arrives. The preparation is complete, the resolution is not.

half cadenceF7

The progression stops on the dominant of Bb — a half cadence. It is unfinished on purpose.

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

Read in Bb major, these bars come out as I – V7/ii – ii – V7 – ii/ii. Inside those 8 chords there is a complete ii-V-I and at least one secondary dominant. The shortest way in is a two-voice reduction: third and seventh only, slowly. G7 contributes B and F, and where that pair resolves is the whole story of the passage. The excerpt above is note for note the same as the one quoted on Oleo, Anthropology and Moose the Mooche, so the reading below is identical on those pages too. That is not a shortcut: these tunes really are built on the same harmony, and what separates them is the melody written over it. You will meet the same move again in Stella by Starlight, How High the Moon and Ornithology, transposed and at a different pace.

How the rest of Rhythm-a-ning goes

Rhythm changes again, and the head is built almost entirely from one short rhythmic cell repeated at different pitches, which is characteristic of its composer: the interest is in the placement rather than in the contour. The A sections take that cell and move it, and the bridge — the standard cycle of dominants — is stated with deliberate plainness, almost as blocks. The tune is easy to read and hard to play, because everything depends on the exact rhythmic placement and a rushed eighth note destroys it.

Rhythm-a-ning on record

Thelonious Monk’s, first recorded in 1957 on the album Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers made with Monk as guest. The title is a pun on the form it is written over, which is about as direct as titles in this repertoire get. Monk played it throughout his career and the tune has the property that it sounds unmistakably like him even though the underlying harmony is the most generic in jazz — evidence that a composer’s signature lives in rhythm at least as much as in chords.

Analyze this progression

The excerpt is loaded and editable. Swap a chord for its tritone substitute, delete the preparation, borrow one from the parallel minor, and watch which numerals change and which do not.

Open in Jazz Harmony Analyzer →

Rhythm-a-ning — 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 Rhythm-a-ning goes

Rhythm-a-ning on record

Analyze this progression

Related

ii-V-I

Secondary dominants

Stella by Starlight

How High the Moon

Ornithology

Jazz chord progressions