Watermelon Man Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis | Niels Dalgaard
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Watermelon Man
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Herbie Hancock · 1962 · F major · 16-bar blues

Watermelon Man — Chord Progression & Harmonic Analysis

The first eight bars are an ordinary blues. Then the V-IV pair that would normally close it is simply said three times, and the extra four bars are all the difference between twelve and sixteen.

Roman numeral analysis

Chord progression

Analyzed excerpt

Form: 16-bar blues · Bars 1–12

F7 | F7 | F7 | F7 | Bb7 | Bb7 | F7 | F7 | C7 | Bb7 | C7 | Bb7

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

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
F major
Tonal center
F
Confidence
High
Chords analysed
12
ChordRoman numeralFunctionWhat it is doingConfidence
F7I7TonicF7 is the tonic, but built as a dominant seventh — the sound that defines the blues. The tonic keeps a b7 and stays at home anyway.High
F7I7TonicF7 is the tonic, but built as a dominant seventh — the sound that defines the blues. The tonic keeps a b7 and stays at home anyway.High
F7I7TonicF7 is the tonic, but built as a dominant seventh — the sound that defines the blues. The tonic keeps a b7 and stays at home anyway.High
F7I7TonicF7 is the tonic, but built as a dominant seventh — the sound that defines the blues. The tonic keeps a b7 and stays at home anyway. Also readable as V7/IV.Medium
Bb7IV7PredominantBb7 is the IV of a blues, built as a dominant seventh. In this context that is its normal quality, not a dominant of anything.High
Bb7IV7PredominantBb7 is the IV of a blues, built as a dominant seventh. In this context that is its normal quality, not a dominant of anything.High
F7I7TonicF7 is the tonic, but built as a dominant seventh — the sound that defines the blues. The tonic keeps a b7 and stays at home anyway.High
F7I7TonicF7 is the tonic, but built as a dominant seventh — the sound that defines the blues. The tonic keeps a b7 and stays at home anyway.High
C7V7DominantC7 is the dominant of F. Its third and seventh form a tritone, and that tritone is what makes the tonic feel due.High
Bb7IV7PredominantBb7 is the IV of a blues, built as a dominant seventh. In this context that is its normal quality, not a dominant of anything.High
C7V7DominantC7 is the dominant of F. Its third and seventh form a tritone, and that tritone is what makes the tonic feel due.High
Bb7IV7PredominantBb7 is the IV of a blues, built as a dominant seventh. In this context that is its normal quality, not a dominant of anything.High

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

Against a tonic of F major the passage numbers as I7 – IV7 – V7. There is no substitution and no borrowing in it at all, which is exactly why it is worth playing: it is the sound the substitutions are substituting for. Strip it to two notes per chord, the third and the seventh, and play it under tempo. F7 gives you A and Eb; follow that pair from chord to chord and the voice leading becomes audible in a way the root motion never makes it. Once you can hear it here, it is hard to miss in Now’s the Time, Billie’s Bounce and Straight, No Chaser.

How the rest of Watermelon Man goes

A sixteen-bar form rather than twelve, which is the detail most people miss: it is blues-derived but has an extra four bars built in, and counting it as a standard blues will put you in the wrong place before the first chorus is out. The head is a riff with a strong rhythmic hook and a good deal of space around it, and the harmony is deliberately plain, because the piece was written to be immediately graspable by listeners who were not jazz audiences.

Watermelon Man on record

Herbie Hancock recorded it in 1962 on his debut Takin’ Off. The following year Mongo Santamaría recorded a Latin version that became a substantial pop hit, and the royalties from it funded a good deal of Hancock’s early career — a fact he has described directly. Hancock recorded a radically different version again in 1973 on Head Hunters, so the tune exists in three well-known and barely compatible forms.

Analyze this progression

Load the progression and start altering it. Every edit is re-read from scratch, so you can test a hunch about one chord without rewriting the rest.

Open in Jazz Harmony Analyzer →

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