Donna Lee

Donna Lee is a jazz composition attributed to Charlie Parker , but composed at least in 1947 with the participation of Miles Davis .

The composition

The Donna Lee theme is a frequently performed bebop piece that is almost always played up tempo . It is in A flat major and is based on the harmonies of the 1917 jazz standard Back Home Again in Indiana , composed by James Hanley (1892–1942). The theme is kept in the ABAC song form . The beginning of Donna Lee is a typical example of the rhythmic shifting of a phrase that is common in modern jazz ; it is reminiscent of Ice Freezes Red , a bebop head from Fats Navarro .

Impact history

The composition was part of the classical bebop repertoire very early on and was not only used by Parker and Miles Davis et al. a. also by Claude Thornhill , Wardell Gray , Herb Geller , Lee Konitz / Warne Marsh , Howard McGhee , Slide Hampton , Art Pepper , Oscar Peterson , Joe Pass , Steve Lacy , Archie Shepp , Peter Herbolzheimer , Clark Terry , Bobby McFerrin , Karrin Allyson , Jane Bunnett and Helge Schneider recorded. It is also the last piece that the trumpeter Clifford Brown recorded before his tragic accidental death.

One of the most virtuoso "Donna Lee" interpretations is the solo by bassist Jaco Pastorius (with Don Alias on the congas) on his debut album Jaco Pastorius from 1976. Donna Lee was a favorite piece by avant-garde jazz saxophonist Anthony Braxton , who recorded it several times .

literature

Bielefeld Catalog Jazz 2001
Carlo Bohländer , Karl Heinz Holler, Christian Pfarr: Reclam's Jazz Guide . 4th, revised and supplemented edition. Reclam, Stuttgart 1990, ISBN 3-15-010355-X .
Ted Gioia The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire , Oxford University Press, New York 2012, ISBN 978-01-99-93739-4 .
Peter Niklas Wilson & Ulfert Goeman: Charlie Parker , Oreos, Schaftlach, 1988

Web links

Remarks

↑ Although Donna Lee has long been officially attributed to Charlie Parker as the author, Miles Davis has always insisted on having composed this title, which is also widely recognized. However, as a band leader, Davis himself did not always take the question of authorship seriously: The jazz standards Four and Tune Up were composed, for example, by Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson , Solar by Chuck Wayne , and Blue in Green by Bill Evans .
↑ The title is supposed to refer to the name of a long-forgotten jazz bassist from the bebop environment. Another possibility for the naming by Parker / Davis could have been the bassist Curly Russell ; Ted Gioia assumes that the title is named after his daughter Donna Lee Russell.
↑ Whose song with a text by Ballard MacDonald was recorded by the original Dixieland Jass Band in 1917 and was a much-played swing classic. See song portrait at jazzstandards.com
^ Description of the title at jazzstandards.com
↑ For a musicological analysis of Pastorius' interpretation cf. Uri Gonzalez, What Does Donna Lee Mean? An Analysis of the Construction of Meaning in Music. Uppsala Universitet (2004)

[1] Although Donna Lee has long been officially attributed to Charlie Parker as the author, Miles Davis has always insisted on having composed this title, which is also widely recognized. However, as a band leader, Davis himself did not always take the question of authorship seriously: The jazz standards Four and Tune Up were composed, for example, by Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson , Solar by Chuck Wayne , and Blue in Green by Bill Evans .

[2] The title is supposed to refer to the name of a long-forgotten jazz bassist from the bebop environment. Another possibility for the naming by Parker / Davis could have been the bassist Curly Russell ; Ted Gioia assumes that the title is named after his daughter Donna Lee Russell.

[3] Whose song with a text by Ballard MacDonald was recorded by the original Dixieland Jass Band in 1917 and was a much-played swing classic. See song portrait at jazzstandards.com

[4] Description of the title at jazzstandards.com

[5] For a musicological analysis of Pastorius' interpretation cf. Uri Gonzalez, What Does Donna Lee Mean? An Analysis of the Construction of Meaning in Music. Uppsala Universitet (2004)