Subs for Days of Wine and Roses reed kottler: This a great Henry Mancini tune with lyrics by Johnny Mercer. These subs are basically head changes. In other words, as Jules pointed out, these harmonically rich changes are not the ones you want to solo on though some musicians like to. To me it's equally alot of work to work out interesting head changes as it is to work out soloing changes and time doesnt permit me to do both in one post. I plan to begin posting written solos for various tunes and then I will get into soloing changes. I am currently struggling with trying to get my finale into .giff and .pdf so I can post them at the web site. To me the soloing changes affect alot what kind of solo you can play. This tune has so many possibilities that I'm not going to try and pick a particular set. You'll have to see the variations and come up with your own set. The sheet music is in F and I think generally the tune is played in that key. The sheet music changes for the first four bars are essentially: F | Cmi6/Eb | D7 | | Gm The Cmi6/Eb is a misspelled Ami7b5/Eb. This is a common mistake in fake books. Apparently the Mi7b5 chord was considered a "novel" idea in the past and nobody would know what it is so they wrote it as a minor sixth chord with the 6th degree in the bass. I even heard a fairly recent interview with Dizzy before he died and he still called it a minor 6th chord with a 6th in the bass. Monk had taught him that chord and it was considered revolutionary. (Though Chopin uses it extensively throughout the Mazurkas). But a Cmi6 chord would no sense harmonically. Why would an F chord go to a C chord and then a D chord. That makes no sense. So we write: F | Amib5/Eb | D7 | | Gm Now we have a I iii/VI ii which makes sense. It is also fairly common to voice a mi7b5 chord with the b5 in the bass. The F can be replace with something like F+ F6. F+ F6 | Amib5/Eb | D7sus D7 | | Gm or F+ F6 | Ami7b5 | D7 | | Gm Even something like: F F+ | F6 Amib5/Eb | D7 | | Gm Another possibility is to use a minor plagal cadence idea: F | Bbm6 |Ami7 | D7 | or F | Bbm6 |Ami7 D7 | D7 | This opens up the possibility of replacing the F, probably not on the first eight though, with Bmi7b5. Bmi7b5 | Bbm6 |Ami7 D7 | D7 | Given that this ivm type chord applies, we can also try the V of that chord, Eb7 which will function the same way. Fmaj7 | Eb7 |D7sus D7| D7 | Notice that I make some chord adjustments for certain subs in order to preserve bassline integrity. The next four are essentially: Gmi | | Bbm6 | | Ami7 This can work as: Gmi7 D7 |Gmi7 | Bbm6 | | Ami7 or Gmi7 Ab7 |Gmi7 | Bbm6 | | Ami7 The Bbm6 can be Bbmi Bbmi+, Bbmi6 Gmi7 Ab7 |Gmi7 | Bbmi Bbmi+ | Bbmi6 | Ami7 Also, you can treat it as a ii and go to Eb7. Gmi7 Ab7 |Gmi7 | Bbmi6 | Eb7 | Ami7 The next four are in the sheet music: Ami7 | Dmi | Gmi | Gmi7/F | Emi7b5 A7 | Some extra ii/V's can spice up things: Ami7 Emi7,A7 | Dmi7 Ami7,D7 | Gmi7 | Gmi7/F | Emi7b5 or Ami7 Emi7,A7 | Dmi7 D7 | Gmi7 | Gmi7/F | Emi7b5 The next for are essentially in the sheet music: Emi7b5 A7 | Dmi7b5 G7 | Gmi7 | C7 | F I prefer to replace the Emi7b5 with Emi7 and Dmi7b5 with Dmi7. Emi7 A7 | Dmi7 G7 | Gmi7 | C7 | F There are a few moves that I've used before possibly here. Emi7 A7 | Dmi7 Ab7 G7sus G7 | Gmi7 Db7 | C7sus C7 | F or even: Emi7 A7 | Dmi7 Ab7 G7sus G7 | Gmi7 G7 | C7sus C7 | F The next eight are essentially the same as the first eight some thing like: Bmi7b5 | Bbm6 |Ami7 D7 | D7 | Gmi | |Bbmi7 | Eb7 | Ami7 The next four in the sheet music are: Ami7 | Dmi7 Dmi7/C | Bmi7b5 | Bb9 | Ami. I prefer to use a Bmi7 in place of Bmi7b5 and to go to the E7 instead of Bb9 (tritone subs). Ami7 | Dmi7 Dmi7/C | Bmi7 | E7 | Ami. I see a lot of possibilities for these four bars. Hopefully anyone that's confused by this will look at earlier postings on subs. Ami7 | Dmi7,G7 Cm7,B7 | Bmi7 | E7 | or Ami7 | Dmi7 G7 | C#mi7 F#7 | Bmi7 E7 | or Ami7 Dmi7 | Gmi7 C7 | Bmi7 | E7 | or perhaps Ami7 Dmi7 | Gmi7,C7 F7,E7 | Bmi7 | E7 | The last four in the sheet music are: Ami Dmi | Gmi7 C7 | F | | These could be left okay or else embellished like I did earlier: Ami7 Dmi7 | Gmi7 C7 | F | | So there are so many variations. [end reed] Jules Goldberg (goldberg@eng.adaptec.com): It is interesting that Amib5/Eb is a subset of Eb7#11. What do you think of that? The scales that you would play over the two are completely different, however. I think it is important to try to solo over the most complicated progression you come up with (as long as it is written down). That will keep you awake on the gig. [end Jules] reed: Well there are basically two ways in jazz that you can go to a I chord. One is the V7 and the other is the ivm6. The V7 is more common but the minor plagal cadence occurs quite a bit too. Sometimes either will work as in this tune. The Ami7b5 is from the ii/V7 idea and the Eb7 from the ivm6 idea as it is just Bbm6/Eb in this instance. In other words the Eb7 is not a true dominant. A true dominant always has resolution of the tritone interval which makes it go to a I or the tritone sub's I. [later...] Of course there are many more variations but I left out one that I had made a note to put in my mail: On bars 9 - 12 you can play Ami7 Emi7,A7 | Dmi7 Ab7 G7sus G7 | Gmi7 | Gmi7/F | One more interesting sub is: On bars 9 - 12 you can play Fmaj7 Emi7,A7 | Dmi7 Ab7 G7sus G7 | Gmi7 | Gmi7/F | [end reed] John F. Hyde : >The Ami7b5 is from the ii/V7 idea and the Eb7 from the ivm6 idea as it is >just Bbm6/Eb in this instance. In other words the Eb7 is not a true >dominant. A true dominant always has resolution of the tritone interval >which makes it go to a I or the tritone sub's I. The Eb7 resolves down a half step to the D7, the tritone resolves (G-Db) to (F#-D). I find an interesting device to use on this tune is to modulate up to Ab for the second part of the tune. (bar 17 to end) It really pushes the solo's along. Just add a Bb-7 Eb7 in bar 16 and your off! [end John] reed replies: Well this is still a little tricky. I kind of glossed over things here. Even though in this case it's resolving by a half step, it's still really a ivm in the key of F. For example, try altering the 9 or 13 or adding a #5 and you will see it doesnt really sound right. Its an Eb#11 which is essentially a Bb jazz minor chord. It's like a bVI chord in minor. That chord wil not resolve to a I, i.e. Abmaj7. I'm probably not explaining it very well in this instance but I will get back to you on this one. [end reed] "Win Hinkle" : Nobody's mentioned it yet so guess I will. "Days of Wine ..." is a good candidate (like several others) to do a cyclic chromatically dropping fill starting on bar 2 cause the melody is static at this juncture and the progression is I moving to VI7 like many tunes. FMaj7 |Bm7 E7 |Bbm7 Eb7 |Am7 D7 | Gm7 ........ But, personally I like the Eb7 on bar two - it's more what Mancini intended - I think. RE: Playing this tune - modulating up a minor third at the halfway point then returning to the starting key at the beginning of the next chorus - Bill Evans, of course was the first to do this and it can be done to most other "Half" type tunes - 32 bar tunes where the second 16 starts as a repeat of the first 16. Even more interesting is the 8 bar-half-step-up modulation scheme available in this tune and others such as "Falling In Love With Love." Try playing "Days...", up tempo in the following way, finding a quick pivot chord to the Dominant of the new key and: First 16, - original key second 16, first 8, - up a half step (melody and changes) last 8, - back to the starting key. Make all voicing as smooth as possible. Then for a real challenge, play this modulation formula with every chorus modulating up a half step (Gb to temp G, etc.). [end days of wine and roses]