Being able to show up to a jam and read tunes out of a real book can be very handy, but..
Have you ever wondered where some of those songs come from?
As jazz musicians, we are fortunate to be able to draw from an endless fountain of repertoire from the 20th century. Today, this music has gained the title of:
The Great American Storybook
Many of the tunes which we know as staples of the jazz idiom, such as “It Could Happen to You,” “All the Things You Are,” “How High the Moon,” were actually written by Broadway and Hollywood composers during this era.
It became common practice for jazz musicians in the 40’s and 50’s to draw from the repertoire of popular songs dating back to the 20’s and put their own spin on them! Visionary artists such as Sonny Rollins and Miles Davis were certainly culprits of this tactic.
One of Sonny Rollin’s signature tunes, “Mack the Knife,” is actually from a 1928 musical by Kurt Weill entitled “The Threepenny Opera.”