Reading a lead sheet

Some notes on a chart I had to play yesterday, on a festival gig with a pianist I've worked with quite a bit, Jasnam Daya Singh. He's Brazilian, and quite a heavy composer. For a one hour concert, he sent me 36 pages of music for I think 9 tunes.  

He was actually being nice, selecting tunes that we could learn with one rehearsal. It's not as bad as it sounds— they're basically normal combo arrangements... with, frequently, composed intros, outros, A1s/B1s, C sections, interludes, a different solo form, recurring vamps. That can add up to some pages. Fortunately we never had to flip from page 9 to page 1, all of the multipage pieces didn't have any backtracking with the roadmap.   

This was one of the friendlier ones. I was reading piano parts, and I've marked this one up up with some of the things I look for, and think about, and want to know when I'm playing something. I marked some of this on my chart in pencil, some of it I just see. 

STYLE: It says bossa at the top, but it's a loose, modern instrumental bossa. You can't just play a repeating Girl From Ipanema beat all the way through. 

METER/TEMPO: Typically Brazilians write sambas and bossas in 2/4 time, which he has done here, with 16th notes as the main subdivision, the cymbal rhythm. Tempo is 58. An American writing the same arrangement in 4/4, with 8th notes as the main subdivision, with a tempo of 116— that's how we're used to thinking of it. I think we played it quite a bit faster than this.   

FORM/ROADMAP: The tune itself is an AB form, 26 bars long— 14+12. That's the melody of the tune, and the solo form. There is also a 10 bar intro, which occurs again at the end as an outro, preceded by a 12 bar coda phrase.

As I've indicated, the intro is played twice, then the main form is repeated a number of times for the head and solos. The chart says DS al coda, but there is no sign marked— he wanted da capo instead. The coda begins at the top of page 2. There is no coda sign indicated on page 1, but at the bottom of the page it says segue to coda on head out, meaning we play through all of page 1 and go directly to page 2.

MEASURE NUMBERS: I've marked in measure numbers every four and eight measures, up to the phrase ending where there are extra measures— some phrases 6 and 10 measures long. I also marked the total number of measures at the beginning of each section— 10, 8+6, 8+4, etc— so I know what I'm in for. 

These ended up being a little misleading, because his phrases don't break down that neatly. On the soloing I'd be listening and playing basically 24+2 bars— the last two measures of the B section were distinctive, and made it easy to set up the top of the form. 

PHRASES: He writes a lot of extended phrases, four or eight bars with an extra measure or two at the end. Sometimes just an extra half measure, or one extra beat. Occasionally he'll do shortened phrases, three measures or seven measures long. 

CHORDS: I look out for home base chords— like the CMaj7 that happens at the beginning of the A section and the intro/outro. I'll also look out for changes in the harmonic rhythm— the number of chord changes per measure— though that wasn't real helpful here. It's helpful to note where there is more than one chord per measure, or where a chord is played for more than one measure. 

In rehearsal I'm also listening for chords that jump out to my ear— like in the rehearsal I noticed the B7(sus 4) in bar 6 of the B section. Those are helpful for staying oriented while not keeping my eyes glued to the page. I played it only once in rehearsal and once on the gig, and didn't get a great feel for that yet. 

THE MELODY: On this tune I could state much of the melody rhythm pretty closely on the drums. I'm also looking for spaces in the melody where it might be appropriate to fill, and set something up— syncopated rhythms after a rest, usually. Above I marked in accents in some spots I would want to catch on the drums— syncopated tied notes. I just see those, I don't mark them on my part unless they're big and unexpected. 

Also see my chart reading pyramid post, and my weird tunes post for more on this type of thing. 

Writing drum charts

I just happened across a couple of nice posts on how to write a drum chart— that is, a handwritten page of notes sketching out whatever information you need to play through a song or arrangement.

My own MO is to write the charts, and then not look at them when I'm actually playing, so I'm probably not the best person to write about the subject. Usually the listening I have to do to make them is enough homework to get me through the rehearsals. But writing them is educational, and if you want to do a lot of work for hire you do need to learn use them effectively, so here:

How to write a drum chart, part 1, from Adam Silverman

Fast parts, from Mike James

And looking for an image for this post I found this excellent piece by Michael Green on the Mel Bay site.

Drum chart: Salve a Mocidade

This is a chart and partial transcription for a Milton Banana track which I've been playing along with quite a bit this week. It's a lot of fun, and really instills a feel for the samba rhythm as played on the drum set— if your usual approach to samba doesn't groove well with this recording, there's a good chance you're doing it wrong. Our format is a little unusual; it's more of a partial transcription, with the ensemble rhythm included. Since that's pretty long, I also wrote up a straight one-page drum chart, which will be easier to read once you know what's going on with the drums and the arrangement.

I suggest giving it several listens through while following along with the transcription, making sure you understand how everything I've written relates to what you're hearing. It's also a good idea read through it playing the ensemble rhythm part on the snare drum alone. For much of the transcription I've given only the left hand part, to be played with a cymbal part of your choice, over the familiar samba bass drum/hihat pattern:

If you don't know what else to do with your right hand, try playing it in unison with the left hand, or quarter notes, on the cymbal or hihat.

Get the pdfs: partial trancription plus ensemble rhythm chart | lead sheet only

Audio after the break:

Drum chart: Along Comes Mary by Cal Tjader

Pillaging the archives while I'm working on tour/book-related junk, I turned up another Cal Tjader drum chart, written by me a couple of years ago. I'll try to do more of these in the future- it's a nice alternative to complete transcriptions. The groove is a bright chacha all the way through.

Get pdf | get El Sonido Nuevo by Cal Tjader | get Along Comes Mary

YouTube audio after the break:

Drum chart: Mamblues by Cal Tjader

Here is a chart of Mamblues, from Cal Tjader's album Soul Sauce, transcribed by me. It's a pretty straightforward (but burning!) salsa tune on a blues form, with a cascara groove, mambo on the vibes solo. If you haven't played a lot of this type of chart, note that the written grooves are for illustration only- you should play whatever version of the grooves you have together, making sure to follow clave. The roadmap is straightforward- take the repeats for the solos, then the DS and coda.

Download the pdf | get the mp3 | get the CD

YouTube clip after the break: