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In this guitar lesson, Jon MacLennan will teach you one of the most commonly used chord progressions in jazz music. We are talking about rhythm changes, so if you want to get into jazz guitar I really recommend you to check out this lesson. Sometimes we forget about being a good rhythm player, everyone wants to play leads and tons of licks, but we forget the art of rhythm guitar, and in this kind of music you HAVE to have a great harmony background.
So, what is rhythm changes? It refers to the chord progression occurring in George Gershwin's song "I Got Rhythm". This pattern, which forms the basis of countless jazz compositions, was popular with swing-era musicians: It is found in tunes like "Shoeshine Boy" and "Cotton Tail", as well as Charlie Christian's "Seven Come Eleven", Charlie Parker's "Salt Peanuts", and Thelonious Monk's "Rhythm-a-Ning", for instance.
Alright, the example of today´s lesson like we already said, it is about this jazz chord progression called rhythm changes with its chord voicings. These changes are usually played in the key of Bb with various chord substitutions. Here is a typical form for the A section with various common substitutions:
| Bbmaj7 G7 | Cm7 F7 | Bbmaj7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |
| Fm7 Bb7 | Ebmaj7 Ab7 | Dm7 G7 | Cm7 F7 |
Ok, hope this helps and don´t forget to come up with your own ideas, which is the best advice for starting to find `your´ unique sound and style. That is all for today... Also I suggest that you keep enjoying and learning from Jon MacLennan and all the staff of Guitarcontrol.com! Where? In our free guitar lessons at www.youtube.com/guitarcontrol
