444 PART 4 | SINCE WORLD WAR II
songwriters: Richard Rodgers and
Oscar Hammerstein II
date: 1961
genre: modal jazz
performers: John Coltrane, soprano sax;
McCoy Tyner, piano; Steve Davis, bass;
Elvin Jones, drums
meter: triple
form: aaa'a chorus with interpolated vamps
WHAT TO LISTEN FOR
- distinctive sound of soprano saxophone
- characteristic sounds of modal jazz:
drones, slow-moving harmonies - expansion of chorus through interpolated
vamps
CD 3.18 Listening Guide 18.1 “My Favorite Things” JOHN COLTRANE
timing section comment
0:00 introduction The rhythm section, grounded by the droning bass, sets a
minor-key modal groove in waltz time
0:18 head a 16 bars: Although the song as written has moving
harmonies in the second half of the a section, Davis
continues to drone on the tonic note, E, sustaining the
modal style.
0:35 vamp 8 bars: Instead of repeating the a section directly, the
rhythm section vamps on the tonic E, again sustaining the
modal style.
0:43 a Repeat of a.
1:01 vamp 24 bars: Shift to the tonic major for a brighter quality,
giving some of the contrast that a conventional B section
would supply; Coltrane solos over the rhythm section.
1:18 References to the melody imply a return of a, but this is
still vamp.
1:27 a' The ending of this a section is slightly different, as in the
original song.
1:44 a Instead of Rodgers’s b section, a repeats with no
intervening vamp.
2:02 vamp 16 bars.
2:19 chorus 2
(piano solo)
Piano solo for one a section and the beginning of a vamp
before the fade out marks the end of the single’s A side.
note Recorded October 21, 1960, and released the following year on LP and, in truncated
form, on 45.
172028_18_440-467_r3_sd.indd 444 23/01/13 11:02 AM