Let’s Learn a Song that Uses the II-V-I

Chord Progression
One of the reasons why I wanted to make this course, was because when I
started learning Jazz, I noticed that they all made you go through hours and
hours of theory, learning chord progressions and chord voicings etc in every
different key before you even got to go anywhere near a song, and that can
take a lot of time and a lot of effort. I think the best way to learn is to keep things
moving, and to be able to apply what you’re learning to songs, which is why I
want to teach you how to play one of the most famous Jazz songs already.

Autumn Leaves
What I’ve done is transposed it into the Key of C, so you can use the 7th chords
you’ve already been learning. Let's start off with the left hand. Here are the
chords.

Can you see that the first 3 chords played is the II-V-I pattern you’ve been
playing already?

The rest of the chords are the same Diatonic 7th chords we looked at earlier in
the course, apart from the E7 chord, which is a Dominant 7th chord, so in this
case has a G# on the 3rd interval.

Have a go at these chords with your left hand, and practise them until you can
play them without any stops or hesitations. Each chord should be held for 4
beats, but go at your own pace.

Now let's have a look at the melody in your right hand.

The A starts above Middle C, and you have to rest for 1 beat before playing on
the 2nd beat, the B on the 3rd beat, and the C on the 4th. The F is then held for
a full bar which is 4 beats. This rhythm repeats itself, you then just need to
follow the different notes.
Practise this until you can play it fluently. Start off slow, and gradually build up
the speed until you can play it this fast. Remember the rests at the start of the
1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th bars. On those bars don’t play on the first beat, wait and
then play on the 2nd beat.

Once you know how to play the right hand melody confidently, you can add the
chords in the left hand. Let’s now go over the chords in your left hand.

Make sure you count a full 4 beats before starting, as your right hand plays on
it’s own in the first Bar. Once you start the left hand chords, hold them for 4
beats each time, moving to the next chord on the 1st beat of each bar.

Start off slowly as usual, getting used to the chord changes. Once you can play
the left hand chords without stopping, you can try it together.

Practise this with both hands.

Now you’ve learnt this, it’s relatively easy to learn the second part of this
melody, as it repeats itself until the last 2 bars where you there is just a slight
change in the right hand.

This time though, we’re going to use what is called a lead sheet, also known as
a fake sheet, which uses the Treble clef notes, along with the chord symbols.
These are what jazz musicians commonly use.

Again, it doesn’t matter if you can’t read music, because I’ve put the notes
above. As you can see the chords are the same. They’re all using the white key
3rds pattern apart from the E7, so whenever there is a chord symbol, for
example Dm7, just put your 5th finger on the D in the left hand and do the
pattern.

Practise this until you can play it confidently with both hands.