Django's Tiger — chords & grille (gypsy jazz)
Django's Tiger by Django Reinhardt — key of A (manouche), form A. Below is the full chord grid; on Haute Gitanerie you can play along with a scrolling chord ribbon, transpose to any key, set the tempo, and switch on a rhythm backing (la pompe) to practise your solos over the changes.
About
Django's Tiger grew out of Django Reinhardt's dazzling improvisations on Tiger Rag, which he first recorded with the Quintette du Hot Club de France in 1934; the melody we know comes from his 1946 solo. It's a rite-of-passage showpiece for gypsy soloists.
The sound — A major, sprinting up to D, spiced with a chromatic diminished (E♭dim7) and dominant kicks (F7, G♭7, B7). Fast, bright, virtuosic.
Practising it — build the A and D major arpeggios first, add chromatic approach notes, and treat the diminished as a passing colour. This is a tempo tune — earn the speed slowly.
Django's Tiger chords — the grille
A : | A | A | A | A | A | A | E7 | E7 | E7 | E7 | F7 | F7 | E7 | E7 | A | E7 | A | A | A | A | A7 | A7 | D | D | D | E♭° | A | F#7 | B7 | E7 | A | E7 |
Chords used
A · E7 · F7 · A7 · D · E♭° · F#7 · B7
The theory in this tune
The chain of dominants · The diminished on the dominant
Play along
Open the interactive grille for Django's Tiger: loop any section, transpose to any key, set the tempo, and play over a rhythm accompaniment — with a real recorded pompe on featured tunes. In the browser, free.