Donna Lee — chords & grille (gypsy jazz)
Donna Lee by Miles Davis — key of A♭ (swing), 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
Donna Lee was written in 1947 by a young Miles Davis (long miscredited to Charlie Parker) and recorded by the Parker Quintet for Savoy — Davis's first recorded composition. Built on the changes of Indiana, it's a bebop rite of passage gypsy players took up for its blistering lines.
The sound — A♭ major, a torrent of fast ii–V chains and four-note bebop cells that never sits still.
Practising it — learn the head in fragments, mapping the A♭ major scale and the arpeggio of every ii–V. It's all about clean eighth-notes: practise slowly with a metronome long before chasing tempo.
Donna Lee chords — the grille
A : | A♭ | F7 | B♭7 | B♭7 | B♭m7 | E♭7 | A♭ | A♭7 | D♭Δ | D♭m | A♭ | F7 | B♭7 | B♭7 | B♭m7 | E♭7 | A♭ | F7 | B♭7 | B♭7 | C7 | C7 | Fm | C7 | Fm | C7 | Fm | A♭° | A♭/C B° | B♭m E♭7 | A♭ | A♭ |
Chords used
A♭ · F7 · B♭7 · B♭m7 · E♭7 · A♭7 · D♭Δ · D♭m · C7 · Fm · A♭° · B° · B♭m
Play along
Open the interactive grille for Donna Lee: 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.