http://www.mattwarnockguitar.

com/take-the-a-train-anatomy-of-a-tune

Take the A Train for Jazz Guitar Harmonic Analysis:

A section
Lets begin by looking at the chord changes for the A Section of Take the A Train. This
section is the basis for a number of other tunes in the jazz repertoire, and is a very
common progression.
Songs such as the Brazilian classics Girl from Ipanema and So Danco Samba use
this opening section, with slight variations, as the basis for their A sections.
The chord progression is all in the key of C major, with one borrowed chord from the
dominant key in the third and fourth bars.
The tune begins with the tonic chord Cmaj7, before moving to the II7 chord, then iim7 to
V7 to Imaj7 and a iim7-V7 back to the top of the tune.
When you go to the bridge section, the second A, you can also use a Gm7-C7 (iim7-V7
of IV) to get to the Fmaj7 chord that starts the B section of the tune, or you can just stick
on Cmaj7 for those two bars, either choice will work in a performance context.
The D7 chord is the tricky one in this section.
This chord is not normally found in the key of C major, but, using a II7 moving to a iim7
chord is a common tactic in jazz to add movement to a tune without going too far outside
of the key. The D7 is the V7 of the V chord, so it is the V7 of G, but in this instance, since
it doesnt immediately resolve to G, we can label it a II7 chord.
This chord also gives the tune a bluesy feel since the b5 of C major (the blues note), F#,
is the 3rd of D7.
This note connects the two chords with a bluesy vibe, allowing you to dig into your
favorite blues licks in this opening section as they will sound good over both chords.

Harmonic Analysis: B Section

The B section is also fairly simple harmonically, and again it sticks to the home key of C
major.
This section starts off with four bars of the IV chord, Fmaj7, followed by two bars of II7,
D7, and a iim7-V7, Dm7-G7, leading back to the Cmaj7 at the start of the third A section.

Here is a Roman numeral analysis of Take the A Train

Melodic and Improvisational Content: A Section

One of the great things about this tune, for both students and teachers of jazz guitar, is
that the melody is written in such a way that you can use it to improvise over the entire tune,
without even thinking of scales or arpeggios etc.
This allows you to improvise over the chord changes, while keeping a strong connection to
the melody as you begin your solo.
Over the course of a few choruses you can expand your melodic material to include
scales, licks, patters, arpeggios, subs etc., but the melody is always a good place to start
when beginning an improvised solo.
Lets start off by looking at the opening phrase of the tune.
The melody line uses three different notes, C-E-G, which spells out a C triad.
Because of this, you can improvise over this first Cmaj7 chord using the plain ole C triad,
connecting your lines to the melody of the tune.

You can use any shape you want for the C triad, Ive written out one of my favorites, as it
is one of the easiest positions to play this melody line on the guitar.
Try learning the melody line for the first two bars, then vamp a Cmaj7 chord and
improvise using only the C triad.
It might get boring pretty quickly, but that will force you to become more creative with
your lines.
You might try moving around the neck, playing on one or two strings only, adding slides
and slurs, using spread-voicing triads, anything you can to keep things from becoming
too monotonous while sticking to just the triad in your solos.

We can now look at the second chord in the tune, the D7, and the melody notes that
accompany that chord.
Here, we can continue the C major triad from the first phrase, but there is one main
difference, the G is now a G#, as you can see in bar 3 of the song.
This now spells out a C-E-G#, or C augmented triad, which we can use to improvise over
the D7 chord in bars 3 and 4.
This note, the G#, is the #11 note on the D7 chord, making the chord a D7(#11) sound.
This might be new to some of you, and if so, this way of improvising, using just the Caug
triad, will allow you to ease into this new harmonic idea before digging into the scale that
goes along with this chord.
Try vamping two bars of Cmaj7 and two bars of D7, moving between the Cmaj and Caug
triads over each corresponding chord.
Notice that you can play a simple idea of Cmaj7, then play the same idea, changing only
G to G#, and you doubled the length of your idea.
This type of motivic improvising can go a long way in stretching out your ideas, as you
are repeating yourself, but altering each line to fit the chord it is under in order to play
exact repetitions.

The third chord in the tune, Dm7, has only one note, A.
Here, we can use this A to morph our C triad one more time, creating the notes A-C-E, or
an Am triad.
Notice how the C triad from the first bar becomes the basis for our first five bars of
improvising, weve just changed the G to G# over D7 to fit the melody line, and the G# to
A to fit the melody line in bar five.
This allows us to outline each chord, connect to the melody line and create a sense of
linear motion in our phrases as we move from one triad to the next.

The last section of new melodic content in the A section is the G7 chord in bar 6, in bar 7
we return to Cmaj7 and Dm7-G7 in bar 8, where we can reuse material from previous
bars in the A section.
In this bar, 6, there are three chromatic notes that are thrown in to spice things up in the
melody line, F#, A# and C#. Not only do these notes act as attention grabbers in the
melody line, but we can use them to create interesting ideas in our improvised solos.
When we look at each note closely, we find that they are located one chromatic note
(one fret on the guitar) lower than each note in the G triad. F#-G, A#-B and C#-D.
There are also added notes from the scale in this line, F-A-C, which are one note below
each chromatic note in the line.

We can use this knowledge to create chromatic lines of our own when improvising.
Just take the G triad, G-B-D, and approach each note by two chromatic notes, two frets
on the guitar, below each chord tone.

F-F#-G

A-A#-B

C-C#-D

This allows you to insert chromatic notes into your lines without getting too far away from
the original melody or harmony as you are basing these ideas off of the melodic phrase
and the underlying major triad.
You can go in either direction if you want, just as the melody line does, so you could play
from G-F#-F, or from F-F#-G, either way is fine.
Try vamping on a G7 chord using this idea to get the sound of these chromatic notes in
your ears before trying to insert it into the tune as a whole.
Also, Im a big proponent of never learning an idea for only one application, so for me,
this line has created a new rule of improvisation that I can apply to other situations. Here
is the rule:
Anytime you are improvising over a triad or arpeggio, you can approach each chord tone
by two chromatic notes below
Pretty cool huh?
This means that you can now go back to any of the triads from the first part of the A
section, Cmaj, Caug and Am, and approach each of those chord tones by two chromatic
steps below.
Now, dont get too carried away with this idea.
Let your ears dictate when you use these outside notes and when you stick to a more
diatonic sound.
Remember, things only sound outside because youve firmly set the inside sound of the
tune.
So practice moving between the plain triads and these chromatic notes sparingly, allow
the forward motion of the solo dictate when you get more outside and when you stay
closer to the basic triad of each chord.

Here are all of the above ideas written out in one page.
Notice that in the last bar of the phrase, Dm7-G7, I use the Am triad from bar 5 over the
Dm7 chord, but I sneak in the Caug triad over the G7.
This is a cool way to bring that melodic material back, reversing it to close the phrase as
the Am moves to Caug which resolves to Cmaj in bar one of the second A section.
The G#(Ab) works over the G7 chord as it is the b9, resolving down to the G in the Cmaj
triad from bar 1, and the C note acts as a sus chord.
Regardless of the harmonic function, what youll notice is that your ears are drawn to that
descending chromatic movement in the line, A-G#-G, which connects each chord and
idea in that short turnaround.

Melodic and Improvisational Content: B Section

As was the case in the A section, we can use the melody line of the B section to derive
some cool sounding melodic material to use in our solos.
The first chord of the B section is Fmaj7, and the melody notes used over this chord are
F-A-C-E, which spells out an Fmaj7 arpeggio.
Try using this arpeggio alone to improvise over these four bars.
If you get bored after a while, keep the arpeggio going but add in the two chromatic-note
approach technique from the previous section to spice things up.
Ive written out two different fingerings for the Fmaj7 arpeggio, you can find more at
my arpeggio resource page, as it will give you two options when improvising.
The first fingering is more for short sweeps and using slides into notes, while the second
fingering gives you the chance to insert slurs into your lines.
Try them both out, separately at first, then move between both fingerings while soloing
over this chord.

We only need to look at one more chord, the D7, in this section as the last two bars,
Dm7-G7, use previously learned material.

The notes of the melody in these two bars spell out an F#m7b5 arpeggio, F#-A-C-E.
Notice that the Fmaj7 and F#m7b5 arpeggios are only one note apart, the F moves to an
F#.
This will allow you to create a motive over the Fmaj7 chord, then repeat the same motive
and just alter the F-F# in order to fit the D7 chord, as we did in the A section of this tune.
If you notice, there is no D in this arpeggio.
Because of this, we have learned another rule of improvising, often referred to as the 3
to 9 Principal. Here is that rule:
When improvising over any 7th chord, you can play a m7b5 arpeggio starting on the
3rd of that chord
This is a great way to play diatonic arpeggios, while avoiding the root in your lines.
Again, try vamping over D7 and use the F#m7b5 arpeggio to improvise before inserting
this idea into the rest of the tune.
Try taking this concept to other keys and other tunes youre working on, it is a simple yet
effective way to expand your dominant 7th vocabulary.

And just for good measure, here are the last two chord, Dm7-G7, using the Am triad over
the Dm7 chord and the Caug triad over the G7 chord.

Finally, here are all the ideas from the B section in one page for easy reference.

Scales for Improvisation

After youve explored the different possibilities when using the melody line as the basis
for your solos, you might want to expand things by adding scales and scale-based ideas
to your phrases.
To do this you will only need to learn two different scales, C major and A melodic minor.
If you are unfamiliar with these scales, you can learn more about them in my Major Scales
for Guitarand Melodic Minor Scales for Guitar pages.
Here are the chords that you can improvise over with the C major scale:

Cmaj7 Imaj7

Dm7 iim7

Fmaj7 IVmaj7

G7 V7

This leaves only the D7(#11) chord, which is the fourth mode of A melodic minor.
Here is how these scales fit over each bar of the tune.

Take the A Train is a great tune for both teachers and students to check out in
woodshed. Because it is largely diatonic there are only two scales needed to navigate
these changes, and at the same time the melody line itself provides a ton of
improvisational material, and can be used as a learning tool to introduce the 3 to 9
Concept and the chromatic approach concept.
If you havent checked this tune out yet, or if you have but havent dug into the melody
line as a source for improvisational inspiration, give the above ideas a shot.
You might be pleasantly surprised how quickly and easily you can navigate this tune, and
learn a few new harmonic and melodic concepts along the way.