Dewey Square

[Lazaro Vega]

Anyone know what tune this is based on?

[Big Wheel]

Funny you should mention it--I once went through the whole Omnibook categorizing tunes by the origin of the changes. 90% were blues and rhythm changes. Dewey Square was one of the only ones I couldn't pin down.

[JSngry]

Original changes, as far as I know.

[Lazaro Vega]

Thanks. I'd read in my Dial set that an alternate take included the theme and bridge, which may not have been on the original issue.

[John L]

In his book on Bird, Lawrence Koch points out a harmonic similarity between Dewey Square and Yardbird Suite, which was a Bird original dating back to the McShann period.

[Big Wheel]

Dewey Square and Yardbird Suite have the same changes in their A sections but very different bridges.

[JSngry]

On the A-section, yeah, but not on the bridge. The bridge is something else entirely.

I've long maintained (w/o any "support" that I'm aware of) that "Yardbird Suite" is really "Rosetta" with an extra passing chord or two thrown in, and a bridge that goes to ABOUT the same places, but not literally so.

I threw this out to David Baker at an Aebersold clinic back in 1979 or so, and he was skeptical at first, but I naively/presumptuously challenged him to "check it out, man, CHECK IT OUT!"

So, this being an "educational environment" and all, we found a piano, he did an A/B, and said, "hmmmm....I see what you mean". But that's the closest to "official" validation as I've gottened.

[Brad]

This is slightly off the mark and maybe I'm intruding because I'm not a musician but does anyone know what the song is named after. Was there really a Dewey Square or perhaps named after Miles, since his middle name is Dewey?

[JSngry]

I think there was/is a Dewey Square, but where I cannot share, because the "aware" is not "there".

[Nate Dorward]

Take a look at the liner notes by Thomas Cunniffe & Will Friedwald to the Stash reissue of the Dial sessions (from 1993). There they state that "Yardbird Suite" is based on "What Price Love?" & that "Dewey Square" is indeed based on "Rosetta". I don't know "What Price Love?" at all so can't judge whether that i.d. is accurate.

I remember reading somewhere that Dewey Square was a place to score drugs at the time, hence Parker's memorial to it.

The only Parker tune I know of that doesn't seem to be based on standard changes is "Confirmation"--or is there a source I've missed?

[Lazaro Vega]

I think "What Price Love?" is a vocal version of "Yardbird Suite" as sung by Earl Coleman, which may have been recorded before Yardbird, and without Bird. But I'm going from memory on that, so it could be there's more to it....

[Lazaro Vega]

In the Spotlight re-issue of Bird's Dial recordings the notes tell us Dewey Square was named for a hotel where Bird was staying at the time. I've also had musicians tell me it was a place to score.

[Alexander Hawkins]

The only Parker tune I know of that doesn't seem to be based on standard changes is "Confirmation"--or is there a source I've missed?

I'm not sure about this one either, but it's a little bit like two eight bar blues sequences, an eight bar bridge, and an eight bar blues type thing again.