Anthropology

This is a bebop tune credited to Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, written in the mid-1940s on the chord changes of Gershwin's "I Got Rhythm." Along with "Oleo" and "Moose the Mooche," it is one of the most-played rhythm changes heads in jazz, and a common first test for anyone learning to improvise over the form. On this page you get the Anthropology chords and a backing track you can transpose and re-style.

Who wrote "Anthropology"

The tune is credited to Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. It was written as an instrumental, a bebop line over borrowed harmony rather than a song from a show or film. It came out of the small-group bebop scene in New York in 1945 and 1946.

An early form of the line appears on Parker's Savoy session of November 26, 1945, with Miles Davis and Max Roach, under the title "Thriving on a Riff." Gillespie recorded it as "Anthropology" for RCA Victor on February 22, 1946, and that is the title the tune has kept.

Recordings that made it a standard

• Charlie Parker, "Thriving on a Riff" (Savoy, 1945) – the same session that produced "Ko-Ko" and "Now's the Time." This take shows the line in its early shape, played by a quintet with the young Miles Davis on trumpet.
• Dizzy Gillespie Sextet, "Anthropology" (RCA Victor, 1946) – with Don Byas on tenor and Milt Jackson on vibes. Gillespie's recording fixed the title and put the head in front of a wider audience on a major label, with vibraphone giving the ensemble a lighter, brighter sound than a two-horn front line.

Parker went on to play the tune regularly in clubs and on broadcasts, and it has since been recorded by many horn players, pianists and guitarists as a standard vehicle for fast bebop soloing.

The changes

The form is rhythm changes: AABA, 32 bars, eight bars per section. The standard key is B♭ major, and it is almost always called in that key at sessions, since the head sits well on saxophone and trumpet there.

The A sections are built on I–vi–ii–V turnarounds. A typical realization:

• Bars 1–4: B♭maj7 G7 | Cm7 F7 | B♭maj7 G7 | Cm7 F7
• Bars 5–8: B♭7 | E♭7 E°7 | B♭/F F7 | B♭ (last A resolves; first A turns around with Cm7 F7)

Players freely substitute within the A sections: Dm7 G7 for B♭ G7, tritone subs such as B7 for F7, or E♭m6 in bar 6 as a minor iv borrowed from the parallel minor. The bassist and pianist should agree on how busy the turnarounds will be before the count-off.

The bridge is a chain of dominant chords moving around the cycle of fourths, two bars each:

• D7 | D7 | G7 | G7 | C7 | C7 | F7 | F7

Each dominant is often split into its own ii–V (Am7 D7, Dm7 G7, and so on), which turns the bridge into a run of ii–V pairs that never settle. The bridge starts on the III7 chord, a long way from home, and the return to B♭ at bar 25 has to be clear.

The head is usually played at a fast swing tempo, often 240 bpm and above. The places that trip players up are the speed of the A-section turnarounds, where the chords change every two beats, and keeping track of the form once the melody is gone: losing a bar in the bridge is the common mistake.

Playing it with VirtBand

A medium or up-tempo swing style suits the tune; start around 140–160 bpm to get the A-section turnarounds and bridge dominants under your fingers, then raise the tempo step by step. The key can be changed to suit a singer or a horn, so you can also practice the changes in the keys where they feel least familiar.