Jazz has a language of its own, but you don’t need to play an instrument to understand it. From comping and contrafacts to trading fours, walking bass and rhythm changes, jazz terms crop up everywhere: in album reviews, musician interviews and conversations about the music.
Some jazz terminology describes things you can actually hear happening in a performance. Other words and phrases come from the history and culture of jazz.
This A–Z jazz glossary explains the most useful terms from a listener’s point of view: what they mean, where they came from and, most importantly, what to listen for in the music.
A
AABA
A common structure for jazz standards, particularly songs originally written for Broadway and popular entertainment. The easiest way to understand it is as four sections: an idea, the same idea again, something different, then a return to the original idea. Those sections are labelled A-A-B-A.
The contrasting B section is usually called the bridge. George and Ira Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm” is a famous example, and its structure became the basis for countless jazz compositions.
Arrangement
The particular way a piece of music is organised for a performance or recording. An arranger might decide which instruments play the melody, where the solos happen, what the other musicians play behind them and how the piece begins and ends. That’s why two recordings of the same jazz standard can sound completely different even though the underlying song is the same.
B
Ballad
A slow or moderately slow song, generally played with an emphasis on melody, space and expression. Many of the great jazz ballads began as popular songs or Broadway numbers before jazz musicians adopted them. “Body and Soul”, “My Funny Valentine” and “‘Round Midnight” are typical examples.
A ballad can also provide some of the most revealing jazz improvisation: with fewer notes and more space, there’s nowhere for a musician’s sound and phrasing to hide.
Bebop
The revolutionary style of modern jazz that emerged during the 1940s around musicians including Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell and Kenny Clarke. Compared with the swing music that preceded it, bebop typically featured faster tempos, more complicated melodies and harmony, and a greater emphasis on improvisation. It also helped shift jazz away from its role primarily as dance music. Bebop was music that demanded close listening.
Read our full guide to bebop →
Big band
A large jazz ensemble, usually containing sections of saxophones, trumpets and trombones alongside a rhythm section. Big bands dominated popular jazz during much of the Swing Era, with Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw among the most famous bandleaders. The format survived long after swing ceased to dominate popular music, providing a large musical palette for composers and arrangers including Gil Evans, Thad Jones and Maria Schneider.
Explore the history of big band music →
Blue note
One of the sounds that gives blues and jazz much of its distinctive character. A musician bends or alters a note away from the pitch you might expect from a conventional Western scale. Singers, saxophonists, trumpeters and guitarists can slide through these pitches rather than treating them as fixed notes. You don’t need to know the theory to recognise the effect: listen to almost any great blues singer and you’ll hear notes that seem to sit somewhere between the keys of a piano.
Blues
Both a musical tradition in its own right and one of the foundations of jazz. The blues has its own characteristic forms, sounds and traditions, and jazz musicians have been using it as a framework for improvisation since the music’s earliest days. Charlie Parker’s “Now’s the Time”, Thelonious Monk’s “Blue Monk” and Miles Davis’s “Freddie Freeloader” are all built around versions of the blues form.
Blowing
Jazz slang for improvising, particularly associated with horn players. If a saxophonist is described as blowing, they’re improvising rather than simply playing a written melody. A blowing session usually means a relatively informal performance or recording built around extended solos rather than elaborate arrangements.
Bridge
The contrasting section in many popular songs and jazz standards. If the main melody has repeated twice and suddenly the song seems to go somewhere different before returning home, you’ve probably reached the bridge. In an AABA song, it’s the B.
C
Changes
Musicians’ shorthand for the chord progression underneath a tune. The easiest way for a non-musician to think about the changes is as the harmonic route through the song. The melody may disappear once the improvisation begins, but the musicians are still following that underlying route. When someone says a player is blowing over the changes, they mean the musician is improvising while navigating that harmonic structure.
Chart
The written music used by a jazz musician or band. A chart can range from a basic page showing the melody and chords to a detailed big-band arrangement specifying exactly what every musician should play.
Chops
A musician’s technical ability on their instrument. If somebody says a trumpeter has incredible chops, they usually mean the player possesses exceptional command of the instrument — perhaps speed, range, precision or some combination of all three. You’ll encounter the word frequently in interviews with jazz musicians.
Chorus
One complete journey through the structure of a song. This is easily confused with the pop meaning of “chorus”. In jazz, if a saxophonist takes a five-chorus solo, it means the musician goes through the complete structure of the tune five times, creating a different improvisation each time. The melody might have disappeared completely, but the underlying structure keeps cycling underneath.
Collective improvisation
When several musicians improvise at the same time rather than taking turns to solo. It’s particularly associated with early New Orleans jazz, where cornet or trumpet, clarinet and trombone could weave different lines around one another. But the idea didn’t disappear with early jazz. Collective improvisation can also be an important part of free jazz and other modern styles.
Combo
Simply a small jazz group rather than a big band. A trio, quartet or quintet might all be described as a jazz combo.
Comping
The accompaniment played behind a melody or solo. Listen to a pianist while a saxophonist is improvising. Rather than playing a fixed part, the pianist will often add chords and rhythmic ideas in response to what is happening around them. That’s comping. Good comping is a conversation: it supports the soloist without getting in the way.
Contrafact
A new melody written over the chord progression of an existing song. It became particularly important during the bebop era. Charlie Parker’s “Ornithology”, for example, is based on the changes of “How High the Moon”, while “Anthropology” uses the harmonic framework of George and Ira Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm”. Contrafacts explain why apparently unrelated jazz compositions can sometimes have the same underlying shape.
Read: Contrafacts — The Bebop Trick That Rewrote the Jazz Repertoire →
Cool jazz
A broad label for music that emerged around the end of the 1940s and during the 1950s, often associated with lighter sounds, restrained dynamics and a less overtly aggressive character than bebop. Miles Davis’s Birth of the Cool, the Gerry Mulligan Quartet and musicians associated with the West Coast jazz scene are commonly connected with the term. Like most jazz genre labels, cool jazz covers a much wider range of music than the name suggests.
Explore the different styles of jazz →
Cutting contest
An informal musical battle in which jazz musicians try to outplay one another. These encounters became part of jazz folklore, particularly during the Swing Era. Musicians would meet at jam sessions and test one another through increasingly impressive solos. Tenor saxophone battles became especially famous, with players such as Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Ben Webster and others building formidable reputations in this competitive environment.
D
Double time / Double-time feel
When the music feels as though it has suddenly become twice as fast, even though the underlying tempo hasn’t necessarily changed. A rhythm section might move into double time behind a soloist, creating more rhythmic activity and momentum without actually speeding up the tune. It’s particularly common during jazz solos.
F
Fake book
A large collection of songs reduced to the essential information a musician needs to perform them. Rather than giving every instrumental part, a fake book usually provides the melody and chords and leaves the musicians to work out the rest. The most famous example is The Real Book, which began circulating among musicians in the 1970s and became one of the most widely used collections of jazz repertoire.
Free jazz
A broad movement that emerged around the end of the 1950s and beginning of the 1960s, challenging some of the structures jazz musicians had traditionally improvised within. Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Albert Ayler and later John Coltrane were among the musicians associated with different forms of freer improvisation. The term doesn’t simply mean musicians playing anything they want. Free-jazz groups developed their own ways of creating structure and responding to one another, sometimes without the predetermined chord sequences or regular rhythms found in more conventional jazz.
Explore free jazz and the avant-garde →
Front line
The main melody instruments at the front of a jazz band, as distinct from the rhythm section. In a traditional New Orleans group that might mean trumpet or cornet, clarinet and trombone. In a bebop quintet it could simply be trumpet and saxophone.
G
Gig
A musician’s job or performance. A one-night club date, festival appearance or concert might all be called a gig. The term has spread so far beyond jazz that it’s easy to forget how firmly it became embedded in musicians’ vocabulary.
Groove
The underlying rhythmic feel of a performance. A groove is easier to recognise than define. It’s created by the way the bass, drums, percussion and other instruments lock together. Swing, funk, bossa nova and Afro-Cuban jazz can all groove while sounding completely different.
H
Hard bop
A development of bebop that became prominent during the 1950s, particularly associated with musicians including Art Blakey, Horace Silver, Clifford Brown, Hank Mobley and Lee Morgan. Hard bop retained bebop’s improvisational sophistication but often drew more obviously on blues, gospel and rhythm and blues. If Blue Note Records in the late 1950s and early 1960s has a sound in your head, there’s a good chance you’re thinking of hard bop.
Listen to 10 essential hard bop albums →
Head
The main composed melody of a jazz tune. A huge amount of small-group jazz follows a basic pattern: melody → improvised solos → melody. Musicians call that melody the head. So when you hear the tune return after several minutes of improvisation, the band has gone back to the head.
Harmony
The chords and combinations of notes that provide the musical framework underneath a melody. In jazz, harmony is especially important because improvisers often use the chords of a tune as a map for their solos. When musicians talk about the harmony or the changes, they’re talking about closely related parts of that underlying structure.
Head arrangement
An arrangement developed and remembered by the musicians rather than completely written down. This was particularly important during the Swing Era. A band could gradually develop riffs, backgrounds and transitions through rehearsal and performance until everyone knew the arrangement by memory.
I
Improvisation
The spontaneous creation of music during a performance — and arguably the single most important idea in jazz. That doesn’t mean musicians simply play random notes. An improviser may be working within the melody, harmony, rhythm and structure of a composition while simultaneously responding to the musicians around them. That’s why two performances of the same jazz tune can be radically different. Much of what you’re hearing is being created in the moment.
Intro
The music played before the main tune begins. An introduction might be carefully arranged or invented on the spot. Sometimes a pianist will play alone for a while before the rest of the band enters with the melody.
J
Jam session
An informal gathering where musicians play together, usually with a heavy emphasis on improvisation. Jam sessions have played an important role throughout jazz history, allowing musicians to exchange ideas, test themselves against other players and experiment away from the constraints of their regular jobs. During the development of bebop, after-hours sessions in Harlem became particularly important meeting places for the musicians creating the new music.
K
Key
The main tonal centre of a piece of music. A jazz standard might be played in different keys depending on the singer, instrumentalist or arrangement. Musicians at a jam session will often agree on the key before starting a tune so that everyone knows where the music is centred.
L
Lay out
To stop playing temporarily while the rest of the band continues. You can sometimes hear the effect clearly during a jazz solo. A pianist might suddenly stop accompanying, leaving just bass and drums underneath the soloist. The music hasn’t broken down. The pianist is simply laying out, changing the texture by leaving space.
Lick
A short musical phrase or idea that becomes part of a musician’s vocabulary. Jazz musicians absorb thousands of musical ideas through listening, transcription and practice. Some phrases can become so closely associated with particular players that knowledgeable listeners recognise them immediately.
M
Modal jazz
Jazz built around relatively static areas of harmony rather than a rapid sequence of changing chords. For a listener, the important effect is space. Instead of having to negotiate a new chord every few beats, the improviser can spend longer exploring a particular sound. Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue is the most famous example, while John Coltrane’s “Impressions” became another modal jazz standard.
Discover essential modal jazz albums and artists →
O
Outside
When a musician deliberately plays notes or phrases that seem to move beyond the expected harmony. The result can initially sound wrong, tense or unstable — until the player brings the improvisation back inside and the tension resolves. Great musicians can move in and out of the harmony deliberately. What sounds like a mistake in isolation may be part of a much longer musical idea.
P
The place where the rhythm feels especially settled, comfortable and locked together. When musicians say a drummer or bass player is playing “in the pocket”, they mean the time feels solid and the groove is working. It’s less a precise musical instruction than a description of rhythmic feel.
R
Rhythm changes
One of the most important harmonic structures in jazz, derived from George and Ira Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm”. Jazz musicians became so familiar with its underlying structure that they wrote numerous new melodies over variations of it. “Anthropology”, “Oleo” and “Moose the Mooche” are among the many jazz compositions based on rhythm changes. The slightly confusing name refers to the changes — the chords — of “I Got Rhythm”, not to the rhythm suddenly changing.
See more essential jazz standards and their contrafacts →
Rhythm section
The part of a jazz group that provides much of its rhythmic and harmonic foundation. In a classic small group, that’s usually piano or guitar, bass and drums. Calling them the rhythm section can understate what these musicians actually do. They don’t simply keep time behind the horns; the best rhythm sections are constantly listening, improvising and shaping the performance.
Riff
A short, repeated musical phrase. Riffs became particularly important during the Swing Era, when bands could build whole passages by layering repeated phrases from different sections. Count Basie’s orchestra became famous for music that could generate enormous momentum from apparently simple riffs.
S
Scat singing
Vocal improvisation using sounds and syllables i