Chasing Spirits – Renee Rosnes

This modern post-bop song has an open-ended feeling due to its sections of quarter-note pedal points in the bass. The form is unusual, 28 measures in total but not divided into sections with rehearsal letters. There are really two distinct melody phrases, but these start in unexpected places. The intro, a four-measure rhythmic piano figure, sets up eight measures of pedal on F7sus. The first four of these measures are the start of the head, but they have no melody. The melody starts in the fifth measure (our audio clip), with a twisty eighth-note line followed by four measures of simpler melody with more active changes (with the bass walking) which lead to the next pedal point section. The rest of the head is similar, with eight measures of pedal on Gm7 and another four of walking bass, but there is a piano fill answering the melody over the first half of the G pedal section. After the four measures of walking, the piano intro figure reappears at the end of the head to lead cyclically into the next chorus. The eighth-note lines in the melody go slightly outside the chords. Though the head of this song starts with an F pedal and the out head ends with an F7sus chord, there is enough chromatic melody material that we show no key signature.

On the recording, saxophonist Chris Potter plays an open solo on F7sus with the bass pedal. Renee Rosnes starts her piano solo over the pedal, and eventually switches to the head form with a 4-feel. Peter Washington's bass solo is also over the form, but finishes with another F7sus pedal vamp—really a vamp of the melody-less first four measures of the head; the out head starts at the fifth measure.

The full piano voicings for the intro and last four measures of the head are shown in our Concert Condensed Score, which is also the rhythm section part. This piano figure has colorful harmonies but we do not show chord symbols; the solo chorus has four measures of D♭7sus here, the first chord in the figure on the head. Renee plays these voicings at the end of her solo to launch the bass solo. Our lead sheet shows the top line of this figure as a cue, as well as the piano response to the melody starting in the 14th measure and other important piano comping rhythms.