Giant Steps

4 Sticks

Giant Steps: is a classic Jazz Standard, composed by John Coltrane. “Jazzers” I’ve been associated with enjoy playing it. It can also be perceived as an academic exercise-ritual, technical callisthenic. I’ve played it in 4/4, 3⁄4 and Bossa Nova, many times.

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Giant Steps is also the album title recorded by John Coltrane, in 1960. Tommy Flannigan, Paul Chambers and Art Taylor are documented as the musicians playing on the Giant Steps track.

There is folklore about that original session and piano solo. Story Goes - the music notation sheet presented by John Coltrane at the session, was initially thought to be a ballad, which it wasn’t.

In the mid 90s, I was affiliated with the NARAS Foundation, The Grammy Organization. (Yes-I was a voting member) As an invited member - to a special event – I met the legendary recording engineer / producer Tom Dowd (1925-2002). I consider Tom Dowd and Rudy Van Gelder (1924-2016) true genius in the recorded history of music.

Much of Tom Dowd’s work was contracted with Atlantic Records. He recorded an eclectic array of artist including Ray Charles, The Coasters, Ruth Brown, Bobby Darin, Cream, The Allman Brothers and a long list of popular groups. Tom Dowd recorded classics by Charlie Parker, Ornette Coleman and Thelonious Monk.

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Tom Dowd was in charge of the John Coltrane, Giant Steps sessions. Face-to Face, Tom and myself, in a quiet corner of the room, he shared several historical stories about those sessions. He told me that he performed multiple tape splices on the Giant Steps track, to incorporate the piano solo. (There are alternate tracks without the piano solo)

Listening closely with phones to the Giant Steps track, it always presented a strange transition coming out of the piano solo, with Art Taylor’s displaced fill on top of Trane’s return. (To me, It’s always sounded like a tape splice)

For my arrangement, I’ve compressed the original Giant Steps melody into measures of 3⁄4 with a sequential 2/4 transition of the form

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