Richard Rodgers, music · Lorenz Hart, lyrics · One Dam Thing After Another, London, 1927
My Heart Stood Still
Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart wrote this love song for a London revue in 1927. Dance bands, singers and small jazz groups have all recorded it, from 1939 to 2000. On this page you can hear Ella Fitzgerald, Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, Bill Evans and Stan Getz perform it.
Listen in this order
The path starts with a dance band and a singer, then moves through small jazz groups of different sizes and sounds. It ends with a live piano trio and a long tenor saxophone and piano performance.
Ella Fitzgerald (Buddy Bregman, arranger and conductor) · 1956 · Vocal
Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Rodgers and Hart Song Book
Ella Fitzgerald recorded it in Hollywood in August 1956 for her Rodgers and Hart Song Book on Verve. Buddy Bregman arranged and conducted the orchestra.
Couldn't play this one here. Try the links below.
Listen for
Ella Fitzgerald sings it in front of an orchestra led by Buddy Bregman. Listen to how clearly each word lands, since Hart wrote the refrain entirely in one-syllable words.
Try it on your instrument
Hum the melody slowly over the chart's first four ( , , Fmaj7 , ), then play it on your instrument and match Ella's phrasing.
Chet Baker recorded it with a quartet in New York in August 1958, his first session for Riverside. It came out on the album Chet Baker Sings: It Could Happen to You.
Couldn't play this one here. Try the links below.
Listen for
A quartet of trumpet, piano, bass and drums plays it in under three and a half minutes. Follow Chet Baker's trumpet and keep an ear on Philly Joe Jones's drums underneath.
Try it on your instrument
Play the 's first four slowly, one per bar: , , , . Notice that the last chord lands in C, away from the of F.
Art Blakey and The Jazz Messengers · 1956 · Hard bop
Hard Bop
The Jazz Messengers recorded it for Columbia in New York on December 12, 1956, with Bill Hardman on trumpet and Jackie McLean on alto saxophone. It came out in 1957 on the album Hard Bop.
Couldn't play this one here. Try the links below.
Listen for
At more than seven minutes it runs far longer than the earlier records, which leaves room for the horns to stretch. Follow Bill Hardman's trumpet and Jackie McLean's alto saxophone, with Art Blakey's drums driving behind them.
Try it on your instrument
Play the first eight of the chart as a loop ( , , Fmaj7 , , , Gm7 C7, , F6) and take turns playing the melody and your own notes over it. Soloing over the takes more practice, so the smaller version is to play just the melody twice.
Wes Montgomery played it on August 25, 1956, at the Turf Club in Indianapolis, with Buddy Montgomery on piano, Monk Montgomery on bass and the tenor saxophonist Pookie Johnson. It came out in 2015 on the Resonance album In the Beginning.
Couldn't play this one here. Try the links below.
Listen for
This is a live club recording of nearly six minutes. Follow Wes Montgomery's guitar and Pookie Johnson's tenor saxophone as they share the front.
Try it on your instrument
Play the 's first four slowly, one per bar: , , , . The smaller version is to play only the root of each chord, F, B♭, G and C.
Nat Adderley (with Wes Montgomery) · 1960 · Hard bop
Work Song
Nat Adderley recorded it in New York on January 25, 1960, for the Riverside album Work Song. Wes Montgomery plays guitar, and Keter Betts plays cello beside Sam Jones on bass.
Couldn't play this one here. Try the links below.
Listen for
There is no piano on this track. Listen for the cornet and the guitar out front, with a cello and a bass underneath.
Try it on your instrument
Play the chart's first four as a bass line, using the first note of each (F, D, G, C, F, F, B♭, E♭), then add the melody above it. The smaller version is to play just the first note of each bar.
Bill Evans recorded it live with bassist Chuck Israels and drummer Larry Bunker at Shelly's Manne-Hole in May 1963. It came out in 1983 on the album Time Remembered.
Couldn't play this one here. Try the links below.
Listen for
Three players, piano, bass and drums, in a live club set of about four and a half minutes. Follow Bill Evans's piano, then listen for Chuck Israels's bass underneath it.
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody with your right hand and one per with your left, using the first chord of each bar on the chart. The smaller version is to play only the left-hand chords while someone else plays the melody.
Stan Getz and Bill Evans recorded it in May 1964 with bassist Richard Davis and drummer Elvin Jones. It stayed unissued until 1973, on the album Stan Getz & Bill Evans (Previously Unreleased Recordings).
Couldn't play this one here. Try the links below.
Listen for
At more than eight and a half minutes this is the longest take on the path. Follow Getz's tenor saxophone and Evans's piano, with Richard Davis on bass and Elvin Jones on drums underneath.
Try it on your instrument
Play the whole 32 of the chart once at your own pace and count the sections: A, A, B, A. Then play the chart twice in a row, which is how a long take like this one goes round. The smaller version is to play only the two .
Rodgers and Hart write it for the London revue One Dam Thing After Another, which opens in May 1927. According to JazzStandards.com, they buy back the American rights and use it in A Connecticut Yankee later that year.
1930s
Artie Shaw's orchestra records it as an instrumental for Victor's Bluebird label in New York in January 1939.
1950s
Ella Fitzgerald sings it for her Rodgers and Hart Song Book in 1956. Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers play it for more than seven minutes that December, and Chet Baker's quartet records it in 1958.
1960s
Nat Adderley records it in January 1960 with Wes Montgomery on guitar. Bill Evans plays it live at Shelly's Manne-Hole in 1963, and in 1964 Stan Getz and Evans record it with Elvin Jones on drums.
2000s
Shirley Horn records it in Los Angeles in 2000 for her album You're My Thrill, produced by Johnny Mandel. Verve releases the album in March 2001.
More great versions
5 more, from 1927 to 2000. Tap a cover to play it here.
1920sJessie Matthews1927
1930s
1940s
1950sLee Wiley with Ellis Larkins1954 · Easy listening
Oscar Peterson Trio1959 · Bebop
1960sRoland Kirk Quartet1963
1970s
1980s
1990s
2000sShirley Horn2000 · Contemporary jazz
Jessie Matthews
1927
Brunswick
Jessie Matthews starred in the London revue One Dam Thing After Another, where the song was introduced in May 1927. A Brunswick disc of her singing it was first recorded around October 1927.
Oscar Peterson's trio with Ray Brown on bass and Ed Thigpen on drums recorded it in Chicago in the summer of 1959. It is on the Verve album The Jazz Soul of Oscar Peterson.
Rahsaan: The Complete Mercury Recordings of Roland Kirk
Roland Kirk's group played it live at Club Montmartre in Copenhagen in October 1963, with Tete Montoliu on piano. It appeared on the 1990 Mercury collection of Kirk's recordings.
Shirley Horn recorded it in Los Angeles in 2000 for the Verve album You're My Thrill, produced by Johnny Mandel. Verve released the album in March 2001.
The tune's layout, its keys and the chord chart, for anyone who wants to play along.
Show the form and chords
How the tune works
F majorusual key
32 barsA · A · B · A form
F major → away from F → F majorkey centers
A8 bars
A8 bars
B8 bars · bridge
A8 bars
F
away from F
F
Each A opens on , , Fmaj7 and , then runs and Gm7 C7. The first A ends with Am7 and Gm7 C7, which lead into the repeat. The second A ends with two of . The has one per bar: , , , , , , , C7. It lands on C in its fourth bar and returns to F through D♭7 and C7. The last A repeats the first six bars, then ends on F6 Dm7 and Gm7 C7.