Raymond Hubbell, music · John Golden, lyrics · Introduced in The Big Show, New York Hippodrome, 1916
Poor Butterfly
Raymond Hubbell and John Golden wrote it in 1916 for The Big Show, a New York Hippodrome revue. Its lyrical melody gives players room to reshape the with richer ones of their own. Hear it with Benny Goodman's sextet in 1940, Sonny Rollins in 1957 and Paul Desmond in 1963.
Listen in this order
The path runs from the 1916 hit record and a 1928 jazz band through Benny Goodman's sextet and Art Tatum's solo piano. Then it hears Sonny Rollins, Sarah Vaughan, Cannonball Adderley and Paul Desmond.
1940sBenny Goodman Sextet featuring Charlie Christian1940 · Swing
Art Tatum1946
1950sSonny Rollins1957 · Hard bop
Sarah Vaughan1957 · Vocal
Cannonball Adderley Quartet1959 · Hard bop
1960sPaul Desmond with Jim Hall1963 · Cool jazz
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Hear the song that started it
Victor Military Band · 1916
Victor 78 rpm single
The Victor Military Band recorded it on November 29, 1916, a few months after The Big Show opened at the New York Hippodrome. Wikipedia counts this record among the two biggest hit versions of 1917.
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Listen for
Listen for the melody as a 1917 audience knew it, played by a military band. Every later track on this path reshapes it.
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody slowly on its own and count the in sections of eight: A, B, A, C. Smaller version: play and count only the first eight bars.
Red Nichols and his orchestra recorded it on March 2, 1928 for Brunswick, in an arrangement by William Grant Still. The solos go to Nichols on cornet, Dudley Fosdick on mellophone and Fud Livingston on clarinet.
mixed
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Listen for
Listen for the cornet, mellophone and clarinet solos, and for how the record shifts between slow, ballad-like stretches and faster ones.
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody once at ballad speed, then once at a brisk dance tempo, to hear how much the pace changes its mood. Smaller version: do this with only the first eight .
Benny Goodman Sextet featuring Charlie Christian · 1940 · Swing
The Benny Goodman Sextet feat. Charlie Christian: 1939-1941
Benny Goodman's sextet recorded it on April 3, 1940, with Charlie Christian on electric guitar and Lionel Hampton on vibraphone. According to JazzStandards.com, Goodman first recorded the song in 1935 with his big band and came back to it almost a dozen more times.
swing · medium slow tempo
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Listen for
Listen for the guitar, vibraphone and piano taking solos in turn, at a medium-slow swing, while Goodman's clarinet carries the tune.
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody at a medium-slow tempo with a loose, swung long-short feel in the eighth notes. Smaller version: swing only the first eight .
Tatum plays it alone at the piano for the V-Disc series, the records issued by the US War Department's music section. MusicBrainz dates the session to January 21, 1946, while the Paris national library catalogs the disc as about 1945.
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Listen for
Listen for the unhurried pace and for how much Tatum fits around the tune with no band behind him.
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody alone, slowly, with the underneath in your left hand and no to lean on. Smaller version: play only the first eight .
Rollins recorded it on April 14, 1957 at Rudy Van Gelder's studio in Hackensack, with J.J. Johnson on trombone and Horace Silver on piano. It came out on Blue Note's Sonny Rollins Vol. 2.
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Listen for
Listen for Rollins's tenor saxophone out front and for J.J. Johnson's trombone alongside him, over a six-minute run.
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody slowly, then play it again leaving a short rest after each phrase and filling it with one or two notes of your own. Playing a full solo over the takes more skill; the smaller version is to repeat the first eight and change a single note.
“Poor Butterfly (Live at Mister Kelly's)”, Sarah Vaughan at Mister Kelly's
Sarah Vaughan sang it live at Mister Kelly's, a Chicago club, in August 1957, with Jimmy Jones on piano, Richard Davis on bass and Roy Haynes on drums. The album appeared in 1958.
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Listen for
Listen for Vaughan's voice up front, with only piano, bass and drums behind her, in a Chicago club.
Try it on your instrument
Sing or hum the melody one phrase per breath while you play the under it. Smaller version: hum the first eight over the chart's chords.
Cannonball Adderley's quartet recorded it on May 12, 1959 in New York, with Wynton Kelly on piano. Riverside released it on the album Cannonball Takes Charge and as a 45 single paired with Serenata.
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Listen for
Listen for the pace starting out relaxed and then building as the alto saxophone leads, and for Wynton Kelly's piano solo.
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody over a steady swing pulse while a backing track plays the chart's . Smaller version: play and repeat only the first eight .
Paul Desmond recorded it with guitarist Jim Hall at Webster Hall in New York on June 10, 1963. It appeared on the RCA Victor album Glad to Be Unhappy.
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Listen for
Listen for Desmond's soft alto saxophone, then Jim Hall's guitar solo, over a relaxed, gently swinging .
Try it on your instrument
Play the melody slowly and softly, then repeat the first eight with one or two notes moved. Playing a full solo over the takes more skill; the smaller version is to change only a single note.
Raymond Hubbell and John Golden write it for The Big Show at New York's Hippodrome in 1916. The Victor Military Band records it that November, and the record is among the biggest hits of 1917.
1920s
Red Nichols records it in March 1928 for Brunswick, in an arrangement by William Grant Still. The solos go to Nichols on cornet, Dudley Fosdick on mellophone and Fud Livingston on clarinet.
1940s
Benny Goodman's sextet, with Charlie Christian on electric guitar and Lionel Hampton on vibraphone, records it in April 1940. Art Tatum plays it alone at the piano for the V-Disc series.
1950s
Sonny Rollins records it for Blue Note in 1957. That August Sarah Vaughan sings it live in a Chicago club, and in 1959 Cannonball Adderley's quartet records it for Riverside.
1960s
Paul Desmond and guitarist Jim Hall record a seven-minute version in 1963. In 1967 Frank Sinatra sings it with Duke Ellington's orchestra in an arrangement by Billy May.
1970s
In 1978 Count Basie and Oscar Peterson, both pianists, play it together for Norman Granz's Pablo label, with bass and drums behind them.
2010s
Jimmy Scott's album I Go Back Home, released in 2017, includes a version with Grégoire Maret.
More great versions
6 more, from 1958 to 2017. Tap a cover to play it here.
“Poor Butterfly (Live)”, Jamal at the Pershing, Vol. 2
Ahmad Jamal's trio played it live at the Pershing Lounge in Chicago on January 17, 1958, with Israel Crosby on bass and Vernell Fournier on drums. Argo issued it on Jamal at the Pershing, Vol. 2.
Hawkins recorded it on January 29, 1960 for Prestige's Moodsville series, with Tommy Flanagan on piano, Wendell Marshall on bass and Osie Johnson on drums.
Sinatra sang it with Duke Ellington's orchestra on December 12, 1967, in an arrangement by Billy May. It appeared on the album Francis A. & Edward K. in 1968.
Count Basie and Oscar Peterson, both pianists, played it together on February 21, 1978 for Norman Granz's Pablo label, with John Heard on bass and Louie Bellson on drums. The record came out in 1986.
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
A♭ majorusual key
32 barsA · B · A · C form
A♭ majorkey centers
A8 bars
B8 bars
A8 bars
C8 bars
A♭
Thirty-two in four sections of eight, , all in A♭. Each A opens with , then and in bar 2, in bar 3 and in bar 4. Bars 5 and 6 stay on , bar 7 is , and bar 8 is F7. B starts with B♭m7 and , passes through and , holds for two bars, then plays and to reach the last A. C begins like the with B♭m7, then moves through , Cm7 and Cm7 , returns to B♭m7 and E♭7, and closes with and Cm7 F7. According to JazzStandards.com, the original is and the form is A, B, A, C. These follow the iReal Pro chart; other lead sheets may spell some chords differently.