A contrafact is a type of standard that uses the underlying harmony (i.e. chord changes, with or without some substitutions) from a well-known song in a new, original composition.
One of the most well-known contrafacts in the BAM tradition is Donna Lee, a tune composed by Charlie Parker (but often mis-attributed to Miles Davis) based on the changes to (Back Home Again In) Indiana, by James Hanley.
In a sense, most songs following the 12-bar blues form are contrafacts. There is a large section of tunes within the standard repertoire that rely on George Gershwin’s “I’ve Got Rhythm”, known as “Rhythm Changes”.
If you’re on a session, and call a tune like “Oleo” or “Anthropology”, the band will know what to do. Because, while these are different tunes, they’re “rhythm changes” and use the same chords.
Now, for some of the legend behind contrafacts:
Legend 1: contrafacts were developed to avoid paying royalties
As the story goes, bebop musicians wanted to record standard tunes, i.e. “How High The Moon” but it was difficult or expensive to license the rights to put it on a record. Therefore, out of necessity to have material to record, new compositions would spring forth, and thus “Ornithology” was born.
Legend 2: contrafacts made recording dates more economical
Another legend is that contrafacts were developed to reduce the amount of rehearsal time that session players would need to pull off a successful recording date. By relying on borrowed chord changes, professional musicians could quickly learn a head arrangement for a new melody, and improvise over chord changes from another popularly-known tune. This resulted in lower cost in recording dates.
Legend 3: it was a way of gatekeeping bebop
This is perhaps a lesser-known myth that I have heard repeated, but I think it has some credence, and at least, I can attest to this with some past experiences I’ve had in jam sessions.
The legend would have it, that as the bebop sound was being crafted in late-night jam sessions at Minton’s Playhouse and other haunts in NYC in the 40s, contrafacts were a way to regulate which musicians could and could not hang. A young upstart might show up to the session and only know Tadd Dameron’s “Lady Bird”, but the rhythm section, wary of the newcomer, would say, “no, what about ‘Half Nelson’?”
Not knowing that new melody, or that it was a contrafact on Lady Bird (and considering the melody is profoundly more complicated), the outsider might be discouraged and sit that tune out.
In general, analyzing some of these melodies and you start to see a pattern: other than their association with Bird and Miles, most well-known contrafacts, such as “Ornithology”, “Donna Lee” or “Half Nelson” find the the quarter-note laden melodies of “How High The Moon”, “Indiana” and “Lady Bird” have been replaced by flurries of triplets and eighth notes.
Conclusion
Whether this is by design to keep non-playing cats from getting on stage, or playgrounds to test the new theories of harmony and composition that Miles, Bird, Dizzy, Coltrane and Monk were exploring, contrafacts are essential knowledge for the modern musician.
Matt Mrozinski 