“Goodbye Pork Pie Hat” was composed by Charles Mingus as an elegy for saxophonist Lester Young, who died in 1959 and was known for his pork pie hat. It appears on Mingus’s 1959 album Mingus Ah Um and has been recorded by Jeff Beck, Joni Mitchell and many jazz musicians.
The form is a 12-bar blues, but with unusual, chromatic harmony that gives it a mournful, searching quality. The chords move in unexpected ways rather than following the standard I-IV-V blues changes. It’s played as a slow, emotional ballad.
For improvisation, learn each chord’s sound and use guide tones to navigate the chromatic harmony. Add bluesy inflections to keep the tune’s soul intact. Play with feeling and restraint, as befits a tribute.
Practice slowly, learning the chord changes one bar at a time. Listen to Mingus’s original and Joni Mitchell’s vocal version with lyrics.
Section by section: the opening bars move through unusual chromatic chords, so practice each chord’s arpeggio slowly and listen to how it connects to the next. The middle bars continue the chromatic movement, and the final bars resolve back to the start of the form. Add blues inflections to keep the tune’s soulful character.
Practice tip: write out the guide tones for each bar and play them as a slow melody. This reveals the beautiful inner voice leading that Mingus built into the tune.
Ear training with the Goodbye Pork Pie Hat Lead Sheet PDF: before reading along, listen to two different recordings and try to hear where each section starts. Then follow the lead sheet while listening. Connecting what you see to what you hear is how lead sheets turn into tunes you truly know.
Is it hard to play? It’s intermediate because of the unusual harmony. Recordings to study: Mingus Ah Um and Jeff Beck’s guitar version. Learn more about the composer on Charles Mingus’s Wikipedia page, and find more jazz blues lead sheets on Minedit.