A Night in Tunisia


"A Night in Tunisia" is a musical composition written in 1942 by American trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie that has become a jazz standard. Dizzy wrote it while he was playing with the Benny Carter band. The tune is also known as "Interlude".
"A Night in Tunisia" was one of the signature pieces of Gillespie's bebop big band, and he also played it with his small groups. In January 2004, The Recording Academy added Gillespie's 1946 RCA Victor recording to the Grammy Hall of Fame.

Background

Gillespie called the tune "Interlude" and said "some genius decided to call it 'A Night in Tunisia' ". According to Gillespie, he composed it at the piano at Kelly's Stables in New York. Dizzy gave Frank Paparelli co-writer credit in compensation for some unrelated transcription work, but Paparelli had nothing to do with the song.
On the album A Night at Birdland Vol. 1, Art Blakey introduced his 1954 cover version with this statement: "At this time we'd like to play a tune was written by the famous Dizzy Gillespie. I feel rather close to this tune because I was right there when he composed it in Texas on the bottom of a garbage can." The audience laughs, but Blakey responds, "Seriously." The liner notes say, "The sanitation department can take a low bow."
Jon Hendricks wrote the now-standard lyrics for the tune, which he performed with Lambert, Hendricks & Ross and which were also sung by Ella Fitzgerald. In 1982, Hendricks wrote a new lyric, "Another Night in Tunisia," sung by The Manhattan Transfer on their 1985 Vocalese album and by Bobby McFerrin on his 1986 album Spontaneous Inventions.

Analysis

The complex ostinato bass line in the "A section" is notable for avoiding the standard walking bass pattern of straight quarter notes, and the use of oscillating half-step-up/half-step-down chord changes gives the song a unique, mysterious feeling. The B section is notable for having an unresolved minor II-V, since the chord progression of the B section is taken from the B section of the standard "Alone Together", causing the V chord to lead back into the Sub V of the A section.
Like many of Gillespie's tunes, it features a short written introduction and a brief interlude that occurs between solo sections — in this case, a twelve-bar sequence leading into a four-bar break for the next soloist.

Notable recordings

Early recordings 1944–1946

Cover versions