Just the Thought of You
This song has a strange birth story. I was working my way through "The Jazz Piano Book" and playing some of the different chords. I played a C13 chord, and when I heard that sound, lyrics started coming into my head, and then a melody. The song isn't about anything or anyone in particular, and where it came from, I have no idea.
There have been several versions of this song. At first, the melody line was too compressed and there were not enough lyrics, and the whole song was only 1:40 long, so way to short. Then I started adding time to the A section melody line and I wrote some more lyrics for the B section. Finally the song was longer, and the pacing seemed better.
Challenging for this song was harmonizing it and trying to add some harmonic interest by moving to different key centres, as often happens in jazz tunes. Also, using chord substitutions so that the chord progression had some variation. Mostly it has ended up being a I vi ii V I song with some chromatic passing chords. Briefly the song goes from F major to Bb major, providing some retonicization.
This song is a slow jazz ballad for piano in the key of F major.
Just the Thought of You
A
Just the thought of you on a summer's night
Just the thought of you, in the evening light
I'm imagining that you're still here
I'm imagining that you're holding me near
B
As the night steals the day, I remember you've gone away
I had stars in my eyes, now just tears to cry, my heart sighs
As the moon rises high, in the darkening twilight sky
Like an echo or you, and love that was true, now my heart is blue.
A1
Just the thought of you on a summer's night
Just the thought of you, in the evening light
I'm imagining that you're still here
I'm imagining that you're holding me near, holding me near
Just the thought of you, just the thought of you, of you.
