Real book of Jazz

It's a book of jazz songs and standards. It's written in standard notation as 'head charts' - chord symbols above a single melody line.

It's not guitar specific.

There are six editions. The last one (maybe two) are 'legal' - royalties have been paid to the songwriters... if it says Hal Leonard on it, it's legit. Each one has a slightly different selection of tunes, but some songs appear in all editions.

Hi

I hear it mentioned once in a while.
What is it ? Is there a guitar specific issue ?

I saw there are number of editions. which is the better one ?

thanks

There should be a different versions for concert pitch instruments (guitar, piano, bass, etc), Eb instruments (alto sax) and Bb instruments (tenor sax, trumpet). You'd probably want to make sure you get the concert pitch version.

Just curious - do they still make the "Eskimo Jazz" and "Bebop" books? When I bought my Real books 20 years ago or so, I think I got a set of four or five books.

Can be called Real books, and sometimes fake books. Various people publish them I think, not just Hal Leonard. A lot of the Legal ones I've seen don't seem to be very comprehensive, you might need to buy 2 or 3 to get everything.

Many fake books may use the work "real" in the title, but there is only *one* Real book. It's the one most people mean when they say "real book" and it's currently published by Hal Leonard:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0634060384/

A "fake book" is any book that contains head charts, which allow a musician to 'fake' a tune. The "Real Book" is a specific fake book. Hal Leonard acquired the rights to the "Real Book", so any legal one is published by Leonard.

There are other legal fake books - I have several of those. Yes, legal 'fake books' are often less comprehensive, but that's not always the case... several of the ones I have contain more tunes than the Real book (which has something like 400)

Leonard publishes other titles that are similar, like "The Real Jazz Fake Book", but there's only one "Real Book". When a band leader tells me we'll be playing from the Real Book, I always know which one to bring.

So I should be looking for C edition - that's the edition for guitar ?

I also saw a blues real book ? Anyone know anything about it ?

thanks

I ended up buying this book

http://www.musicroom.com/se/ID_No/010142/details.html

It was clearer then hall leonard's and it has the words of the songs in it.
And I know more songs that appear here then on hall's edition.
The book seems to be more addressed towards the adbvanced beginner - which suits me more.

anyway they have only 36 songs in common. So I might buy the "real" real book after all. since it has 400 songs.

I finally bought the "real" real book - hal leonard's I mean