Tea for Two — Free Lead Sheet PDF (Eb, Bb, Concert)

Music by Vincent Youmans · Published 1924 · Melody & chords only

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About Tea for Two

From a Navy Sketch to Broadway’s Biggest Hit

Tea for Two was composed by Vincent Youmans, with lyrics by Irving Caesar, and published on 10 June 1924. Youmans first sketched the tune’s basic melodic idea years earlier while serving in the US Navy during the First World War, using it as an introductory passage for an unrelated song. He returned to the idea in 1924 while working on a new musical then touring under the title No, No, Nanette, reshaping it into what he described as “a song the hero could sing to the heroine.” He played the result for Irving Caesar, who by his own account wrote the lyrics in about ten minutes.

The song was introduced in Chicago in May 1924 during the show’s pre-Broadway run. By the time No, No, Nanette reached Broadway in September 1925 — after successful runs in London and Paris — Tea for Two had become the show’s biggest hit and the defining success of Youmans’s career.

The chart on this page offers the melody and chords, no lyrics.

The Form & Harmony

An Economical Melody Built for Reharmonisation

Tea for Two is a 32-bar AABA standard most commonly played in the key of Ab, and its melody is a study in economy. Youmans was known throughout his career for building tunes from small motifs — short two-, three- and four-note phrases, repeated and varied through subtle changes in harmony and rhythm rather than through melodic invention. Tea for Two is one of the clearest examples of that approach in his whole catalogue.

One of the tune’s most distinctive features is a sudden modulation away from the home key of Ab up to C major, before finding its way back — a bolder key change than most Tin Pan Alley songs of this era attempt, and one that gives the tune real harmonic interest underneath its deceptively simple surface.

That combination — a tight, riff-like melody sitting over harmony with genuine motion in it — is exactly what made Tea for Two such a magnet for virtuoso reharmonisation. Pianist Art Tatum returned to the tune throughout his career, using its simple bones as a launchpad for some of his most dazzling harmonic substitutions, and in 1927 the conductor Nikolai Malko famously challenged a young Dmitri Shostakovich to orchestrate the tune from memory in under 45 minutes — the result, titled Tahiti Trot, was later folded into Shostakovich’s ballet The Golden Age.

How to Play It on Saxophone

A Practical Approach to an Economical Standard

1. Learn the melody’s short motifs precisely. Youmans built this tune from tiny two-, three- and four-note phrases repeated and varied rather than long melodic lines. Get each small cell exactly right before worrying about the shape of the whole tune — the economy is the point, not a shortcut.

2. Isolate the modulation to C major and back. Practise the tune’s sudden shift away from the home key of Ab up to C major, and its return, on its own until the key change feels smooth and confident rather than jarring.

3. Build a relaxed swing feel. Work with a metronome at a comfortable medium-swing tempo, prioritising a relaxed, danceable time feel over rushing toward speed.

4. Study Art Tatum’s reharmonisations. Listen closely to how Tatum substitutes and reharmonises the simple changes underneath the tune’s plain melody, and try picking out a few of his substitutions to practise over the form yourself.

5. Improvise from small motifs, not long lines. Once you know the tune, try building your own solo out of short repeated phrases in the spirit of Youmans’s original melody, rather than defaulting to long, continuous runs.

If you would like one-to-one guidance on jazz harmony, improvisation or building a wider vocabulary, saxophone lessons in person in South East London or online are available. The free saxophone transcriptions on this site are also useful for hearing how great players navigate this and other standards.

Essential Recordings

Where to Start Listening

Start with Marion Harris’s original 1924 recording, cut for Brunswick just months after the song was written and one of the very first versions committed to disc. From there, Art Tatum’s recordings are essential — he returned to this tune throughout his career as a vehicle for astonishing harmonic reinvention, and no two of his versions sound quite the same.

For something completely unexpected, seek out Dmitri Shostakovich’s orchestral arrangement Tahiti Trot (1928), written from memory in under 45 minutes on a conductor’s dare and later folded into his ballet The Golden Age — a genuinely unusual crossing point between Tin Pan Alley and the Soviet concert hall. On the popular side, Tommy Dorsey’s cha-cha-cha version reached the American top ten in 1958 and found a whole new audience decades later through a 2005 UK advertising campaign.

If you are working through the broader Great American Songbook repertoire, browse the online real book index for related tunes, all available as free lead sheet PDFs in Concert, Bb and Eb.