Free Jazz Standard Sheet Music Downloads

"Cheek to Cheek" was written by Irving Berlin for the 1935 film Top Hat, in which Fred Astaire sings it to Ginger Rogers during one of cinema's most celebrated dance sequences. Astaire's recording with the Leo Reisman Orchestra topped the charts for eleven weeks and was named the No. 1 song of 1935.

Set in C major, the song has an unusually expansive 72-bar form (AA-BB-C-A) that departs significantly from the standard 32-bar structure. The C section introduces a brief shift to the parallel minor, adding emotional depth before the final radiant return of the main theme. Written as a foxtrot, the melody combines stepwise motion with syncopated rhythms that give it a buoyant, danceable swing feel. Despite its length, the harmony remains relatively diatonic, providing an inviting framework for improvisation and vocal interpretation.

Fred Astaire's 1935 original with the Leo Reisman Orchestra was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2000. The definitive jazz version is the duet by Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong on Ella and Louis (Verve, 1956), backed by the Oscar Peterson Quartet, which transforms the song into a sublime jazz conversation.