Why Do I Love You? by Jerome Kern

Overview

Key: G major · Chords used: 6 · Sections: 4

Form: A Section → A Section ×2 → B Section

Where these chords come from: a lead sheet of this public-domain song, contributed by a musician to the Wikifonia archive and preserved in the OpenEWLD lead-sheet collection (Simonetta et al., 2018). It describes the song as written, not any particular recording. This page shows that lead sheet as-is: the analysis below is generated directly from it by code, not written by AI. Consecutive repeats of a chord are shown once, and the piano voicings are our playable arrangement of each chord symbol, not a note-for-note transcription.

Section by section

A Section 1

• G – Am – D7 (×2)
  I – ii – V7

A Section 2

Same chords as A Section 1.

A Section 3

Same chords as A Section 1.

B Section

• G – G7 – C – Cm – G – Am – D7 – G
  I – I7 – IV – iv – I – ii – V7 – I

Chord vocabulary

Harmonic highlights

• Cm (iv) is borrowed from the parallel key, G minor.
• G7 acts as V/IV: it resolves to C.

Sources & accuracy

• Chords: the OpenEWLD lead-sheet collection (Simonetta et al., 2018). Community-contributed lead sheet (chord symbols over the melody) from the Wikifonia archive, MIT licence. Title and songwriter credit as written on the sheet.
• Section names: detected by code from repeated 8-, 12- and 16-bar phrases (letters such as A and B mark different phrases; a phrase that comes back keeps its letter). Lead sheets rarely print section names.
• Not verified: only one lead sheet of this song is available, so it hasn't been cross-checked.
• Rhythm and chord durations aren't shown; each step is one chord change.