Skippy is a jazz tune by Thelonious Monk, recorded for Blue Note in 1952 and part of his early Blue Note releases. It is Monk's reharmonization and abstraction of Vincent Youmans' Tea for Two, rendered as a 32-bar head with a dense melody and relentlessly shifting harmony. The form is commonly described as A1-B-A2-C, with a D7 starting point that acts as the bV7 of Ab, and a second eight bars that wanders with ambiguity while cycling through rapid chromatic motions and tritone substitutions. The piece is noted for its advanced harmonic language for 1952, including diminished-scale ideas and chromatic lines, and for constant movement of dominant seventh chords rather than resting cadences. Skippy remains a cornerstone of Monk's Blue Note legacy and has been performed by others such as Steve Lacy, Anthony Braxton, and Ravi Coltrane.
