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The most feared song in jazz, explained

18 videos recommended on HN
YouTube
5 HN users recommended this explainer4 months2021–2025 score 4.5
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

Recommended as a well-produced, accessible explanation of Giant Steps and the harmonic ideas behind Coltrane's work.

Vox Earworm explains why John Coltrane's Giant Steps is so hard to improvise over: it is fast and moves through three keys. Musicians Braxton Cook and Adam Neely walk the host through the underlying music theory.

“I highly recommend this Vox explainer on John Coltrane's” (HN, 2023)

1 strong recommendations · 4 recommendations · Explainers

5 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@peteforde Jan 2023 Strongly recommends
on HN thread Jazz Is Freedom
I highly recommend this Vox explainer on John Coltrane's "Giant Steps", for anyone interested in learning about the math behind one of Jazz' greatest innovations. [this video]
Explains the math behind Coltrane's Giant Steps
@davidwf Jan 2021 Recommends
on HN thread Ask HN: What YouTube channels do you subscribe to?
Read more
I keep a Google Document of these to share just in case people ask about my YouTube interests. I Actually Watched All of Them I have actually watched ALL of the videos on these channels and I don’t even feel bad about it :-) I actually like new videos from some of the ones below (like NativLang, for example) but they maybe don’t hold up in the early videos. - Space Time: PBS Physics, sooo good -- [link] -- Great first video: [link] - Lindsay Ellis: Really, really intelligent video essays about film and culture -- [link] -- Great First Video: [link] - Periodic Videos: Chemistry, including a video for every element -- [link] -- Great first video (obviously): [link] Other Math and Science - 3Blue1Brown: Amazing math visualizations -- [link] -- Great first video, how e^pi*i works: [link] - NumberPhile: Fun math videos -- [link] -- Great first video: [link] - PBS Eons: Biology! -- [link] -- Great first video: [link] - PBS Infinite Series: Math math math, really really hard math -- [link] -- Great first video: [link] - SciShow: Science! More poppy but fun -- [link] -- Silly first show: [link] -- Actual physics: [link] - VSauce: Science-y? -- [link] -- Great first video: [link] - Practical Engineering: -- [link] -- Great first video: [link] Other Humanities - Alliterative: Connections via language -- [link] -- Great first video about gin and gimlets: [link] - Bon Appetit: Such fun food stuff! -- Gourmet Makes: [link] -- It’s Alive: [link] - Masaman: Genetics and human migration (and
Part of a personal list of channels
@ghostpepper Sep 2025 Recommends
on HN thread John Coltrane's Tone Circle
If you don’t have the time (or the musical background) for the full article, this short YouTube video touches on some of the same ideas in a much more condensed and accessible version: [this video]
Condensed, accessible version of the tone circle ideas
@zzzeek Sep 2025 Recommends
on HN thread John Coltrane's Tone Circle
Nice site but we're at the point in "Show an In Depth Thing on Hacker News" where circles like these need to be presented with a live GUI that includes sound and colors as you spin the circles around to play different chords. towards my craving for instant gratification with sound and lights I found a well produced video by Vox on the subject: [this video]
Well produced video with sound on the subject

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

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