Licks & Riffs : Lalo Shifrin - Mission Impossible


Mission Impossible is surely the tune every school boy (and ex-schoolboy) wants to play. One of the reasons for its distinctive sound is the unusual 5/4 time signature, split bettween a pair of dotted quarter notes and a pair of plain quarter notes:

Lalo Shifrin




The background harmony is a series of sliding chords which all have C and E in common: A minor, Ab Aug, C major (2nd inversion).

We've added a couple of our own chords on to the end of this riff to create our own version:

Lalo Shifrin




Now let's extend the idea, here it is again, with a few funky moves in the left hand bass part, and a bit of octave displacement in the right:

Lalo Shifrin




Sheet Music to buy by Lalo Shifrin