Blues/Jazz Piano Lesson - Jazz Chord Voicings

Hey, In this video I use a great jazz classic, Autumn Leaves as an example to Jazz chord voicings.

Hope it helps! Leave a comment and rate please :)

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Blues
• piano
• jazz
• chord
• voicings
• chords
• keyboard
• musicguru12
• music
• swing
• boogie
• woogie
• riffs

[greytarist]

K. same thing w/ a dominant 13th then? U can choose to play or leave out the 9 and/or 11?

[MusicGuru12]

Usually with a thirteenth chord you would play:

7th - 3rd - 13th

The root can be played in the left hand. You can add a ninth in as well, so it would be:

7th - 9th - 3rd - 13th

So in the key of G the chord would be:

F (7th) - A (9th) - B (3rd) - E (13th)

Hope this helps

[greytarist]

he said "any note above the octave" is where 9ths, 11th, and 13ths, ect ... come from. But isn't it the "7th" that makes a normal add2 chord into a 9 chord? It shouldn't matter "where" the note is in the chord. Am I right?

[MusicGuru12]

You are kind of right. An add2/sus2 chord does become a 9th chord when the 7th is added. It depends on whether you have the third or not.

It does matter where the note is placed. If the sixth of a C chord was placed under the leading note of the scale (B natural), it would be called a 6th. If it was above the octave, or above the 7th, it would be a 13th. Same with 4ths and 11ths.

[Chiz87]

Awesome - I had no idea the dominant 13th chord (or 7 13 as you call it) was so elusive. Maybe you could feature a video on the use of 15th chords that contain 3rds AND suspended 4ths?

Also, you played D major twice and it had different notes - can you let me know which notes are the right notes if i wan't to play D major?

[MusicGuru12]

Yes, looking back I noticed for the first octave of D major I played a C natural rather than a C#.

A D major scale is:

D-E-F#-G-A-B-C#-D

[tiktak87]

importantly though, in jazz, if you see written Gm11, you are completely free to play Gm13, Gm7, Gm9 or whatever you feel sounds best in that context, even G7 or GM7 if you prefer. thus is the beauty of jazz, the freedom to add personality

[tiktak87]

@tiktak87 the C being the third, and as it is a "sus" chord we must suspend the third. also, in terms of higher extensions, in general if 9 or 11 or 13 is used instead of 2, 4 or 6, it generally means you are to include the 7th and/or any other extensions beneath it. Eg. c major 6 is usually an instruction to play JUST the root, 3rd, 5th and 6th or any combination of, whereas C major 13 implies that it is acceptable to play any the extensions of lesser value than 13 ie. the 7th, 9th or 11th.

[tiktak87]

the way chords are notated sometimes is a clue to how they should be voiced too though. a rough guide could be:

"sus" means you are SUSPENDING the third of the chord, either to the 4th or the second, hence sus2/sus4. If the chord says add9, it means include the third, the ninth (second) is added, it is not a suspended third. any chord that also says m7 or M7 or 7, include the relevant 7th as well. for instance Am7 (sus4) mean play an a minor including the seventh, but change any C notes to D

[pringle1186]

im starting to learn keyboard do you have any tips for me cause i dont even know the first thing about keyboard cant seem to get anyone to teach me around my area help

[tomichaubg]

I completely agree, and you really should use "ehm" less and at some point you were like "ehm, you could use this (chord) or this (chord), really, a lot of variants..." and I didn't get anything you played :) Try explaining note by note... But from what I got, good stuff, thanks a lot, it really helped. Five stars!

[eedski]

Cm7sus, that's a So What chord, right?

[kinigit]

You can play as many notes as your fingers will allow (so 10 I guess would be your limit). In jazz, once you start adding those tones on to the chord, the 5th becomes less important. The root, 3rd, and 7th define the chord quality (usually), then you can add pitches on top. If you had to choose between the 9th and 11th for an 11th chord, then you would need to choose the 11th. It kind of comes down to personal preference of the sound you want!

[greytarist]

Thanx! I do have another question .. in order to play a dominant 11th chord you need the 1, 3, 5, b7, 9, and 11, right? or can u omit the 9th?