**Welcome to the ultimate guide for jazz piano chords. This page will teach you everything that you need to know to create beautiful jazz piano chord voicings.**
Whether you’re brand new to jazz piano, or you’ve been playing for years, this guide is guaranteed to level-up your chord voicings. Let’s start with one of my most popular videos on jazz piano chords to get a flavor for what this guide will cover.
This guide is broken into 6 sections starting with the most basic theory and gradually introducing more sophisticated jazz piano chords.
Use the table of contents below to navigate the key sections of this guide.
Table of contents
1. Introduction To Jazz Piano Chords
1. The 4 Types Of Triads
1. The 5 Types Of 7th Chord
1. Extended Chord Voicings
1. Altered Chord Voicings
1. Upper Structure Triad Voicings
1. Suspended Chords
Introduction To Jazz Piano Chords
Jazz music is characterised by rich, full-bodied chords which are used to create lush harmonies and beautiful jazzy chord progressions. If you are new to jazz piano, expanding your knowledge of jazz piano chords should be your #1 priority.
On this page you will learn step-by-step how to construct jazz piano chords from the most simple chord shapes, to the jazziest sounding chords used by the pros. Starting from the beginning you will now learn step-by-step how to build these beautiful chord voicings for major, minor, and dominant chords. Let’s get started:
#### Foundational Chord Theory
The first step to mastering jazz piano chords is to ensure that you understand the concepts of triads and 7th chords. Triads and 7th chords are the most basic of all chord structures and these 2 chord types create the foundation for jazz piano chords which incorporate extensions and alterations.
Let’s start our journey into jazz piano harmony with the 4 types of triads.
The 4 Types Of Triads
Triads are the simplest of all chords and they will most likely be the first chords you will learn on the piano. There are 4 different types of triads that we need to learn:
– Major triads
– Minor triads
– Diminished triads
– Augmented triads
Here are the 4 types of triad using C as the root note:
In our lesson on [triads for jazz piano](https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/triads-for-jazz-piano/) we learn the major and minor triads in all 12 keys and we arpeggiate and invert the triads over 2 octaves.
The 5 Types Of 7th Chords
The next step is to build the 5 types of 7th chord. A 7th chord is a triad which has been extended to include the 7th note of the scale. This creates a 4 note chord structure. 7th chords create a fuller sound than triads and are used in jazz music to create chord progressions such as the 251 progression. Here are the 5 types of 7th chord using C as the root note:
There are 5 main types of 7th chord that we need to learn – the major 7th chord, the minor 7th chord, the dominant 7th chord, the minor 7b5 chord, and the diminished 7th chord.
#### The Major 7th Chord
First of all we have the major 7th chord. The major seventh chord is built by playing the 1st, 3rd, 5th, and 7th notes of the major scale.
#### The Minor 7th Chord
The minor 7th chord is built in the same way as the major 7th chord except we use the 1,3,5 & 7 from the natural minor scale.
We can also build a minor 7th chord by playing the major 7th chord and then lowering the 3rd and 7th note by a half step.
#### The Dominant 7th Chord
The dominant 7 is a very important chord. It has an unstable sound and wants to resolve to a major chord a fifth away.
Dominant chords give movement & tension to a piece of music.
#### The -7b5 Chord (Also known as Half Diminished)
The minor 7 flat 5 chord, also known as the half diminished chord is most commonly used as the 2 chord in a [minor 251 progression](https://www.pianogroove.com).
Minor 7 flat 5 chords are built using the 1, b3, b5 and b7 of the major scale. A simpler way to build a half diminished chord is to play the minor chord of the key and flatten the 5.
#### The Diminished 7th Chord
The next step is to build the 5 types of 7th chord. A 7th chord is a triad
4) Extended Chord Voicings
Extended jazz piano chords create a richer and more complex sound than triads and 7th chords and so they are used in jazz music to create more interesting harmonic progressions.
5) Rootless Chord Voicings
6) Altered Chord Voicings
Leave a reply