Green Dolphin Street Comping & Improv
In this lesson we explore a selection of comping voicings and improvised solo ideas for the famous tune ‘On Green Dolphin Street’.
This tutorial features 3 comping choruses, 2 choruses of improvised solo, and a head-in and head-out. The scrolling score contains annotations of the theory areas for additional explanation on the styles of voicings being used.
Comping Voicing Styles
We incorporate a wide range of comping voicings and styles to achieve different textures and colours in our accompaniment. In particular we apply the following theory areas:
- Simple left hand voicings and melody
- Dominant chain turnarounds (G7 – C7 – F7 – Bb7)
- Basic drop 2 voicings
- 4th voicings & ‘So What’ voicings
- Red Garland voicings
- Upper structure triad voicings
See the related lesson section below for in-depth tutorials on these theory areas.
Lesson Downloads
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Green Dolphin Street – Supporting Material File Type: pdf
Related Lessons
The So What chord voicing contains all 5 notes of the pentatonic scale. That’s why it works so well in so many different harmonic situations.
The Red Garland voicing has a distinctive ‘block chord’ sound, but compared to previous styles of block chords, it has a much brighter quality.
In this lesson I explain what drop 2 voicings are, how to construct them and how to practice drop 2 so that you are familiar with them in all 12 keys.
Practice Tips
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First learn the left hand voicings that are used to accompany the head-in and head-out.
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Once you are familiar with the harmony of the tune you can spread the voicings over 2 hands in drop-2 configuration.
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The final step is introduce the bigger 2 handed voicings such as the Red Garland voicings and the upper structure harmony.
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See the related lessons above for theory lessons on these voicing concepts.
It appears this video file is not available? @Hayden are you able to check please?
It’s working now!😀
Masterfully done! I am working on the beginner version of this tune (block chords in root position to start), and it’s great to see where the music can lead. The notations are very helpful guideposts.