Minor Chord Voicings For Jazz Piano
This is the second lesson in the series on learning to harmonise the melody of jazz standards. In the first lesson we looked at harmonising the melody note of major chords and in this lesson we are going to focus on minor chords and focus on the different voicings that can be used under each of the 7 notes of the Dorian scale.
The majority of the time, the melody over minor chords will be one of these 7 notes so if you memorise formulas for harmonising these melody notes, you will always be able to find a rich and interesting sounding voicing for minor chords in all 12 keys.
Lesson Downloads
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Minor Voicings Lesson Supplement File Type: pdf -
Minor Voicing Lesson Transcript File Type: pdf
Related Lessons
We can also achieve some really interesting sounds by applying upper structure triad theory to both major and minor chords.
In this lesson we explore how you can navigate over the minor line cliché using bass lines, two-handed chords and left hand voicings.
We have voiced minor 251 progressions with our left hand and so now it’s time to spread the notes across 2 hands to get bigger chords with more impact!
Practice Tips
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Every time you come across a chord on a lead sheet, you should analyse the scale degree of the melody in relation to the chord underneath.
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Making a conscious analysis of this when you are playing through jazz standards will help you memorise and internalise voicings. This is really important!
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By ‘internalise’ I mean remember the formula. With jazz it is far more efficient to think in terms of numbers (or scale degrees) than to think of individual notes.
- For example, with the So What Chord, from top to bottom, it contains the Root. 11th, b7th, b3rd and 5th. Knowing this formula means you can then apply it to any key (considering you know your major/minor scales... which is why they are so important!)
Thanks Hayden. I’ve been trying to explore all of your lessons that deal with minor chords. I’ve downloaded the worksheets about major minor upper structures as well as right hand voicings for minor chords. Are there any more that I might be missing? Thanks!
Hi Josh,
By the sounds of it you have all of them.
Here is a cheat sheet that contains many different types of chords: https://www.pianogroove.com/resources/common-voicing-formulas/
Not only minor, but major, dominant, sus, -7b5, diminished and upper structures.
Cheers,
Hayden
Hello Hayden.
Which lesson does this score contain?
Hey John 👋
Are you talking about this PDF?… https://www.pianogroove.com/resources/minor-chord-voicings-supplement/
In this lesson, we cover examples from many jazz standards, the PDF file mentioned above tells you the name of each jazz standard.
Does that answer your question?
If I have misunderstood you, let me know 🙂
Cheers,
Hayden
I am talking about this pdf https://www.pianogroove.com/resources/common-voicing-formulas/
Ah yes, that is just a cheat sheet… it doesn’t accompany any 1 lesson in particular. It contains the chords from many lessons on different voicings.
It was an idea from one of our Russian students to create a cheat sheet encompassing all the types of voicings. I will likely add more to it… if you have any suggestions to improve it let me know 🙂 Cheers, Hayden
Thank you!
These lessons explaining voicing options for each scale degree in the melody are great to help create my own arrangements. It would be great if you could add a lesson covering options for voicing m7b5 chords under each different scale degree. The cheat sheet helps with some situations but a lesson like this with examples in actual tunes would really help put it all in context. Thx!
Fantastic idea Scott… I will get that added to this course.
That’s awesome to hear this course is helping you create your own arrangements… that was the idea behind it so it’s brilliant to hear that 🙂
Yes I feel you, when it is demonstrated in context of a tune, it sticks better in the memory.
Leave it with me and I will get the lesson planned and recorded.
Cheers,
Hayden
Thx!
I was taught that minor chords need minor 3s. Your favorite voicing for minor chord with root on top substitutes a 4th in line with a sus. Your minor chords with an 11th on top often lack a minor third. Minor flat 5 s often seem to lack a minor third. Please clarify. Thanks
Hi Edwin 👋🏻
Good question!
When playing jazz piano we have the creative freedom to voice the 3rd and 7th anywhere in the chord.
You will notice that all of the minor voicings I demonstrate contain the minor 3rd and minor 7th, but they do not need to be stacked in sequential order.
I think your question is that all of the voicings do not contain an *interval of a minor 3rd*, which is not a problem.
The quality of the chord (major, minor, dominant)is defined by the presence of 3rd and 7th, and we can play these notes anywhere in the voicing.
When playing solo jazz piano, we use a concept called ‘spread voicings’ where we play the melody in our right hand, the bass note in our left hand, and the 3rd and 7th in between which can be played with either hand.
If our minor voicings had to contain an *interval of a minor 3rd* for it to be a minor chord, that would greatly limit the number of potential voicings we could play.
For example, the voicings with the 11th on top – also known as Kenny Barron Voicings – are constructed by stacking 5th intervals from root, to 5th, to 9th, then a half step up to the minor 3rd, another 5th interval up to the minor 7th, and another fifth interval up to the 11th. This chord contains both the minor 3rd and minor 7th which is what makes it a minor chord, and we have the 9th and 11th which adds colour.
Let me know if that makes sense, and any further questions let me know.
Cheers,
Hayden
Hi, When playing from a lead sheet, say Misty for example, could these concepts be applied?
Thanks,
Allen
Hi Allen 👋🏻
Yes that’s right, you can apply these to any jazz standard.
The key is to try to memorise the voicings that work under each scale degree.
For example, if you are playing any jazz standard and you find a minor chord with the 5th in the melody, we know that the “So What Chord” is a great choice. If we see the 9th in the melody, we could play a simple extended 9th voicing, or alternatively the “Herbie Hancock Voicing”.
This might feel like a lot of work to start with, but soon it becomes an almost subconscious process where you see the melody note on the lead sheet, and your hands will instantly gravitate towards certain voicing shapes. This is because we have developed our muscle memory.
Remember the most important point is to memorise the top note of voicings in terms of the scale degrees. That way you will have the information to apply them to Misty, and any other tune you are working on.
Any other questions let me know.
Cheers,
Hayden
I learned jazz piano playing open voicings. Your lesson on minor voicings states stacked 4ths leading to the melody same as root is a minor chord. Your cheat sheet shows it is a suspended chord. Is it both? Also, does a minor chord with 11th in melody need a minor third? You have a great web site. Thanks
Hi Edwin 👋🏻
Good questions here!
I’m unsure on your first point “Your lesson on minor voicings states stacked 4ths leading to the melody same as root is a minor chord.” – Please can you reference the time in the video that I say this and I will look into it further for you.
To construct the “So What Voicing”, we stack 4ths from the root, and the final interval is a major 3rd which gives us the 5th on top.
For it to be a minor chord voicing, it must contain the b3rd and b7th.
I’m unsure on which chord you are referring to on the cheat sheet. Please can you specify?
The key difference between a minor chord and a sus chord, is that a sus chord would never contain the b3rd, it’s the presence of the b3rd which makes the chord minor in quality (b3 and b7). Whereas a sus chord contains the suspended 4th and the b7, never the minor 3rd/b3rd.
For your final question, yes for it to be a minor chord, it must contain a b3 and a b7.
Hope that makes sense.
Cheers,
Hayden
In your lecture above on minor voicing options at the 1:08 mark of My One and Only Love you play the stacked 4ths for the d and e minor chords in the bridge. Given your above reply to my previous question is stacked 4ths appropriate for a minor voicing with root in melody. Thanks. Stay healthy.
Hi Edwin,
Thanks for this. Yes you are correct, in this case we are reharmonising the minor chord with a sus voicing instead of a minor chord.
If instead of playing the stack of 4ths in our left hand, if we play the following 4 notes: root-b3-5th-b7, and then in our right hand we play the same stacked 4ths off the 9th, we are then playing a Minor 11th voicing as we have the minor 3rd in our left hand.
If you listen to both voicings they sound somewhat similar but also slightly different. The sus chord (stacked 4ths in both hands) has a slightly more uplifting quality and brighter quality. Whereas when we play the 4 notes in our left hand, the voicing has a more minor quality.
I’d look at these as 2 options we can play when the root is in the melody over a minor chord.
In hindsight I should have included both of these options in the tutorial. Or at least explained that we were changing the harmony. Good spot there and apologies for the confusion. I hope this makes sense now and any further questions let me know.
Cheers,
Hayden
3rd in the melody:
I was taught minor seconds below the melody are not allowed because they distract from the melody. In fact when I listen to your examples I hear the 9 as the melody. Only the Kenny Barron Voicings sounds right to me. Are there any other voicings with the 9 one octave below?
Hi Sebastian,
Yes I love to tuck the 9th underneath the 3rd in the melody for minor chords, it creates a nice “crunch” and adds a lot of colour to the chord.
The key is to play them both together to get a clean sound. If you play one note and then the next it can sound a little messy.
Yes the Kenny Barron voicing that you mention uses this interval in the centre of the chord.
There are other voicings but the KB voicing is the most useful and versatile. I would recommend using these voicings as a basis but also experiment with minor chords that you find on lead sheets. Play the melody note and then try to tuck the 3rd and 9th underneath. You will learn a lot in the process of discovery.
Enjoy the lessons!
Cheers,
Hayden
Thanks! I do enjoy the lessons! I already know quite a lot and was looking for some more advanced topics, and for structuring and naming things better. So far it really helped a lot!
Hi Hayden, in your explanation of voicing an Fm7 in bar 4 , it is then followed by an E diminished with C in the melody which you seem to voice with a E and B flat in your left and an A flat 2 nd inversion in your right. Can you please explain this as I’m not the quickest and coupled with a slow net it’s driving me nuts?
Hi Andy,
Apologies for the late reply here.
Yes that is an upper structure triad voicing. Edim7 can also function as a rootless C7 chord. For any diminished chord, if we add a bass note a major 3rd below we then have a dominant b9 chord. In this case it would be C7b9.
In the example you mention, I am treating the Edim7 chord as a C7 chord, and therefore I can use upper structure triad voicings such as the Ab triad over C7 which creates a C7#5#9 chord and this works well with the melody note C.
You can learn more about upper structures here:
https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/what-are-upper-structure-triads/
https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/upper-structure-triads/
https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/upper-structures-practice/
As an exercise, when you find a diminished chord on a lead sheet, try to voice it with its related dominant chords. There are many options and you will learn a lot in the process of discovery.
Cheers and enjoy the lessons!
Hayden
Hey, at 13:59 in the sheet music I see an A7(b13) but I can’t seem to understand the chord you use since you don’t use an A in the bass. Can you explain what it is and why it works? Thanks.
Hi Alex,
Great question!
This is an upper structure triad (UST) voicing without the root in the chord.
This chord would be called “A7#5#9” which can also be referred to as “A7#9b13” as the terms #5 and b13 are interchangeable – ultimately it’s the same note (F) but it can be referred to as either the #5 or the b13.
You will see that I am playing the 3rd and 7th of the A7 chord in my left hand. The 3rd is the note C# (showing as Db here because this is an older lesson where all black notes are flats) and G which is the 7th of the A7 chord.
We can play any chord in jazz without the root. Generally, we wouldn’t play every chord without the root (unless playing with a bass player who’s job is to play the root) but when playing solo piano it can be nice to drop the root out of the chord sometimes to create different textural effects in our voicings.
Dropping the root out of the chord works particularly well with upper structure triad voicings.
I recommend to check out the following lesson which is an introduction to upper structure triad voicings:
https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/what-are-upper-structure-triads/
In particular see chapter 2 of the lesson “UST Theory” where I show the different left hand configurations which can be: R-7, R-3-7, or just 3-7 as we see in this example.
That lesson should explain everything for you so check that lesson out first. Also print out the “Upper Structure Cheat Sheet” and stick this near the piano so that you can reference it when playing jazz standards.
We have a full course on USTs and altered voicings here:
https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/altered-harmony-upper-structure-triads/
It can be a little complicated to understand at first, but with practice and repetition this theory and the voicings options become much easier to remember.
We also have a full course on rootless voicings here:
https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-piano-lessons/left-hand-voicings/
Please check out the lessons/courses above and let me know if you have any further questions.
Talk soon, cheers,
Hayden