If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’ve seen several lessons on “inversions.”

For those of you who don’t know, an inversion is simply a different way to play a chord.

And here’s a simple rule to remember…

The number of ways to “invert” a chord is equal to the number of notes in the chord!

Got that?

Basically, if the chord has 3 notes, there are 3 different inversions or ways to play that chord.

If the chord has 4 notes in it, there are 4 inversions for that chord.

Pretty simple.

But it doesn’t end there.

That rule just applies to inversions, not voicings. There are tons more ways to “voice” a 3-tone major chord… not just 3.

So don’t mix inversions up with voicings. A voicing is a particular representation of a chord.

Here’s the difference.

C major

Since it has 3 notes, you can invert it three different ways:

Root

First Inversion (has the 3rd degree of the chord on the bottom)

Second Inversion (has the 5th degree of the chord on the bottom)

But let’s look at other “voicings” for the chord.

See… you can double up on notes — you can leave notes out — you can rearrange notes… that’s the difference between inversions and voicings (at least the way I teach it).

C major
C on bass (not shown)

(big sound)

And if you want to get fancier and turn this regular C major triad into a C major 7, it gives you even more “voicings” to experiment with…

C on bass (not shown)

C on bass (not shown)

As you can see, there’s a lot you can do.

So remember that just because it’s written a certain way in the “textbooks” doesn’t mean you have to play it that way!

Until next time —

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Since this post about seventh chords has been resurrected from the dead by various students (via new comments that appear on the side menu), I’ve decided to expound on the concept of that lesson a little more.

Basically in that post, I showed you how to spice up seventh chords by changing the way you voice them.

• How the notes in a chord are spaced.
• What notes are being played twice.
• Where the root of the chord is placed.
• What feeling a particular order gives you.

These things are all important when it comes to understanding voicings.

And believe me, some musicians need a lot of help in this area. Just because you’re playing the same notes as the next musician doesn’t mean you’ll make that chord sound the same way the next musician does.

For example, Jason White and Michael Bereal (from our advanced dvds) both do this well. They can take the same ole’ major chords we’ve been playing for years and make them sound like something we think we’ve never played before. And when you find out what they’re doing, you’re often times blown away because it’s so simple.

The key is how you voice your chords and where you place them.

So in that lesson I referred to above, all I did was take regular seventh chords and alter the order and number of notes I played.

Step 1: I started with the regular root inversions.

Example:
C major 7: C + E + G + B

Step 2: I took out the fifth interval.

Example: The fifth interval in this chord is “G” (”G” is the fifth tone in the C major scale).
C major 7: C + E + B

Step 3: I chose to only play the root on my left hand bass.

Example:
C major 7: E + B on right /// C on left hand bass

Step 4: I chose to double up on the “third” (doubling up means playing octaves).

Example: The third interval in this chord is “E” (”E” is the third tone in the C major scale).
E + B + E

Step 5: Once I established my voicing (which is basically “3 + 7 + 3 over the root bass”), I used this same voicing all the way up the piano.

Example:
You already know the seventh chords that correspond to the major scale. The trick is this: Just slide over your fingers one note and that will give you the voicing for the next chord in the scale.

C major 7 = C + E + G + B = new voicing (E + B + E on right / C on left)
D minor 7 = D + F + A + C = new voicing (F + C + F on right / D on left)
E minor 7 = E + G + B + D = new voicing (G + D + G on right / E on left)
F major 7 = F + A + C + E = new voicing (A + E + A on right / F on left)
G dom 7 = G + B + D + F = new voicing (B + F + B on right / G on left)
A minor 7 = A + C + E + G = new voicing (C + G + C on right / A on left)
B half-dim 7 = B + D + F + A = new voicing (D + A + D on right / B on left)
C major 7 = C + E + G + B = new voicing (E + B + E on right / C on left)

Note: What you see in the first group of notes is what the chord normally looks like in root position. Then you see our voicing in parentheses.

You may be thinking… “wow, that seems too easy. I just move my fingers over and I can learn all these new voicings!”

Well, it’s because these voicings all have the 3rd and 7th in them and quite frankly, that’s all you need in order to play a chord (along with the root, of course). The 5th doesn’t really tell you much about the chord because major, minor, and dominant chords all have perfect 5th intervals. What really matters in a chord is what the 3rd and 7th are doing.

(Even when you’re trying to figure out what kind of chord you’re playing, the third and fifth should be able to tell you. Any extra notes may hint at it being an extended or altered chord but the 3rd and 7th will tell you what kind of underlying chord you’re playing, in most cases).

So try making up your own voicings.

Maybe you won’t use “3 + 7 + 3″ like I did. Maybe yours is the reverse: “7 + 3 + 7.” That sounds pretty good, too! And you can even take it all the way up the scale too because it has the 3rd and 7th and that’s all you need in order to form the seventh chords of a major scale.

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Until next time —

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I get tons of e-mails everyday and from experience, I find that one of the hardest things for musicians to do is play chords on both hands.

It takes a lot of getting used to, especially when you’re used to playing chords on the right and single bass notes (or power chords like the “1″ and “5″ notes) on the left.

Don’t get me wrong… this is fine if you’re a solo musician and have to hold down the chords and bass.

But as you get more experienced and start getting invited to play in bands, you’ll have to say goodbye to the left hand bass technique, or the bass player WILL HATE YOU. And your chords won’t sound as full as the musician using two hands to play them.

So as I was going through our youtube videos (we have almost 200 of them there, check it out), I came across a pretty good demonstration of a two-hand groove by our very own Jonathan Powell from the GospelKeys Urban Pro 600 course.

He goes over this chord progression in depth in the dvd but what I wanted to do was include the notes of the groove and explain a little more of what’s going on for those who don’t have the course.

Stick with me… you’ll get a lot out of this…

If you want to check out the video first, be my guest. If not, click on this video after reading what I have to say:

So here’s what’s going on…

Jon is in the key of Ab major and he’s playing a 2-6 groove. This is very common in urban and contemporary music. This happens to be a part of a contemporary gospel theme but the truth is that you’ll find this is in R&B, soul, and other genres.

(For my beginners, it’s called a “2-6″ groove because the bass is moving from Bb to F… which are the “2nd” and “6th” tones of the Ab scale, respectively. You won’t find Jon doing this because he’s not playing the bass. He has a bass player on the side so don’t get confused).

Ok, so the groove is starting on Bb and then moving to F. But it doesn’t stay that simple for long as you’ll find Jon introducing other changes to get you from Bb to F that I’ll cover in a minute (like using the 3 to get to 6… thus a “2-3-6″ progression or using the 7 to get to the 3 and the 3 to get to the 6… thus a “2-7-3-6″ progression). Don’t worry, I gotch you!

But let me cover what you don’t get to see in the video (because it’s actually already occurred and this clip starts in the middle).

Here’s what Jon is playing on Bb:

Left hand: Ab C Db F
Right hand: Ab C Eb (but he’s using his pointer finger to play Bb slightly early to create a “grace note sliding” effect).
Chord name: Bb minor 11

Here’s what he’s doing on F:

Left hand: Eb G Ab C
Right hand: Eb G Bb (using “F” to create the “grace note sliding” effect).
Chord name: F minor 11

So these are the two chords you hear in the beginning of their groove. This is the foundation.

What can you gather from this?

Any time you want to play a two hand voicing for a minor chord and make it sound real good, you can use this voicing. Notice that the Bb and F chords use the same exact type of voicing. So if you learn all of these, you’ll have your minor chords taken care of.

To learn em’ all, just move up your notes a half step and write that chord down. Move your bass up as well even though you’re not playing the bass. Whatever bass note you’re at will be the title (or keynote) of the chord. Do this to all keys until you get back to your starting point. Then practice playing them.

Now, let’s move further.

He introduces a chord on the “3″… or in this case “C.”

(Bass player would be playing C)

Left hand: E Ab Bb Eb
Right hand: Ab C Eb (using the same “grace note slide” effect with “Bb”)

You’d put this chord in between the Bb and F chord.

So altogether, it looks like this:

Left hand: Ab C Db F
Right hand: Ab C Eb (but he’s using his pointer finger to play Bb slightly early to create a “grace note sliding” effect).
Invisible Bass: Bb

Left hand: E Ab Bb Eb
Right hand: Ab C Eb (using the same “grace note slide” effect with “Bb)
Invisible Bass: C

Left hand: Eb G Ab C
Right hand: Eb G Bb (using “F” to create the “grace note sliding” effect).
Invisible Bass: F

This is called a “2-3-6″ progression because the root bass is going from Bb (which is the 2nd tone in the Ab scale) to C (the 3rd tone) to F (the 6th tone).

But it gets even better than that…

He wants to lead to the “3″ with a chord so he uses the “7″ chord in the scale. In this case, that’s a “G” bass.

Left hand: F B
Right hand: F Bb Db

But he does change the “3″ chord from before to this:

Left hand: E Bb
Right hand: Eb Ab C (using the same “grace note slide” effect with “Bb)

If you think about it, it’s pretty much the same chord that you used above on “C” but it’s just smaller. Instead of the big ‘E Ab Bb Eb’ chord on the left, it’s just ‘E Bb’ (which is a tritone… another lesson). And the right hand is still an Ab major chord, just in second inversion (Eb Ab C instead of Ab C Eb).

So altogether, this progression looks like this:

Left hand: Ab C Db F
Right hand: Ab C Eb (but he’s using his pointer finger to play Bb slightly early to create a “grace note sliding” effect).
Invisible Bass: Bb

Left hand: E Bb
Right hand: Eb Ab C (using the same “grace note slide” effect with “Bb)
Invisible Bass: G

Left hand: F B
Right hand: F Bb Db
Invisible Bass: C

Left hand: Eb G Ab C
Right hand: Eb G Bb (using “F” to create the “grace note sliding” effect).
Invisible Bass: F

At the end of the day, you have 3+ ways to play this same progression. You can keep it simple with just the “2″ and “6″ chord. You can add the big “3″ chord in between them. Or you can add the “7-3″ pair between the “2″ and “6.”

Of course Jon does other fancy things on the video that I can’t get into right now because of time but this lesson will get you started jammin’ with this groove!

I would really like to hear from you all on this one. Did you enjoy this progression? Are you having problems playing it? Are you getting that little “grace note sliding” trick? Let me know!

I can even get Jon on here to do another demonstration or something if you let me know what you want to learn! :)

Until next time!

P.S. - Here are some other video clips in the urban series…

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I have something you guys are going to like!

It’s a chord finder tool. You simply tell it what chord you want to learn and it displays it right there on the screen.

The best way for me to describe this is by letting you mess around with it.

Click here to give it a go.

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