Voicings I: shell voicings
Build your comping on three-note shell voicings (root, 3rd, 7th), learn them with the root on the 6th and 5th strings, play them Freddie Green style, add 9ths and 13ths, and take them through all twelve keys.
- Play maj7, 7, m7, m7b5, dim7, 6 and m6 shells with the root on the 6th string (string sets 6-4-3 and 6-5-4) and on the 5th string (sets 5-3-2 and 5-4-3)
- Comp a ii–V–I and a jazz blues in F with shells without leaving one position
- Play four-to-the-bar rhythm guitar in the Freddie Green style with clean muting and a light accent on 2 and 4
- Add 9ths and 13ths to shells and recognise rootless voicings as the same idea with the root removed
- Move shells around the cycle of fourths and through I–vi–ii–V turnarounds in all twelve keys from memory
Every chord you will ever play in jazz is built on the three notes a shell voicing contains: the root, the 3rd and the 7th. Pianists learned this from Bud Powell's left hand; guitarists learned it from Freddie Green and Jim Hall. Shells are small enough to play at any tempo, clear enough to define the harmony on their own, and they are the skeleton that every drop-2, drop-3 and rootless voicing later in the course hangs on. Spend the five lessons here properly and the later voicing modules become a matter of adding notes to shapes you already own.
Before starting, you should be comfortable naming notes on strings 6 and 5 (lesson 1.3) and reading the chord notation used in the examples (lesson 1.2).