We mostly think about jazz chord inversions when it comes to types of chords like Drop2 and triads, but there is a lot more to discover when it comes to using inversion to create beautiful jazz chords.
In this lesson, I am going to start with a Dm7(9) voicing that you are probably already familiar with and then use that and a little voice-leading to create some great voicings and make inversions of entire chord progressions.
Later in the lesson, I will also show you a few great “guitaristic” tricks that are easy to play but sound incredible.
A great Dm7(9) voicing
You probably know this great Dm7(9) voicing and maybe you also use the rootless version.
But from this rootless 3-note chord you can make beautiful voicings like this with inversions:
Putting inversions to use on a progression, not just a chord
If I took the first one and played a II V I in C then that could be this: II V I in C
Since it is only 3 notes you can easily look at how the voices move: F, F, E, E, Eb, D and C, B, B
Working through a few progressions like this is incredible for your fretboard knowledge and understanding of chords and voice-leading, even if you don’t use these voicings that in itself is a great exercise.
If you do this in the other postions you get this:
Inversions of Shell-voicings
If you try the same with a Shell-voicing like for example Cmaj7. Below is first the shell-voicing and then the two inversions.
Creating and inverting a II V I for the shell-voicing
Now we can construct a II V I with the shell-voicing and make inversions of these chord sets.
First the basic II V I:
And the inversions we can create from this set of chords:
A great trick with Shell-Voicings
A great way to create some moving voices when you use shell voicings is to move the outer voices in opposite directions.
In this case, that means moving the C, on the D string, up to a D and the B, on the B string, down to an A.
This is a pretty easy thing to play that also sounds great. The basic idea is shown below:
This works great with a lot of voicings. You could use that like this:
Or make a simpler variation like this one:
Another thing that these voicings can do really well is inner-voice movement that could be something like this.
And it also works in this place:
In the last one, it would be the melody which also sounds really good.
If you want to check out some more ideas then check out this video and learn some beautiful chord voicings and inner-voice ideas with 15 rootless II V I voicings.
How to use Great Flexible 3-note Jazz Voicings
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