So, a great way to comp on your left hand while improvising on the right hand,
is to use really simple two-note voicings, and in this video,
I'll show you a couple of techniques on how to build these two-note voicings,
and give you a four step exercise to practice in all keys for all chord types.
All right. So, what's the benefit of using two-note voicings? Well, you'll make your
left hands comping easier to play. This is a great technique to use on Up Tempo Tunes with
lots of chords, like Bebop Tunes, blues, and so on. There are two types of two-note voicings:
the ones that include the root of the chord, and the ones that are rootless. The two-note voicings
that include the root are more effective for solo piano (or when there's no bass player) Conveying
a chord's Identity, or color, with only two notes is easy, if you know which notes are the ones that
offer these basic colors. Let's say I have a Cm7 chord. This is a 1-b3-5-b7 chord. And let's also
take a look at C7 and Cmaj7. The C7's chord-tones are: 1-3-5-b7. The Cmaj7 is: 1-3-5-7. So, which of
these notes hold the essence of each chord? If you look at them carefully, you can see that we only
need to know the 3 and the 7, to discern between them. The m7 is a b3-b7, the dominant seven is
a 3-b7, and the maj7 is a 3-maj7.Tthese two notes are known as the guide-tones. So, one might think
that the root should be essential because to hear the 3rd or the 7th as being major or minor,
we need that root note. That's why we should know two types of two-note voicings: the rooted ones
(when we play solo piano) and the rootless ones (for when we're playing with a bass player) So,
by just playing the guide-tones we can convey the chord's type (the chord's essence) To play Cmaj7,
we just play E and B. Cm7 is Eb and Bb, and C7 is E and Bb. And an important property of
these two-note voicings is that they all have two inversions. So, Cmaj7 could be E and B,
or B with an E on top. Cm7 is Eb with Bb on top, or Bb with Eb, and C7 is either: E Bb,
or Bb E. This is going to become really handy when we try to create nice voice leading in a chord
progression. I know what you're probably thinking right now. "What about m7b5 chords, augmented
chords, or diminished chords? Don't they have an altered fifth? We're gonna need that altered fifth
to convey those chord types, won't we?" Well, yes, and no. Let me explain. For a Cm7b5 chord, we can
just play the guide-tones: Bb and Eb, and let the right hand fill in the blanks by providing the b5,
in the lines that the right hand is playing. The Eb and the Bb are more ambiguous in this case but,
as I'll show you later, the functionality of the m7b5 which is probably a related ii, will still
be conveyed when we start using voice leading to move from the next chord in the progression. And
augmented dominant chords work exactly the same. Augmented dominants are better represented by two
guide-tones: the 3 and the b7. Finally we have o7 chords. These are quite interesting because in a
diminished seven, any note could be the root. Co7 could be seen as an Ebo7, or a Gbo7, or an Ao7,
and so, any note could be seen as the 3rd, the 5th, or the 7th of the chord. So any node could
be a root, or a guide-tone, or an altered fifth. This gives us quite a few options for two-note
voicings. The easiest way to look at these is to realize that we can play tritones or minor thirds.
So for our Co7 we can play any of these voicings. But again, any of the two tritones here are the
best option for voice leading. One more thing before we start practicing. All of these two-note
rootless voicings are either 3rds, 4ths, or 5ths. That's it! And when we play these intervals on the
left hand, we need to consider the low interval limit. You don't want these voicings to sound
muddy. So try to avoid playing any of these notes below this base C here. By the way, we
have an entire course on 4-note rootless voicings, that you should check out because we explained so
many of these concepts in greater detail. We'll teach you how to build 4-note rootless voicings,
and give you workouts in every key. So, if you're interested in this topic, make sure
to check out our 4-note rootless voicings course on mDecks.com. All right! Enough Theory. Let's get
into today's exercise. Let's work on rootless 2-note voicings first, and in the next video,
I'll give you a similar exercise to practice rooted 2-note voicings. In step one, I want you
to play all dominant chords around the circle of fifths. Remember, we're playing the 3 and a b7,
or the inversion b7 and 3. So these are going to be tritones. I want you to practice these because,
no matter where you start, the next voicing is going to be a half step below.
C7 to F7 is either this... or this... so we're moving chromatically down when we play dominant
chords around the circle of fifths. By the way, this is known as an extended dominant sequence.
An obvious problem with that dominant sequence is that, by constantly descending chromatically down,
we eventually hit the low interval limit, and we need to reset the range by breaking
the voice leading. And this is true for almost 90% of all well-formed chord progressions. So,
be aware of that. When you start getting lower in the range, start to consider breaking the
voice leading and resetting the voicings to a higher range. Step two: now let's play
consecutive two fives. These "two-note m7 chord voicings" are always a perfect fifth,
or a perfect fourth. The related five is the closest tritone descending. We just need to
move one of the notes down to turn the fifth or the fourth into a tritone pretty simple.
Step three: let's do a 2-5-1 sequence. Now the tritone voicing turns back into a perfect fourth
(or a fifth), and it'll match the interval you used on the ii chord, just a half step down.
Step four: let's turn the major seven in step 3 into a 6 chord.
So we play Dm7 to G7 to Cmaj7 to C6 like this...
This is a great intermediary step to learn the voice leading for a ii V I(6) progression. We're
just turning the fifth of the major seven chord into a fourth, or the fourth into a fifth. Notice
how all these voice leading movements are always descending. As I said before, well-formed harmonic
progressions tend to create descending movement in the voice leading. Step five: let's play a
2-5 that lands on a major six chord directly now the two notes of the tritone move down
Step six: let's add a Bebop line on the right hand like this...
Step 7: we're gonna play the mixolydian b9 b13 line, that we showed you in our tutorial for that
scale, over a iim7b5 V7b9, and then a im6 chord at the end. The cool thing is that we don't have
to change the voicings we used in the major two five. The only new voicing that we need to learn
is the one of the im6 chord. Two-note voicings for m6 chords takes some time to get used to,
because the guide tones on a m6 chord are the b3 and 6, which create a tritone. A Cm6
two-note voicing is: Eb A, or A and Eb; and out of context, this is a hard sound to swallow. It
doesn't sound like minor chords at all but if I add some context you'll hear how good it sounds
The Voice leading is pretty simple just move the tritone you're playing
on your V chord a whole step down so in Step seven we're going to play this
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