The Bill Evans minor 7 move I keep coming back to

Reader,

One of the things I love most about Bill Evans is the way he moves the inner voices to create tension and release on any chord. You can hear it really clearly on this recording of "When I Fall In Love" from Solo Sessions.

For the next few weeks, I want to show you a few Bill Evans' inspired movements so you can try them over the voicings in the 7-Step Jazz Piano Voicings Roadmap.

Here's a simple movement for a minor 7 chord.

The movement works by playing our voicings but with some added dissonance and then releasing that tension into our voicing. It's kind of like we start our voicing with one note out of place.

That "out of place" note is going to sound a bit off... because it is. And on its own, this dissonant chord sounds pretty gnarly. But, as a movement, its incredibly satisfying.

On our minor 7 chord, we're doing to do this by shifting our minor 7th up to the major 7th instead.

Here's a 2-5-1 in C major, using our standard comping voicings:

(Don't forget to try it in the B voicing too)

The Wednesday Woodshed

Here are the three things you should practice to get this sound into your playing this week.

1. Play the example above, slowly. Listen to to the tension in that C#, and then hear it resolve to C-natural. It helps me to sing that C# - C-natural.
2. Take this through the circle of fifths, playing this same 2-5-1 in all 12 keys.
3. Work it into whatever song you are learning now by trying this movement on any 2-5.

We're learning The Nearness of You in our Zoom workshops. That tune is full of 2-5's where you can work this in. How are you going to play it?

Workshop this Friday, May 29

At our workshop this Friday we're continuing our work on The Nearness of You. We'll be continuing to practice our rootless voicings, and start to bring in some bass notes.

You are signed up, so I'll see you Friday, May 29, at 1:00 Eastern.

Happy Practicing,