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  • (piano music)

  • - [Julian] How's it going guys?

  • Julian Bradley here from TheMusicalEar.com.

  • In today's video I'm gonna share with you

  • my chord progression of the week.

  • I'm gonna start by playing the original version,

  • and then I'm going to share a couple

  • of other variations, which you can do

  • on the same chord progression.

  • So here is the original version.

  • (piano music)

  • So the chords start on C-minor-Seven,

  • and I'm using an interesting voicing.

  • It's called an open voicing,

  • where you skip every other note.

  • So you play C, you skip the Third,

  • play G, skip the root,

  • play E-Flat, skip G,

  • and play B-Flat.

  • This is a nice open voicing.

  • It sounds very clean when you play it.

  • And then what we're going to do

  • is just take the bottom Fifth,

  • and we're going to slide it down a half-step

  • to B and F-Sharp.

  • That is a B-major-Seven.

  • So it goes C-minor-Seven, B-major-Seven.

  • And then you're gonna take both hands down and reset.

  • Play B-Flat and F, and D-Flat and A-Flat in the right.

  • Which chord is this?

  • That's right, it's a B-Flat-minor-Seven chord.

  • And then we're going to do the same pattern.

  • We're just gonna slide the left hand

  • down a half-step.

  • And which chord do we end up playing here?

  • Well this is an A-major-Seven chord.

  • Root and Fifth in the left,

  • C-Sharp, the major Third, and G-Sharp, the major Seventh.

  • So those first four chords.

  • C-minor-Seven, B-major-Seven,

  • B-Flat-minor-Seven, going to A-major-Seven.

  • And then here's the nice part.

  • You play a C-Sharp-minor-Nine chord.

  • This is how I'm voicing it,

  • but you can voice it any way you like.

  • We could voice it just simply with the same voicing.

  • Root, Fifth, Third, Seventh.

  • Or you could switch these the other way around

  • and play Seventh, Third, that would be nice.

  • So ...

  • (piano music)

  • You could just play that.

  • However, I'm adding the Ninth and the Fifth.

  • And this is one of the most common voicings I will play

  • for a minor Nine chord, or a minor Seven chord.

  • This is C-Sharp-minor-Nine.

  • (piano music)

  • Okay, so here's the first variation

  • on this chord progression.

  • First three chords are going to stay the same.

  • C-minor-Seven, B-major-Seven, B-Flat-minor-Seven,

  • but then instead of playing A-major-Seven,

  • we can change this to an A-dominant-Seven.

  • However, if we just play the literal chord voicing

  • it doesn't sound great.

  • So really, we're going to revoice it,

  • and play this voicing, which has G, the minor-Seventh,

  • B the Ninth, C-Sharp the major Third,

  • and F-Sharp the 13th.

  • And then this chord resolves really nicely

  • to the same C-Sharp-minor-Nine chord.

  • And I'm going to voice it like this.

  • I'm just going to play an E-major-Seven chord

  • in my right hand, with C-Sharp on the bass.

  • And that's a simple way to think

  • of a C-Sharp-minor-Nine chord.

  • Just C-Sharp and then build a major-Seven chord

  • from the minor-Third.

  • So here's how that chord progression sounds.

  • (piano music)

  • Okay, and for the final variation,

  • I'm going to apply the Kenny Barron 11th voicing

  • to each of these chords.

  • The Kenny Barron 11th voicing is root, Fifth, and Ninth

  • in the left hand, or just build a stack of Fifths.

  • And then in the right hand,

  • you build a stack of Fifths from the Third.

  • So if it's a minor chord, then you build a stack of Fifths

  • from E-Flat, the minor-Third.

  • Which would give you B-Flat, the minor-Seventh,

  • and F, the 11th.

  • And that's a really nice voicing for a C-minor-11.

  • Or, if the chord was C-major-Seven,

  • then you would do the same left hand,

  • but you would build a stack of Fifths

  • from the major-Third, which would give you

  • B, the major-Seventh,

  • and F-Sharp, the Sharp-Four.

  • So, we're going to apply these two voicings

  • to the same chord progression.

  • Every time there's a minor chord

  • we'll play the minor version,

  • and every time there's a major chord,

  • we'll play the major version.

  • First chord is C-minor-Seven.

  • Start with this.

  • Now, the next chord is B-major-Seven,

  • and we're just going to slide the left hand

  • down by a half-step.

  • And the right hand stays in place.

  • And when the right hand stays in place,

  • well you end up playing the major voicing anyway,

  • because this is just a stack

  • of Fifths built from the major-Third.

  • And then we're going to reset for the B-Flat chord.

  • B-Flat-minor-Seven, how are we going to voice it?

  • That's right, stack of Fifths in the left hand.

  • B-Flat, F, and C.

  • And then a stack of Fifths in the right hand

  • from the minor-Third of B-Flat, which is D-Flat.

  • That gives you this.

  • And then we're going to do the same trick one more time.

  • Just move the left hand down by a half-step.

  • And the right hand stays in place.

  • So, that's the first four chords.

  • (piano music)

  • And then for the final chord we have C-Sharp-minor-Seven.

  • Stack of Fifths in the left hand,

  • and stack of Fifths in the right hand from the minor-Third.

  • Or you could voice it up here,

  • if it sounds a bit muddy down there for you.

  • So, that's the final variation.

  • Here's how it sounds.

  • (piano music)

  • So, thank you very much for watching.

  • I hope you enjoyed this video.

  • If you did, I would really appreciate a thumbs up.

  • Or if you could share this video with a friend.

  • And, if this is the first video of mine you've seen,

  • make sure you don't miss out on future videos

  • by subscribing to my channel.

  • Now I've actually notated the sheet music

  • to all three variations on this chord progression.

  • You can download that for free at the link below.

  • And, I'm even including five more chord progressions

  • in a very similar style,

  • and I'll put them all together into one PDF.

  • You can download it, print it out,

  • and then play all of the chord progressions

  • plus variations at the piano.

  • So, just click on the link below.

  • Download the sheet music.

  • That's it from me, and I'll see you again

  • in a new video soon.

(piano music)

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