"So What" Voicings

This is a preview of the educational program A Jazz Improvisation Almanac which is under development for the Outside Shore Music Online School. Feel free to browse this preview and learn what you can from it. For a more completed product, though, check out the original freely browsable jazz textbook, A Jazz Improvisation Primer.

These voicings are similar to quartal voicings, except the interval on top is a third rather than a fourth. These voicings are almost invariably played as five note voicings and are most often used in parallel motion like quartal voicings:

[EXAMPLE]

The name derives from the tune "So What" by Miles Davis, which used these voicings extensively:

[EXAMPLE]

These voicings may be played on piano or guitar, but take up two hands on piano and all but one string on guitar. Therefore, they tend not to be used when accompanying one's own melodic lines, except as punctuation, as in the composition "So What" shown above.

Copyright 2000 Outside Shore Music
Authored by Marc Sabatella

"So What" Voicings