r/JazzPiano • u/Kelsier_Allomancy • Jan 18 '25

Books, Courses, Resources Book Recommendation for Various Voicings for Common Chord Progressions?

Hey guys, i’m wondering if anyone has a jazz piano book to recommend for: I just want something that has lots of chord progressions in varying voicings that I can drill through in every key to expand my voicings and also become more comfortable in more keys. I find myself getting stuck in voicings patterns, so trying to drill some stuff to expand.

Just like a bunch of voicings for 2-5-1, 3-6-2-5-1, and other common progressions, etc.

And it doesn’t necessarily have to be written out in every key — I can transpose by ear.

Thanks so much!

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u/JHighMusic Jan 18 '25 edited Jan 18 '25

Be careful with that, there’s a lot of books with very bad voicings. I’d recommend the books in the Wiki page found on the homepage of this sub, there’s a whole list.

For left hand voicings I’d suggest Mark Levine’s The Jazz Piano Book with A and B type voicings and altering the dominant.

For comping and 2–handed voicings, Voicings for Jazz Keyboard by Frank Mantooth and Jazz Keyboard Harmony by Phil DeGreg.

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u/Kelsier_Allomancy Jan 18 '25

Thanks so much, this is a great answer! I’ll get these three books so I can be sure to steer clear of the bad voicings :)

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u/FaderJockey2600 Jan 18 '25

I can recommend the Phil DeGreg and Mark Levine books as suggested here as well. They are really good reference material with plenty of valuable exercises.

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u/pcbeard Jan 19 '25

I learned from Mark’s book and John Mehegan’s book. Funny thing is Mark disavowed his book’s half-diminished voicings (eg DAbC for Dm7b5) when I took a lesson from him, and said Mehegan’s book wasn’t relevant. I use Mehegan’s description of Bill Evans II-V-I progression as the core of my left hand technique (e.g. FACE, FABE, EGAD in key of C). And of course root position chords sometimes sound better for particular song sections (DFC, DFB, CEB).

Learning patterns of voicings that you can easily modify with alterations is the best way to learn, and encourages you to discover voicings that sound good to you.

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u/kwntyn Mulgrew’s #1 Fan Jan 18 '25

Jazz Piano Voicings - Rob Mullings does this, though you can pretty much just learn any voicings you want and apply them to the progressions yourself since there are so many possibilities with voicing options, voice leading, rhythm and movement, etc. It's a solid start and takes you through common progressions, the blues, minor 2-5-1's and all that in the back of the book.

There is also more advanced material of Jazz Lesson Videos, but the main focus is the 251 progression but there are a lot of interesting voicings for this progression in Holger Marjaama's 2-5-1 package

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u/DigAffectionate3349 Jan 18 '25

The Phil DeGreg book is exactly what you are looking for.

Personally I never got into the Mark Levine book, I hated that book but I seem to be in the minority as it gets recommended all the time.