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Four Way Close, Locked Hands and Drop Two Voicings

Close Position

In a previous lesson we determined that to play in ‘close harmony’ (AKA close position) means to play all the notes of the chord within the range of a single octave. While to play in ‘open harmony’ (AKA open position) means to play all the same notes but over a span larger than an octave. And I stated that playing in open position creates a richer, more balanced and more ‘open’ sound. There is, nevertheless, a place for close position voicings in Jazz – and these are called Four Way Close, Locked Hands and Drop Two Voicings.

Four Way Close Runs

Harmonically, the strongest possible sounding chord progression is a V7-I Perfect Cadence (e.g. G7 to C). And a common Chord Substitution for the V7 chord is a diminished chord one semitone above the root (A♭o7 = Rootless G7♭9).

If you superimpose A♭o7 over a C6 and play all the notes in the form of a scale you get the C Bebop Scale:

We can do something interesting with this. If we alternate between the two chords, changing inversions, we can create a little run of chords where the top note moves up in steps. This creates a repeating V7-I sequence which sounds really smooth and really strong. You can do the same with Cm6, C7 and Cm7 chords (though not CMaj7).

This is called Four Way Close – playing a 4 note chord in close harmony.

This is a great technique to employ when playing a song where the melody moves in steps, such as:

Locked Hands and Drop 2 Voicings

This technique can be modified in a couple of ways to get two other widely used techniques.

As an example, take the song Fly me to the Moon

OriginalMelodyFWC ChordFWC NotesLckd HandsDrop 2
Am7CAm7EGACC-EGACA-EGC
BFo7 (E7)DFA♭BB-DFA♭BA♭-DFB
AAm7CEGAA-CEGAG-CEA
GB♭o7 (A7)B♭D♭EGG-B♭D♭EGE-B♭D♭G
Dm7FDm7ACDFF-ACDFD-ACF
GB♭o7B♭D♭EGG-B♭D♭EGE-B♭D♭G
ADm7CDFAA-CDFAF-CDA
CDm7DFACC-DFACA-DFC
G7BG7DFGBB-DFGBG-DFB
AE♭o7 (D7)CE♭G♭AA-CE♭G♭AG♭-CE♭A
GG7BDFGG-BDFGF-BDG
FA♭o7 (G7)A♭BDFF-A♭BDFD-A♭BF
CMaj7EC6GACEE-GACEC-GAE

And note that the Drop 2 voicing can be applied to any song that has a run of chords to make it sound richer and more balanced.

Have a Listen to

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