Modern Jazz Voicings: Arranging for Small and Medium Ensembles

How do you get that modern jazz sound?

Performers and Arrangers: Add color, character, and sophistication to your chord voicings. Learn to use fourths, clusters, upper-structure triads, and other advanced arranging and performing techniques for three to six parts.

This is the definitive text used for the time-honored Chord Scales course at Berklee College of Music.

Through a step-by-step process with exercises and recorded examples, the authors guide you through the intricacies of deriving "non-tertial" voicings from the right chord scales and applying them to various musical situations.

Become fluent in these techniques and use them effectively to express your own music:

• Select appropriate harmonic tensions and understand jazz harmony
• Avoid common mistakes and overcome harmonic ambiguity
• Experiment with unusual combinations and non-traditional alignments, mixing in other textures, including solo, linear, and contrapuntal passages
• Listen to arranging techniques performed on the CD and follow along with corresponding notated examples
• Apply new techniques using the Suggested Activities pages; great for assignments or home use
• Hear arrangers and players use these voicings to create their characteristic sounds with recommended recordings.

About the Authors

Read a Sample Chapter

Modern Jazz Voicings sample chapter

Sample Lessons on Berklee Shares

Samples from this title are available on Berkleeshares.com, where you can download free music lessons and share them with your friends.

• Reharmonizing Approach Notes (PDF lesson)
  
• Five-part Soli Voicings in Jazz Music (PDF lesson)
  
• Five-Part Spreads in Jazz (PDF lesson)
  

Also by Ted Pease

Jazz Composition: Theory and Practice

Also by Ken Pullig

Arranging For Large Jazz Ensemble