Get ready to unlock the secrets of jazz piano chords and infuse your playing with mesmerizing jazzy flair! Our latest video, “The Secret To Sounding Jazzy: Jazz Piano Chords for Beginners,” is now live on our channel.
Join us as we dive into the essentials of Dominant Seventh, Minor Seventh, and Major Seventh chords, with a twist! We showcase these chords through the amazing music of the legendary Stevie Wonder.
Don’t miss out on this opportunity to embark on a musical journey filled with jazz-inspired magic.
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Unleash the magic of jazz piano chords and experience the transformative power of Stevie Wonder’s music. Like, comment, and share the video with fellow music enthusiasts.
VIDEO TRANSCRIPTION:
Today we’re going to dive into the world of jazz chords. Get ready to unlock the secret to sounding jazzy and become the coolest cat in town. So put on your shades and let’s swing into action. Today’s lesson’s going to be pretty fun because I’m going to teach you all about jazz chords and I’m going to do it through one of my favorite artists, Stevie Wonder. And if you’d like to get more videos on how to go from zero to playing your favorite songs on the piano in months, not years, be sure to hit the bell and subscribe, because I post new videos every week. And if you’re one of those people out there who’s clicking around a lot on YouTube trying to learn the piano, but you have no roadmap at all, I highly recommend taking my free training. In that training, I’m going to show you the exact roadmap I take my students on that helps them go from zero to playing their favorite songs in months, not years. The link is in the description below.
There are several different types of jazz chords, which are really seventh chords. The first one we’re going to do is called dominant seventh chords. This is one that you hear all the time in jazz music, and it’s just a really awesome sound. This chord is a four-note chord. So to build these chords, we’re going to use what we call half steps. A half step is when we go from one note to the very next note. These are all half steps. And all you have to do is build a major chord first. So what I do is I tell my students to start on the first note. So let’s say we’re building C dominant seventh. We’re going to say C, we’re going to count 4 — 1, 2, 3, 4. Then we’re going to count 3 — 1, 2, 3. So that’s building the major part of the chord.
Now we’re going to add the seventh, so we’re going to add three more. 1, 2, 3, and that is C dominant seventh, such a nice jazzy sound. Let’s build one more as an example. Let’s build G dominant seventh. So I’m going to say G, I’m going to build the major chord first, 1, 2, 3, 4. Then I’m going to count 3 — 1, 2, 3. Then I’m going to count 3 again — 1, 2, 3. This is G dominant seventh. So the formula for this is 4 plus 3 plus 3. And let’s say you’re actually trying to read music. There’s also certain ways that these chords are written. It will look like this, C7, G7, D7, and so forth.
A really nice song that has a lot of dominant seventh chords is Signed, Sealed, Delivered by Stevie Wonder. Let’s check it out.
Speaker 2:
(singing)
Speaker 1:
All right. The second type of seventh chords is called a minor seventh chord. Again, this is a four-note chord. So like the other one, we’re going to build a major chord first. So let’s do C minor seventh. This is a four-note chord. All you have to do is build a minor chord first. So let’s start on C. C, I’m going to count 3 — 1, 2, 3, then I’m going to count 4 — 1, 2, 3, 4. So that’s C minor, and then I’m going to add three more — 1, 2, 3, and this is C minor seventh. So the formula is then 3 plus 4 plus 3. You’ll see minor seventh chords written like this. Fm7, Gm7, Cm7, and so forth.
Let’s do one more with G minor seven. We’re going to say G. We’re going to build the minor chord, 1, 2, 3, then 1, 2, 3, 4, and then 1, 2, 3. So here is G minor seventh. 3 plus 4 plus 3. Okay. This is actually my favorite song, Ribbon in the Sky by Stevie Wonder. Let’s check it out and how he uses a lot of minor sevenths.
Before we get to the next jazz chords, let me know which jazzy song are you wanting to learn. Let me know in the comments.
Our last jazz chord is called major seventh chords. This is a four-note chord, just like the other ones. All you have to do is build a major chord first. So we’re going to say C. We’re going to build C major seventh. 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3. There’s C major. And now this time we’re going to count 4 — 1, 2, 3, 4. So C major seven is this, C, E, G, B. So that makes the formula 4 plus 3 plus 4.
Let’s build one more with G. We’re going to say G, 1, 2, 3, 4, plus 3 — 1, 2, 3, and then 4 — 1, 2, 3, 4. Again, it is 4 plus 3 plus 4. And let’s say you’re reading some music with this chord. It’s going to look like this. Cmaj7, Gmaj7, and so forth.
Now let’s check out the song My Cherie Amour by Stevie Wonder and how he uses these chords.
Speaker 2:
(singing)
Speaker 1:
If all of this sounds really cool, but you have no idea where to begin, with how to apply these chords to actual songs, I highly recommend taking my free training. In this training, I’m going to show you exactly the roadmap I take my students on that helps them go from zero to playing their favorite songs in months, not years. The link is in the description below. And before we go, be sure to hit the bell and subscribe if you’d like more videos on how to learn the piano fast. And I will see you next time.
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