Possible Error in Al Di Meola & Bob Aslanian’s Book on Voicings?

[DiegoPereira]

Hi everyone,

I was recently reading the book: A Guide to Chords, Scales & Arpeggios by Al Di Meola and Bob Aslanian, and I came across what seems to be a conceptual error regarding voicings. The book states:

"CHORD VOICING — The notes that make up a chord are referred to as voicings. For now, the two basic voicings we are interested in are the root or bass note (generally the lowest note in the chord) and the lead or soprano voicing (or the highest note of the chord). These two voicings are important when playing chords because they should be moving in various cycles. (Chromatic Cycle, Cycle of 4ths, Cycle of 5ths, Cycle of flatted 5ths, etc.)"

As I understand it, voicing refers to the way chord tones are arranged across the register, including spacing, inversions, and note doubling. The book, however, seems to define voicings as individual notes (root and soprano), which doesn’t align with standard music theory.

Has anyone else noticed this? I haven’t found discussions about this online, so I’d love to hear your thoughts. Is this just an unconventional use of the term, or is it actually a mistake?

Thanks!

[paulkogut]

That's certainly a confusing and terribly worded explanation. If you ignore the text and just work through the musical examples you might have better luck

PK

[garybaldy]

I don't bother with books. At least 50% of most of them at the beginning is basic stuff. The last book I bought was Quartal Harmony for Piano ( or something like that) by Frank Mantooth. Excellent book.

[Mick-7]

I was recently reading the book: A Guide to Chords, Scales & Arpeggios by Al Di Meola and Bob Aslanian, and I came across what seems to be a conceptual error regarding voicings. The book states:

"CHORD VOICING — The notes that make up a chord are referred to as voicings. For now, the two basic voicings we are interested in are the root or bass note (generally the lowest note in the chord) and the lead or soprano voicing (or the highest note of the chord). These two voicings are important when playing chords because they should be moving in various cycles. (Chromatic Cycle, Cycle of 4ths, Cycle of 5ths, Cycle of flatted 5ths, etc.)"

Sounds like the book lacked a proofreader, if you replace the word "voicings" with "voices" in that description it will be correct.

[DiegoPereira]

Thanks man! That totally makes sense!

[sgosnell]

I haven't seen the book, but reading just the posted bit, I would take it to mean the collection of notes, not the individual notes, as being a voicing.

[Mick-7]

Free copies of the book can be found online. I just looked at the chord section, the exercises focus on voice leading (the movement of voices) through chord progressions, and the various chord forms are chord voicings. It's written in a confusing manner, whoever wrote it expressed the concepts poorly.

[jazzloverfat]

Free copies of the book can be found online. I just looked at the chord section, the exercises focus on voice leading (the movement of voices) through chord progressions, and the various chord forms are chord voicings. It's written in a confusing manner, whoever wrote it expressed the concepts poorly.

Ok, I gotta ask, what is the difference then between "voices" and "voicings". With my little theoretical knowledge I would have assumed they are the same thing :/

[starjasmine]

Ok, I gotta ask, what is the difference then between "voices" and "voicings". With my little theoretical knowledge I would have assumed they are the same thing :/

Composers and arrangers refer to the notes in a four-note chord from highest in pitch to lowest in pitch as the soprano, alto, tenor and bass VOICES, in that order. Regardless of what chord or inversion these voices spell, the uppermost note is always the soprano voice, the lowermost the bass, and the alto and tenor voices in the middle. That is standard musical terminology dating back hundreds of years.

"Voicing" refers to the different ways that pitches might be arranged to sound a chord. The notes in the chord are always the same notes, but they can be stacked in a variety of ways to produce different colors. You can also double or omit notes to produce a particular effect. For example, you might know how to play G13 in different positions on the neck of the guitar. Even though all of those positions are the same chord, each sounds a bit different according to which notes are included or left out or doubled: different voicings of the same chord.

Now expand the idea of voicing to how you might arrange a chord to be played by a full big band or an orchestra: you have four notes but many more players than four. So you can assign different notes to different instruments, adding or omitting voices to create different sonic colors. And just because you have 80 musicians does not mean all of them have to play. So... many options for voicing any chord.

[jazzloverfat]

Thank you, that makes perfect sense to me now.

[Mick-7]

Ok, I gotta ask, what is the difference then between "voices" and "voicings". With my little theoretical knowledge I would have assumed they are the same thing :/

I see that starjasmine answered your question, but regarding this book....

In the book, the author uses the terms voice and voicing interchangeably, which is confusing.

For example, this Am7 voicing: | 5-x-5-5-5-x |
(Voices: Chord Root is bass note/voice, 5th is soprano note/voice. Voicing: A(root)-G(7th)-C(3rd)-E(5th).

Goes to D7b9: | x-5-4-5-4-x |
(Voices: Root in bass, 5th in soprano. Voicing: Root-3rd-7th-5th)

And then to Gmaj7: | 3-x-4-4-4-x |
(Voices: Root in bass, 5th in soprano. Voicing: Root-7th-3rd-5th)

His generic label for these chords is "bass/soprano chord voicings," which is so vague that it's practically meaningless, you have to study the chord diagrams in the book to decipher what he's trying to say.