Shell voicings: the left hand for playing alone

Most jazz piano lessons start with the band in mind: the bass player plays the roots, so the pianist can leave them out. That is exactly right in a group. But most of the time you practise alone, at home, with nobody holding the bottom of the music. Without roots, your chords float. You need a left hand that does two jobs at once: play the bass note and say what kind of chord it is.

That left hand is the shell voicing. It is three notes, sometimes only two, and it is how the bebop pianists of the 1940s and 50s played behind their own right-hand lines. It is also the quickest way to make a lead sheet sound like jazz when you play solo.

What a shell voicing is

A shell voicing is the root plus the 3rd and the 7th of the chord. Those are the notes that matter most:

• The root tells you where you are: it is the bass note.
• The 3rd tells you major or minor.
• The 7th tells you which kind of 7th chord: major 7th, dominant or minor.

What is missing? The 5th. In most chords the 5th adds almost nothing to the colour, so we drop it and keep the hand light. Think of the shell as the frame of a house: the walls that hold everything up, before any furniture goes in.

Shape 1: root, 3rd, 7th

Play the root with your little finger, the 3rd with your middle or ring finger, and the 7th with your thumb. In C:

• Cmaj7: C, E, B
• C7: C, E, B♭
• Cm7: C, E♭, B♭

Only one note changes from one chord to the next. Play them and listen to how much each single note changes the mood:

Shape 2: root, 7th, 3rd

Now move the 3rd up an octave, above the 7th. The notes are the same, but the hand stretches wider: root at the bottom, the 7th in the middle, and the 3rd on top, a 10th above the root. In C:

• Cmaj7: C, B, E
• C7: C, B♭, E
• Cm7: C, B♭, E♭

Shape 2 sounds fuller and more open, and it lets the root go lower, down to F2.

• Leave the 3rd out: play the root and the 7th only. Why the 3rd and not the root? When you play alone, the root is your bass line: without it the harmony loses its floor. The 3rd is easier to do without, because the right hand can add it in the melody or the line. Two-note shells like this are completely normal in jazz. (With a bass player it is the other way round: the bass plays the root, so you leave the root out and keep the 3rd and the 7th.)
• Split the chord between the hands: the left hand plays only the root, low, like a bass player, and the right hand plays the 3rd and the 7th around middle C. Use this when you are comping, with no melody to play: the right hand is free, so let it hold the chord.

Connecting the shapes: the ii–V–I

Here is the reason there are two shapes. If you play every chord in the same shape, the hand jumps around the keyboard. If you alternate them, the upper notes barely move.

Take the ii–V–I in C: Dm7, G7, Cmaj7. Play Dm7 in shape 1 (D, F, C), G7 in shape 2 (G, F, B), and Cmaj7 in shape 1 again (C, E, B). Watch the upper notes: F stays where it is, C slips down to B, then F slips down to E. Only the root really travels, the way a bass line does.

If the 10th in G7 is too wide for your hand, play just G and F, or split the chord: G in the left hand, F and B in the right.

Press All 12 keys and the example walks through every key around the circle of 4ths. Play along slowly. This one exercise is worth more than any list of chords you could memorise.

You can also start with shape 2. Then G7 takes shape 1, and Cmaj7 shape 2 again. Use this version when the ii chord would otherwise sit too high:

Shells under a melody

Now the right hand gets something to do. Hold each shell for the whole bar and play a melody on top. The shell fills the low and middle register; the melody sits above it, clear and singing.

With a melody in the right hand you can’t split the chord, so keep every shell within reach of the left hand. Here G7 is just G and F, the root and the 7th: the melody supplies the rest.

This is already a complete solo-piano texture. Try it with the first lead sheet you know: shells in the left hand, the melody in the right. It will sound more like jazz than full chords in both hands.

The bebop left hand

Listen to Bud Powell, the pianist who brought Charlie Parker’s lines to the piano. His left hand plays very little: short shells, often just two notes (the root and the 7th, or the root and the 3rd), placed in the rhythm. The right hand does the talking. Here is a line in his style from our own phrase library, with short two-note shells in the Charleston rhythm: beat 1 and the “and” of 2. Dm7 is D and C, G7 is G and B, Cmaj7 is C and B: no stretch at all.

Notice how short the left-hand chords are. They give the line a kick and then get out of the way. Held shells would sound heavy at this tempo.

A 12-bar blues in shells

The blues is the best place to make shells automatic. In F, there are only three chords: F7, B♭7 and C7. Play F7 in shape 1 (F, A, E♭), B♭7 in shape 2 (B♭, A♭, D) and C7 in shape 2 (C, B♭, E). Your hand stays in one place, and the upper notes move by half steps. If B♭7 and C7 are too wide, play only the root and the 7th (B♭–A♭, C–B♭), or comp the blues with the split, the root in the left hand and the 3rd and 7th in the right:

Once this feels easy, play the blues melodies you know over it, or improvise with the blues scale in the right hand.

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Shells or guide tones?

When you play with a bass player, take the root out. The bass already plays it, and two roots in the same register get in each other’s way. What remains is the 3rd and the 7th, the guide tones: the shell without its root. My lesson on comping with two notes shows that version. So the plan is simple: shells when you are alone, guide tones when there is a bass player.

How to practise shells

1. One chord type through all 12 keys: all the maj7 shells in shape 1, then all the dominant 7ths, then all the minor 7ths. Say the chord name out loud as you play it.
2. The ii–V–I round the circle, shape 1–2–1, then 2–1–2. Slowly, without stopping between keys.
3. Eyes off the hand. Once a shape is familiar, look at the chord symbol, not your fingers. That is what you will do with a lead sheet.
4. One tune a week. Take a standard you know and play it with shells and melody only. Nothing else.
5. Add rhythm. When holding the shells feels easy, play them short in the Charleston rhythm, as in the bebop example.

Mistakes I hear most often

• Too low. Shape 1 with the root down at C2 is a dark rumble, not a chord. Keep the 3rd above B♭2.
• Always the same shape. The hand jumps and the voice leading disappears. Alternate.
• Adding the 5th back “to make it fuller”. It only makes it thicker. The right hand can add colour notes later.
• Forcing a stretch. If a 10th hurts, don’t play it. Leave the 3rd out or split the chord between the hands; the music won’t suffer.
• Holding everything forever. Shells can breathe. Release them before the next chord, or play them short.
• Playing roots with a bass player. In a band, switch to guide tones.

Questions students ask

Are shells only for beginners?

No. Many great pianists use them all their lives, especially at fast tempos and behind fast right-hand lines. They are simple, clear and they never get in the way.

What about chords with extensions, like a 9th or a 13th?

Play the shell in the left hand and put the extension in the right hand, on top. A G13 can be a G7 shell plus E in the right hand. When you want the extensions inside the left hand, move on to the four-note rootless voicings.

My hand is small. Can I still play shape 2?

Yes. Play the root and the 7th only, or split the chord: the root in the left hand, the 3rd and the 7th in the right. Both are completely normal in jazz.

Recommended listening

Bebop pianists and their left hands. Listen under the right-hand lines: short shells, often just two notes, placed in the rhythm.

1. “Un Poco Loco▶”, Bud Powell · The Amazing Bud Powell (1951)
2. “Bouncing with Bud▶”, Bud Powell · The Amazing Bud Powell (1949): with Fats Navarro and Sonny Rollins
3. “Tempus Fugue-It▶”, Bud Powell · Jazz Giant (1949)
4. “Celia▶”, Bud Powell · Jazz Giant (1949)
5. “Blues the Most▶”, Hampton Hawes · Hampton Hawes Trio (1955)
6. “Cool Struttin’▶”, Sonny Clark · Cool Struttin’ (1958)
7. “Relaxin’ at Camarillo▶”, Tommy Flanagan · Overseas (1957)
8. “Mr. P.C.▶”, John Coltrane · Giant Steps (1959): Tommy Flanagan, piano
9. “Sandu▶”, Clifford Brown and Max Roach · Study in Brown (1955): Richie Powell, piano
10. “Walkin’▶”, Miles Davis · Walkin’ (1954): Horace Silver, piano