Infinite Fretboard

In part 1 of this article, we will identify a challenge that is inherent to the guitar and suggest a solution: Drop Voicings. Then we will go into depth about the most common example: Drop-2.  In part 2, we will dissect all the types of drop voicings. In part 3, we will learn a practical exercise that will incorporate the drop voicings into your harmonic vocabulary.  If you are curious about what "Drop-2" or "Drop-3" means, this article is for you. If you do know what those terms mean, you might find some additional insight here. To start, here are the four inversions of a C Major 7 chord:   Fig 1: Close Voicings These are called the "close voicings" because the notes are as close together as possible. If you look at the top and bottom notes of each inversion, you'll find that the notes span an interval less than an octave. For example, root position has the interval C-B, which is a Major 7th. 1st inversion has the interval E-C, which is a minor 6th. T

Many guitarists are familiar with the classic ii-V-I progression. Figure 1: ii-V-I It's a tried and true sequence of chords, but it can get a bit... vanilla. One way of spicing it up is borrowing the Vb9 chord from harmonic minor. Figure 2: ii-Vb9-I If you play Figure 2  on your guitar, you'll notice that the second chord is simply a fully diminished 7th chord. This is an easy way of voicing a G7-flat 9 chord on guitar without playing the root. D is the fifth, A-flat is the flat 9, B is the third, and F is the seventh. Playing this chord is as easy as raising the root of the vanilla V7 voicing. Don't forget that A-flat is the flat 9. Since a diminished 7th chord may be spelled with any of the four tones as the root, why can't we consider any of these four tones to be the flat 9? For instance, if F  is the flat 9, this is an E7 flat 9 chord. If B is the flat 9, this is a Bb7-flat 9. If D  is the flat 9, this is a Db7 flat 9. To take it a step farther