Ever wondered if there was an easier way to get great sounds over both major and minor 2 5 1 chord progressions?
This easy 2 5 1 hack for saxophone makes it super-simple for anybody to play all their major and minor 2 5 1s. And in this lesson you’ll learn how get a clear sound using just two simple shapes. So let’s get into it.
The flavours of 2 5 1
So the 2 5 1 is a common progression in jazz, and in all music.
And there are two flavours of 2 5 1. There is the major 2 5 1 which consists of a minor 7 chord, a dominant chord – chord V, going to the 1 chord, a major 7 chord.
And then there is a different flavour of 2 5 1, the minor 2 5 1. This generally starts with a minor 7 flat V or half diminished chord, moving to a dominant chord, often with a flat 9, and then moving on to a minor chord as chord 1.
Variations
And we can find different iterations of these and different mixes of these.
We may find a normal minor 7 with a dominant flat 9 chord going to a major chord. Or we might find a minor 2 5 going to a major 1. We find them in lots of different orders.
But that requires us to learn a lot of different aspects of harmony to get the right sounds over these different progressions. And often they can fly past very quickly in that piece of music.
So today we’re going to learn this 2 5 1 hack for saxophone to help with this challenge. We’ll look at some simple four-note shapes that are going to help us get good clarity on any type of 2 5 1 using just four notes.
Importance of knowing the 2 5 1s
Now, we all know that it’s important to spell out at least some of the chord tones throughout one of these progressions, because that gives us harmonic clarity.
And then there are also other aspects to consider, for example, the guide tones or voice leading. These are all important to make sure that our sound sounds like the progression of a 2 5 1, rather than us just floating about in a major scale or a minor scale and hoping that it all works out.
So the traditional method is to play the chord tones, learn the chord scales or modes or key centres that are related to that, and just try and make sure that we get these kinds of elements in when we’re improvising.
However, this can be tricky, particularly if it’s a faster piece, or if the 2 5 1s are very short. Maybe the 2 and the 5 only last two beats, for example. And this is a lot to get in under the pressure of playing, with technique to think about, and everything else.
But there is a simpler way of going about this and still retaining all these elements.
Who is this lesson for?
So this lesson is useful if you don’t know too much about how to play over 2 5 1s.
But it’s also useful if you’re a more advanced player and you’re just struggling with those tricky short 2 5 1s, particularly the minor 2 5 1s, which have a lot more harmony behind them.
And remember, whether you’re into jazz, pop, DJ sax, or classical, there are thousands of lessons in Sax School. So come and join us by clicking the link. There is still a 14-day free trial.
The Major 2 5 1
So first of all, let’s have a look at the major 2 5 1. So as I said earlier, this is built of a minor 7 chord – chord 2 of a major scale, then a dominant 7 chord – chord 5 of a major scale, and then a major 7 chord – chord 1 of a major scale.
This is the classic 2 5 1 progression, and we see it in hundreds and hundreds of tunes, in different keys, and in different orders.
So what the 2 5 1 hack for saxophone we are going to look at today is a small group of notes that not only is very melodic, but also contains a good smattering of chord tones and voice leading. That’s going to make sure that we get a clear sound on these chords. But we won’t have all the technical and harmonic difficulties that come along with normally playing 2 5 1s.
A familiar shape
Now this shape might also seem quite familiar to you as you start playing it. And that’s because it’s the first four notes of a minor pentatonic.
So in D minor, for example, that would be the notes D, F, G and A.
It’s as simple as that. And that’s the shape we’re going to use to get a great sound over these 2 5 1s.
Chord 2: The minor 7 chord
So, on the minor chord – on the minor 7 chord, we’re going to start this shape on the root.
It’s going to give us the root of the chord, the flat three, and the five. But we’ve also got this extra note. We can call it a fourth in the scale or an eleventh from a chord point of view. And that adds in just a little bit of colour.
A boring sound?
If you’ve ever tried just improvising using only chord tones, you might find that even though it gives you quite a strong sound of the progression, it can sound a little bit boring.
And that’s because you’re improvising in one interval. You’re improvising in thirds.
The issue with improvising in just one interval is melody requires smaller intervals. It wants some tones or semitones. It wants to break up those intervals. And that’s what makes it interesting and varied and adds contrast to our melodies.
And this little group does that. We’ve got some chord tones and we’ve got some tones. So we’ve got everything we need to give a strong sound on that minor seven chord.
Chord 5: The dominant chord
Now, as we move across to the dominant chord, we’re going to carry on playing the same shape.
So, if this was a D minor 7 chord, and we were playing the D minor 4 note group, as we’re going to call it, we’ll carry on playing the D minor four-note group.
and you might say, well, what about the chord tones? Well, let’s examine those notes.
So the D is the fifth of G seven. The F is the flat seven, and the G is the root. And then the extra note – the A – is a ninth.
So we’ve got a very similar thing here without changing shapes. We’ve got three chord tones and one extra note that helps us melodically get a stronger sound because we’ve got more intervals. So it’s an effective way of combining the two and the five in one simple-to-play shape. In this case, it’s the D minor four-note shape.
Chord 1: The Major 7
As we move to the one chord – the C major seven chord – we’re going to play a different minor shape.
We’re going to play the E minor shape. And once again you’ll notice that within this shape is the third of that chord, the fifth of the chord, and the major seventh. And the extra note is the 6th.
Now sometimes the 1 chord might even be C6, in which case we’ll have the 3rd, the 5th, the 6th, and our extra note will be the 7th. But either way, we’re still always going to get three chord tones and that extra sound in there. That’s going to help break up the melody and break up the intervals in the group.
Moving between shapes
Now as we look at the movement of that D minor shape going to the E minor shape, we can see that there is some voice leading going on between those two movements. It contains one of the more important voice-leading methods, that move from five dominant chords to one major chord, and that’s the sound of the seventh – the flat seven on that G7 chord (the note F) moving to the third of that major seven chord – the note E.
So theres a nice sense of resolution and cadence built into these groupings.
With this being a major 2 5 1, the other thing that I particularly like about this is that these two groups move upwards. You’re going from the D minor grouping up to the E minor grouping. And because this is a major 2 5 1, it’s quite uplifting. It’s major and that movement up between the two groups I think just helps magnify the happy sound of a major 2 5 1.
Listen to what this sounds like over a full 2 5 1 progression.
The sound
Now I think that gives a clear, definitive sound between the 2 5 parts of the progression and the 1 part of the progression. And it’s easy to play.
The great thing about these groupings specifically is there are no semitones in them. And semitones are the biggest problem on saxophone. The movement from Bb to B natural or F to F sharp are tricky, particularly if you’re just starting out. So these groups are pretty easy to play in every single key, which makes them great.
And we’re playing them over one of the most common chord progressions that you’re going to find in the majority of standards. This means you can go through it, write on these groupings, do a bit of practice, and get a good solid sound without having to learn all the theory behind 2 5 1s.
The Minor 2 5 1
Now, what about the minor 2 5 1?
So, as we’ve mentioned earlier, this is a slightly different progression. So, we generally start with a minor 7 flat 5 chord as chord 2. Sometimes this is written as the half-diminished chord, which is a circle with a little line through it.
Then we move on to the dominant chord (chord 5). And there’s nearly always a flat 9 and quite often a flat 13th on that chord. Already we’re getting into a lot of harmony that maybe you’re not quite ready for. But once again, we’re going to look at a solution that means you don’t need to worry about that, if you’re not ready for that kind of step.
Finally the chord one is just a minor chord, or a minor 7 chord quite often. Now we’ve already dealt with that chord. For minor 7 chords, we just play the minor shape starting on the root. So we’re going to do nothing different there to what we did when it was a 2 chord in a 2 5 1.
The minor 2 and 5 chords
But we need to deal with these new minor 2 and 5 chords from this progression. So if we look at what we originally did on the minor 7 chord in the major 2 5 1, the only real difference in the notes we’re playing is there isn’t a natural 5 anymore.
So this is our second shape and we’re going to call it the half-diminished four-note shape.
All we’re going to do is flatten the fifth. So instead of it being D, F, G, A, now it’s going to be D, F, G, A flat, and we’re going to get that flat 5 in.
Now the same thing’s going to happen again. We’re going to get three solid chord tones and an 11th again, which is going to make it nice and melodic and break up those intervals.
When we move to the dominant chord, we’re going to keep exactly the same shape. So we’re going to keep this D half-diminished four-note grouping.
So we have:
- D – the 5th
- F – the flat 7th of this chord
- G – the root of the chord
- and we’re going to get the flat 9.
Now we can think of this as the extra note. But also it’s an important note to get the right sound on a minor 2 5, and particularly on that 5 chord. So in some ways, we’ve got four chord tones here that are important to the sound.
So once again the 2 and the 5 on the minor 2 5 1 are linked together with one single shape.
Chord 1: The minor 7 chord
When we go to the I chord, we already know what we’re doing on minor chords. We’re just playing the minor shape.
Now you’ll notice in this one there are some nice cadence movements, going from one shape to the other shape. But also, interestingly, in this minor one, which is a bit sadder because it’s minor, the actual shape now moves downwards. We’re going from the D half-diminished shape, moving down to the C minor shape. It’s a really simple way of doing it.
And this is useful even if you’re a more advanced player, particularly for those faster minor 2 5 1s, which are renowned for being quite fiddly to get the right sound on. If we were to look at the harmony from this, there are a lot of scalic and tonal variance that happens in minor 2 5 1s and quite a lot of options.
So this is just a simple way of getting a solid sound without worrying about that side of harmony, and all that involves.
Listen to how this sounds over the minor 2 5 1
Next steps
Okay, so hopefully you agree that that gives a clear, definitive sound over that progression.
So if you like this kind of content, I do a monthly lesson in Sax School called Explore Jazz, where we get into all sorts of elements of jazz improvisation, jazz practice, and how to work on tunes to become a better improviser.
And I’ve got a course coming up at the beginning of 2024 where we explore the full potential of these two groupings to get more contemporary sounds. So check it out – there is still a 14-day free trial running right now.
Recap
So let’s do a little recap of what we’ve learned today.
So on minor chords, minor 7 chords, minor 6 chords, even if you come across more exotic chords like minor major 7 chords, you just play the minor four-note grouping starts on the root. It’s as simple as that.
Now on dominant chords, we’re starting on the 5th. Our only rule to remember there is if it’s a dominant chord with a natural 9, like in a blues or a major 2 5 1, we just use the minor grouping.
However, if we want the flat 9, maybe because it’s a minor 2 5 1, or maybe just because we want that sound as a substitution, we need to play the half-diminished four-note grouping starting on that fifth.
And then when we get to the one chord, if it’s a minor chord, then we just start on the root again. If it’s a major chord, we’re going to play the normal minor four-note grouping starting on the third. And it’s as simple as that, and we can mix and match those together for the different types of 2 5 1.
Maybe it’s a minor 2 5 with a major 1. Maybe it’s a major 2 5 with a minor 1. It doesn’t matter which it is. We’ve got a mix now that can deal with every variant of 2 5 1 types, that we’re possibly going to come across. And remember as well, we could use this over a 5 1, and we could also just use this over a 2 5. We don’t need all the chords of the 2 5 1 to apply this method.
Example of 2 5 1 changes: Coltrane’s Moment’s Notice
So I’m going to take the changes of a tune, that’s got lots of these variants in there. It’s got some 2 5s without 1s. And it’s got some 2 5 1s. It’s got some minor 2 5s, and it’s got some minor 2 5 1s. So this is the changes of Coltrane’s “Moment’s Notice”.
I’m going to play only the 4-note groupings that we’ve talked about – the minor 4-note groupings and the half-diminished 4-note groupings – in the way that we’ve talked about applying them through this entire tune. So this will give you an example of what this sounds like in practice.
Joel’s Pro Advice
Now, using this method does mean that some available sounds are missing from your improvisation, and some important guide tones aren’t there as well.
However, there is enough there for clarity of movement between the 5 and the 1, particularly in all these progressions. And it’s a great place to start if you’re just getting into improvisation and you’re coming across a lot of 2 5 1s. And even if you’re a more advanced player and just need something extra, a different sound, or a way of dealing with faster, shorter 2 5 1s, particularly those minor ones which are awkward, then this is a great method to practice.
So give it a go and apply it to some of the tunes that you’re currently working on in your practice.
If you want to get this method nailed in all keys, don’t forget you can grab the backing tracks inside Sax School. It’s all keys of major and minor 2 5 1s. Just follow the link below to get access with a 14 day free trial.