Understanding Thirds and Sixths in Music

Right. So we've looked at thirds with some passing notes in between, that kind of thing.

Inverting a Third to Get a Sixth

So how about what happens when we invert a third? We get a sixth.

• By inversion, I mean you take the bottom note and put it at the top.
• So that becomes...
• Take the bottom two notes and put them at the top, it becomes...

And suddenly, you've got a slightly bigger, more open sound.

Creating Expansive Lines

The great thing about that is you can use it to create more expansive lines.

• You could simply play with those intervals and see what happens.
• I'm just playing them an octave higher there.

There you go. I've just got those little linking notes in. Instantly, it sounded like it's more involved.

Adding Extra Passing Notes

Then you could add some extra little passing notes in or...

Which is the same as in thirds.

So you could instantly get something like this.

• Sorry, jumping the gun there with a little...
• But there you go. That's what felt natural again.

It's just using exactly the same thing, but going from sixth to thirds with...

I did put a little... Feel free to pick that up.

You could go...

Classic Riffs and Linking Techniques

I mean, this is a classic riff.

• So you could go to the...
• Or when it goes to the F, you could use the E flat: 1, 2, 3, 4.

So there you go, sixths and thirds.

You could do more linking things. This is something that Albert Ammons does a lot, which is just going thirds to sixths.

• That's used a lot as well.
• It's almost like a dominant ninth with a sharp five.

Or you could think of it as the diminished going...

Resolving to the one.

Example from Albert Ammons

So Albert Ammons uses that in "Boogie Woogie Stomp," where he uses it like this:

• There's that Pine Top River.

Exploring More Ideas

So let's look at some other things you could do.

• I mean, you could go again; suddenly we're getting into something that sounds pretty hip.
• Just the same thing down the piano: sixths, then thirds with that linking thing.

As you'll notice, I'm doing some crush notes quite a lot. And that's definitely something you should bring into what you're doing.

Building Tension with Licks

In fact, that's a great little lick there, built on thirds on the F7.

• I was just playing it as an E flat.
• You could carry on playing it with the E, I think it was, add that bit of tension.

So that little Pete Johnson thing there you could go, just jumping from the thirds.

• Same thing, but in sixths, going up the keyboard.

And again, I ran out of notes at the top, so I couldn't actually do the sixth at the top. So I just played it as single notes.

Combining Intervals and Concepts

You could sort of combine...

• We're sort of staying within the octave there, so combining that sort of fourth interval, aiming for a note that's in the G7 chord there.

So lots of ideas for thirds and sixths.

If you listen to Pete Johnson records, Albert Ammons records, or Mead Lux Lewis, hopefully those things will kind of jump out at you.

And that's...

Oh, yeah, that's them using thirds and sixths.

So, yeah, let's look at some...

Moving On

Let's move on and look at some other stuff.