Creating a chord progression with a neo soul sound using minor 11th chords is quite simple, once you know how to voice the chords. Rather then following harmonic rules, just try around with some minor 11th combinations until you come up with a version that you like. With a little trial and error you can arrive at a nice neo soul progression and create a song from it!
Creating minor 11th chords
Here is an example. It consists of three minor 11th chords: Cm11, Em11 and Ebm11. The voicings of the first two are explained in the previous post
- Cm11 consists of C minor + Bb major on top.
C minor 11
- Em11 consists of E minor + D major on top.
E minor 11
- To create Ebm7 play an Eb minor chord (Eb, Gb, Bb) with your left hand, then add a Db major chord (Db, F, Ab) on top. Or simply move all notes of the Em11 chord down one half step!
Eb minor 11
A neo soul chord progression for piano or keyboard
Now you can combine these chords into a chord progression. The little extra notes at the end are just the upper triad Db major played up an octave.
Add some drums and a Rhodes patch, and you have a nice riff to work with!
Learn some more minor 11th voicings using the simple formula from the previous post and play around with them to come up with your own neo soul chord progressions for piano or keyboard. Less is more in this style and rhythm is key.