Questions tagged [voice-leading]
The craft of writing multipart music such that all notes are transitioned to in a "smooth" or "harmonious" manner consistent with common practice harmony.
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Is there such a thing as a 7-5 suspension?
It is not shown in my harmony books but I sometimes use it in my composition. A 7-6 suspension is very common but that suspension resolves to 63 chords. Is a 7 suspension also able to resolve to the 5 ...
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Can a suspension be combined with an anticipation?
On the word "destiNAtion" there is what looks to be 7-6 suspension except the suspension is not prepared on the strong beat as I believe it must be for it to be a suspension. So what is this ...
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How come scales that differ in their ascent and descent tend to use raised notes going up and lowered notes going down regardless of musical culture?
A great variety of scales across the world differ in the way they go up and down. Some examples that come to mind are the Melodic minor that has A and B natural going up but Bb and Ab going down. A ...
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What is the difference between legitimate doubling and un-stylistic voice leading?
Here is part of a string section I am working on with 2 violas, 3 celli and 2 double basses. I am trying to learn from a composers point of view how many independent voices there are here? My guess is ...
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Why does Bach not resolve this chordal seventh down by step?
I was reading this chorale by Bach (#130, "Meine Seele erhebet den Herrn", BWV 324) and discovered something curious. It starts in Em and modulates to G. In the last beat of the third bar, ...
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Is voice leading exempt when using chord vamps in pop or contemporary music?
In harmony and voice leading pedagogy there is usually a "goal-directed" idea that the voices lead to a cadence or similar but in popular music or contemporary music we often find chord ...
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How do voice leading chords work in practice?
I've learned the existence of voice leading chords; passing chords, anticipation chords, and such, but I'm having a hard time understanding them. I know they need to have a so-called "voice ...
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What type of dissonant voice leading is this Bach example?
Dissonances have to be resolved in Bach's style. If you don't resolve dissonance, you're writing is out of style for the period.
Bach's WTC I Fugue in C# minor, BWV 849, has a passage with unresolved ...
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Do composers arrange an entire score without parallel perfect intervals or is this only when you have few voices and need them to all be independent?
In harmony class one is taught not to use parallel perfect intervals as it undermines the independence of the voices. I have come to completely understand this and see why it is so important but when ...
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Is switching a vocal melody between parts a bad thing?
I wanted to compose a song starting out by using only 4 voices in the traditional SATB way and get a mockup for the song I am producing. I am the singer and producer and just want to get a mockup of ...
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Are parallel 5ths still problematic if the texture switches between 2 and 3 voices?
This is a 3-part counterpoint I am working on. It is not a strict counterpoint exercise but I want to try keep within the guidelines as much as possible. In m. 19 the middle voice (in red) stops ...
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Figured bass: Am I on the right track?
I'm studying for the Grade 6 music theory exam with the ABRSM and am working through this exercise in preparation (2018 B, question 2)
Can anyone tell me if there are any errors I should correct? Beat ...
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What chords are considered acceptable as passing chords in common-practice-period tonal voice leading?
I want to move from an FMaj to an Fmaj(6) chord. Putting a passing chord in between, a CMaj(3/4)(A second inversion dominant 7th) chord seems to work nicely. But these chords, at least in the common-...
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Voice leading errors in Bach's WTC 1 fugue in C major?
Bach is supposed to be the master of all things music, but in the first fugue of the WTC (BWV 846), there seem to be a lot of counterpoint errors and voice leading errors. In the Urtext edition, there ...
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Does the traditional rule regarding parallel octaves and fifths apply if they are not rhythmically aligned?
In polyphonic writing, you aren't supposed to use parallel octaves or fifths, but does that apply to, say, this situation(inner voices are not yet filled in for the second shown bar):
Where there are ...
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Why was the melodic augmented second forbidden?
When voice leading in the eighteenth-century style, why is the melodic augmented second (e.g., B♮ to A♭ in the same voice) forbidden?
Over the years I've heard reasons ranging from "it's awkward&...
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How Can The Leading Tone Resolve Up and The 7th Go Down?
I'm struggling and my professor suggested I try Artusi. This isn't homework. I'm trying to learn about 7th chords and I'm stuck on this problem in Artusi:
From the picture above, I'm thinking both ...
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is an augmented second in the soprano avoided in 4 part harmony even when it occurs in a modulation?
In this chord progression I wanted to modulate to the minor subdominant (Em to Am) but instead of just using a V7/iv I wanted to see if I could arrive to the V/iv in different ways and perhaps by ...
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Reason for 4-voice music octave rule
As far as I know, a basic rule of 4-voice music is:
-The two intervals between the upper 3 voices should not be wider than an octave, and when moving on to the next chord, each voice should proceed as ...
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Are unequal 5ths acceptable in applied or seconday dominant chords?
I am trying to write a progression in Cm that modulates to the minor dominant (Gm). In this progression I think I have written a viio65/v but I am getting unequal 5ths between the bass and alto parts. ...
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What is the term for swapping parts in a harmony?
What is the technical term given to the technique where parts of a choir switch or swap their parts in a harmony?
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Learning to sing: Some songs i can sing straightforwardly other i really cant is this normal?
I've been learning to sing for a year. And I noticed some great improvements but there is one thing that happens to me that is totally strange: When I listen to songs, there are songs that I can "...
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chord progressions in minor with the 6th degree rasied
The obvious one is using ii as a minor triad and IV as a major triad but are there some progressions where the raised ^6 is in the bass? I guess the ii and IV would be in inversions then but I can't ...
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How to study part-writing as a self-taught musician?
I've recently picked up Schoenberg's "Preliminary Exercises In Counterpoint" after reading most of "Fundamentals of Musical Composition" as he indicates there and in other texts ...
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Do all 3rd inversion diminished and half diminished 7th chords resolve to 64 chords?
I am playing around with the use of b7 as melody note in a major key and with ^2 in the bass I am able to build a diminished 42 chord (in C that is DEGBb) and I am trying to figure out how to resolve ...
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Are diminished 5ths more dissonant than augmented 4ths?
To me when I play these intervals they sounds the same, yet in my harmony textbooks there seems to be a big difference on how these intervals are treated in voice leading.
The principal difference is ...
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Can a ii° built on ^2 of the harmonic minor scale with an added 6th function as a fully dimished 7 chord?
The added raised ^7 from using harmonic minor allows for a chord that is enharmonic to a fully dimished 7th
chord but built on ^2 not ^7. Can this chord be used as a fully diminished 7th chord?
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Is an anticipation capable of causing parallel 5ths?
This is in 4/4 time. To me this does not sound like parallel 5ths between the top 2 voices because there is a 3rd on beat 2 and the 5th is in the up beat before the chord. Can someone share their ...
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How to make a "reduction" from an arpeggiated bass
In one of my textbooks (Harmonic Practice by Robert Gauldin), there is a section about figuration and making reductions from arpeggiations to better see the voice leading. In the provided example the ...
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Seemingly unsolvable SATB harmonization
Was working on the following exercise in RCM Harmony 9 - it seems like there's no solution if you follow all the SATB rules.
It's in F# minor, so looking at the second note, we see that it's tonic (...
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Can I - V support the melodic motion ^3 ^5?
The outer voices would move into a P8 by leap which is supposed to be hidden octaves and not good. Is this indeed a bad progression and would another harmony be better here? I normally would just stay ...
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What it's the key and chord progression of this four part harmony music [closed]
I'm trying to write a four-part harmony song with some suspended chords and stuff. I'm having some problems identifying the chords, I'm also not sure if the key is in F. Can anyone help me? I'm also ...
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Is the treatment of accented 5ths and octaves in 3rd species counterpoint the same as between soprano and bass in 4 part writing?
Here in this image from my textbook "Harmony and voice leading" there are several very useful examples of accented and unaccented octaves and 5ths in third species Counterpoint. It shows ...
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How to make a chordal analysis when you only have 2 voices?
In my textbook Harmony and Voice Leading 5th edition I am to complete an exercise using 2 voices and wanted to make an analysis first of what chords were implied by the bass and soprano. Can someone ...
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How to turn block chords into arpeggios
I have written a chord progression using block chords and now I would like to turn this into an arpeggiated two voice texture. Is there any advice that someone could give me on how to do this with ...
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What is the principle of I46 progression to I7?
The above image is called a secondary 7th chord solution by Anton Bruckner.
But there is an I46 there, and there are many ways to use the I46,
but I've never seen it used this way, so I don't know why ...
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Why are parallel 5ths not allowed in part writing but reducing to 3 voices is?
Parallel octaves and fifths are not allowed in four-part writing because it undermines the independence of the two voices. But it is perfectly acceptable to go from 4 to 3 voices when necessary. Aren'...
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How does the treatment of tendency tones vary outside the scope of 4 part chorales and harmony exercises?
I understand that in a strict exercise all tendency tones should resolve properly. For example, 7ths resolve down by step in the same voice, leading tones usually resolve and always do so if in the ...
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Is there a music-theoretical language for directly expressing voice leading?
The question
Does music theory provide a language for directly expressing voice leading? Roman numeral analysis (RNA) encapsulates voice-leading expectations, but these are built in by implication (...
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What are "apparent octaves and unisons"?
In the workbook for "Harmony and Voice Leading" (5th edition), there is an exercise on page 14 for which I need to write an accompaniment.
As you can see in the instructions, octaves and ...
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Are parallel diminished 5ths allowed in 4 part harmony?
This is a figured bass exercise I just completed and towards the end you will see a IV65 going to a V65. This progression has two diminished 5ths in parallel motion. Is this acceptable part writing ...
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Why do tonal composers prepare dissonances when the dissonant chord is inverted?
ii65 is a good example. According to my textbooks, the dissonant ^1 in this chord requires a more strict preparation than the ^4 of the V7 chord in common practice harmony which many times is not ...
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Why do the parallel fifths work in Schumann's Op. 15 No. 1?
In Robert Schumann's "Von fremden Ländern und Menschen" ("Of Strange Lands and People"), he composed parallel fifths in measure 13, highlighted in red in the below illustration. ...
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What are inner and outer voices in music of late 20th century and 21st century?
In many textbooks voices are classified as inner and outer. Outer voices are the highest voice (soprano) and the lowest voice (bass), and the inner voices are all the other voices that are between the ...
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Is there such a thing as a tonic 42 chord and how would it work in a functional chord progression?
For a melody harmonization, I wrote a 2 bar bassline using half notes with scale degrees ^1 ^7 3^ and ^5 and wanted to write chords for these bass tones. For the first bass note I chose the I chord. ...
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How to part write I6 to IV with parallel 10ths in the outer voices
In this first phrase of a part writing exercise I have been given ( "Harmony and Voice leading 5th edition") a figured Bass and the few soprano tones marked with red dots. I am stuck right ...
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Can a soprano leap 2 times in a row in the same direction?
Here is a bar where my soprano leaps a 5th then a 3rd in the same direction. the 5th is on the same chord but it doesnt change direction after. What are the guidelines for two consecutive leaps in ...
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Are unequal 5ths going from i to ii°6 acceptable in 4 part harmony?
Im major this wouldn't work but in minor usually a P5 to a D5 is permitted right?
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When ^6 is raised in minor can it be approached by leap?
At the end of this passage I have realized a figured bass with an ascending line using melodic minor. I am instructed to use 10ths in the outer voices for bar 5 so I obviously will have ^6 in the ...
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Are perfect intervals in the outer voices approached by similar motion acceptable within the same harmony?
Here is a V6 to V with 5ths in the outer voices approached by leap in both the voices. Is this ok so long as it is in the same harmony?
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