Good voice leading is good voice leading, no matter what musical style you like to play!
Voice leading is a musical technique found in many Western music traditions, from choral and classical music to jazz and pop music. It isn’t unique to any particular style of music; instead, it’s a sign that the musician has a solid understanding of harmonic progressions.
Understanding voice leading and its importance is an essential milestone for musicians who want to take their harmonic knowledge to the next level. In this article, we will explore everything you need to know about voice leading by answering the following questions:
- What is voice leading, and how should you think about it?
- What is the history of voice leading?
- What are common voice leading techniques?
- What are four steps for writing parts with strong voice leading?
- What are guide tones, and how do they relate to chord progressions?
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Table of Contents
What Is Voice Leading? How You Should Think About Good Voice Leading
Voice leading in music theory refers to how individual melodic lines, or “voices,” move from one note to the next within a chord progression. This musical technique prioritizes each voice’s smooth, logical, and efficient transition to the following note.
Good voice leading principles strive to maintain a sense of linear continuity and coherence, emphasizing stepwise motion or small intervals and avoiding large leaps.
Voice leading is important in part writing, where each voice must work alongside the others to create harmony as it moves through the progression.
Voice Leading is a Different Way To Think About Harmony
People just getting into music theory and new to understanding how music works will look up the chords to a song they like and learn the shapes on the guitar or piano. They might think of a song as a series of static block chords, with the melody floating on top of the harmony.
Let’s use a common chord progression to examine this way of looking at a song.
This chord progression moves from C major to A minor and then from A minor to D minor before finally coming to a G major chord. This typical I-vi-ii-V chord progression makes sense, especially from a birds-eye view, where we need to understand how the harmonic environment changes throughout the song.
Thinking about music this way emphasizes a separation between the melodic line and the the harmonic progression. The melody is “separate” from the harmony but still somehow restricted by it.
This “grid-like” way of thinking about music and composition is a convenient shortcut that helps us quickly organize a song’s harmonic progression and efficiently communicate the necessary information to other musicians.
However, beginner music composition students might think that this convenient shortcut is how harmony works, and this is a limiting point of view! That’s because each melodic voice in a “chord” is a snapshot of several melodic lines working together to create the harmonic progression.
Advanced composers may even consider “chords” and “chord progressions” as a simplification of what’s really happening in a piece of music. A proponent of good voice leading sees each voice as having its own melody and harmonic function.
Look at an example we’ll reexamine later in the article.
Each melodic line suggests a harmonic progression when considered against the other voices. This is the essence of strong voice leading! You want to treat every note you use as its own independent melody that brings out the harmony when played simultaneously with the other voices.
Surely, this must be a modern and advanced way of looking at music… right?
The History of Voice Leading
image source: Wikimedia Commons
You’d be mistaken if you think voice leading is a modern musical concept. In fact, chord charts, lead sheets, and harmony as a distinct entity compared to melody are modern conventions adapted to simplify music’s recording and expression.
The modern concept of voice leading developed out of medieval choral music. Melodic motion started simple, with all voices singing the same pitch, and grew more advanced as musicians developed complex musical ideas such as polyphony, harmony, and modality.
Quam Pulchra Es
You can hear the development of ancient voice leading in action when you listen to this motet by English composer John Dunstable, who wrote this piece in the late 14th or early 15th century. This is an example of music written for three voices, and it’s a rich and beautiful example of ancient voice leading.
image source: Wikimedia Commons
After listening, you’ll notice that harmony is undoubtedly present, or what we would call harmony today. However, it would be anachronistic to think that John Dunstable thought about this composition in terms of “changes” with a melody on top.
How Harmonic Roles Developed
As you’ve seen, “part writing” is quite old as a musical concept. As the conventions and rules governing harmony and tonality evolved from the Medieval period (500-1400) to the Renaissance (1400-1600), harmonic roles for the outer and inner voices took shape.
These rules and conventions became reinforced and ingrained as Renaissance music evolved into Baroque music (1600-1750). By the time we were rightly in the Classica Era (1750-1800), the rules and conventions that govern voice movement were pretty much in place.
The outer voices, or what we might call the melody and the bass line, directed the flow and progression of a musical piece. In contrast, the inner voices helped support the outer voices by tying them to a tonal center and creating movement and interest through their melodic development.
This ancient practice is the harmonic foundation for what we do as musicians and composers today.
The Modern Lead Sheet
If anything, the modern jazz lead sheet is a shorthand distillation of this process. The chord symbols suggest the harmonic environment as the melody develops on top of it all.
However, the loose suggestions provided by lead sheets are quite freeing as they allow you to manipulate and develop your own parts for jazz standards and practice good voice leading as part of your improvisational prowess!
So, what are these effective voice leading techniques?
Voice Leading Techniques And Rules You Need to Know
Let’s go over important information you need to know regarding voice leading techniques. It’s essential to review this before attempting your own four-part harmony!
Does Each Voice Have a Name?
If you’ve noticed, we’ve been referring to melodic lines as voices. It is no coincidence that voice-leading practices developed from choral music are called voices.
These voices are modeled after the human vocal ranges in choral music. Each voice has a name and harmonic function in four-part harmony, which we will explore later. These four voices are soprano, alto, tenor, and bass.
Soprano
The soprano line is the highest voice and typically carries the melody or the top line in the musical texture. This upper voice usually has the most freedom to take large leaps and ignore many rules governing the other voices.
Alto
The alto line is the second-highest voice and often supports the soprano. The alto usually stays within a mid-range register, and its motion tends to be more stepwise to maintain smooth voice leading.
Tenor
The tenor line is the second-lowest voice, below the alto. Like the alto, it has a supportive role.
Bass
Bass voices are the lowest and equally important to the soprano voice. The bass outlines the root or fundamental tones of chords and moves in a way that grounds the harmonic progression in a tonality or on one chord, depending on the composition.
When combined, these voices form a harmonic structure that is cohesive vertically (in terms of “chords”) and horizontally (melodic interest).
Remember, voice leading focuses on how each voice moves independently while maintaining harmonic coherence and smooth movement between chords.
Know the Four Types of Motion
Let’s learn four types of motion you can incorporate into your melodic lines.
Parallel Motion
Parallel motion is when two voices move in the same direction by the same interval. For example, if both voices move up by a perfect fifth, they maintain the same intervallic relationship while progressing. This was the first kind of “polyphony” that medieval monks experimented with.
In traditional Western music, parallel motion of certain intervals (like parallel fifths and octaves) is generally avoided in classical polyphony as it can weaken the independence of the voices.
Similar Motion
Similar motion happens when two voices move in the same direction but by different intervals. For instance, one voice may move up by a second while the other moves up by a third.
Similar motion maintains the directional relationship between the voices but allows for intervallic variety.
Oblique Motion
Oblique motion occurs when one voice remains stationary (sits on a single pitch) while the other moves up or down. This type of motion creates a sense of stability, as one voice acts as a pedal or anchor while the other is free to move.
Contrary Motion
Contrary motion occurs when two voices move in opposite directions—one voice ascends while the other descends. Contrary motion enhances the separation and independence of each voice, contributing to a more dynamic and contrapuntal texture.
Don’t Cross Voices
Generally, you want each voice to stay in its lane. It’s not that you shouldn’t ever cross voices, but you should be aware that doing so breaks the integrity of having independent lines working together to create smooth voice leading.
Avoid Parallel Fifths
Writing melodic lines in parallel fourths and fifths was the first step in developing polyphony. Medieval musicians started here, but contemporary musicians avoid writing with parallel fifths unless they want that open, ungrounded sound.
BEFORE YOU CONTINUE...
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Four Steps For Effective Voice Leading
Let’s walk through the voice leading process, starting with the melody. Then, we’ll add a bass voice and fill out the intended harmony with inner voices. When composing, you don’t necessarily need to follow this format—you don’t need an intended harmony.
However, it makes sense to start with some kind of harmonic framework to get used to the process. As we add more voices to the mix, the harmony will become richer, and the individual melodic lines will suggest more chords.
Independent Melodic Lines Moving in Stepwise Motion
In this section, we’ll write four different voices that follow the principles we listed above. By the end, we’ll have a rich, harmonically, and melodically interesting musical composition (or at least four measures of one).
Let’s start by establishing our melodic line.
1. Soprano Voice: Start With The Melody
Since the melody is the first voice, I’ve included chord charts to help you hear the basic harmony I’ll attempt to portray. I’m aiming for a I-vi-ii-V progression. In the key of C major, that’s C-Am-Dm-G.
2. Soprano Voice and Bass Voice (Melodic Line and Bass Line)
I like to begin the process by writing the outermost voices first. This establishes the boundaries and helps me craft the direction of the voices.
The bass voice movement mostly follows the direction of the melody with some slight variations. However, you could say that the bass line has similar motion to the soprano line or generally moves in the same direction.
Also, notice how the presence of two voices already suggests a more dynamic harmonic environment. Let’s adjust the progression to account for the new line.
Note that the chord symbols are a generalization of the harmony! The actual harmony resides in the relationship between each melodic line as it moves through time!
3. Soprano Voice, Bass Voice, and Alto Voice (Melodic Line, Bass Line, and First Inner Voice)
Adding a third voice to the mix will help to bring out the harmony. However, adding chord symbols comes after prioritizing strong melodic lines. The alto line first moves in contrary motion against the other two voices but then moves in similar motion in the second half of the system.
Also, notice how I used a G# in the first measure to move from G to A in the next measure.
This action turns the harmony in the first measure into a I-III7 instead of a I-iii. This chord substitution is a secondary dominant that helps tonicize the following chord (E7 to A-7 is a V-i). Check out this article to learn more about chord substitutions.
The chord symbols represent a generalization of the harmony. The actual harmony is the interplay between the three voices!
Three voices are enough to convey a smooth and logical progression. However, a fourth voice in the mix will enrich the harmony and provide additional opportunities for voice leading techniques such as contrary motion or parallel motion.
4. Soprano Line, Bass Line, Alto Line, and Tenor Line (Melodic Line, Bass Line, and Two Inner Voices)
For the tenor line, I want to help bring out the harmony indicated by the chord symbols. I use parallel motion to add a third above the bass notes. In the last bar, I use an inverse oblique motion where the soprano and alto voices stay on one pitch, and the tenor and bass voices have motion.
Adding Additional Stepwise Motion To Each Voice
We can add even more step-wise motion to each voice and bridge any leaps between larger intervals, adding more movement to each part. Ideally, the result isn’t “harmony” and “melody”—instead, it’s four independent voices that function as separate lines and portray harmonic unity.
Notice how these changes affect the last bar. Here, we see the tenor voice break out of parallel motion and move in contrary motion to the bass and alto lines. Also, the soprano voice is stationary, and all the other voices see increased movement, enhancing the oblique motion from the last example.
Guide Tones And Chord Progressions
If you follow common jazz chord progressions, you’ll notice that the principles of strong voice leading are already baked into these harmonic progressions. Many guitar and piano players will use shell voicings to deconstruct and break a harmonic progression down to its essential parts.
Shell voicings consist of the following:
- Guide Tones
- The Bass Note
The bass note is pretty self-explanatory, but I should mention that it isn’t always the root note! Other chord tones can function as the lowest note in the chord. The takeaway is that the bass note doesn’t always equal the root note.
Let’s learn about guide tones.
Understanding Guide Tones
Guide tones are the chord tones in a chord that help you identify a chord’s quality. One guide tone is the third of the chord, which tells you whether the chord quality is major or minor.
The other guide tone is the seventh, which tells you whether a major chord is dominant or a major seventh chord. The seventh can be major or minor.
Minor and half-diminished chords will have a minor seventh interval anyway, so the distinction only matters for maj7 and dominant chords.
For more on seventh chords, check out this ultimate guide to 7th chords on piano and guitar. To learn more about intervals, check out this article on musical intervals.
Guide Tones in a ii-V-I Progression
Something exciting happens to the guide tones in a ii-V-I chord progression. Let’s demonstrate first, then explain.
ii-V
In our D-7 chord, the 7th is C, and our third is F. However, when we move to the next chord, the seventh of D-7 becomes the third of G7 or B. That stepwise motion is, by definition, good voice leading!
On the other hand, the third of D-7 is F, and when the chord changes to G7, the F remains an F. However, its function in the new chord is different. F is the third of D-7 and the seventh of G7. The third becomes the seventh. Again, we have a natural example of good voice leading.
V-I
The same pattern occurs in the following chord change, G7 to Cmaj7. The third of G7 is B, which doesn’t move when switching to Cmaj7. B is the seventh of Cmaj7. F, the seventh of G7, moves a half step to E to become the third of our Cmaj7 chord.
Using Inversions To Improve the Voice Leading Further
Let’s add in the missing chord tone (the 5th) so that we have all the chord tones of a seventh chord.
D-7
- 7th: C
- 5th: A
- 3rd: F
- Root: D
G7
- 7th: F
- 5th: D
- 3rd: B
- Root: G
Cmaj7
- 7th: B
- 5th: G
- 3rd: E
- Root: C
When we use strong voice leading techniques to move the chord tones of a D-7 to a G7, we go from a close root position D-7 chord to a close 2nd inversion G7 chord. Likewise, the close 2nd inversion G7 chord becomes a close root position Cmaj7 chord.
Notice how the upper voices of the D-7 chord (the A and C) move when switching to the G7 chord, but the other voices remain static. Then, when we go from V to I, it’s the lower voices’ turn to move while the upper voices remain static.
Check out this article for more on jazz chord progressions.
Join The Learn Jazz Standards Inner Circle And Master Smooth Voice Leading
If you want to enhance your jazz theory and musicianship skills, you should check out the Learn Jazz Standards Inner Circle! We have everything you need to take your skills to the next level!
Improve in 30 days or less. Join the Inner Circle.
