Part I

Connecting I and V

Voice leading is supported by choosing strong harmonic progressions. The I chord is a point of departure and return in tonal harmony, it can move to any chord. V invariably moves to I or a I-substitute. As we develop our repertoire of chords, we will be able to summarize strong root movements.

The following tables summarizes V-I and I-V. Students may wish to generate similar tables to see how chords tones can be connected before commiting pitches to the staff.

The tables are generated by:

  1. writing the chord progression
  2. adding the complete bass line
  3. completing the pitches in the first chord
  4. resolving active tones (a)
  5. connecting common tones (ct)
  6. moving any remaining voices by step (s) or small skip (sk)
V-I


       D  -  E  (s)                  D  -  C
       B  -  C  (a)                  B  -  G
       G  -  G  (ct)                 G  -  E
----  ---------                     ---------
Bass:  G  -  C                       G  -  C
C +:   V -   I                       V  -  I


I-V



       G  -  G                       G  -  B
       E  -  D                       E  -  G
       C  -  B                       C  -  D
----  ---------                     ---------
Bass:  C  -  G                       C  -  G
C+:    I  -  V                       I  -  V

In V-I, and I-V, the first example of each above is preferred: the common tone between the two chords is used to good effect. Furthermore, in V-I, the leading-note B resolves to C, something that will become increasingly important as we look at dominant seventh type chords.

The second example in each case, however, is common, but with V-I, perhaps it is best saved for when the D- C movement is in the soprano.