Voice Leading
Voice leading refers to the technique of moving as few notes as possible when transitioning between chords.
The highest note is the most important. It should move the shortest distance possible. Our ears are most sensitive to the top note of a chord. If the jump is too large, it can sound jarring.
Of course, this doesn’t apply to chords that intentionally have large leaps! The goal here is to create the smoothest possible chord progressions.
Voice Leading with Open-String Chords
For example, standard guitar open-string chords generally have good voice leading. The reason is that many open strings remain stationary, so very little changes when switching chords.
In this example, we can see that all the green arrows remain on exactly the same note, whether we’re playing a C major or A minor chord. While this isn’t always possible, it’s the ideal scenario.
The orange arrow shows a note that moves by only one step. In this example, from G to A.
The blue arrow makes a slightly larger jump. However, this isn’t as problematic since it’s the bass note. Bass notes can often make larger leaps.
Voice Leading with Barre Chords
Barre chords generally don’t have as smooth voice leading. You might have noticed that barre chords often don’t sound as good. They often sound like the notes are spread out too far.
Again, this isn’t a big issue if you’re playing with other instruments or in a song. This is simply about theory.
In this example, we can see that the highest note is also shifted compared to the open-string chords. This can make it sound a bit strange or less fitting.
Incidentally, the A minor chord in this example has one more note than the C major chord because we’re playing one more string. However, this doesn’t change the chord itself. For more information, see: Guitar Chords.
Voice Leading with Jazz Chords
Jazz chords, which are often confused with simple four-note chords, are also a great way to improve chord progressions.
I’ve replaced the chords here with a jazz classic: IIm7-V7.
It’s common practice to adjust a chord so that the voicing is as similar as possible to the previous chord.
That’s why I’ve changed the D7 chord to a D7 with a 9 as the top note.
Voice Leading with Drop-2 Chords
If you want to go all out and achieve perfection, learn drop-2 chords.
With these chords, you can precisely control how far each note moves.
Here, we can see that theoretically, only one note would need to be changed.
Exercises to Learn Voice Leading
One of the most effective ways to learn voice leading is to choose a note and try to play as many chords as possible while keeping that note as the highest tone.
You’re essentially creating a kind of melody chords / fingerstyle only with drop-2 voicings, always trying to keep the same highest note.
