Voice leading is used to smoothly connect chords by finding the most efficient path (smallest interval) for each voice to travel to get from one chord to another. This helps to maximize the ‘perceptual independence’ of each voice and results in a smooth, connected texture.
When the voice lead setting is on, inversion and spacing settings are ignored for the sake of the voice lead.
Voice Lead Menu (located in sidebar) #
Settings in the voice lead menu can be applied to a specific palette or be used as a global setting that multiple palettes can use.
Voice lead behavior can be altered to control the melodic direction and voice lead range by using the following voice lead modes:
Voice Lead Modes: #
Best Choice – most efficient path
Similar Up – most efficient path where both the top and bottom voice move up
Similar Down – most efficient path where both the top and bottom voice move down Oblique/Up – most efficient path where top voice stays in common or moves up Oblique/Down – most efficient path where top a voice stays in common or moves down
Reverse on Boundary – Flips the voice lead mode direction when voices reach the boundary of the voice lead range.
Similar Up → Similar Down
Similar Down → Similar Up
Oblique Up → Oblique Down
Oblique Down → Oblique Up
The Voice Lead dashboard icon indicates the active voice lead mode using arrows:
Low Interval Limits #
Low Interval Limits refer to the limits below which interval lose their clarity and create ‘muddiness’. Enabling Low Interval Limits will ensure that voice leading avoids generating voicings that include intervals that violate these limits. The result is that voicings are able to get as low in the range as possible without crossing these low interval limit thresholds.
