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Concept

Common tone (chord)

In music, a common tone is a pitch class that is a member of, or common to (shared by) two or more chords or sets. Typically, it refers to a note shared between two chords in a chord progression. According to H.E. Woodruff: Any tone contained in two successive chords is a common tone. Chords written upon two consecutive degrees of the [diatonic] scale can have no tones in common. All other chords [in the diatonic scale] have common tones. Common tones are also called connecting tones, and in part-writing, are to be retained in the same voice. Chords which are four or five degrees apart have one common tone. Chords which are three or six degrees apart have two common tones. Chords which are one or seven degrees apart have no tone in common. The example below shows the seven diatonic triads of C major. The common tones between the tonic triad and the other six triads are highlighted in blue. As Woodruff describes, the tonic triad shares no common tones with either II and VII (consecutive to I), one common tone with IV and V (four and five degrees from I) each, and two common tones with III and VI (three and six degrees from I) each. { \override Score.TimeSignature #'stencil = ##f \relative c' { \time 1/1 \once \override NoteHead.color = #blue 1 \bar "||" \time 2/1

\bar "||" } \addlyrics { I II VII IV V III VI } } Common tones are a consideration in voice leading and voicing. Abbé Vogler (1749–1814), Weber (1779–1839), Hauptmann (1792–1868), A. B. Marx (1795–1866), and earlier theorists emphasized "common-tone retention and smooth voice leading in... [their] treatment[s] of harmonic succession [chord progressions]" . It may be considered a guideline or a rule . The example below shows a circle progression in C major, in which common tones are retained in the second voice (alto).

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Related lectures (2)
Music Notation Tutorial
Introduces music notation basics, major scales, key signatures, and diatonic chords.
Harmony in Music: Counterpoint and Chord Progressions
Delves into the principles of harmony in music, focusing on counterpoint and chord progressions.
Related concepts (3)
Submediant
In music, the submediant is the sixth degree () of a diatonic scale. The submediant ("lower mediant") is named thus because it is halfway between the tonic and the subdominant ("lower dominant") or because its position below the tonic is symmetrical to that of the mediant above. (See the figure in the Degree (music) article.) In the movable do solfège system, the submediant is sung as la in a major mode and fa in a minor mode. It is occasionally called superdominant, as the degree above the dominant.
Chord (music)
A chord, in music, is any harmonic set of pitches/frequencies consisting of multiple notes (also called "pitches") that are heard as if sounding simultaneously. For many practical and theoretical purposes, arpeggios and other types of broken chords (in which the chord tones are not sounded simultaneously) may also be considered as chords in the right musical context. In tonal Western classical music (music with a tonic key or "home key"), the most frequently encountered chords are triads, so called because they consist of three distinct notes: the root note, and intervals of a third and a fifth above the root note.
Chord progression
In a musical composition, a chord progression or harmonic progression (informally chord changes, used as a plural) is a succession of chords. Chord progressions are the foundation of harmony in Western musical tradition from the common practice era of Classical music to the 21st century. Chord progressions are the foundation of popular music styles (e.g., pop music, rock music), traditional music, as well as genres such as blues and jazz. In these genres, chord progressions are the defining feature on which melody and rhythm are built.

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