Noncommon tone connection of I, IV, and V chords.

[glisser]

Bonjour,

I have a question regarding the noncommon tone connection of the I to V chords, and the I to IV chords.  

The theory book I own is called Techniques and Materials of Tonal Music with an Introduction to Twentieth-Century Techniques. The authors are Thomas Benjamin, Michael Horvit, and Robert Nelson.

In the connection of the Dominant and Tonic triads, there is a noncommon tone connection option. Basically, when you go from I-V or V-I, you can use this option. It states that the soprana voice must involve the scale degrees of 2-1, 1-2, 3-5, 5-3, or 5-7, for this to be possible. They show some examples and I understand and see this assumption.

My problem comes when the noncommon tone connection involves the I-IV, or IV-I chords. The book states that the connection is the same as I-V or V-I, but the examples they give, I cannot see the soprano voice have 2-1, 1-2, 3-5, 5-3, or 5-7 scale degree imvolments. I see scale degrees 1-6, 4-5, and 1-3, and have no idea what is going on.

If someone can help me, I will appreciate it.

Merci beaucoup.  

[prometheus]

Your post makes no sense to me. The scale degrees you give are not part of the chords you talk about.

I and V share the 5th degree. The first degree chord has 1 and 3. The 5th degree chord has 2 and 7. In basic species of counterpoint/most restricted form of voice leading, you would have 1 and 3 go to 2 while 7 goes to 1 and 2 to 1 or 3.
Same logic can be applied to the other chord change you mention.

Larger steps are handled more carefully and generally descent rather than ascend, but I don't know with what restriction you are practicing with is.

[glisser]

Hello.

Thanks for answering my question. To begin, I am doing strict four part harmony at the moment.

And sorry for my wording, it was the best I thought, I could post with it making sense, I guess it did not.

But you are right. After going back to the example, the scale degrees that function with I and V do not with I and IV because they share different scales degrees. Feel kind of dumb for not figuring it out sooner, but that was the problem I was running into.

In the example in the book, a V# in re minor is going to a i chord. the soprano voice goes from mi (in V#) to re(in i)(major second down). in re minor, those two scale degrees are the i and the ii. So as I said in the first post, a 2-1 movement in the soprano voice, a noncommon tone connection is possible here. The other scale degrees function the same, and they work because like you mention, the I and V chords share those scale degrees.

I was expecting the same degree movements to work in a I to IV connection, bu again, like you mention, the scale degrees that work with a I and V do not work with a I to IV. Unfortunately, my book does not mention the scale degrees so I have to figure them out.

But thanks again I appreciate your help.