Leading Tone Example Not Working Out
 

I figure this whole issue is that I'm not reading this correctly. I've checked the errata for the book I'm using and what I think is wrong in the book is not listed. So I figure it's me. The actual leading tone itself is working out, but the walking bass line going from C to D is not. Please please please let this be a mistake in the book so I don't feel entirely stupid.

I'm working on basic walking bass lines with a leading tone. A walking bass line is I, V, right? Right. Then the leading tone is the 7th of whatever chord you are going to, right? Right.

I've attached an image of the exercise I'm learning from. Going from G -> C all is well from my understanding. I play:

Root of G, G chord, 5th of G, G chord. Then root of G, G Chord, 5th of G, then 7th of C, which is a B. It lines up. Fifth string, second fret is indeed a B. Perfect!

Moving on ...

Root of C, C, 5th of C, C, root of C, C, HOLD THE HORSES. Where I expect to see the 5th of C, I'm seeing another root of C, THEN the leadng tone (7th of D).

Is this a mistake in the book or am I just fundamentally confused on this?

http://www.michaelhenry.rocks/wp-con...eadingTone.png

The exercise seems OK to me. I would expect the root to be re-stated in bar four because C to C# to D makes more sense, physically as well as aurally, than G to C# to D.

However this is not what I would expect a walking bass line to look like. The only bit that looks like walking bass is the C to C# to D. Maybe this is an early step in the process.

This indeed pretty early in the process and the book is having us crawl before walking, then running.

What you said about the exercise seeming OK to you loses me. I'm hoping to understand if within the bounds of the I, V walking bass line and the leading tone being the 7th of the upcoming chord, is what I have as a "??" is correct. The root being re-stated has never been mentioned. That may be taught further down the road, I don't know.

I thank you for your answer though.

You know, if this was presented in the context of a song rather than an attempt to illustrate a poorly defined concept it might have some use. Off the bat I can think of at least a dozen ways to illustrate leading tones, but their utility depends on THE SONG.

Randomness is not good context...and your feelings of "something wrong" are justified.

To me a I-V bass figure is about as far as you can go away from a walking bass, and therefor it's not a problem to sacrifice that to get to something that demonstrates walking bass better.

In bar two and bar four you deviate from the bass, strum, bass, strum format of bars one three and five to replace the second strum with a leading note. I guess this is the point of the exercise.

There's no right or wrong when doing something like this. I wouldn't call this "walking bass", but it's doing a sort of basic alternating bass with a connecting 7th before each chord change. The pattern seems a bit non-instructive to me - why root, then 3 5ths in a row in measure one, for example? But there's nothing "wrong", it's just the author's choice of notes. I imagine all he's trying to show you is the 7th leading into the next chord. The rest is beside the point.

What I'd call "walking bass" would be something like bass notes, as quarter notes like this (two bars of G, 2 bars of C, back to G):

|G A Bb B | D Db C B | C E D C | B A G F# G | and so on.

You just play the bass with a scale-like motion, Mostly hitting chord tones on 1, and approaching the tonic of each chord change from either a whole step or half step above or below.

It just appears to be an ascending bass where the question mark is. Here's how I played it (sloppily, lol). (I'm not too crazy about calling the first measure alternating bass as I would expect it to be G B G B as bass notes.) Plus the notation should use downward note stems for the bass line played for clarity,

In the example, were you to replace the note in question with the V you would then get a tritone (b5) from G to C#. That would be an ugly bass line. The only tasteful option at the level you're working is to repeat the I.

.

First rule of music theory: does it sound good? C-C#-D is standard walk up from the 4 chord, and it SOUNDS good. Don't overanalyze too much.

More common would probably be to approach the C with A-B-C. I think the author is just trying to simplify by sticking to chord tones for now. In the long run , it will be most helpful to think of the walk up notes as basically belonging more to the chord they're approaching than the preceding one anyway. C-C#-D works because it's a great connection between those two chords.

Hmm, the three note walks ups with the leading tones are fine. Consistency is that at each chord change the new chord starts on the root note – consistent and tight. Beats ending up with C-G-C-G-C#-D in any case

It's an exercise book and they are just showing the very introduction of a leading tone by using the 7th of the chord it's going to, as well as building on the introductory lesson of I, V walking bass line. One of the notes does not fit in the lesson and I'm simply trying to find out if I misunderstood the lesson or if there is an error in the tab.

I think the book is starting out very simply to walk people such as myself to more complex, and therefore more real-world, examples.

If you've played for a very long time, it's difficult to see things as a beginner would. You miss things and assume things , thinking that they're obvious. You don't realize which things need to be explained more until you have someone in front of you asking the question maybe. I always have to rewrite things when confusing points are pointed out by someone other than me.

That's the value of having a teacher live and in person by the way. I think that the above example would be explained very easily and casually if you had the author in front of you. I don't think it's something to fret over . When things get put down on paper there's a tendency to over analyze or assume that it's somehow in some perfect form, or to try to attach "meaning" to each note. I think authors would do well to work things through in workshops or lessons for a little while before publishing or whatever, but for your part, it's helpful to remember that this stuff is not holy scripture.

I would chalk it up to the awkwardness inherent in taking specific musical practices and trying to boil them down to a very basic concept. Things don't necessarily work that way. You compromise one thing or another. The "rules " you're assuming in these beginning lessons aren't rules at all. They're simply artificial limitations to make your understanding easier. It's ironic, because limitations to "simplify" cause OTHER problems apparently.

I really don't think this is something to obsess over. Skip to the next lesson or try playing out the way you think it should be. I think you're going to find that the alternate bass version you're wanting to see won't sound as good.

The first two rules of music theory are:
1. "Does this sound good?" and
2. "Does it sound good?"

You may be right in that it's alternating bass and I have the terminology mixed up. I'll have to check that when I get back home. And again you may be right in that the author simply chose to use a different note because he could, and I'm trying to shove these things into a formula.

Sounds nice when you play it!

I may be overthinking all this. When starting to learn this I'm sure they are wanting to keep it somewhat defined. If it's "Hey you can do all kinds of things!" that would just confuse me at the start.