The Rising Cycle-Of-Fifths Progression: Its
Structural and Formal Implications
The
relationships between structural principles of counterpoint and harmony can be
imagined as those of subordination and inclusion. Counterpoint represents a
lower level of musical structure. Harmony, as a higher level, contains both
contrapuntal and non-contrapuntal elements (the former – as voice leading, the
latter – as tonal relations).
Whereas the
descending cycle-of-fifth progression is one of the most common chord
progressions in the tonal music, the rising one (except for such simplest
cases as I–V and IV–I) is quite rare. In the progression I–V–ii–vi, the second
fifth, as a dominant followed by a subdominant, is somewhat problematic. In
such cases, one speaks usually about the back-relating dominant. However, one
can disregard the continuation V–ii in terms of harmony but not in terms of
voice-leading. The
contrapuntal structure and formal implications of a rising cycle-of-fifth
progression depend on the number of rising fifths. When the second fifth
(V–ii) is followed by one more ascending fifth (ii–vi), it gives rise to an
exact sequence. On the other hand, when it is followed by one or two
descending fifths (ii–V, or, as usually ii–V–I), there is no exact sequence.
In my paper,
these two cases will be discussed in more detail, analysing the contrapuntal
structure of a number of progressions on the base of a five-part voice-leading
matrix, rather than the two-part Schenkerian Ursatz, as the high-level structure of tonal counterpoint.
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