Voice Leading is an arranging technique which looks for the best way to connect chord voices in any given chord progression in a smooth fashion. First you have to know that each note in a chord will be called a “voice” in the order of the highest to the lowest note rather than degrees, so the top note will be the first voice, the next below it will be the second voice and so on. The idea is to keep common tones in the same voice (on the guitar usually it will be kept on the same strings) and to move the rest of the notes as little as possible.
The root movement will tell you how many common notes you have between the two chords and it goes like this:
Root movement of 2nd and 7th there are no common notes
Root movement of 4th and 5th there is 1 common note
Root movement of 3rd and 6th there are 2 common notes
Consider the Gmaj and the Cmaj chords in the V – I progression in C which uses the root movement of fifth and a common tone of G:
G – B – D
C – E – G
We can put G in first inversion to look like this:
B – D – G
C – E – G
When voiced like this, you only have one half-step from B to C, one whole step from D to E, and G remains the same:
B → C, D→D#→E, G
If you are playing triads, even if they’re inverted, you will always be able to move to the next chord in the progression with only one or two half-steps of movement.
Take a look below at the chords of C major in first inversion and see how the note in the bass doesn’t need to move more than two half-steps:
C Dm Em F G Am Bdim
E - G - C F - A - D G - B - E A - C - F B - D - G C - E - A D - F - B
3 - 5 - 1 ♭3 - 5 - 1 ♭3 - 5 - 1 3 - 5 - 1 3 - 5 - 1 ♭3 - 5 - 1 ♭3 - ♭5 - 1
One fret up from E is F Two frets up from F is G Two frets up from G is A Two frets up from A is B One fret up from B is C Two frets up from C is D Two frets up from D brings you back to E
Likewise, this works for second inversions:
C Dm Em F G Am Bdim
G - C - E A - D - F B - E - G C - F - A D - G - B E - A - C F - B - D
5 - 1 - 3 5 - 1 - ♭3 5 - 1 - ♭3 5 - 1 - 3 5 - 1 - 3 5 - 1` - ♭3 ♭5 - 1 - ♭3
Two frets up from G is A Two frets up from A is B One fret up from B is C Two frets up from C is D Two frets up from D is E One fret up from E is F Two frets up from F brings you back to G
