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According to this article, 4 part chorale-like voice leading (part writing), despite being taught in music conservatories, is not used in orchestral music. I understand the basic concepts of voice leading, voice independence, which note to double, and resolving in the "right" direction, but I haven't worried to much about learning strict textbook voice leading. (I admit these concepts can be hard to prioritize and I think that might be where I got the idea of adding another voice or two) I know it's a lot, but here are the things I want to clear up for myself: 1. When people write in more than four voices, do they use standard 4 part voice leading and add in additional parts to fill in space, or do they voice lead all of the parts? I imagine both methods are used, but what do I know? 2. Is it easier to voice lead in, say 5 parts, rather than in 4? I understand that the more voices you add, the more responsibility you have to lead (resolve?) all of them, but I feel like a lot of specific rules for specific situations come from the limitations of 4 parts. For example I feel like it might be easier to balance doubling the correct note and writing independent lines, in 5 voices. 3. How is voice leading used in modern composition? I would probably just voice lead the chords and write the melody and countermelody together separate from the chords, not considering them in voice leading (of course except for the difference between perfect authentic cadences and imperfect authentic cadences). 4. How worried are modern composers (I'm sure there's a difference between media composers and "academic" concert stage composers) about line independence and not using parallel fifths octaves and unisons? I know I would never (never say never) try to voice lead in say, eight voices, because it would be impossible to avoid forbidden parallels unless you have a ton of upper chord extensions, like jazz. 5. Do people (if no one does it, I might try it) ever use a different amounts of voices in different sections of a single piece (i. e. five voices in the A section and four in the B section)? If I were to do this, I would redistribute the parts to the instruments, so that doesn't equate to parallel unisons, but this "redistribution" would happen anyway since different sections normally have a different set of instruments. This is just an idea I got, but I'm sure it's not original. 6. Are there any existing systems to voice lead in more than four parts, or is it just the same basic principles (or is only four part voice leading taught, leaving the rest to the composer to figure out)? I know this is a longer post, and I can probably figure some of it out myself, but I would be thrilled if someone of more experience were to offer some insight. P.S. Just to clarify, I know that orchestral music uses part doublings on top of the original part writing; I'm not asking about that.

Hey everyone, hope your all doing well. I want to go more in depth with chord voicing. I know about inversions and I use them to make help chord changes more fluid and avoid too much parallel harmony, but that's all I use them for. Are there other reasons one would choose a certain chord voicing? Is the middle not that important and it's all about the top and bottom notes? I would like to have a greater understanding and was wondering if anyone can recommend a book or something that goes into great detail and the subject? So far I have just been making it so each line moves as little as possible to the next note, without really understanding how the voicing can have an effect on the sound. Thanks for your time EDIT: I have just read this topic: http://forum.youngco...oicing-help-me/ Some good advice from Wayne-Scales Still would like some more information on it though

I was recently told on one of my peices that I need to look more into voicing. While I have a vague idea of what this means, I was wondering if someone could give me an overview of what it is (really) and how I can get better at it. Feel free to get nerdy with it, I have Google ;) PS The song is called Silver Linings and can be found with the other band stuff. It would be great if you could listen to it; I need the views and the comments hahaha