Level (music)

A level (van der Merwe 1989, also "tonality level", Kubik's "tonal step", and John Blacking's "root progression") is a temporary modal frame contrasted with another built on a different foundation note. It is more general and basic than a chord and is found in Asian, African, and Celtic folk musics and in European Renaissance music. Levels then give way to chords and chord changes in Baroque music and in the twentieth-century chords give way to levels in the blues, completed with the V-IV-I progression, and spread to all popular music. (ibid, p.209-211)
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