← Real Sight Reader · Chromatic harmony series
The deceptive cadence: where V actually goes
Textbooks say the dominant resolves to the tonic. The corpus disagrees more often than you'd think: of the 710 V and V7 chords in our 57 reduced pieces, only 41% go straight home. The rest prolong, sidestep, or — the famous case — deceive: 108 times, V resolves to vi or VI instead, the cadence every ear expects and every composer loves to deny.
Where the corpus's dominants go
| V resolves to… | count |
|---|---|
| I | 151 |
| i | 72 |
| vi7 | 64 |
| V7 | 57 |
| I7 | 51 |
| V | 25 |
| vi | 22 |
| V7/IV | 20 |
| i7 | 20 |
| V7/V | 17 |
Hear the deceptions
Each link opens the piece in the harmony player, chords labeled — follow the bar numbers to the moment the cadence swerves.
- Canon in D J. Pachelbel 16 deceptive moves
- Arabesque No. 2 C. Debussy 10 deceptive moves
- Arabesque No. 1 C. Debussy 6 deceptive moves
- Prelude 21 in B-flat major (BWV 890) J. S. Bach 5 deceptive moves
- Prelude 5 in D major (BWV 850) J. S. Bach 4 deceptive moves
- Prelude 17 in A-flat major (BWV 886) J. S. Bach 4 deceptive moves
- Prelude 20 in A minor (BWV 889) J. S. Bach 4 deceptive moves
- Prelude 4 in C-sharp minor (BWV 849) J. S. Bach 3 deceptive moves
- Prelude 13 in F-sharp major (BWV 858) J. S. Bach 3 deceptive moves
- Prelude 17 in A-flat major (BWV 862) J. S. Bach 3 deceptive moves
Go deeper
- Did it land home? → Authentic vs deceptive resolutions drilled by ear until the swerve is unmistakable.
- The theory: cadences → The full cadence taxonomy — authentic, half, plagal, deceptive — and how phrases end.
- More chromatic harmony → The series: applied dominants, borrowed chords, Neapolitans, augmented sixths.