It's neither - chords don't move by intervals.

Now, if you're looking at root movement, that's a different story.

But it's not really the whole story, because in this context, the term "fifth" refers to the harmonic function, not the interval.

For example, in the key of C Major, the chord progression Dm -> G could be notated as ii V. However, the D is the V of G, so functionally the progression is a V -> I progression.

Well, more properly v -> I. wink

So the movement is "by fifths" in the sense that the first chord is functionally built on the "fifth scale degree" relative to the target chord, with the "fifth scale degree" resolving to the root.


-- David Cuny
My virtual singer development blog

Vocal control, you say. Never heard of it. Is that some kind of ProTools thing?