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Musical Terms: Musicians use certain words and phrases (that may have a different meaning in common usage) to describe musical elements. Music is made of pitches (notes or tones) that can be altered to be higher or lower. Pitches can also be altered by duration; the length of time a pitch lasts. Pitch can also be altered in terms of dynamics and tone quality (timbre). Scales and Intervals are the building blocks of musical language. An interval is the distance between any two pitches. Intervals are said to be consonant or dissonant…though our concepts of consonance and dissonance can and have changed over time and through different cultures. The Octave is a special kind of interval that has a 2:1 frequency ratio. The two pitches that make up this interval can sound remarkably similar and have been referred to as having the quality of “auditory duplication”. Scales are the way pitches are organized between octaves. Western cultures often use a sevennote scale (called either Major or Minor) or a twelve note scale (called Chromatic). Other cultures may use different divisions of the octave. Ancient Greece used a series of different scales called Modes: scales that were used in western music throughout the Middle ages and the Renaissance. We still use them: the Major scale is the Ionian mode and the Minor scale is (more or less) the Aolian mode. Other scales used include a Whole Tone scale, Octatonic scale (eight notes) and Pentatonic scale (five notes). The Four Basic Elements of Music (according to Aaron Copland, among others): Rhythm Melody Harmony Tone (timbre) Rhythm Rhythm is the way pitches are organized in time. Rhythm can be relatively simple as in a march; a march has a regular, even and symmetrical rhythm that consists of strong beats in groups of two or four. Rhythm can also be quite complex as a Stravinski composition or a jazz improvisation. Altering rhythm can change simple musical elements into melody. A descending major scale, rhythmically manipulated so that some notes are longer or shorter than others, can become the Christmas carol “Joy to the World”. One important element of rhythm is tempo: the speed that music travels through time. Musicians use a number of terms to designate tempo, and many are in Italian. Some commonly used terms is below: Adagio Lento Largo Larghetto Andante Moderato Allegro Presto Prestissimo Quite slow Also quite slow Slow A little Largo…a little less slow a moving tempo…moderate speed Moderate Fast Quite fast Very fast Terms that modify tempo: e.g. Allegro ma non troppo; Fast but not too much. Molto Much Poco a little Piu more Meno less Ma non troppo not too much Accelerando Ritardando Fermata Rubato to speed up to slow down a stop, often a note or chard that is held for a long time Fluctuating tempo Meter is the organization of beats or musical pulses where some beats are stronger than others. The strong beats are said to be accents. Syncopation is where a normally unaccented beat is given an accent. Meter is usually (though not always) thought of as duple or triple: Duple (two) as in “She’ll be Comin’ ‘round the Mountain when She Comes” or “Auld Lang Syne” or a march; triple as in a waltz or “The Star Spangled Banner”. Tempo (speed), pitch (high or low), duration (long or short) and accent are all parts of language. Melody Melody is the organization of pitches and note durations into a musically coherent (expressive) order. Melodies are often organized into segments called phrases. Phrases are similar to sentence structures in language. Themes and motives are melodies or melodic fragments that are usually used as a building block for a piece of music: The opening of the fifth symphony by Beethoven is a good example. Not really much of a melody per se, the four-note motive is used as the essential musical idea for virtually all of the first movement. Cadence is a term for a musical ending point…either of a phrase, melody, movement or verse. Harmony Harmony is the combination of two or more simultaneous sounds. Three or more notes sounding together is often called a chord (a triad is specifically a three note chord). Musicians refer to several different kinds of harmonic textures; monophony is an unaccompanied melodic line as in Gregorian chant. Homophony is a melody with simple accompaniment. Polyphony is the presence of multiple melodic lines. The art of polyphonic writing became known as counterpoint. Harmony, because it is made up of various intervals can be different degrees of consonance or dissonance. Often time they help define for us a sense of key. Key refers to a central tone or pitch, which seems for us to provide a natural ending point for a musical thought. The pitch that is the recipient of this kind of musical power gives us the name of our key or tonal center. Another word for key is tonality.