Four-part Harmony ... A special genre in this music is the "barbershop quartet" usually consisting of 4 men who sing tenor, countertenor, baritone, and bass parts... Four parts for instruments Some music is written, in four-part harmony, for small groups of only 4 instruments, such as a string quartet, a brass quartet, or a woodwind quartet (might include a French horn)... However, due to the range of musical instruments covering more pitches than a typical human voice, a quartet might play some harmonies with very high notes or very low notes, rather than the blended range of choral music...
Aspect Of Music ... Universal aspect Often a definition of music lists the aspects or elements that make up music under that definition... In classical music of the common practice period, for instance, melody and harmony are often considered to be given more importance at the expense of rhythm and timbre... John Cage considers duration the primary aspect of music as, being the temporal aspect of music, it is the only aspect common to both "sound" and "silence"...
Alternative Rock ... Alternative rock is a broad umbrella term consisting of music that differs greatly in terms of its sound, its social context, and its regional roots... But most alternative bands' commercial success was limited in comparison to other genres of rock and pop music at the time, and most acts remained signed to independent labels and received relatively little attention from mainstream radio, television or newspapers... The term alternative rock Before the term alternative rock came into common usage around 1990, the sort of music to which it refers was known by a variety of terms...
Progressive Rock ... The Oxford Companion to Music states that progressive rock bands ".explored extended musical structures which involved intricate instrumental patterns and textures and often esoteric subject matter." Additionally, the arrangements often incorporated elements drawn from classical, jazz, and later world music... Progressive rock bands sometimes used "concept albums that made unified statements, usually telling an epic story or tackling a grand overarching theme." Progressive rock developed from late 1960s psychedelic rock, as part of a wide-ranging tendency in rock music of this era to draw inspiration from ever more diverse influences... The term was initially applied to the music of British bands such as Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Yes, Genesis, Jethro Tull, and Emerson, Lake & Palmer, reaching its peak of popularity in the mid 1970s...
Musical Scale ... Western music See also: Musical mode Scales in traditional Western music generally consist of seven notes and repeat at the octave...
Dynamics (music) ... In music for marching band, passages louder than ƒƒƒ are sometimes colloquially referred to by descriptive terms such as "blastissimo"...
Transformational Theory ... The goal of transformational theory is to change the focus from musical objects—such as the "C major chord" or "G major chord" -- to relations between objects. Thus, instead of saying that a C major chord is followed by G major, a transformational theorist might say that the first chord has been "transformed" into the second by the "Dominant operation." (Symbolically, one might write "Dominant (C major) = G major.") While traditional musical set theory focuses on the makeup of musical objects, transformational theory focuses on the intervals or types of musical motion that can occur...
Musical Analysis ... The principle of analysis has been variously criticized, especially by composers, such as Edgard Varèse's claim that, “to explain by means of is to decompose, to mutilate the spirit of a work” (quoted in Bernard 1981, 1). Analyses Some analysts, such as Donald Francis Tovey (whose Essays in Musical Analysis are among the most accessible musical analyses) have presented their analyses in prose...
Orff Schulwerk ... A child participating in an Orff classroom does not feel the pressure of performing that is often in tandem with music because every student in an Orff classroom is treated as an equal, even when performing a solo... The Orff Approach is used by teachers to encourage their students to enjoy making music as individuals as well as in groups... Students of the Orff Approach learn music by experiencing and participating in the different musical lessons and activities...
Paleolithic Flutes ... They suggested music may have helped to maintain bonds between larger groups of humans, and that this may have helped the species to expand both in numbers and in geographical range...
Timbre ... In simple terms, timbre is what makes a particular musical sound different from another, even when they have the same pitch and loudness. For instance, it is the difference between a guitar and a piano playing the same note at the same loudness...
Persian Traditional Music ... Iranian classical music continues to function as a spiritual tool as it has throughout its history, and much less of a recreational activity... The Radif of Iranian music * Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity Country Iran Reference 279 Region ** Asia and Australasia Inscription history Inscription 2009 * Name as inscribed by UNESCO ** Region as classified by UNESCO The Radif:...
Musical Notation ... Byzantine music uses the eight natural, non-tempered scales called Ēkhoi, "sounds", exclusively, and therefore the absolute pitch of each note may slightly vary each time, depending on the particular Ēkhos used... Early Europe Scholar and music theorist Isidore of Seville, writing in the early 7th century, remarked in this Etymologiae that it was impossible to notate music... The problem with this notation was that it only showed melodic contours and consequently the music could not be read by someone who did not know the music already...
Kodály Method ... Beginning in 1935, along with his colleague Jenő Ádám, he embarked on a long term project to reform music teaching in the lower and middle schools by actively creating a new curriculum and new teaching methods, as well as writing new musical compositions for children... The school was so successful that over one hundred music primary schools opened within the next decade (Eösze 1962:79)... After about fifteen years approximately 50% of the schools in Hungary were music schools (Russell-Smith 1967:44)...
Blues ... World War II marked the transition from acoustic to electric blues and the progressive opening of blues music to a wider audience, especially white listeners... Though the use of the phrase in African-American music may be older, it has been attested to since 1912, when Hart Wand's "Dallas Blues" became the first copyrighted blues composition... Form The blues form is a cyclic musical form in which repeating progression of chords mirrors the call and response scheme commonly found in African and African-American music...
Classical Music ... European music is largely distinguished from many other non-European and popular musical forms by its system of staff notation, in use since about the 16th century... Western staff notation is used by composers to prescribe to the performer the pitch, speed, meter, individual rhythms and exact execution of a piece of music... This leaves less room for practices such as improvisation and ad libitum ornamentation, that are frequently heard in non-European art music and popular music...
Napster ... Its ease of use led to massive copyright violations of music and film media, as well as other intellectual property... History Although there were already networks that facilitated the distribution of files across the Internet, such as IRC, Hotline, and USENET, Napster specialized exclusively in music in the form of MP3 files and presented a user-friendly interface... The result was a robust system whose popularity generated an enormous selection of music to download – at its peak there were 25 million users and 80 million songs, and the system never once crashed...
Schenkerian Analysis ... This reflects Schenker's belief that the deep, long–range structure of a piece of music has no particular rhythm... This long–range structure is called the Fundamental Structure (Ursatz) in Schenkerian analysis, while the more surface aspects of the music are called the foreground or surface layer... Although it is a subject of debate among music theorists whether there is a single correct hearing and analysis of a piece of tonal music, even those who hold that there is a unique correct analysis agree that the analysis can only be arrived at and evaluated subjectively by an expert listener...