Year 10 GCSE Music - Melody

Melody

Rhythmically organised pattern of single notes arranged in succession

How notes are arranged in a melody

Horizontally

How notes are arranged in a harmony

Vertically

Melodic features you need to recognise

Intervals within the octave, conjunction, disjunction, triadic and scalic (melody), arpeggios, passing notes, acciaccaturas, appoggiaturas, blues notes, diatonic, chromatic, pentatonic, whole note and modal scales, augmentation, diminution, sequences, inversions, slides / glissandos / portamentos, ornamentation, ostinatos, riffs, phrasing, articulation, pitch bend and improvisation

Degrees of the scale, in order

Tonic, supertonic, mediant, subdominant, dominant, submediant, leading note and tonic

Interval

Distance in pitch between two notes in a scale

Conjunction (adj. conjunct)

Notes in the melody move mainly by step, mostly next to each other in pitch as they move

Disjunction (adj. disjunct)

Notes in the melody move mainly by leap

Leap in music

Wide intervals between notes

Triadic melody

One that begins with notes that belong to a triad, often the tonic triad

Scalic melody

One made up of notes that follow the order of a particular scale

Arpeggio

Broken chord where notes are played one after the other

Passing note

Note in a melody that connects two notes that are part of the harmony

Purpose of passing notes

To 'smooth' out the melodic line between notes of the harmony e.g. recognisable as notes part of a the tonic triad

Sequence

Melodic idea repeated up or down a pitch, usually several times

Defining feature of a melody

Element that is unique, repeated and developed later on

Two things the most common defining features are based on

Rhythm or a particular melodic interval

Six examples of defining features

Triplet and dotted rhythms, descending perfect 5ths, chromatic movement, ascending major 3rds and tritones

Tritones

Musical interval spanning three adjacent whole tones. In other words, an augmented 4th or diminished 5th

Two features that may ruin a melody

Big leaps and an unclear key

Four factors to consider when composing a melody - 'melody recipe'

Key i.e. major or minor, time signature, pitch direction i.e. up or down and type of movement i.e. triadic or scalic or a combination

Degree of the scale a melody would typically start on

Tonic

A suitable decision for what the ends of bars two and four in a melody may end on

Dominant

What a defining feature gives a melody

Character and style

Common structure used in a piece of music

AABA

Four instructions that may be taken when composing a 16-bar melody

A i.e. the first four bars should end on the dominant note or note of the dominant chord, A i.e. the second set of four bars should end on the tonic, B should involve the defining feature in a one-bar sequence and the last A should repeat the second A

Melodic augmentation or diminution

When intervals are made bigger or smaller

Fanfare

a short, loud, and celebratory piece of music typically played by brass instruments (like trumpets and trombones) and often accompanied by percussio