Humanities - Fundamentals of music

acoustics

the study of how sound behaves in physical spaces

beat

the basic unit of time in music

brass

instruments traditionally made of brass or another metal (and thus often producing a “bright” or “brassy” tone) whose sound is generated by blowing into a mouthpiece that is attached to a coiled tube

chromatic

musical pitches which move up or down by successive half-steps

composition

the process whereby a musician notates musical ideas using a system of symbols or using some other form of recording

conjunct

a melody that moves mostly by step, in a smooth manner

disjunct

a melody with wide leaps and rapid changes in direction

dissonant

intervals and chords that tend to sound harsh to our ears; dissonance (noun) is often used to create tension and instability, and the interplay between dissonance and consonance provides a sense of harmonic and melodic motion in music

dynamic

the variation in the volume of musical sound (the amplitude of the sound waves)

form

the structure of the phrases and sections within a musical composition (Does it repeat?)

Guide of Arezzo

a medieval music theorist who developed a system of lines and spaces that enabled musicians to notate the specific notes in a melody

improvisation

the process whereby musicians create music spontaneously using the elements of music as building blocks

instrumentation

the instruments comprising a musical group (including the human voice)

interval

the distance in pitch between any two notes

harmony

any simultaneous combination of tones and the rules governing those combinations (the way a melody is accompanied is also another way to define harmony)

homophonic

musical texture comprised of one melodic line accompanied by chords

key

the set of pitches on which a composition is based

keyboard

instruments that are characterized by keyboards, such as the piano, organ, vibraphone, and accordion

measure

a unit of time that contains a specific number of beats defined by the meter/ time signature

melody

a succession of single tones in musical compositions

meter

the way in which the beats are grouped together in a piece

monophonic

musical texture comprised of one melodic line; a melodic line may be sung by one person or 100 people

motive

the smallest musical unit of a melody, generally a single rhythm of two or three pitches

noise

a disorganized sound with no observable pitch

polyphony

musical texture that simultaneously features two or more relatively independent and important melodic lines

range

the number of pitches, expressed as an intervallic distance

register

the low, medium, and high sections of an instrument or vocal range

rhythm

the way the music is organized in respect to time

scale

a series of pitches, ordered by the interval between its notes

sequence

a repetition of a motive or phrase at a different pitch level

strings

instruments whose sound is produced by setting strings in motion

syncopation

the act of shifting the normal accent, usually by stressing the normally unaccented weak beats or placing the accent between the beats themselves

synthesizers

electronic instruments (often in keyboard form) that create sounds using basic wave forms in different combinations

tempo

the speed at which the beat is played

texture

the ways in which musical lines of a musical piece interact

timbre

the tone color or tone quality of a sound

time signature

the numeric notation at the beginning of a line of music where the top number indicates how many beats are in each measure and the bottom number indicates which type of note will represent that beat

tonic

the most important pitch of a key; the note from which the other pitches are derived

triad

a chord that has three pitches stacked in intervals of thirds

Twelve-Bar blues

a twelve-bar musical form commonly found in American music

woodwinds

instruments traditionally made of wood whose sound is generated by forcing air through a tube, thus creating a vibrating air column