Music and Meaning

Nov. 2, 2005AK 2100

The aim of this presentation is to provide a few fundamental ideas, terms and concepts that can be used to better understand how music is structured. Such an understanding is key to unravelling the “mystery” of how and what music means.

Sound and Time

• Music is the art of sound in time

• Sound produced by vibrations

• Pitch

• Dynamics

This symbol is pianissimo, it means play very softly.

This symbol is piano, it means play softly

This symbol is mezzo piano, it means play moderately soft.

This symbol is mezzo forte, it means play moderately loud

This symbol is forte, it means play loudly

This symbol is fortissimo, it means play very loudly

The crescendo sign, it means gradually become louder.

This sign is decrescendo, it means gradually become softer.

Sound and Time• Excerpt: Berlioz,

Fantastic Symphony, IV, March to the Scaffold

0:00 Quiet and Mysterious Low Range pp 0:15 Rustling Sounds Middle Range 0:22 Wind Instruments High Range0:35 Single Sharp Accent sf0:47 Gets Louder Higher instruments long crescendo, leading to f added then ff, more accents1:07 Sudden collapse p followed by diminuendo1:15 New Tune First low, then high Played p1:52 Cuts off sharply: big sound ff, more accents

Similar pitch and dynamic effects for the rest of the excerpt

3:07 Sinking passage Individual pitches, lower and lower3:45 Ominous Lowest pitch of all pp

Pitch Dynamic

Sound and Time

• Tone Color - overtones

• No precise terms: bright, warm, ringing or brassy

• Duration: broad term within music is rhythm

Rhythm and Pitch

• rhythm: actual arrangement of durations

• beat: basic unit for measuring time in music

• accent: some beats are given more emphasis than others

• to beat time is to organize it

• meter: recurring patterns of strong and weak beats

• in Western music only two basic kinds of meter (simple and compound meter)

Metrical vs Non-metrical

• Metrical: Doogus Idris, Sudanese Song

Metrical vs Non-metrical

• Metrical: Tehillim, Steve Reich

Metrical vs Non-metrical

• Non-metrical: Rag, Mauj-Khammaj)

Metrical vs Non-metrical

• Non-metrical: Debussy, Clouds

Rhythm and Pitch

• Compound meter: think of “row, row, row your boat”

• In Western music duple or triple meter serves as the background against which we perceive music’s actual rhythms

• Meter is background; rhythm is foreground

Rhythm and Pitch

Rhythm and Pitch

• Often meter is not explicitly beaten out at all. Does not need to be. We “sense” it

• Meter is strongly stressed in music designed to stimulate regular body movements (e.g. dance of marching music) Example of Duple Meter

I Lotring, Bopong

Rhythm and Pitch

• Often meter is not explicitly beaten out at all. Does not need to be. We “sense” it

• Meter is strongly stressed in music designed to stimulate regular body movements (e.g. dance of marching music) Example of Duple Meter

Bach, Brandenburg Concerto

Pitch

• music in general does not use the total continuous range of musical sounds

• draws from a limited number of fixed pitches

• assembled in a collection called a scale

• different cultures have different scales

• pitches that constitute scales differ across cultures and history

Octaves

A vibrating string that is exactly half as long as another will reinforce the longer one’s strongest partial. This reinforcement causes the duplication effect of octaves

Scales

Diatonic

• Andean Processional “Hanaq pachap kusikuynin”

Diatonic

• Copeland, Appalachian Spring

Chromatic

• Chopin, Nocturne in F-sharp

Chromatic

• Ligeti, Lux aeterna

Scales• human beings able to

detect about 10 octaves

• most instruments have a 2-3 octave range. Piano has about 7

• 7 pitches originally used in Western music. Dates from Ancient Greece

• chromatic scale: original basic scale

Structures of Music

• music consists of simple and complex structures

• do not experience tone, colour, rhythm, dynamics in isolation of one another

Structures of Music - Melody

• melody: an organized series of pitches

• evokes human emotions most directly

Structures of Music - Tunes

• Tunes: a special kind of melody

• divisions in to phrases

• balance between phrases

• parallelism and contrast

• climax and cadence

Structures of Music - Tunes

• George Gershwin “Who Cares” - Ella Fitzgerald0:12 Verse

Let it rain and thunder . . . . Includes a long (six fold) sequence 0:48 Tempo changes0:57Tune Who cares if the sky is to fall in the sea? Who cares what banks fail in Yonkers? Contrasting phrase Long as you’ve got a kiss that conquers Parallel phrase - starts like the preceding, ends higher Why should I care? Life is one long... Three-fold sequence (should I care/life is one/jubilee) Climax on “jubilee” So long as I care for you and you care Free sequence (I care for you/You care for me) - cadence1:55 Tune Begun by band

Structures of Music - Motives & Themes

• motive: distinctive fragment of melody

• theme: refers to the function, not the nature of musical material. Could be a motive, a colour tone, a melody...

Structures of Music - Harmony

• single melodic line in time is enough to qualify as music

• common to hear melodies together with other sounds (accompaniments)

• harmonization

Structures of Music - Harmony

• Consonance:chords that sound at rest

• Dissonance: chords sound tense

• Depend on the kinds of intervals that are sounding simulatenously

• Octaves are the most consonant. Half steps most dissonant

Structures of Music - Texture

• refers to the blend of the various sounds and melodic lines occurring simultaneously in music

• monophony: single unaccompanied melody

• heterophony: subtly different versions of a single melody presented simultaneously

• homophony: one melody combined with other sounds

• polyphony: two or more melodies simultaneously

0:00Joy theme Low register monophony: a single melodic line, cellos and bases playing together. No accompaniment0:39Theme An octave higher Polyphony, non-imitative: the theme with two lines of counterpoint, in low strings and a mellow wind instrument1:36Theme Two octaves higher

2:21 Theme Three octaves higher Homophony: full orchestra with trumpets prominent

Example of monophonic, polyphonic and homophonic texturesfrom: Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 (Joy Theme)

Structures of Music - tonality/modality

• tonality: occurs when melodies give a sense of focusing around a single home pitch

• modality: major and minor keys - refers to different ways of centering or organizing the diatonic scale

Structures of Music - tonality/modality

Musical Form and Style

• form in art is related to its emotional quality

• in music form refers to organization of elements and also standardized formal patterns that are used over and over again

• Two basic factors created musical form

• repetition: Bernstein, “Cool”

• contrast

Musical Form and Style

• form in art is related to its emotional quality

• in music form refers to organization of elements and also standardized formal patterns that are used over and over again

• Two basic factors created musical form

• repetition

• contrast: Joplin “Maple Leaf Rag”