1.
Henry Purcell
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Henry Purcell was an English composer. Although incorporating Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, Purcells legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music, Purcell was born in St Anns Lane, Old Pye Street Westminster – the area of London later known as Devils Acre – in 1659. Henry Purcell Senior, whose older brother Thomas Purcell was also a musician, was a gentleman of the Chapel Royal, Henry the elder had three sons, Edward, Henry and Daniel. Daniel Purcell, the youngest of the brothers, was also a composer who wrote the music for much of the final act of The Indian Queen after Henry Purcells death. Henry Purcells family lived just a few hundred yards west of Westminster Abbey from 1659 onwards, after his fathers death in 1664, Purcell was placed under the guardianship of his uncle Thomas, who showed him great affection and kindness. Thomas was himself a gentleman of His Majestys Chapel, and arranged for Henry to be admitted as a chorister, Henry studied first under Captain Henry Cooke, Master of the Children, and afterwards under Pelham Humfrey, Cookes successor. Henry was a chorister in the Chapel Royal until his voice broke in 1673, when he became assistant to the organ-builder John Hingston, who held the post of keeper of wind instruments to the King. Purcell is said to have been composing at nine years old and it is assumed that the three-part song Sweet tyranness, I now resign was written by him as a child. After Humfreys death, Purcell continued his studies under Dr John Blow and he attended Westminster School and in 1676 was appointed copyist at Westminster Abbey. Henry Purcells earliest anthem Lord, who can tell was composed in 1678 and it is a psalm that is prescribed for Christmas Day and also to be read at morning prayer on the fourth day of the month. In 1679, he wrote songs for John Playfords Choice Ayres, Songs and Dialogues and an anthem, the dates of very few of these sacred compositions are known, perhaps the most notable example is the anthem They that go down to the sea in ships. The challenging work opens with a passage which traverses the full extent of Gostlings range, beginning on the upper D, in 1679, Blow, who had been appointed organist of Westminster Abbey in 1669, resigned his office in favour of his pupil. Purcell now devoted himself almost entirely to the composition of sacred music, between 1680 and 1688 Purcell wrote music for seven plays. It was written to a libretto furnished by Nahum Tate, and performed in 1689 in cooperation with Josias Priest, a dancing master, priests wife kept a boarding school for young gentlewomen, first in Leicester Fields and afterwards at Chelsea, where the opera was performed. Both works run to less than one hour, at the time, Dido and Aeneas never found its way to the theatre, though it appears to have been very popular in private circles. The composition of Dido and Aeneas gave Purcell his first chance to write a musical setting of a dramatic text. It was his opportunity to compose a work in which the music carried the entire drama. The story of Dido and Aeneas derives from the source in Virgils epic the Aeneid
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Dido and Aeneas
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Dido and Aeneas is an opera in a prologue and three acts, written by the English Baroque composer Henry Purcell with a libretto by Nahum Tate. The dates of the composition and first performance of the opera are uncertain and it was composed no later than July 1688, and had been performed at Josias Priests girls school in London by the end of 1689. Some scholars argue for a date of composition as early as 1683, the story is based on Book IV of Virgils Aeneid. It recounts the love of Dido, Queen of Carthage, for the Trojan hero Aeneas, a monumental work in Baroque opera, Dido and Aeneas is remembered as one of Purcells foremost theatrical works. It was also Purcells only true opera, as well as his only all-sung dramatic work, one of the earliest known English operas, it owes much to John Blows Venus and Adonis, both in structure and in overall effect. The influence of Cavallis opera Didone is also apparent and he also composed songs for two plays by Nahum Tate, The Sicilian Usurper and Cuckold-Haven. Dido and Aeneas was Purcells first all-sung opera and derives from the English masque tradition, originally based on Nahum Tates play Brutus of Alba, or The Enchanted Lovers, the opera is likely, at least to some extent, to be allegorical. The prologue refers to the joy of a marriage between two monarchs, which could refer to the marriage between William and Mary. In a poem of about 1686, Tate alluded to James II as Aeneas, who is misled by the machinations of the Sorceress and her witches into abandoning Dido. The same symbolism may apply to the opera and this explains the addition of the characters of the Sorceress and the witches, which do not appear in the original Aeneid. It would be noble, or at least acceptable, for Aeneas to follow the decree of the Gods, no score in Purcells hand is extant, and the only seventeenth-century source is a libretto, possibly from the original performance. The earliest extant score, held in the Bodleian Library, was copied no earlier than 1750, no later sources follow the act divisions of the libretto, and the music to the prologue is lost. The first of the arias to be published separately was Ah, the most famous aria of the work is When I am laid in earth, popularly known as Didos Lament. Both arias are formed on a ground bass. Didos Lament has been performed or recorded by far from the typical operatic school, such as Klaus Nomi, Ane Brun. It has also been transcribed or used in scores, including the soundtrack to the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers. It is played annually by a band at the Cenotaph remembrance ceremony. The music is thought by some to be too simple for Purcell in 1689, the work is scored for four-part strings and continuo
3.
Figured bass
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Basso continuo parts, almost universal in the Baroque era, provided the harmonic structure of the music. The phrase is shortened to continuo, and the instrumentalists playing the continuo part are called the continuo group. The titles of many Baroque works make mention of the section, such as J. S. Bachs Concerto for Two Violins, Strings. The makeup of the group is often left to the discretion of the performers. At least one instrument capable of playing chords must be included, such as a harpsichord, organ, lute, theorbo, guitar, regal, or harp. In addition, any number of instruments play in the bass register may be included, such as cello, double bass, bass viol. The most common combination, at least in modern performances, is harpsichord and cello for instrumental works and secular works, such as operas. Harps, lutes, and other instruments are more typical of early 17th-century music. The keyboard player realizes a continuo part by playing, in addition to the bass line, notes above it to complete chords. The figured bass notation, described below, is a guide, but performers are expected to use their musical judgment. Experienced players sometimes incorporate motives found in the instrumental parts into their improvised chordal accompaniment. Modern editions of music usually supply a realized keyboard part, fully written out in staff notation for a player. With the rise in historically informed performance, however, the number of performers who are able to improvise their parts from the figures, as Baroque players would have done, has increased. Basso continuo, though a structural and identifying element of the Baroque period, continued to be used in many works, mostly sacred choral works. An example is C. P. E. Bachs Concerto in D minor for flute, strings and basso continuo. Examples of its use in the 19th century are rarer, but they do exist, masses by Anton Bruckner, Beethoven, the phrase tasto solo indicates that only the bass line is to be played for a short period, usually until the next figure is encountered. This instructs the chord-playing instrumentalist not to play any improvised chords for a period, composers were inconsistent in the usages described below. Especially in the 17th century, the numbers were omitted whenever the composer thought the chord was obvious, early composers such as Claudio Monteverdi often specified the octave by the use of compound intervals such as 10,11, and 15
4.
Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta
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Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta, Sz. 106, BB114 is one of the compositions by the Hungarian composer Béla Bartók. Commissioned by Paul Sacher to celebrate the anniversary of the chamber orchestra Basler Kammerorchester. The work was premiered in Basel, Switzerland on January 21,1937 by the orchestra conducted by Sacher. As its title indicates, the piece is written for string instruments, percussion instruments, the ensemble also includes a piano, which may be classified as either a percussion or string instrument. The piece is in four movements, the first and third slow, all movements are written without key signature, Andante tranquillo Allegro Adagio Allegro molto The first movement is a slow fugue. It is based around the note A, on which the movement begins, the movement ends with the second phrase of the fugue subject played softly over its inversion. Material from the first movement can be seen as serving as the basis for the movements. The second movement is quick, with a theme in 2/4 time which is transformed into 3/8 time towards the end and it is marked with a loud syncopated piano and percussion accents in a whirling dance, evolving in an extended pizzicato section, with a piano concerto-like conclusion. The third movement is slow, an example of what is often called Bartóks Night music and it features timpani glissandi, which was an unusual technique at the time of the works composition, as well as a prominent part for the xylophone. The last movement, which begins with notes on the timpani, the popularity of the Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta is demonstrated by the use of themes from this work in films and popular music. The second movement of this work accompanies Craigs Dance of Despair, the Adagio movement was used as the theme music for The Vampira Show, and it was also featured in the Stanley Kubrick film The Shining. It also was the soundtrack for the 1978 Australian film Money Movers, also the Music is sampled by Anthony Ant Davis from the underground hip hop group Atmosphere, from Minneapolis, on the song Aspiring Sociopath of their album Lucy Ford. The architect Steven Holl used the overlapping strettos that occur in this piece as a parallel on which the form of the Stretto House in Dallas, Texas was made. The novel City of Night by John Rechy makes reference to Music for Strings Percussion and Celesta, the Music is also mentioned in the novel The Collector by John Fowles, where one of the main characters, Miranda Grey, calls it The loveliest. Much of the music from this collection, along with The Miraculous Mandarin, can be heard as underscore for two Doctor Who stories, 1967s The Enemy of the World and 1968s The Web of Fear
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Fugue
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A fugue usually has three sections, an exposition, a development, and a final entry that contains the return of the subject in the fugues tonic key. In the Middle Ages, the term was used to denote any works in canonic style, by the Renaissance. Since the 17th century, the fugue has described what is commonly regarded as the most fully developed procedure of imitative counterpoint. Most fugues open with a main theme, the subject, which then sounds successively in each voice, when each voice has entered. This is often followed by a passage, or episode, developed from previously heard material. In this sense, a fugue is a style of composition, the form evolved during the 18th century from several earlier types of contrapuntal compositions, such as imitative ricercars, capriccios, canzonas, and fantasias. The famous fugue composer Johann Sebastian Bach shaped his own works after those of Johann Jakob Froberger, Johann Pachelbel, Girolamo Frescobaldi, Dieterich Buxtehude and others. With the decline of sophisticated styles at the end of the period, the fugues central role waned, eventually giving way as sonata form. The English term fugue originated in the 16th century and is derived from the French word fugue or the Italian fuga and this in turn comes from Latin, also fuga, which is itself related to both fugere and fugare. A fugue begins with the exposition and is according to certain predefined rules, in later portions the composer has more freedom. Further entries of the subject will occur throughout the fugue, repeating the accompanying material at the same time, the various entries may or may not be separated by episodes. What follows is a chart displaying a fairly typical fugal outline, S = subject, A = answer, CS = countersubject, T = Tonic, D = Dominant A fugue begins with the exposition of its subject in one of the voices alone in the tonic key. After the statement of the subject, a second voice enters and states the subject with the subject transposed to another key, to make the music run smoothly, it may also have to be altered slightly. A tonal answer is called for when the subject begins with a prominent dominant note. To prevent an undermining of the sense of key, this note is transposed up a fourth to the tonic rather than up a fifth to the supertonic. Answers in the subdominant are also employed for the same reason, while the answer is being stated, the voice in which the subject was previously heard continues with new material. If this new material is reused in later statements of the subject, it is called a countersubject, if this material is only heard once. The countersubject is written in invertible counterpoint at the octave or fifteenth, for example, when the note G sounds in one voice above the note C in lower voice, the interval of a fifth is formed, which is considered consonant and entirely acceptable
6.
Subject (music)
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In music, a subject is the material, usually a recognizable melody, upon which part or all of a composition is based. In forms other than the fugue this may be known as the theme, a subject may be perceivable as a complete musical expression in itself, separate from the work in which it is found. In contrast to an idea or motif, a subject is usually a phrase or period. The Encyclopédie Fasquelle defines a theme as Any element, motif, Thematic changes and processes are often structurally important, and theorists such as Rudolph Reti have created analysis from a purely thematic perspective. Fred Lerdahl describes thematic relations as associational and thus outside his cognitive-based generative theorys scope of analysis, Music based on a single theme is called monothematic, while music based on several themes is called polythematic. Most fugues are monothematic and most pieces in sonata form are polythematic, in the exposition of a fugue, the principal theme is announced successively in each voice – sometimes in a transposed form. In some compositions, a subject is announced and then a second melody, sometimes called a countersubject or secondary theme. Music without subjects/themes, or without recognizable, repeating, and developing subjects/themes, is called athematic, examples include the pre-twelve-tone or early atonal works of Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, Alban Berg, and Alois Hába. Schoenberg once said that, intoxicated by the enthusiasm of having freed music from the shackles of tonality, in fact, I … believed that now music could renounce motivic features and remain coherent and comprehensible nevertheless. Examples in the works of later composers include Polyphonie X and Structures I by Pierre Boulez, Sonata for Two Pianos by Karel Goeyvaerts, and Punkte by Karlheinz Stockhausen. In a fugue, when the first voice has completed the subject, and the voice is playing the answer. The countersubject usually contrasts with the subject/answer phrase shape, in a fugue, a countersubject is the continuation of counterpoint in the voice that began with the subject, occurring against the answer. It is not usually regarded as a feature of fugue. Attacco Cell Figure Formula composition Leitmotif Thematic transformation Benward, Bruce, Music in Theory and Practice, eighth edition, vol. The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie, the Oxford Companion to Music, edited by Alison Latham. Une nouvelle grammaire musicale, prémices et premiers essais / A New Musical Grammar, Principles, la Scena Musicale 6, no.3. Lerdahl, Fred. Cognitive Constraints on Compositional Systems, Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press. Encyclopédie de la musique,3 vols, Music and Discourse, Toward a Semiology of Music, translated by Caroline Abbate
7.
Greek language
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Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece and other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any living language, spanning 34 centuries of written records and its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the major part of its history, other systems, such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, were used previously. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic and many other writing systems. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world, during antiquity, Greek was a widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world and many places beyond. It would eventually become the official parlance of the Byzantine Empire, the language is spoken by at least 13.2 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey, and the Greek diaspora. Greek roots are used to coin new words for other languages, Greek. Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, the earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the worlds oldest recorded living language. Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now extinct Anatolian languages, the Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods, Proto-Greek, the unrecorded but assumed last ancestor of all known varieties of Greek. The unity of Proto-Greek would have ended as Hellenic migrants entered the Greek peninsula sometime in the Neolithic era or the Bronze Age, Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Mycenaean civilisation. It is recorded in the Linear B script on tablets dating from the 15th century BC onwards, Ancient Greek, in its various dialects, the language of the Archaic and Classical periods of the ancient Greek civilisation. It was widely known throughout the Roman Empire, after the Roman conquest of Greece, an unofficial bilingualism of Greek and Latin was established in the city of Rome and Koine Greek became a first or second language in the Roman Empire. The origin of Christianity can also be traced through Koine Greek, Medieval Greek, also known as Byzantine Greek, the continuation of Koine Greek in Byzantine Greece, up to the demise of the Byzantine Empire in the 15th century. Much of the written Greek that was used as the language of the Byzantine Empire was an eclectic middle-ground variety based on the tradition of written Koine. Modern Greek, Stemming from Medieval Greek, Modern Greek usages can be traced in the Byzantine period and it is the language used by the modern Greeks, and, apart from Standard Modern Greek, there are several dialects of it. In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia, the historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language is often emphasised. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language and it is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, Homeric Greek is probably closer to demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English, Greek is spoken by about 13 million people, mainly in Greece, Albania and Cyprus, but also worldwide by the large Greek diaspora. Greek is the language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population
8.
Music theory
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Music theory is the study of the practices and possibilities of music. The term is used in three ways in music, though all three are interrelated. The first is what is otherwise called rudiments, currently taught as the elements of notation, of key signatures, of time signatures, of rhythmic notation, Theory in this sense is treated as the necessary preliminary to the study of harmony, counterpoint, and form. The second is the study of writings about music from ancient times onwards, Music theory is frequently concerned with describing how musicians and composers make music, including tuning systems and composition methods among other topics. However, this medieval discipline became the basis for tuning systems in later centuries, Music theory as a practical discipline encompasses the methods and concepts composers and other musicians use in creating music. The development, preservation, and transmission of music theory in this sense may be found in oral and written music-making traditions, musical instruments, and other artifacts. In ancient and living cultures around the world, the deep and long roots of music theory are clearly visible in instruments, oral traditions, and current music making. Many cultures, at least as far back as ancient Mesopotamia and ancient China, have also considered music theory in more formal ways such as written treatises, in modern academia, music theory is a subfield of musicology, the wider study of musical cultures and history. Etymologically, music theory is an act of contemplation of music, from the Greek θεωρία, a looking at, viewing, contemplation, speculation, theory, also a sight, a person who researches, teaches, or writes articles about music theory is a music theorist. University study, typically to the M. A. or Ph. D level, is required to teach as a music theorist in a US or Canadian university. Methods of analysis include mathematics, graphic analysis, and especially analysis enabled by Western music notation, comparative, descriptive, statistical, and other methods are also used. See for instance Paleolithic flutes, Gǔdí, and Anasazi flute, several surviving Sumerian and Akkadian clay tablets include musical information of a theoretical nature, mainly lists of intervals and tunings. The scholar Sam Mirelman reports that the earliest of these dates from before 1500 BCE. Further, All the Mesopotamian texts are united by the use of a terminology for music that, much of Chinese music history and theory remains unclear. The earliest texts about Chinese music theory are inscribed on the stone and they include more than 2800 words describing theories and practices of music pitches of the time. The bells produce two intertwined pentatonic scales three tones apart with additional pitches completing the chromatic scale, Chinese theory starts from numbers, the main musical numbers being twelve, five and eight. Twelve refers to the number of pitches on which the scales can be constructed, the Lüshi chunqiu from about 239 BCE recalls the legend of Ling Lun. On order of the Yellow Emperor, Ling Lun collected twelve bamboo lengths with thick, blowing on one of these like a pipe, he found its sound agreeable and named it huangzhong, the Yellow Bell
9.
Scale (music)
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In music theory, a scale is any set of musical notes ordered by fundamental frequency or pitch. A scale ordered by increasing pitch is a scale. Some scales contain different pitches when ascending than when descending, for example, the Melodic minor scale. Due to the principle of equivalence, scales are generally considered to span a single octave. A musical scale represents a division of the space into a certain number of scale steps. A measure of the width of each scale step provides a method to classify scales, based on their interval patterns, scales are put into categories including diatonic, chromatic, major, minor, and others. A specific scale is defined by its interval pattern and by a special note. The tonic of a scale is the selected as the beginning of the octave. Typically, the name of the scale specifies both its tonic and its interval pattern, for example, C major indicates a major scale with a C tonic. Scales are typically listed from low to high, most scales are octave-repeating, meaning their pattern of notes is the same in every octave. An octave-repeating scale can be represented as an arrangement of pitch classes. The distance between two notes in a scale is called a scale step. The notes of a scale are numbered by their steps from the root of the scale, for example, in a C major scale the first note is C, the second D, the third E and so on. Two notes can also be numbered in relation to other, C and E create an interval of a third. A single scale can be manifested at many different pitch levels, for example, a C major scale can be started at C4 and ascending an octave to C5, or it could be started at C6, ascending an octave to C7. As long as all the notes can be played, the octave they take on can be altered, the pitch distances or intervals among the notes of a scale tell us more about the sound of the music than does the mere number of tones. The notes of a scale form intervals with each of the notes of the chord in combination. A 5-note scale has 10 of these intervals, a 6-note scale has 15, a 7-note scale has 21
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Interval (music)
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In music theory, an interval is the difference between two pitches. In Western music, intervals are most commonly differences between notes of a diatonic scale, the smallest of these intervals is a semitone. Intervals smaller than a semitone are called microtones and they can be formed using the notes of various kinds of non-diatonic scales. Some of the very smallest ones are called commas, and describe small discrepancies, observed in some tuning systems, Intervals can be arbitrarily small, and even imperceptible to the human ear. In physical terms, an interval is the ratio between two sonic frequencies, for example, any two notes an octave apart have a frequency ratio of 2,1. This means that successive increments of pitch by the same result in an exponential increase of frequency. For this reason, intervals are often measured in cents, a derived from the logarithm of the frequency ratio. In Western music theory, the most common naming scheme for intervals describes two properties of the interval, the quality and number, examples include the minor third or perfect fifth. These names describe not only the difference in semitones between the upper and lower notes, but also how the interval is spelled, the importance of spelling stems from the historical practice of differentiating the frequency ratios of enharmonic intervals such as G–G♯ and G–A♭. The size of an interval can be represented using two alternative and equivalently valid methods, each appropriate to a different context, frequency ratios or cents, the size of an interval between two notes may be measured by the ratio of their frequencies. When a musical instrument is tuned using a just intonation tuning system, Intervals with small-integer ratios are often called just intervals, or pure intervals. Most commonly, however, musical instruments are tuned using a different tuning system. As a consequence, the size of most equal-tempered intervals cannot be expressed by small-integer ratios, for instance, an equal-tempered fifth has a frequency ratio of 2 7⁄12,1, approximately equal to 1.498,1, or 2.997,2. For a comparison between the size of intervals in different tuning systems, see section Size in different tuning systems, the standard system for comparing interval sizes is with cents. The cent is a unit of measurement. If frequency is expressed in a scale, and along that scale the distance between a given frequency and its double is divided into 1200 equal parts, each of these parts is one cent. In twelve-tone equal temperament, a system in which all semitones have the same size. Hence, in 12-TET the cent can be defined as one hundredth of a semitone
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Chord (music)
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A chord, in music, is any harmonic set of pitches consisting of two or more notes that are heard as if sounding simultaneously. In everyday use by musical ensembles such as bands and orchestras, however, the notes of a chord do not have to be played together at the same time, arpeggios and broken chords may, for many practical and theoretical purposes, also constitute chords. Other chords with more than three notes include added tone chords, extended chords and tone clusters, which are used in classical music, jazz. Triads commonly found in the Western classical tradition are major and minor chords, the descriptions major, minor, augmented, and diminished are referred to collectively as chordal quality. Chords are also classified by their root note—for instance, a C major triad consists of the pitch classes C, E. While most chords have at least three notes, power chords, which are used in rock music, particularly in hard rock. An ordered series of chords is called a chord progression, one example of a widely used chord progression in Western traditional music and blues is the 12 bar blues progression, the simplest versions of which include tonic, subdominant and dominant chords. To describe this, Western music theory has developed the practice of numbering chords using Roman numerals which represent the number of steps up from the tonic note of the scale. Common ways of notating or representing chords in Western music include Roman numerals, figured bass, macro symbols, the chords in a song or piece are also given names which refer to their function. The chord built on the first note of a scale is called the tonic chord. The chord built on the note of a major scale is called the subdominant chord. The chord built on the degree of the major scale is called the dominant chord. There are names for the built on every note of the major scale. Chords can be played on instruments, including piano, pipe organ, guitar. Chords can also be performed when multiple musicians play together in an ensemble or when multiple singers sing in a choir. The English word chord derives from Middle English cord, a shortening of accord in the sense of agreement and later. A sequence of chords is known as a progression or harmonic progression. These are frequently used in Western music, a chord progression aims for a definite goal of establishing a tonality founded on a key, root or tonic chord
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Musical note
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In music, the term note has three primary meanings, A sign used in musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a sound, A pitched sound itself. Notes are the blocks of much written music, discretizations of musical phenomena that facilitate performance, comprehension. In the former case, one note to refer to a specific musical event, in the latter. Two notes with fundamental frequencies in an equal to any integer power of two are perceived as very similar. Because of that, all notes with these kinds of relations can be grouped under the pitch class. However, within the English-speaking and Dutch-speaking world, pitch classes are represented by the first seven letters of the Latin alphabet. A few European countries, including Germany, adopt an almost identical notation, the eighth note, or octave, is given the same name as the first, but has double its frequency. The name octave is also used to indicate the span between a note and another with double frequency, for example, the now-standard tuning pitch for most Western music,440 Hz, is named a′ or A4. There are two systems to define each note and octave, the Helmholtz pitch notation and the scientific pitch notation. Letter names are modified by the accidentals, a sharp ♯ raises a note by a semitone or half-step, and a flat ♭ lowers it by the same amount. In modern tuning a half step has a ratio of 12√2. The accidentals are written after the name, so, for example, F♯ represents F-sharp, B♭ is B-flat. Additional accidentals are the double-sharp, raising the frequency by two semitones, and double-flat, lowering it by that amount, in musical notation, accidentals are placed before the note symbols. Systematic alterations to the seven lettered pitches in the scale can be indicated by placing the symbols in the key signature, explicitly noted accidentals can be used to override this effect for the remainder of a bar. A special accidental, the natural symbol ♮, is used to indicate an unmodified pitch, effects of key signature and local accidentals do not accumulate. If the key signature indicates G♯, a flat before a G makes it G♭, though often this type of rare accidental is expressed as a natural. Likewise, a sharp sign on a key signature with a single sharp ♯ indicates only a double sharp. Assuming enharmonicity, many accidentals will create equivalences between pitches that are written differently, for instance, raising the note B to B♯ is equal to the note C
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Harmony
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In music, harmony considers the process by which the composition of individual sounds, or superpositions of sounds, is analysed by hearing. Usually, this means simultaneously occurring frequencies, pitches, or chords, the study of harmony involves chords and their construction and chord progressions and the principles of connection that govern them. Harmony is often said to refer to the aspect of music, as distinguished from melodic line. In popular and jazz harmony, chords are named by their root plus various terms, in many types of music, notably baroque, romantic, modern, and jazz, chords are often augmented with tensions. A tension is an additional member that creates a relatively dissonant interval in relation to the bass. Typically, in the common practice period a dissonant chord resolves to a consonant chord. Harmonization usually sounds pleasant to the ear when there is a balance between the consonant and dissonant sounds, in simple words, that occurs when there is a balance between tense and relaxed moments. The term harmony derives from the Greek ἁρμονία, meaning joint, agreement, concord, from the verb ἁρμόζω, to fit together, the term was often used for the whole field of music, while music referred to the arts in general. In Ancient Greece, the term defined the combination of contrasted elements, in the Middle Ages the term was used to describe two pitches sounding in combination, and in the Renaissance the concept was expanded to denote three pitches sounding together. Aristoxenus wrote a work entitled Harmonika Stoicheia, which is thought the first work in European history written on the subject of harmony, the underlying principle behind these texts is that harmony sanctions harmoniousness by conforming to certain pre-established compositional principles. Current dictionary definitions, while attempting to give concise descriptions, often highlight the ambiguity of the term in modern use, ambiguities tend to arise from either aesthetic considerations or from the point of view of musical texture (distinguishing between harmonic and contrapuntal. The view that modern tonal harmony in Western music began in about 1600 is commonplace in music theory and this is usually accounted for by the replacement of horizontal writing, common in the music of the Renaissance, with a new emphasis on the vertical element of composed music. Modern theorists, however, tend to see this as an unsatisfactory generalisation, as Carl Dahlhaus puts it, It was not that counterpoint was supplanted by harmony but that an older type both of counterpoint and of vertical technique was succeeded by a newer type. And harmony comprises not only the structure of chords but also their movement, like music as a whole, harmony is a process. Descriptions and definitions of harmony and harmonic practice may show bias towards European musical traditions, pitch simultaneity in particular is rarely a major consideration. Nevertheless, emphasis on the precomposed in European art music and the written theory surrounding it shows considerable cultural bias, the conception of musics that live in oral traditions as something composed with the use of improvisatory techniques separates them from the higher-standing works that use notation. Yet the evolution of harmonic practice and language itself, in Western art music, is and was facilitated by this process of prior composition, some traditions of Western music performance, composition, and theory have specific rules of harmony. This model provides that the seventh and ninth are not dissonant
14.
Heptatonic scale
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A heptatonic scale is a musical scale that has seven pitches per octave. Indian classical theory postulates seventy-two seven-tone scale types, whereas others postulate twelve or ten seven-tone scale types collectively called thaat, several heptatonic scales in Western, Roman, Spanish, Hungarian, and Greek music can be analyzed as juxtapositions of tetrachords. All heptatonic scales have all intervals present in their interval vector analysis, there is a special affinity for heptatonic scales in the Western key signature system. In Western music, there are seven such scales, and they are known as the modes of the major scale. In traditional classical theory, the minor scale has two forms, as noted above, an ascending form and a descending form. Although each of these forms of itself comprises seven pitches, together they comprise nine, in certain twentieth-century music, however, it became common systematically to use the ascending form for both ascending and descending passages. Such a use has been ascribed to the works of Béla Bartók. The traditional descending form of the minor scale is equivalent to the natural minor scale in both pitch collection and tonal center. The harmonic minor scale is so called because in music of the common practice period chords or harmonies are derived from it more than from the natural minor scale or the melodic minor scale. The A♭ in the middle voice does not ascend to B, the names heptatonia prima and heptatonia secunda apply to various seven-note scales that can be formed using tones and semitones, but without two semi-tones in succession. The less common series is While the diatonic modes have two and three tones between each semitone, the heptatonia secunda modes have one and four. g, if the interval of the augmented second is used, many other scales become possible. These include Gypsy I-♭II-III-IV-V-♭VI-VII Hungarian I-II-♭III-♯IV-V-♭VI-VII The scales are symmetrical about the tonic and dominant respectively, Phrygian major or dominant harmonic minor I-♭II-III-IV-V-♭VI-♭VII This differs from the Phrygian in having a major third. It may also be considered built on the dominant of the minor scale. Verdis Scala Enigmatica I-♭II-III-♯IV-♯V-♯VI-VII i. e. G A♭ B C♯ D♯ E♯ F♯, melakarta is a South Indian classical method of organizing Raagas based on their unique heptatonic scales. The postulated number of melakarta derives from arithmetical calculation and not from Carnatic practice, seven-pitch melakarta are considered subsets of a twelve-pitch scale roughly analogous to the Western chromatic scale. The second and third melakarta tones can be picked from the 4 chromatic tones, arithmetically this produces 25, or thirty-two, possibilities, but Hindustani theory, in contradistinction to Carnatic theory, excludes scale forms not commonly used. Gongche notation heptatonic scale gives a do, re, mi, sol, la, diatonic and chromatic Modes of the ancohemitonic heptatonic scales and the key signature system
15.
Chromatic scale
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The chromatic scale is a musical scale with twelve pitches, each a semitone above or below another. On a modern piano or other equal-tempered instrument, all the semitones have the same size, in other words, the notes of an equal-tempered chromatic scale are equally spaced. An equal-tempered chromatic scale is a nondiatonic scale having no tonic because of the symmetry of its equally spaced notes, the most common conception of the chromatic scale before the 13th century was the Pythagorean chromatic scale. Due to a different tuning technique, the twelve semitones in this scale have two different sizes. Thus, the scale is not perfectly symmetric, many other tuning systems, developed in the ensuing centuries, share a similar asymmetry. Equally spaced pitches are provided only by equal temperament tuning systems, the term chromatic derives from the Greek word chroma, meaning color. Chromatic notes are understood as harmonically inessential embellishments, shadings. The chromatic scale may be notated in a variety of ways, ascending and descending, The chromatic scale has no set spelling agreed upon by all. Its spelling is, however, often dependent upon major or minor key signatures, the images above, therefore, are only examples of chromatic scale notations. As an abstract entity, the chromatic scale is usually notated such that no scale degree is used more than twice in succession. The ancient Chinese chromatic scale is called Shí-èr-lǜ, however, it should not be imagined that this gamut ever functioned as a scale, and it is erroneous to refer to the Chinese chromatic scale, as some Western writers have done. The series of twelve known as the twelve lü were simply a series of fundamental notes from which scales could be constructed. The Indian solfège, i. e. sargam, makes up the notes of the chromatic scale with respective sharps. The total chromatic is the set of all pitch classes. An array is a succession of aggregates and these are 19-EDO just intonation approximations. In Pythagorean tuning the chromatic scale is tuned as follows, with higher than their enharmonic flats. The 12 golden notes of music Hewitt, Michael
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Semitones
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A semitone, also called a half step or a half tone, is the smallest musical interval commonly used in Western tonal music, and it is considered the most dissonant when sounded harmonically. It is defined as the interval between two adjacent notes in a 12-tone scale, for example, C is adjacent to C♯, the interval between them is a semitone. In music theory, a distinction is made between a diatonic semitone, or minor second and a semitone or augmented unison. In twelve-tone equal temperament all semitones are equal in size, in other tuning systems, semitone refers to a family of intervals that may vary both in size and name. In quarter-comma meantone, seven of them are diatonic, and 117.1 cents wide, while the five are chromatic. 12-tone scales tuned in just intonation typically define three or four kinds of semitones, for instance, Asymmetric five-limit tuning yields chromatic semitones with ratios 25,24 and 135,128, and diatonic semitones with ratios 16,15 and 27,25. The condition of having semitones is called hemitonia, that of having no semitones is anhemitonia, a musical scale or chord containing semitones is called hemitonic, one without semitones is anhemitonic. The minor second occurs in the scale, between the third and fourth degree, and between the seventh and eighth degree. It is also called the diatonic semitone because it occurs between steps in the diatonic scale, the minor second is abbreviated m2. Its inversion is the major seventh, listen to a minor second in equal temperament. Here, middle C is followed by D♭, which is a tone 100 cents sharper than C, melodically, this interval is very frequently used, and is of particular importance in cadences. In the perfect and deceptive cadences it appears as a resolution of the leading-tone to the tonic, in the plagal cadence, it appears as the falling of the subdominant to the mediant. It also occurs in many forms of the cadence, wherever the tonic falls to the leading-tone. Harmonically, the interval usually occurs as some form of dissonance or a tone that is not part of the functional harmony. It may also appear in inversions of a seventh chord. In unusual situations, the second can add a great deal of character to the music. For instance, Frédéric Chopins Étude Op.25, No.5 opens with a melody accompanied by a line that plays fleeting minor seconds and these are used to humorous and whimsical effect, which contrasts with its more lyrical middle section. This eccentric dissonance has earned the piece its nickname, the wrong note étude and this kind of usage of the minor second appears in many other works of the Romantic period, such as Modest Mussorgskys Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks
17.
Tetrachord
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In music theory, traditionally, a tetrachord is a series of four notes separated by three smaller intervals that span the interval of a perfect fourth, a 4,3 frequency proportion. In modern usage a tetrachord is any four-note segment of a scale or tone row, the term tetrachord derives from ancient Greek music theory, where it signified a segment of the Greater and Lesser Perfect Systems bounded by unmovable notes, the notes between these were movable. It literally means four strings, originally in reference to instruments such as the lyre or the kithara. Modern music theory makes use of the octave as the unit for determining tuning. Ancient Greek theorists recognized that the octave is a fundamental interval, ancient Greek music theory distinguishes three genera of tetrachords. This characteristic interval is usually smaller, becoming a whole tone. Classically, the diatonic tetrachord consists of two intervals of a tone and one of a semitone, e. g. A–G–F–E. Chromatic A chromatic tetrachord has an interval that is greater than about half the total interval of the tetrachord. Classically, the interval is a minor third, and the two smaller intervals are equal semitones, e. g. A–G♭–F–E. Enharmonic An enharmonic tetrachord has an interval that is greater than about four-fifths the total tetrachord interval. Classically, the interval is a ditone or a major third. The hypate and mese, and the paramese and nete are unmovable, fixed a perfect fourth apart, while the position of the parhypate and lichanos, as the three genera simply represent ranges of possible intervals within the tetrachord, various shades with specific tunings were specified. Once the genus and shade of tetrachord are specified, their arrangement can produce three types of scales, depending on which note of the tetrachord is taken as the first note of the scale. The tetrachords themselves remain independent of the scales that they produce, larger scales are constructed from conjunct or disjunct tetrachords. Conjunct tetrachords share a note, while disjunct tetrachords are separated by a tone of 9/8. Alternating conjunct and disjunct tetrachords form a scale that repeats in octaves, the Greeks analyzed genera using various terms, including diatonic, enharmonic, and chromatic. Scales are constructed from conjunct or disjunct tetrachords and this is a partial table of the superparticular divisions by Chalmers after Hofmann. Tetrachords based upon equal temperament tuning were used to explain common heptatonic scales, the 19th-century theorists of ancient Greek music believed that this had also been the case in Antiquity, and imagined that there had existed Dorian, Phrygian or Lydian tetrachords
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Mensural notation
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Mensural notation is the musical notation system used for European vocal polyphonic music from the later part of the 13th century until about 1600. The term mensural refers to the ability of this system to describe precisely measured rhythmic durations in terms of proportions between note values. e. Mensural notation grew out of an earlier, more limited method of notating rhythms in terms of fixed repetitive patterns, the rhythmic modes. An early form of notation was first described and codified in the treatise Ars cantus mensurabilis by Franco of Cologne. Around 1400, the French system was adopted across Europe, after around 1600, mensural notation gradually evolved into modern measure notation. The decisive innovation of mensural notation was the use of different note shapes to denote rhythmic durations that stood in well-defined. Mensural notation differed from the system in that the values of each note were more strongly context-dependent. In particular, a note could have the length of two or three units of the next smaller order, whereas in modern notation these relations are invariably binary. Whether a note was to be read as ternary or binary was a partly of context rules. There was also a system of temporarily shifting note values by proportion factors like 2,1 or 3,2. Mensural notation used no bar lines, and it sometimes employed special connected note forms inherited from earlier medieval notation. Unlike in the earliest beginnings of the writing of polyphonic music, Mensural notation was extensively described and codified by contemporary theorists. As these writings, like all work of the time, were usually in Latin. The system of note types used in mensural notation closely corresponds to the modern system, very rarely, mensural notation also used yet smaller subdivisions, such as the semifusa. On the other hand, there were two larger values, the longa and the maxima, which are no longer in regular use today. Despite these nominal equivalences, each note had a much shorter temporal value than its modern counterpart, between the 14th and 16th centuries, composers repeatedly introduced new note shapes for ever smaller temporal divisions of rhythm, and the older, longer notes were slowed down in proportion. Thus, what was originally the shortest of all values used, the semibreve, has become the longest note used routinely today. Originally, all notes were written in solid, filled-in form, in the mid-15th century, scribes began to use hollow note shapes, reserving black shapes only for the smallest note values
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Genus (music)
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Genus is a term used in the Ancient Greek and Roman theory of music to describe certain classes of intonations of the two movable notes within a tetrachord. Aristoxenus names genera some patterns of rhythm, the tetrachordal concept is also found in the modal theory of Byzantine music and relates to the jins of Arabic music. Between these are two notes, called parhypate and lichanos. The upper tone, lichanos, can vary over the range of a whole tone, however, their variation in position must always be proportional. This interval between the fixed hypate and movable parhypate cannot ever be larger than the interval between the two movable tones, when the composite of the two smaller intervals is less than the remaining interval, the three-note group is called pyknon. The positioning of two notes defined three genera, the diatonic, chromatic, and enharmonic. The first two of these were subject to variation, called shades—χρόαι —or species—εἶδη. For Aristoxenus himself, these shades were dynamic, that is, they were not fixed in a scale. Instead, they described characteristic functional progressions of intervals, which he called roads, for his successors, however, the genera became fixed intervallic successions, and their shades became precisely defined subcategories. Furthermore, in sharp contrast to the Pythagoreans, Aristoxenos deliberately avoids numerical ratios, Aristoxenus describes the diatonic genus as the oldest and most natural of the genera. It is the division of the tetrachord from which the diatonic scale evolved. The distinguishing characteristic of the genus is that its largest interval is about the size of a major second. The other two intervals vary according to the tunings of the various shades. The word is derived either from the Greek, dia and tonos, meaning proceeding by whole tones, or through, at the interval of a tone, or from Greek dia and tonikos, Aristoxenus describes two shades of the diatonic, which he calls soft and syntonic. Aristoxenus describes the chromatic genus as a recent development than the diatonic. It is characterized by an interval of a minor third. The pyknon, consisting of the two members of the tetrachord, is divided into two adjacent semitones. The scale generated by the genus is not like the modern chromatic scale
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Quarter tone
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A quarter tone play, is a pitch halfway between the usual notes of a chromatic scale or an interval about half as wide as a semitone, which is half a whole tone. Many composers are known for having written music including quarter tones or the quarter-tone scale —proposed by 19th-century music theorists Heinrich Richter in 1823, george Tucker, Ivan Alexandrovich Wyschnegradsky, and Iannis Xenakis. The term quarter tone can refer to a number of different intervals, for example, some 17th- and 18th-century theorists used the term to describe the distance between a sharp and enharmonically distinct flat in mean-tone temperaments. In the quarter tone scale, also called 24 tone equal temperament, the tone is 50 cents, or a frequency ratio of 24√2 or approximately 1.0293. In this scale the quarter tone is the smallest step, a semitone is thus made of two steps, and three steps make a three-quarter tone play or neutral second, half of a minor third. The 8-TET scale is composed of three-quarter tones, in just intonation the quarter tone can be represented by the septimal quarter tone,36,35, or by the undecimal quarter tone,33,32, approximately half the semitone of 16,15 or 25,24. The ratio of 36,35 is only 1.23 cents narrower than a 24-TET quarter tone and this just ratio is also the difference between a minor third and septimal minor third. Quarter tones and intervals close to also occur in a number of other equally tempered tuning systems. 22-TET contains an interval of 54.55 cents, slightly wider than a quarter-tone, whereas 53-TET has an interval of 45.28 cents, 72-TET also has equally tempered quarter-tones, and indeed contains 3 quarter tone scales, since 72 is divisible by 24. Johnston uses an upward and downward arrow to indicate a note is raised or lowered by a ratio of 33,32, because many musical instruments manufactured today are designed for the 12-tone scale, not all are usable for playing quarter tones. Sometimes special playing techniques must be used, other instruments can be used to play quarter tones when using audio signal processing effects such as pitch shifting. Pairs of conventional instruments tuned a tone apart can be used to play some quarter tone music. Indeed, quarter-tone pianos have been built, which consist essentially of two stacked one above the other in a single case, one tuned a quarter tone higher than the other. Many Persian dastgah and Arabic maqamat contain intervals of three-quarter tone size, the quarter tone scale may be primarily a theoretical construct in Arabic music. Previously, pitches of a mode were chosen from a scale consisting of seventeen tones, the Japanese multi-instrumentalist and experimental musical instrument builder Yuichi Onoue developed a 24-TET quarter tone tuning on his guitar. Several quarter-tone albums have been recorded by Jute Gyte, a one-man avantgarde black metal band from Missouri, the enharmonic genus of the Greek tetrachord consisted of a ditone or an approximate major third, and a semitone, which was divided into two microtones. Intervals matched particularly closely include the second, neutral third. The septimal minor third and septimal major third are approximated rather poorly, overall, 24-TET can be viewed as matching the 11th and 13th harmonics more closely than the 7th
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Ars nova
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The term is sometimes used more generally to refer to all European polyphonic music of the 14th century. For instance, Italian ars nova is sometimes used to denote the music of Francesco Landini, the ars in ars nova can be read as technique, or style. The term was first used in two treatises, titled Ars novae musicae by Johannes de Muris, and a collection of writings attributed to Philippe de Vitry often simply called Ars nova today. However, the term was only first used to describe an era by Johannes Wolf in 1904. Roughly, then, the ars antiqua is the music of the century. Other musical periods and styles have at times been called the new art, however, in modern historiographical usage. Stylistically, the music of the ars nova differed from the era in several ways. The overall aesthetic effect of changes was to create music of greater expressiveness. The most famous practitioner of the new style was Guillaume de Machaut. The ars-nova style is evident in his body of motets, lais, virelais, rondeaux. Denkmäler alter Musik aus dem Codex Reina, esther Lamandier, voice, harp, and portative organ. La fontaine amoureuse, Poetry and Music of Guillaume de Machaut, Music for a While, with Tom Klunis, narrator. La Messe de Nostre Dame und Motetten, James Bowman, Tom Sutcliffe, countertenors, Capella Antiqua München. La messe de Nostre Dame, Le voir dit, Messe de Notre Dame, Le lai de la fonteinne, Ma fin est mon commencement. Philippe De Vitry and the Ars Nova—Motets, sequentia Freiburg, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi,1991. Jean Bollery, Studio der Frühen Musik, anne Azéma, Dominique Visse, Boston Camerata and Ensemble Project Ars Nova. The Service of Venus and Mars, Music for the Knights of the Garter, the Spirit of England and France I, Music of the Late Middle Ages for Court and Church. The Study of Love, French Songs and Motets of the 14th Century, in Medieval France, An Encyclopedia, edited by William W. Kibler, Grover A. Zinn, Lawrence Earp, and John Bell Henneman, Jr. 72–73
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Coloratura
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The word Coloratura is originally from Italian, literally meaning coloring, and derives from the Latin word colorare. It is also now used to refer to passages of such music, operatic roles in which such music plays a prominent part. In these early texts the term is dealt with briefly and always with reference to Italian usage, the term coloratura is most commonly applied to the elaborate and florid figuration or ornamentation in classical and romantic vocal music. In the modern musicological sense the term is used to refer to florid music from all periods of music history. Despite its derivation from Latin colorare, the term coloratura does not apply to the practice of coloring the voice, the term is not restricted to describing any one range of voice. All female and male voice types may achieve mastery of coloratura technique, there are coloratura parts for all voice types in different musical genres. Nevertheless, the coloratura, when used without further qualification. A coloratura soprano has the ability to produce notes above high C. Examples of coloratura music for different voice ranges include, Mozarts Allelujah may be arranged for and sung by a properly trained contralto, the piece was written for soprano castrato. The aria Every valley shall be exalted from Handels Messiah is an example of a piece for tenor. Each singer of a role in Rossinis operas must have a secure coloratura technique. Osmin, a character in Mozarts The Abduction from the Seraglio, is a role for a bass. A modern example is I am the wife of Mao Tse-tung, sung by the part of Jiang Qing in the John Adams opera Nixon in China. Glitter And Be Gay from Leonard Bernsteins comic operetta, Candide Agitata da due venti a coloratura mezzo-soprano aria, medieval coloration Apel, Willi, ed. Harvard Dictionary of Music, second edition. Cambridge, Massachusetts, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, randel, Don Michael, ed. Apel, Willi, ed. Cambridge, Massachusetts, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, the New Grove Dictionary of Opera
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Chromaticism
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Chromaticism is a compositional technique interspersing the primary diatonic pitches and chords with other pitches of the chromatic scale. Chromaticism is in contrast or addition to tonality or diatonicism, chromatic elements are considered elaborations of or substitutions for diatonic scale members. Chromaticism is almost by definition an alteration of, an interpolation in or deviation from this basic diatonic organization, though these styles/methods continue to incorporate tonality or tonal elements, often the trends that led to these methods were abandoned, such as modulation. David Cope describes three forms of chromaticism, modulation, borrowed chords from secondary keys, and chromatic chords such as augmented sixth chords, the total chromatic is the collection of all twelve equally tempered pitch classes of the chromatic scale. Similarly, a chord is one which includes one or more such notes. A chromatic scale is one which proceeds entirely by semitones, so dividing the octave into twelve equal steps of one semitone each, linear chromaticism, is used in jazz, All improvised lines. will include non-harmonic, chromatic notes. In other words, at least one note of the chord is chromatically altered, any chord that is not chromatic is a diatonic chord. Examples, ♭II in first inversion is called the Neapolitan sixth chord, for example in C Major, F–A♭–D♭. The Neapolitan Sixth chord resolves to the V, the ♯IV diminished chord is the Sharpened subdominant with diminished seventh chord. The ♯IV diminished chord resolves to the V, the ♯IV can also be understood as the tonicization of V where it functions as viio7 of the V chord, written viio7/V. ♭VI, The Augmented sixth chord resolves to the V, in music theory, passus duriusculus is a Latin term which refers to chromatic line, often a bassline, whether descending or ascending. From the late 16th century onward, chromaticism has come to symbolize intense emotional expression in music, the chromatic symbolizing darkness doubt and grief and the diatonic light, affirmation and joy—this imagery has hardly changed for three centuries. Nevertheless the convention is a one and the emotional associations evoked by chromaticism have endured and indeed strengthened over the years. The rich harmonization of a chromatic scale in the Sleep Motif from Wagners opera Die Walkure. Donington speaks of this musics slow chromatic drift and its modulations as elusive as the drift into sleep itself. Chromaticism is often associated with dissonance, in the 16th century the repeated melodic semitone became associated with weeping, see, passus duriusculus, lament bass, and pianto. For instance, Catherine Clément calls the chromaticism in Wagners Isolde feminine stink, 20th-century music – Classical Passus duriusculus, Bach-Cantatas. com
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Orlande de Lassus
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Orlande de Lassus was a Netherlandish or Franco-Flemish composer of the late Renaissance. Lassus was born in Mons in the County of Hainaut, Habsburg Netherlands, at the age of twelve, he left the Low Countries with Ferrante Gonzaga and went to Mantua, Sicily, and later Milan. While in Milan, he made the acquaintance of the madrigalist Spirito lHoste da Reggio and he then worked as a singer and a composer for Costantino Castrioto in Naples in the early 1550s, and his first works are presumed to date from this time. However, he stayed there for only a year, no solid evidence survives for his whereabouts in 1554, but there are contemporary claims that he traveled in France and England. In 1555 he returned to the Low Countries and had his works published in Antwerp. In 1556 he joined the court of Albrecht V, Duke of Bavaria, Lassus was one of several Netherlanders to work there, and by far the most famous. He evidently was happy in Munich and decided to settle there, in 1558 he married Regina Wäckinger, the daughter of a maid of honor of the Duchess. They had two sons, both of whom became composers, and his daughter married the painter Hans von Aachen, by 1563 Lassus had been appointed maestro di cappella, succeeding Ludwig Daser in the post. Lassus remained in the service of Albrecht V and his heir, Wilhelm V, by the 1560s Lassus had become quite famous, and composers began to go to Munich to study with him. Andrea Gabrieli went there in 1562, and possibly remained in the chapel for a year, giovanni Gabrieli also possibly studied with him in the 1570s. His renown had spread outside of strictly musical circles, for in 1570 Emperor Maximilian II conferred nobility upon him, pope Gregory XIII knighted him and in 1571, and again in 1573, the king of France, Charles IX, invited him to visit. I do not want to leave my house, my garden, in the late 1570s and 1580s Lassus made several visits to Italy, where he encountered the most modern styles and trends. In Ferrara, the center of activity, he doubtless heard the madrigals being composed for the dEste court. However, his own style remained conservative and became simpler and more refined as he aged, Lassus died in Munich on 14 June 1594, the same day that his employer decided to dismiss him for economic reasons. He was buried in Munich in the Alter Franziskaner Friedhof, a cemetery that was cleared of gravestones in 1789 and is now the site of Max-Joseph-Platz. One of the most prolific, versatile, and universal composers of the late Renaissance, Lassus wrote over 2,000 works in all Latin, French and these include 530 motets,175 Italian madrigals and villanellas,150 French chansons, and 90 German lieder. The German music publisher Adam Berg dedicated 5 volumes of his Patrocinium musicum to Lassus music, almost 60 masses have survived complete, most of them are imitation masses using as melodic source material secular works written by himself or other composers. Technically impressive, they are nevertheless the most conservative part of his output, several of his masses are based on extremely secular French chansons, some of the source materials were outright obscene
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Prophetiae Sibyllarum
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Prophetiae Sibyllarum are a series of twelve motets by the Franco-Flemish composer Orlande de Lassus. The works are known for their extremely chromatic idiom and this cycle of motets is said to have been given as a personal gift to Albrecht V. of Bavaria, Lassus employer, after his arrival in Munich. By the time he had work in Germany, Lassus had already enjoyed great success in Italy as a composer for Costantino Castrioto. The motets were first published in 1600, after Lassus death in 1594, there remains, however, a small amount of disagreement over the dates of the original manuscript. This can be understood by studying the Prologue to the cycle, the texture remains triadic, typical of the polyphony of that time, but modulates so often that the listener quickly loses the original tonal center. Lowinskys discussion has led to other quandaries on the topic of the coherence of the prologue. These debates are ultimately built on the question of license to analyze the piece through our modern lens of tonality and atonality. The Prophetiae Sibyllarum text is made up of one three-line prologue, all of the poems are in dactylic hexameter. The prophesies, each told by a different prophetess, tell of the coming of Christ, given the Renaissances fascination with mysticism and antiquity it is no surprise that Lassus would choose these prophesies as his text. The extremely chromatic setting of this text points toward Lassus interactions with Rore and Vicentino, lowinsky also speculates that rendering the Sibylline prophecies in chromatic style, the young genius probably implied that chromaticism was the music of the future. Prologue Carmina chromatico quae audis modulata tenore, Haec sunt illa quibus nostrae olim arcana salutis Bis senae intrepido cecinerunt ore Sibylla, polyphonic songs which you hear with a chromatic tenor, these are they, in which our twice-six sibyls once sang with fearless mouth the secrets of salvation. Sibylla Persica Virgine matre satus, pando residebit asello, lucundus princeps, unus qui ferre salutem Rite queat lapsis, tamen illis forte diebus Multi multa ferent, solo sed satis est oracula prodere verbo, Ille Deus casta nascetur virgine magnus. But it is enough for the oracles to bring forth with a single word, Sibylla Delphica Non tarde veniet, tacita sed mente tenendum Hoc opus. Hoc memori semper qui corde reponet, Huius pertentant cur gaudia magna prophetae Eximii, qui virginea conceptus ab alvo Prodibit and this conquers all the works of nature, yet he has done this who governs all things. Sibylla Samia Ecce dies, nigras quae toilet laeta tenebras, Mox veniet, solvens nodosa volumina vatum Gentis Judaeae, hunc poterunt clarum vivorum tangere regem, Humano quem virgo sinu inviolata fovebit. Annuit hoc coelum, rutilantia sidera monstrant, behold, the joyful day which shall lift the black darkness will soon come and unravel the knotty writings of the prophets of the Judean tribe, as the peoples songs tell. They shall be able to touch this glorious ruler of the living and this the heavens promise, this the glowing stars show. VI. castam pro matre puellam Deliget, haec alias forma praecesserit omnes and he shall choose a chaste maiden for his mother, she shall exceed all others in beauty
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Nicola Vicentino
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Nicola Vicentino was an Italian music theorist and composer of the Renaissance. He was one of the most visionary musicians of the age, inventing, among other things, little is known of his early life. At some time in the 1530s or early 1540s he went to Ferrara, apparently he served as a music tutor to the Duke of Este as well as some of his family members, and some of Vicentinos music was sung at the court of Ferrara. During the late 1540s his reputation as a music theorist grew, the debate was rather unlike those among contemporary musicologists, being more like a refereed prize fight, with a panel of judges, they awarded the prize to Lusitano. Unbowed, Vicentino continued his experiments, and went on to build the archicembalo which could play the music he described in his publications and it is on display at the International museum and library of music in Bologna. After a short time in Rome, Vicentino returned to Ferrara, in 1563 he became maestro di cappella at Vicenza Cathedral, thus returning to his home city, but only briefly, for he accepted a position in Milan in 1565. Around 1570 he had connection with the Bavarian court in Munich. He died in Milan during the plague of 1575–1576, though his date of death is not known. While Vicentino was known as a composer, and wrote two books of madrigals and motets in a sophisticated style, it was his work as a music theorist that gained him renown. Composers such as Cipriano de Rore, Orlande de Lassus and others wrote music which was impossible to sing in tune without having a system for adjusting the pitch of chromatic intervals in some way, several theorists attacked the problem, including Vicentino. In this work he expanded and justified many of the ideas which he first brought up in his debate with Lusitano, another area in which Vicentino did original work was musical dynamics. He was one of the first theorists, and perhaps the first, in Lantica musica ridotta alla moderna prattica he mentioned that the strength of singing must respect carefully the text and passage being sung. Vicentinos most famous invention was the archicembalo, a keyboard containing thirty-one keys to the octave, later he applied the same keyboard layout to the arciorgano, a microtonal keyboard for the organ. While these keyboards did not achieve popularity, they did offer a way of playing music in meantone temperament in all keys. Vicentinos solution in effect divides the octave into 31 equal parts, with good intonation for the thirds and sixths, genus, Species and Mode in Vicentinos 31-tone Compositional Theory, Music Theory Online 20.2. This article includes several remarkable recordings of vocal groups, retuned in the studio to the 31-tone system, the Life and Works of Nicola Vicentino. The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie, ISBN 1-56159-174-2 Gustave Reese, Music in the Renaissance. ISBN 0-393-09530-4 Edwin M. Ripin, Arcicembalo, Henry W. Kaufmann/Robert L. Kendrick, Nicola Vicentino, Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy, Grove Music Online Vicentino, L antica musica ridotta alla moderna prattica
27.
Diatonic scale
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This pattern ensures that, in a diatonic scale spanning more than one octave, all the half steps are maximally separated from each other. The word diatonic comes from the Greek διατονικός, meaning progressing through tones, the seven pitches of any diatonic scale can be obtained using a chain of six perfect fifths. Musical keyboards are designed to play notes, and hence diatonic scales. A diatonic scale can be described as two tetrachords separated by a whole tone. The term diatonic originally referred to the genus, one of the three genera of the ancient Greeks. In musical set theory, Allen Forte classifies diatonic scales as set form 7–35 and this article does not concern alternative seven-note diatonic scales such as the harmonic minor or the melodic minor. Western music from the Middle Ages until the late 19th century is based on the diatonic scale, there is one claim that the 45, 000-year-old Divje Babe Flute uses a diatonic scale, but there is no proof or consensus it is even a musical instrument. There is evidence that the Sumerians and Babylonians used some version of the diatonic scale and this derives from surviving inscriptions that contain a tuning system and musical composition. Despite the conjectural nature of reconstructions of the known as the Hurrian songs from the surviving score. The scales corresponding to the medieval Church modes were diatonic, one of these, the one starting on B, has no pure fifth above its reference note, it is probably for this reason that it was not used. Of the six remaining scales, two were described as corresponding to two others with a B♭ instead of a B♮, A–B–C–D–E–F–G–A was described as D–E–F–G–A–B♭C–D and C–D–E–F–G–A–B–C as F–G–A–B♭–C–D–E–F, as a result, medieval theory described the Church modes as corresponding to four diatonic scales only. Heinrich Glarean considered that the modal scales including a B♭ had to be the result of a transposition, by the beginning of the Baroque period, the notion of musical key was established, describing additional possible transpositions of the diatonic scale. Major and minor scales came to dominate until at least the start of the 20th century, some Church modes survived into the early 18th century, as well as appearing occasionally in classical and 20th-century music, and later in modal jazz. Glareans six natural scales could be transposed not only to include one flat in the signature, of these six scales, three are major scales, three are minor. To these may be added the seventh diatonic scale, with a fifth above the reference note. Transposing each of seven scales on the twelve degrees of the chromatic scale results in a total of eighty-four diatonic scales. The modern musical keyboard originated as a keyboard with only lower keys. The major scale, for instance, can be represented as T–T–S–T–T–T–S or 2–2–1–2–2–2–1 The major scale or Ionian scale is one of the diatonic scales and it is made up of seven distinct notes, plus an eighth that duplicates the first an octave higher
28.
Mode (music)
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In the theory of Western music, mode generally refers to a type of scale, coupled with a set of characteristic melodic behaviours. This use, still the most common in recent years, reflects a tradition dating to the Middle Ages, regarding the concept of mode as applied to pitch relationships generally, Harold S. being in the domain of mode. This synthesis between tonus as a tone and the older meaning associated with an octave species was done by medieval theorists for the Western monodic plainchant tradition. Since the end of the century, the term mode has also applied to pitch structures in non-European musical cultures, sometimes with doubtful compatibility. The word encompasses several additional meanings, however, authors from the ninth century until the early eighteenth century sometimes employed the Latin modus for interval. A scale is a series of pitches that, with the key or tonic as a reference point, defines that scales intervals. The concept of mode in Western music theory has three stages, in Gregorian chant theory, in Renaissance polyphonic theory, and in tonal harmonic music of the common practice period. In all three contexts, mode incorporates the idea of the scale, but differs from it by also involving an element of melody type. By the early 19th century, the mode had taken on an additional meaning. At the same time, composers were beginning to conceive of modality as something outside of the system that could be used to evoke religious feelings or to suggest folk-music idioms. Early Greek treatises describe three interrelated concepts that are related to the later, medieval idea of mode, scales, tonoi—, and harmonia —pl. harmoniai—this third term subsuming the corresponding tonoi but not necessarily the converse. The association of ethnic names with the octave species appears to precede Aristoxenus. Depending on the positioning of the tones in the tetrachords. The diatonic genus, the genus, and the enharmonic genus. The framing interval of the fourth is fixed, while the two internal pitches are movable. Within the basic forms, the intervals of the chromatic and diatonic genera were varied further by three and two shades, respectively, the term tonos was used in four senses, as note, interval, region of the voice, and pitch. We use it of the region of the voice whenever we speak of Dorian, or Phrygian, or Lydian, in Ptolemys system, therefore there are only seven tonoi. Pythagoras also construed the intervals arithmetically, in their diatonic genus, these tonoi and corresponding harmoniai correspond with the intervals of the familiar modern major and minor scales
29.
Guidonian hand
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In Medieval music, the Guidonian hand was a mnemonic device used to assist singers in learning to sight-sing. Some form of the device may have used by Guido of Arezzo. The hand occurs in some manuscripts before Guidos time as a tool to find the semitone, 1105–10 did describe Guido using the joints of the hand to aid in teaching his hexachord. The Guidonian hand is linked with Guidos new ideas about how to learn music, including the use of hexachords. The idea of the Guidonian hand is that portion of the hand represents a specific note within the hexachord system. In teaching, an instructor would indicate a series of notes by pointing to them on their hand, and this is similar to the system of hand signals sometimes used in conjunction with solfege. This device allowed people to visualize where the steps of the gamut were. The Guidonian hand was reproduced in numerous medieval treatises, exact notation to the hexachord system can be found in a reproduction of Ameri Practica artis musice, or in the 1784 source Scriptores ecclesiastici de musica sacra potissimum. The hexachord as a device was first described by Guido of Arezzo, in his Epistola de ignoto cantu. It was the most basic tool for learning new music in the European Middle Ages. In each hexachord, all adjacent pitches are a tone apart. These six pitches are named ut, re, mi, fa, sol and these six names are derived from the first syllable of each half-line of the 8th century hymn Ut queant laxis. Each hexachord could start on G, C or F and the adjacent table, reading upwards from the bottom, reading from left to right could, within certain limits, permit notes within different octaves to be distinguished from each other. Thus, C was C fa ut, c was C sol fa ut, the hexachordal system also distinguished between B♭ and B♮. Over time, the soft and hard variants of b were depicted as a rounded ♭, in this way the Guidonian system of multiple hexachords was different from the modern system of solfege, wherein a single set of syllables suffices to name all possible pitches within a mode. Because it included B durum, the G hexachord was called hexachordum durum, likewise, the C hexachord, containing neither B, was called hexachordum naturale. In the 14th century, this system was expanded to hexachords that would accommodate an increased use of signed accidentals, from this time onward, the use of such notes was called musica ficta. Guido of Arezzo, Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy, solmization, Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy, grovemusic. com
30.
Guido of Arezzo
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Guido of Arezzo was an Italian music theorist of the Medieval era. He is regarded as the inventor of musical notation that replaced neumatic notation, his text. Guido was a monk of the Benedictine order from the Italian city-state of Arezzo, recent research has dated his Micrologus to 1025 or 1026, since Guido stated in a letter that he was thirty-four when he wrote it, his birthdate is presumed to be around 991 or 992. His early career was spent at the monastery of Pomposa, on the Adriatic coast near Ferrara, while there, he noted the difficulty that singers had in remembering Gregorian chants. He came up with a method for teaching the singers to learn chants in a short time, while at Arezzo, he developed new techniques for teaching, such as staff notation and the use of the ut–re–mi–fa–so–la mnemonic. A seventh note, Si was added shortly after to complete the diatonic scale, in Anglophone countries, Si was changed to Ti by Sarah Glover in the nineteenth century so that every syllable might begin with a different letter. Ti is used in tonic sol-fa and in the song Do-Re-Mi, the Micrologus, written at the cathedral at Arezzo and dedicated to Tedald, contains Guidos teaching method as it had developed by that time. Soon it had attracted the attention of Pope John XIX, who invited Guido to Rome, most likely he went there in 1028, but he soon returned to Arezzo, due to his poor health. It was then that he announced in a letter to Michael of Pomposa his discovery of the ut–re–mi musical mnemonic, little is known of him after this time. Guido is credited with the invention of the Guidonian hand, a widely used mnemonic system where note names are mapped to parts of the human hand. However, only a form of the Guidonian hand is actually described by Guido, and the fully elaborated system of natural, hard. In the 12th century, a development in teaching and learning music in an efficient manner had arisen. Guido of Arezzos alleged development of the Guidonian hand, more than a years after his death. Using specific joints of the hand and fingertips transformed the way one would learn, not only did the Guidonian hand become a standard use in preparing music in the 12th century, its popularity grew more widespread well into the 17th and 18th century. The knowledge and use of the Guidonian hand would allow a musician to simply transpose, identify intervals, and aid in use of notation, musicians were able to sing and memorize longer sections of music and counterpoint during performances and the amount of time spent diminished dramatically. The computer music notation system GUIDO music notation is named after him, the International Guido dArezzo Polyphonic Contest is named after him. Francisco Valls controversial Missa Scala Aretina took its name from Guido Aretinus scale, gamut Monochord Soggetto cavato Solmization solfege Richard Hallowell Hoppin, Medieval Music. New York, W. W. Norton & Company,1978, stuart Lyons, Music in the Odes of Horace
31.
Major second
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In Western music theory, a major second is a second spanning two semitones. A second is an interval encompassing two adjacent staff positions. For example, the interval from C to D is a major second, diminished, minor and augmented seconds are notated on adjacent staff positions as well, but consist of a different number of semitones. The major second is the interval that occurs between the first and second degrees of a scale, the tonic and the supertonic. On a musical keyboard, a second is the interval between two keys separated by one key, counting white and black keys alike. On a guitar string, it is the interval separated by two frets, in moveable-do solfège, it is the interval between do and re. It is considered a step, as opposed to larger intervals called skips. Intervals composed of two semitones, such as the second and the diminished third, are also called tones, whole tones. One source says step is chiefly US. The preferred usage has been argued since the 19th century, Mr. M. in teaching the Diatonic scale calls a tone a step, and a semitone a half step, now, who ever heard of a step in music, or in sound. The largest ones are called major tones or greater tones, the smallest are called minor tones or lesser tones and their size differs by exactly one syntonic comma. Some equal temperaments, such as 15-ET and 22-ET, also distinguish between a greater and a lesser tone, the major second was historically considered one of the most dissonant intervals of the diatonic scale, although much 20th-century music saw it reimagined as a consonance. It is common in different musical systems, including Arabic music, Turkish music and music of the Balkans. It occurs in both diatonic and pentatonic scales, listen to a major second in equal temperament. Here, middle C is followed by D, which is a tone 200 cents sharper than C, the difference in size between a major tone and a minor tone is equal to one syntonic comma. The major tone is the 9,8 interval play, and it is an approximation thereof in other tuning systems, the major tone may be derived from the harmonic series as the interval between the eighth and ninth harmonics. The minor tone may be derived from the series as the interval between the ninth and tenth harmonics. The 10,9 minor tone arises in the C major scale between D and e and G and A, and is a sharper dissonance than 9,8
32.
Octave
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In music, an octave or perfect octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. It is defined by ANSI as the unit of level when the base of the logarithm is two. The octave relationship is a phenomenon that has been referred to as the basic miracle of music. The most important musical scales are written using eight notes. For example, the C major scale is typically written C D E F G A B C, two notes separated by an octave have the same letter name and are of the same pitch class. Three commonly cited examples of melodies featuring the perfect octave as their opening interval are Singin in the Rain, Somewhere Over the Rainbow, the interval between the first and second harmonics of the harmonic series is an octave. The octave has occasionally referred to as a diapason. To emphasize that it is one of the intervals, the octave is designated P8. The octave above or below a note is sometimes abbreviated 8a or 8va, 8va bassa. For example, if one note has a frequency of 440 Hz, the note one octave above is at 880 Hz, the ratio of frequencies of two notes an octave apart is therefore 2,1. Further octaves of a note occur at 2n times the frequency of that note, such as 2,4,8,16, etc. and the reciprocal of that series. For example,55 Hz and 440 Hz are one and two away from 110 Hz because they are 1⁄2 and 4 times the frequency, respectively. After the unison, the octave is the simplest interval in music, the human ear tends to hear both notes as being essentially the same, due to closely related harmonics. Notes separated by a ring together, adding a pleasing sound to music. For this reason, notes an octave apart are given the note name in the Western system of music notation—the name of a note an octave above A is also A. The conceptualization of pitch as having two dimensions, pitch height and pitch class, inherently include octave circularity, thus all C♯s, or all 1s, in any octave are part of the same pitch class. Octave equivalency is a part of most advanced cultures, but is far from universal in primitive. The languages in which the oldest extant written documents on tuning are written, leon Crickmore recently proposed that The octave may not have been thought of as a unit in its own right, but rather by analogy like the first day of a new seven-day week
33.
Transposition (music)
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In music transposition refers to the process, or operation, of moving a collection of notes up or down in pitch by a constant interval. For example, one might transpose a piece of music into another key. Similarly, one might transpose a tone row or a collection of pitches such as a chord so that it begins on another pitch. The transposition of a set A by n semitones is designated by Tn, thus the set consisting of 0–1–2 transposed by 5 semitones is 5–6–7 since 0 +5 =5,1 +5 =6, and 2 +5 =7. There are two different kinds of transposition, depending on one is measuring intervals according to the chromatic scale or some other scale. In chromatic transposition one shifts every pitch in a collection of notes by a number of semitones. For instance, if one transposes the pitches C4–E4–G4 upwards by four semitones, in scalar transposition one shifts every pitch in a collection by a fixed number of scale steps relative to some scale. For example, if one transposes the pitches C4–E4–G4 up by two steps relative to the familiar C major scale, one obtains the pitches E4–G4–B4, if one transposes the same pitches up by two steps relative to the F major scale, one obtains instead E4–G4–B♭4. Scalar transposition is sometimes called diatonic transposition, but this term can be misleading, however, scalar transposition can occur with respect to any type of scale, not just the diatonic. There are two kinds of transposition, by pitch interval or by pitch interval class, applied to pitches or pitch classes. Transposition may be applied to pitches or to pitch classes, although transpositions are usually written out, musicians are occasionally asked to transpose music at sight, that is, to read the music in one key while playing in another. There are three basic techniques for teaching sight transposition, interval, clef, and numbers, first one determines the interval between the written key and the target key. Then one imagines the notes up by the corresponding interval, a performer using this method may calculate each note individually, or group notes together. Clef transposition is routinely taught in Belgium and France, one imagines a different clef and a different key signature than the ones printed. The change of clef is used so that the lines and spaces correspond to different notes than the lines and spaces of the original score. Seven clefs are used for this, treble, bass, baritone, and C-clefs on the four lowest lines, the signature is then adjusted for the actual accidental one wants on that note. The octave may also have to be adjusted, but this is a matter for most musicians. Transposing by numbers means, one determines the degree of the written note in the given key
34.
Equal temperament
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An equal temperament is a musical temperament, or a system of tuning, in which the frequency interval between every pair of adjacent notes has the same ratio. In equal temperament tunings, the interval is often found by dividing some larger desired interval, often the octave. That resulting smallest interval, 1⁄12 the width of an octave, is called a semitone or half step, the standard pitch has not always been 440 but has varied and generally risen over the past few hundred years. For example, some music has been written in 19-TET and 31-TET, in Western countries, when people use the term equal temperament without qualification, they usually mean 12-TET. To avoid ambiguity between equal temperaments that divide the octave and ones that divide some other interval, the equal division of the octave. According to this system, 12-TET is called 12-EDO, 31-TET is called 31-EDO. Other instruments, such as wind, keyboard, and fretted instruments, often only approximate equal temperament. Some wind instruments that can easily and spontaneously bend their tone, most notably trombones, use tuning similar to string ensembles, the two figures frequently credited with the achievement of exact calculation of equal temperament are Zhu Zaiyu in 1584 and Simon Stevin in 1585. Kenneth Robinson attributes the invention of equal temperament to Zhu Zaiyu, Zhu Zaiyu is quoted as saying that, in a text dating from 1584, I have founded a new system. I establish one foot as the number from which the others are to be extracted, altogether one has to find the exact figures for the pitch-pipers in twelve operations. Kuttner disagrees and remarks that his claim cannot be considered correct without major qualifications, kuttner proposes that neither Zhu Zaiyu or Simon Stevin achieved equal temperament, and that neither of the two should be treated as inventors. The origin of the Chinese pentatonic scale is traditionally ascribed to the mythical Ling Lun, allegedly his writings discussed the equal division of the scale in the 27th century BC. However, evidence of the origins of writing in this period in China is limited to rudimentary inscriptions on oracle bones, an approximation for equal temperament was described by He Chengtian, a mathematician of Southern and Northern Dynasties around 400 AD. He came out with the earliest recorded approximate numerical sequence in relation to equal temperament in history,900849802758715677638601570536509.5479450, historically, there was a seven-equal temperament or hepta-equal temperament practice in Chinese tradition. Zhu Zaiyu, a prince of the Ming court, spent thirty years on research based on the equal temperament idea originally postulated by his father and he described his new pitch theory in his Fusion of Music and Calendar 乐律融通 published in 1580. An extended account is given by Joseph Needham. Similarly, after 84 divisions the length was divided by a factor of 128,84 =27 =128, according to Gene Cho, Zhu Zaiyu was the first person to solve the equal temperament problem mathematically. Matteo Ricci, a Jesuit in China recorded this work in his personal journal, in 1620, Zhus work was referenced by a European mathematician
35.
Major scale
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The major scale or Ionian scale is one of the most commonly used musical scales, especially in Western music. It is one of the diatonic scales, like many musical scales it is made up of seven notes, the eighth duplicates the first at double its frequency so that it is called a higher octave of the same note. In Carnatic music, it is known as Dheerasankarabharanam, and in Hindustani classical music it is known as Bilaval, a major scale is a diatonic scale. The sequence of intervals between the notes of a scale is, whole, whole, half, whole, whole, whole, half where whole stands for a whole tone. A major scale may be seen as two tetrachords separated by a whole tone. Each tetrachord consists of two whole tones followed by a semitone, whole, whole, half, seven sharps or flats make major keys that may be more conveniently spelled with five flats or sharps. The term major scale is used in the names of some other scales whose first, third. The harmonic major scale has a minor sixth and it differs from the harmonic minor scale only by raising the third degree. The melodic major scale is the mode of the jazz minor scale. It is the Ionian scale with a sixth and minor seventh. The combined scale that goes as Ionian ascending and as melodic major descending is also called melodic major, the double harmonic major scale has a minor second and a minor sixth. It is the mode of the Hungarian minor scale. Ionian mode Major and minor Listen to and download harmonised Major scale piano MP3s The major scale for guitar in one position, with derivation
36.
Minor scale
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This includes the natural minor, harmonic minor, and melodic minor scales. A minor scale differs from a scale in that the third degree in a major scale is a major third above the first degree. In other words, the degree in a major scale is one semitone higher than in a minor scale. The natural minor scale, also known as Aeolian scale, taken by itself, when a major scale and a natural minor scale have the same key signature, they are relative keys. A natural minor scale has the notes as its relative major scale. The functional fusion of minor, harmonic minor, and melodic minor scales. A harmonic minor scale differs from a minor scale in that the seventh note is raised one semitone both ascending and descending. Melodic minor scales raise both the sixth and seventh notes one semitone when ascending, and descends like the minor scale. In this case the scale is called A-minor, and this minor scale has no accidentals. A-minor is called the minor of C. Every major key has a minor, which starts on the sixth scale degree or step. For instance, the degree of F major is D. The relative natural minor of a major key always shares the notes, for example, F major consists of F, G, A, B♭, C, D, and E, while D natural minor consists of D, E, F, G, A, B♭. The natural minor scale can also be represented by the notation,12 ♭345 ♭6 ♭78 Each degree of the scale and their difference from the major scale is shown. Thus a number without a sharp or flat represents a major interval, a number with a flat represents a minor interval, and a number with a sharp represents an augmented interval. In this example, the mean, 1=unison, 2=major second, ♭3=minor third, 4=perfect fourth, 5=perfect fifth, ♭6=minor sixth, ♭7=minor seventh. In rock and popular examples of songs in Minor Keys include The Moody Blues Nights in White Satin, Blondies Call Me. The notes of the minor scale are the same as the natural minor except that the seventh degree is raised by one semitone
37.
Gregorian mode
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A Gregorian mode is one of the eight systems of pitch organization used in Gregorian chant. The theoretical framework of modes arose later to describe the structure of this chant repertory. The repertory of Western plainchant acquired its basic forms between the sixth and early centuries, but there are neither theoretical sources nor notated music from this period. By the late century, a system of eight modal categories, for which there was no precedent in Ancient Greek theory. This system likely originated from the medieval Byzantine oktōēchos, as indicated by the non-Hellenistic Greek names used in the earliest Western sources from about 800, ignorant of these developments, Hucbald created a series of eight modes. In the traditional system of eight modes there are four pairs, each comprising an authentic mode. The range of mode 5 does not employ a subfinal, and these four modes correspond to the modern modal scales starting on D, E, F, and G. The tenor, or dominant, is a fifth above the final of the scale, with the exception of mode 3 and this is because a fifth above the tonic of mode 3 is the unstable B♮/B♭. However, they are numbered differently, the modes being 1,2,3,4. Other Eastern Christian rites use similar systems of eight modes, see Syriac usage of Octoechos, a plagal mode has a range that includes the octave from the fourth below the final to the fifth above. The earliest definition of the term is found in Hucbalds treatise De harmonica, in addition to the range, the tenor differs. In Byzantine modal theory, the word Plagal refers to the four lower-lying echoi, thus Plagal first mode represents a somewhat more developed and widened in range version of the first mode. The plagal second mode has a relation to the second mode. Though there is no plagal third mode, the mode that one would expect is called the grave tone, two characteristic notes or pitches in a modal melody are the final and cofinal. These are the degrees on which the melody is conceived and on which it most often comes to rest. The final is the pitch in which the chant usually ends, likewise the cofinal is an additional resting point in the chant, it may be regarded as having some analogy to the more recent dominant, but its interval from the tonic may not be a fifth. In addition to the final and cofinal, every mode is distinguished by scale degrees called the mediant, the mediant is named from its position—in the authentic modes—between the final and cofinal. In the authentic modes it is the degree of the scale, unless that note should happen to be B
38.
Violin
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The violin is a wooden string instrument in the violin family. It is the smallest and highest-pitched instrument in the family in regular use, smaller violin-type instruments are known, including the violino piccolo and the kit violin, but these are virtually unused in the 2010s. The violin typically has four strings tuned in fifths, and is most commonly played by drawing a bow across its strings. Violins are important instruments in a variety of musical genres. They are most prominent in the Western classical tradition and in varieties of folk music. They are also used in genres of folk including country music and bluegrass music. Electric violins are used in forms of rock music, further. The violin is sometimes called a fiddle, particularly in Irish traditional music and bluegrass. The violin was first known in 16th-century Italy, with further modifications occurring in the 18th and 19th centuries. In Europe it served as the basis for stringed instruments used in classical music, the viola. According to their reputation, the quality of their sound has defied attempts to explain or equal it, many of these trade instruments were formerly sold by Sears, Roebuck and Co. and other mass merchandisers. A person who makes or repairs violins is called a luthier or violinmaker, the parts of a violin are usually made from different types of wood and on the use of a pickup and an amplifier and speaker). Violins can be strung with gut, Perlon or other synthetic, the earliest stringed instruments were mostly plucked. Similar and variant types were probably disseminated along East-West trading routes from Asia into the Middle East, the first makers of violins probably borrowed from various developments of the Byzantine lira. These included the rebec, the Arabic rebab, the vielle, the earliest pictures of violins, albeit with three strings, are seen in northern Italy around 1530, at around the same time as the words violino and vyollon are seen in Italian and French documents. One of the earliest explicit descriptions of the instrument, including its tuning, is from the Epitome musical by Jambe de Fer, by this time, the violin had already begun to spread throughout Europe. The violin proved very popular, both among street musicians and the nobility, the French king Charles IX ordered Andrea Amati to construct 24 violins for him in 1560, one of these noble instruments, the Charles IX, is the oldest surviving violin. The Messiah or Le Messie made by Antonio Stradivari in 1716 remains pristine and it is now located in the Ashmolean Museum of Oxford
39.
Glockenspiel
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A glockenspiel is a percussion instrument composed of a set of tuned keys arranged in the fashion of the keyboard of a piano. In this way, it is similar to the xylophone, however, the glockenspiel, moreover, is usually smaller and higher in pitch. In German, a carillon is also called a Glockenspiel, while in French, in music scores the glockenspiel is sometimes designated by the Italian term campanelli. When used in a marching or military band, the bars are mounted in a portable case and held vertically. However, sometimes the bars are held using a harness similar to a marching snare harness. In orchestral use, the bars are mounted horizontally, a pair of hard, unwrapped mallets, generally with heads made of plastic or metal, are used to strike the bars, although mallet heads can also be made of rubber. If laid out horizontally, a keyboard glockenspiel may be contrived by adding a keyboard to the instrument to facilitate playing chords, another method of playing chords is to use four mallets, two per hand. The glockenspiel is limited to the register, and usually covers about two and a half to three octaves, but can also reach up to three and a half octaves. The glockenspiel is an instrument, its parts are written two octaves below the sounding notes. When struck, the give an very pure, bell-like sound. Glockenspiels are quite popular and appear in almost all genres of music ranging from hip-hop to jazz. A keyboard-operated glockenspiel, as played by Danny Federici on such hit songs as Born to Run and Hungry Heart, is considered part of Bruce Springsteen, john Lennon also plays it on Only a Northern Song. Panic. at the Disco have used glockenspiel in several of their songs, including their hits I Write Sins Not Tragedies and Build God, Then Well Talk. Radiohead have used glockenspiel on their single No Surprises as well as on The Tourist, Lull, Morning Bell/Amnesiac, Sit Down/Stand Up, songs From the Wood, Heavy Horses and Stormwatch. Solo glockenspiel can be heard briefly, but notably at the beginning of Shostakovichs 15th Symphony, a modern example of the glockenspiel can be heard in Steve Reichs 1970–71 composition Drumming, in which the glockenspiel plays a major role in the third and fourth movements. Other instruments that work on the same principle as the glockenspiel include the marimba. The Dulcitone has a sound to the glockenspiel since its sound is made by hammers striking tuning forks. The dulcitone uses soft hammers which damp the forks, compared to the hammers of the glockenspiel
Play (help·info), 
F
E (where F
was referred to as "chromatic" because of its abundance of "coloured in" black notes, that is semiminims (crotchets or quarter notes) and shorter notes, as opposed to the open white notes in 
, commonly used for the notation of sacred music.[16] These uses for the word have no relationship to the modern meaning of chromatic, but the sense survives in the current term coloratura.[17]
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