terms Flashcards
(36 cards)
Music
is aesthetic communication through the design of sound and silence in time in motion.
A musical tone has four characteristics:
Pitch
Duration
Intensity
Timbre
Pitch
is highness or lowness of sound
directly related to the frequency of vibration.
Duration
is how long in time a tone sounds, whether measured in musical beats or in seconds.
Intensity
is the loudness or softness of a musical tone.
Timbre
is tone color, the distinct quality of the sound of a particular instrument or voice that distinguishes it from others.
A melody i
is a succession of tones with rhythmic and tonal organization; also known as a tune or theme.
A motive
(motif) is a short melodic or rhythmic idea that a composer uses as the basis for a composition.
Harmony
is the sounding of two or more tones at the same time.
interval
An is the sounding of precisely two tones at once.
A chord
is the sounding of three or more tones at the same time, understood as a single harmonic unit.
A chord progression i
s a series of chords moving toward a cadence.
cadence
A is a point of harmonic resolution, when a chord progression reaches a goal chord.
Consonance
is harmony that blends and sounds stable.
Dissonance
is harmony that clashes and sounds unstable.
Tonality
is the organization of music based on major and minor scales.
Atonality
is the organization of music in which all tones are equal in harmonic importance.
Musical texture
describes the nature of the relationship between layers of sound occurring at the same time.
Monophony
is a texture in which there is only a single melody sounding.
Homophony
is a texture in which there is a primary melody and supporting harmony.
Polyphony
is a texture in which there is more than one rhythmically independent melodic line sounding at the same time.
Rhythm
is patterns of sound and silence, or patterns of pulses and accents.
Beats
are regularly spaced stresses or pulses in music.
Meter
is the grouping of beats, typically into 2s, 3s, and 4s.