Full file at
PRELUDE: The Fundamentals of Music
CHAPTER 1: Elements of Music: Sound, Melody, Rhythm, and Harmony
CHAPTER OUTLINE
Sound
Tone
Note
Pitch
Frequency
Staff
Interval
Unison
Octave
Major Scale
Pitch Range
Dynamics
Accent
Decrescendo
Diminuendo
Crescendo
Timbre
Rhythm
Beat
Meter
Measures
Triple
Downbeat
Duple
Quadruple
Upbeat
Compound Meters
Syncopation
Tempo
Tempo Indications
Tempo Changes
Rubato
Fermata
Melody
Legato
Staccato
Phrase
Cadence
Incomplete
Complete
Sequence
Theme
Harmony
Chords
Progression
Consonance
Dissonance
Triad
Arpeggio
NEW CONCEPTS
IM 1 | 1
Full file at
tone
note
pitch
frequency
staff
interval
unison
octave
major scale
pitch range
dynamics
accent
pianissimo pp
piano p
mezzo piano mp
mezzo forte mf
forte f
fortissimo ff
decrescendo
diminuendo
crescendo
timbre
rhythm
beat
meter
measure
triple meter
downbeat
duple meter
quadruple meter
upbeat
sextuple
quintuple meter
septuple meter
syncopation
tempo
largo
grave
lento
adagio
andante
moderato
allegretto
allegro
vivace
presto
prestissimo
rubato
fermata
melody
legato
staccato
phrase
cadence
sequence
theme
harmony
chord
chord progression
consonance
dissonance
triad
tonic
arpeggio
IM 1 | 1
Full file at
OVERVIEW
The Prelude to Chapters 1–3 explains to students that they will experience a wide variety of music. Although these various types of music sound quite different, they all involve the same components: sound, rhythm, melody, and harmony. In order to understand how these elements contribute to the music, it is necessary to become familiar with them and how they can be combined. It is also helpful to become familiar with the orchestra and its instruments. The first three chapters will provide the vocabulary and experience students will need.
TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION
1. Although this chapter has no specific listening examples, it has ample opportunities for listening examples as illustrations of the elements. It is helpful to have a keyboard handy to play simple melodies, illustrate concepts of tempo and dynamics, and provide examples of chords. Consider incorporating the following pieces set as examples of concepts covered in Chapters 1–3:
Purcell, “When I am laid in earth,” from Dido and Aeneas—triple meter
Mozart, Symphony No. 40, I—duple meter
Handel, “Comfort Ye” from Messiah—quadruple meter
Bernstein, “America” from West Side Story—sextuple meter
Haydn, String Quartet, op. 33, no. 3, (“The Bird”) IV—dissonance
2. Music is a most difficult art to grasp because it is so abstract. It never entirely exists in the present, but relies on both memory and intuition (or expectation, as Leonard Meyer says in his Emotion and Meaning in Music). The listener needs to be able to remember what he or she has heard before and relate that to what he or she hears in the present. Much folk and popular music is brief and repetitive with very little thematic development. More complex works—a Mozart string quartet, for example—have distinct themes that go through a period of development. The listener needs to have the skill to recognize something as a theme and then listen as that theme is transformed, manipulated, and recapitulated.
3. Listeners cannot always perceive the beat easily. Students may confuse it with the metric accent. Composers can also manipulate durations to make the music sound as though the beat speeds up or slows down. Simple examples of folk or nursery-rhyme songs can help illustrate: Play “Mary Had a Little Lamb” in common time and in cut time, or play the tune using quarter-note durations and then half notes, keeping the beat the same.
4. Students need to think of melody as linear. But melody also takes on contour because of its changes of pitch. Help students understand this by playing the opening phrase of “Joy to the World,” which descends stepwise, and then comparing that with “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” which has repeated pitches, leaps, and downward steps.
5. Students are often confused by melodic contour, perceiving legato melodies as conjunct and staccato passages as disjunct. Be sure to emphasize that melodic contour refers to the placement of pitches within a melody, and not to the way that melody is performed.
5. Probably the best way to illustrate harmony is to use the blues progression as an example of how chords provide a framework over which a melody is constructed. Chords can contribute to rhythm, too, by how often and regularly they change.
FURTHER QUESTIONS AND TOPICS
- What do the terms piano and forte mean? How does the composer indicate dynamics between and beyond these two levels?
- What are the components of rhythm? How does beat differ from meter? How do beat and meter differ from note values (duration)?
- How does a listener recognize the end of a melodic phrase?
- What is an arpeggio? How does it relate to a chord?
- Can you draw a picture of a melody? What are some interesting melodies that you know? Suggest: Draw a picture of a melody you know. What makes it interesting to you? What materials would you use in order to recreate that melody? Are the pitches all connected, as if on a string? Or are they individual points?
IM 1 | 1