Audio 207: Music terms

Glissando

"Sliding" smoothly from one note to another. Trombones and stringed instruments do this easily, as do singers.

Arpeggio

A chord in which the notes are played one after another instead of all at the same time.

Phrase

A group of notes — or bars — that make up a section of a melody or rhythm.

Tone

A musical interval consisting of two semitones. Also refers to the quality or timbre of a sound - eg. rough, sweet, pure

Note

A musical sound, or the sign used to write it down. The written note has rhythmic value from the shape, and pitch value from the position on the stave.

Duet

A piece for two instruments or voices, either with or without accompaniment.

Arrangement

A piece of music that has been adapted so that it can be played/sung by instruments other than those the composer intended. For example, a composition for orchestra arranged so that it could be played on piano. In addition, the original parts played by a group of instruments in a new composition may be termed the arrangement or orchestration

Solo

A piece or section of music composed for a single voice or instrument, either with or without accompaniment.

Accidental

A pitch that is changed "out of key" by means of a sharp, flat or natural sign.

Pitch

A relative term describing how high or low a musical sound or note is. In Western music they are named A B C D E F and G, with sharps and flats. By international convention, A above middle C is mapped to 440 hz as a standard tuning reference.

Melody

A series of notes of varying pitch, played one after another to form a musical line or tune.

Staff

A set of five parallel horizontal lines used in musical notation. The vertical position of the note indicates pitch and is relative to the clef. The stave is divided by bar lines at regular intervals defined by the time signature.

Key Signiture

A sign consisting of sharp and flat symbols, that is written after the clef at the beginning of each line of a piece of music, which shows the performer which key the music is in.

Time Signature

A sign that appears after the clef and the key signature of a piece of music and shows how many beats there are in each bar, and what type of beats they are.

Clef

A sign that is placed at the beginning of each line of a piece of music. It indicates the pitch of all notes as they are written down on the stave. There are treble, alto, tenor and bass clefs.

Rest

A silence in music, or the sign used to represent it, and is part of the notation dealing with rhythm. The symbols cover all lengths from whole or multiple bars to very small divisions of a beat. The image below shows semibreve (whole note), minim (1/2 note), crotchet (1/4 note), quaver (1/8 note), and semi-quaver (1/16 note).

Bar

A small section of a piece of music. Music is split up into bars by vertical lines known as bar lines, and each bar contains the number of beats shown in the time signature.

Flat

A symbol that lowers the pitch of the note that follows by a semitone. If the following note is a sharp note, either in the key or via an accidental, the symbol will be a natural.

Sharp

A symbol that raises the pitch of the note that follows by a semitone. If the following note is a flat note, either in the key or via an accidental, the symbol will be a natural.

Natural

A symbol that returns the pitch of the note that follows to its usual pitch follwoing an "accidental".

Beat

A unit of time used in music to indicate the pulse. The value of that beat, and the number of them in a bar, is defined by the time signature. In each bar, notes are grouped together in beats to make them easier to read.

Unison

A word used to describe notes that are played or sung by two or more voices either at the same pitch, or in octaves (usually called "octave unison")

Tempo

An Italian term indicating the speed of a piece of music. In modem music it is usually marked as beats per minute (bpm), e.g. 120bpm.

Octave

An interval of eight notes in the major or minor scale, it is often written 8ve.

Chord

Any two or more notes played at the same time. They create harmony and make music sound complete.

Notation

Describes the way of writing music down.

Harmonics

Each musical sound is made up of lots of different vibrations. For example, when a string vibrates, it not only vibrates as a whole, but also in halves, thirds, quarters, and so on. Each kind of vibration produces a different frequency, known as a harmonic.

Semitone

Half a tone. The smallest interval in most Western music, and the between any two keys on a keyboard.

Bridge

In popular music it is a term which may be used to describe any passage of music which serves as a link, leading from one theme to another. Sometimes called a "middle 8".

Hook

In popular music it is either a repeated word, phrase, line, chorus, sound or riff that gives a song its unique commercial appeal. These are musical or sonic elements that "stick" in the memory, both within the piece - setting up anticpation, and beyond the song.

Dynamics

The different levels of volume or intensity used in music — they tell the performer how loudly or quietly to play and when to change from one volume to another. The terms are usually in Italian or abbreviated, eg Forte, Piano, Mezzo forte, Crescendo etc., also graphics are used

Interval

The distance in pitch between any two notes, measured by counting up the notes of the scale from one to another.

Vibrato

The effect of tiny and rapid fluctuations in the pitch of notes, to bring expression to the tone. Singers and string players use this technique to good effect.

Key

The mode or scale around which a piece of music is based.

Accompaniment

The musical background that supports the main part in a piece of music. For example, a singer might perform songs with piano accompaniment.

Score

The notation of a piece of music in which all the different instruments' parts are shown.

Chorus

The part of a song that is repeated between verses, sometimes called the refrain. It can also mean a group of singers in a vocal composition, where they all sing together.

Rhythm

The pattern of long and short notes in a piece of music — also the number of beats in each bar and the use of accented notes.

Improvisation

The process of making up music as you go along, without playing from a score or from memory. It is common in jazz and popular music performance and was once common in classical chamber music as well.

Harmony

The sounding of different notes at the same time to form chords. The movement form one chord to another is called Harmonic Progression.

Intonation

The tuning of a musician's performance. Good intonation — in tune. Bad intonation out of tune. This generally refers to single notes rather than the whole instrument.

Transpose

To change the pitch of a piece of music by moving all notes the same distance ino a new key e.g. C major transposed into D major.