Mus 215- Music

Blue Notes

"Bent" or "flattened" tones lying outside traditional European-based scale structures that reflect particular African American melodic characteristics.

Salvation

(Christianity) the act of delivering from sin or saving from evil

Harmony

(n.) - agreement, often of sound

Pentatonic scale

5 note scale

Creole

A language that results from the mixing of a colonizer's language with the indigenous language of the people being dominated.

Prohibition

A law forbidding the sale of alcoholic beverages

Storyville

A part of New Orleans in the early part of the twentieth century which contained bars, nightclubs, and brothels that hired jazz musicians to provide entertainment and dance music.

Rhythm

A strong, regular, repeated pattern of movement or sound.

Sharecropping

A system used on southern farms after the Civil War in which farmers worked land owned by someone else in return for a small portion of the crops.

Middle Passage

A voyage that brought enslaved Africans across the Atlantic Ocean to North America and the West Indies

Social commentary

A way of speaking out about issues in society

Jelly Roll Morton

African American pianist, composer, arranger, and band leader from New Orleans; Bridged that gap between the piano styles of ragtime and jazz; Was the first important jazz composer

Two beat music

Also "playing in two." A form of rhythm organization in which the first and third beats of the bar are emphasized (particularly by the bass), often leaving the second and fourth beats silent, with a resulting "boom-chick" feel. Two-beat was especially common in early jazz, but can be found in all eras.

Antebellum

Belonging to a period before a war especially the American Civil War

Brass Trumpet/trombone, French horn, tuba

Brass section of a band

Sidney Bechet

Clarinet, Soprano Saxophone

Moans, hoops and Shouts

Common in folk songs and spirituals, defining element of both. They were encouraged as audience participation was more common in african culture, as is evidenced by the call and response.

Cross rhythms

Contrasting rhythms played at the same time or played with unusual emphasis on notes.

Dynamics

Degrees of loudness or softness in music

Hocketing

Dispersing the tones of the melody among several voices and/or instruments, which play it in alternation or sequence rather than simultaneously. Traditional performance practice for south Andean panpipe music, such as "Kutirimunapaq," but also found elsewhere in the world.

2 beat music

Emphasis on 1 and 3 beat

Black Swan Records

First major black owned record company, founded in 1921 by Harry Pace

The Gospels

Four books in the New Testament that tell the story of Christ's life and teachings

Scale

In music, it is a set of notes that are grouped together arbitrarily. It is said that the notes of a scale go together naturally. For example, the Pentatonic scale is often used in melodies as no note is particularly dissonant when paired with other notes in the scale.

Motives

In music, motives are the start of a musical phrase that "motivate" the rest of the pattern. It is easily repeatable and easy to expand upon.

Scott Joplin

King of Ragtime

Jim Crow

Laws designed to enforce segregation of blacks from whites

Louis Armstrong

Leading African American jazz musician during the Harlem Renaissance; he was a talented trumpeter whose style influenced many later musicians.

Oral Tradition

Literature that passes by word of mouth from one generation to the next.

Black Folk Church

Look at andrews

The Gospel

Means "good news"

Great Migration

Movement of African Americans from the South to the North for jobs.

Self-empowerment

Music is a form of self-empowerment in African culture. It allows for self expression and is used to connect with the gods in African culture.

Jazz Age

Name for the 1920s, because of the popularity of jazz-a new type of American music that combined African rhythms, blues, and ragtime

Antebellum

Occurring before a war

Second Line

People who follow the band in the jazz funeral, dancing as they go.

backbeat

Placing a strong accent on the offbeats. In a four-beat measure, the drummer typically emphasizes beats 2 and 4, creating the basic rhythm of rock music.

Minstrelsy

Popular theatrical entertainment begun around 1830, in which white actors in blackface presented comic routines that combined racist caricature and social criticism. White people stereotyping black people.

Tuning preachers

Preachers who sing their words to increase their impact.

Harry Pace

Publisher, business partner of W.C. Handy and founder of Black Swan Records, the first black-owned record label of the 20th century

Unison

Singing same melody at the same time

Spirituals

Song form that emphasized Christian values and embodied many of the rhythmic aspects of the folk songs. There were two types of spirituals- arranged, which were songs appropriated by white people to "europeanize" folk songs, and folk spirituals, which was closer to african culture.

Blues Aesthetic

The blues Aesthetic is more than the "black" aesthetic.

Old Testament

The forty-six books that make up the first part of the Bible and record salvation history before the coming of the Savior, Jesus Christ.

Fisk Jubilee Singers

The group that introduced the spiritual to the northern states and Europe

Congo Square

The place in New Orleans where slaves were allowed to play traditional African music and dance.

New Testament

The second part of the Christian Bible, containing descriptions of the life and teachings of Jesus and of his early followers

TOBA

Theater Owners Booking Association

King Oliver

United States jazz musician who influenced the style of Louis Armstrong (1885-1938)

Plessy v. Ferguson

a 1896 Supreme Court decision which legalized state ordered segregation so long as the facilities for blacks and whites were equal

glissandos

a continuous slide upward or downward between two notes.

Syncopation

a deliberate upsetting of the normal pattern of accents

Soli

a group of soloists, multiple soloists.

Pathos

a quality that evokes pity or sadness

Call and Response

a question-and-answer pattern in which a group responds to a leader

Polyrhythm

a rhythm that makes use of two or more different rhythms simultaneously

Melody

a sequence of single notes that is musically satisfying.

riff

a short, catchy, and repeated phrase that is similar to a melody but is shorter.

Call and response

a song style in which a singer or musician leads with a call and a group responds

cakewalk

a strutting dance popularized by minstrel shows in the late 19th century

New Orleans Jazz

a style of jazz that originated in that city shortly after 1900, involving a syncopated, improvisatory style of playing built on the tunes and harmonies of blues, parlor songs, rags, and marches

Chattel

an item of personal, movable property; slave

Meter

bars or beats, regularly recurring demarcations in music.

Double Entendre

double meaning

Falsetto

high voice

falsetto

high voice

Inclusion relation

logical relation--set a is included in b if every element of A is in B.

vocables

meaningless sung syllables that take the place of song lyrics

Collective Improvisation

method of improvisation found in New Orleans jazz in which several instruments in the front line improvise simultaneously in a dense, polyphonic texture.

Great Migration

movement of over 300,000 African American from the rural south into Northern cities between 1914 and 1920

Functional Music

music that fulfills a social purpose outside itself

Octoroon

person of one-eighth black ancestry

Timbre

quality of sound

timbre

quality of sound

Beat/pulse

regular, recurrent pulsation that divides music into equal units of time

Hymns

songs of praise to God

Arranged Spiritual

spirituals that retained the melodies and texts of their folk predecessors, but sung in the European tradition and formal performance style

Blues

style of music evolving from African American spirituals and noted for its melancholy sound

Oral tradition

the custom of passing along stories by speech

Reconstruction

the period after the Civil War in the United States when the southern states were reorganized and reintegrated into the Union

Mute

to soften or tone down the sound of

Polymeter

two or more meters sounding simultaneously

Work song

type of folk song used during work to regulate physical activity or engage worker's attention

Ragtime

type of music that blended African-American rhythmic elements and European musical forms. It required technical prowess when playing the piano. Made huge waves through Scott Joplin. It's on the piano and isn't improvised. It's a sectional music.

A cappella

without instrumental accompaniment