Music 1 Final Exam Terms

Bel Canto

"beautiful singing"; vocal style characterized by perfect legato and agile delivery; Pauline Viardot

Tonic

"home key; The opening and closing passages of a work are virtually always in the home key."

Dramma Giocoso

"joking drama"

Romanticism

(19th century) higher and more intense experiences and forms of expression

Big Band Jazz/Swing

10-25 players; bigger audiences (predominantly white), bigger auditoriums, detailed arrangements, less improvisation, rich color/timbre combinations; Duke Ellington, "Conga Brava"

Sonata Form

ABA' form: made up of exposition, development, and recapitulation Mozart; Don Giovanni, "Overture"

Da Capo Aria

ABA' form; start with A, goes into a contracting section, then similar section to A Handel, "La giustizia"

Fluxus

An international coalition of visual artists, writers, and musicians, mostly centered in NYC in the 1960s and 1970s; The main characteristics of the performance are that it is easy to do, no training is needed, there are simple props. it can be done anywhere by anyone, and it blurs the line between art and life Bird Call performance; spilled water demonstration

Secco

Continuo Handel, "There were shepherds"

Lied (Lieder)

German song(s); "Im wunderschonen Monat Mai"

Rondo Form

In the symphonies and other multi-movement genres of the Classical era, it was used mainly for fast, closing movements. A rondo begins with a full-fledged tune (A) and comes back to it after episodes (B, C, etc.) serving as spacers between appearances (ABACA, ABACABA); Haydn Symphony No. 101 in D, Fourth Movement

Chance Operations, Aleatory Music

Music whose composition and/or performance is undetermined by the composer; the composer has made a deliberate withdrawal of control; I Ching, Book of Changes; John Cage, Solo for Voice No. 11

Accompanied

Orchestra; Handel, "There were shepherds"

Polyrhythms

Severel (complex) overlapping rhythms; Carnaval bands and dances (Comparsas)

Silk Road Ensemble

The Silk Road Ensemble is a musical collective; loose collective of as many as 59 musicians, composers, arrangers, visual artists and storytellers from Eurasian cultures. The ensemble uses various instruments from the Silk Road region.

Minuet and Trio

Third movement in a classical symphony; Haydn, Symphony No. 99 in E-flat, Third Movement

Socialist Realism

a creative method based in the truthful, historically concrete artistic reflection of reality in its revolutionary development; "Roses for Stalin" (1949)

Ballets Russes

a dance company formed by impresario Sergei Diaghilev that specialized in the performance of "Russian-folklore"; Commissioned The Rite of Spring

Blues

a genre of black folk songs whose subjects often deal with loneliness, trouble, and unhappiness

Singspiel

a genre of opera characterized by spoken dialogue; they are generally romantic and funny by nature; Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Overture

Concerto

a large composition for a solo instrument(s) & orchestra

Exposition

a large, diverse section of music in which the basic material of the movement is presented; made up of first theme, bridge, second group, second theme, and cadence group

Symphony

a large-scale, multi-movement work for orchestra; Beethoven, Symphony No. 5

Melisma

a lot of melody over one syllable

Modernist vs. Modern

a particular self-consciousness of being at the forefront of new developments; an -ism anti-traditionalism, radical experimentation

Ragtime

a piano playing style developed by black musicians with a particular rhythmic style where the left had played on the beat and the right hand would "rag" off teh beat; The Pineapple Rag; The Maple Leaf Rag

Solo

a piece or a section of a piece played or sung featuring a single performer, who may be performing completely alone or supported by an accompanying instrument such as a piano or organ, a continuo group (in Baroque music), or the rest of a choir, orchestra, band, or other ensemble

Trill

a quick succession of two notes; alternation between two notes in quick succession

Pentatonic Scale

a scale built on five notes

Tenor

a singing voice between baritone and alto or countertenor, the highest of the ordinary adult male range

Recapitulation

a step-by-step overview; the music remains in the same key, the tonic key

Double Stop

a stringed instrument plays more than one string at a time

Gesamtkunstwerk

a total work of arts, a multimedia of music, dance, drama, and spectacle; originally applied to the operas of Wagner, who wanted his operas to combine music, acting, visual arts, and architecture; Stravinsky's The Right of Spring, Beyonce's Lemonade

Primary/First Theme

a tune, a group of small phrases that sound as though they might grow into a tune, or just a motive or two with a memorable rhythmic character.

Alto

a voice, instrument, or part below the highest range and above tenor, in particular

Ornamentation

addition of fast notes and special effects to melody, making it more expressive; gives the artist some artistic license

Castrato

an adult male soprano or alto who was castrated before puberty Farinelli (1994)

Primitivism

an aesthetic movement that purported to value the arts of tribal people; Paul Gauguin

Intro

any material that precedes the primary theme zone (P). It stands outside the exposition

Dialect

attempts at mimicking the linguistic nuances of a particular people and region; "I Got Plenty of Nothing" from Porgy & Bess

Dominant

away from home

Janissary Band

bands that traveled with turkish armies

Fragmentation

breaking up melodic material into smaller parts

Impresario

business director of an opera house; Sergei Diaghilev

Arpeggio

chord broken so that its pitches are played in succession rather than simultaneously; Bach, Well-Tempered Clavier Book 1, Prelude

Parallel Chords

chords with added intervals that do not resolve in ways typical of tonality; Debussy, Sunken Cathedral

Kantor

church music director

Opera Buffa

comic opera; Classical opera buffa works with the same elements, except that the fully musical numbers include ensembles as well as solo arias; Mozart, Don Giovanni, "Ho Capito"

Coda

concluding section in any musical form Mozart; Don Giovanni, "La ci darem la mano"

Kapellmeister

court music director

Through-Composed

each stanza is set differently; "Die alten, bosen Lieder"

New Orleans Jazz

early roots of jazz; 6-8 players; 3 melody instruments (trumpet, trombone, clarinet); rhythm section Louis Armstrong

Galant Style

emphasis on textual clarity, clear phrasing, and singabilty analog to elegant courtly conversation (wit, banter)

Coloratura

fast scales and turners over a single syllable in a word "Pensieri voi mi tormente"

Jazz

firmly American roots, firmly associated with American cultury; an ornamented performance style based on improvisation around a tune/song; highly syncopated where accents emphasize the "backbeat"

Double-Exposition Form

first section of the movement is played twice, first by the orchestra alone, and the second time by the soloist accompanied by the orchestra

Rubato

flexible use of time; use time as liberally as you want; artistic license

Development

free space for elaboration of musical material we have already encountered

Cadenza

improvised, vituosic solo passage to showcase technique; singer left to wow the audience when the chorus drops out

Program Music

instrumental music accompanied by some sort of story or narrative; music that attempts to represent extra-musical concepts without resorting to sung music; Indigena (1991)

Continuo

instruments play the bassline; usually cello and harpsichord Bach, Brandenberg Concerto No. 3

Scatting

jazz technique using onomatopoeic or nonsense syllables sung to improvised melodies; Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong's rendition of "Summertime"

Bass

lowest vocal range

Call and Response

musical interaction between a leader and chorus, usually involving repitition or another form of reply in alteration; "It Ain't Necessarily So"

Ritornello

musical material introduced at the beginning of a piece/movement that frequently "returns" Vivaldi, Violin Concerto in G, La Stravaganza, First Movement

Homophony

one main melodic line Handel, "Hallelujah"

Secondary Theme

one new theme that stands out by its melodious quality

Meter

recurring pattern of stresses or accents that provide the pulse or beat

Circle of Fifths

relationship among the 12 tones of the chromatic scale, their corresponding key signatures, and the associated major and minor keys

Spiritual

religious folk song that originated outside an established church and passed down by African Americans through oral tradition; Wade in the Water

Ostinato

repeating rhythmic figure, often in the bass line-repeated with cyclical regularity Vivaldi, Second Movement; Procession of the Oldest and Wisest One; Mi Gente; "Bitches Brew" has a trumpet ostinato

Song Cycle

series of songs(poems) united by a common theme; Robert Schumann, Dichterliebe; Beyonce, Lemonade

Opera Seria

serious, heroic opera of the Baroque period in Italy Julius Caesar

Strophic Form

setting a poem using the same music for each stanza of the text; "Im wunderschönen Monat Mai"

Monophony

single melodic line Gregorian Chant

Glissando

slide from one note to another; rapidly sliding up or down the musical scale.

Concertino

solo instrument(s) playing with an orchestra; flute, violin, harpsichord

Grand opera

style of opera developed in the mid-19th century Paris, featuring historical plots, ornate costumes, and spectacle (a lot going on)

Recitative

style of speech-like singing; certain words are accented

Stretto

subects are presented in quicker succession Bach, Well Tempered Clavier Book 1, Fugue

Ripieno

the accompnaying instruments; violin, viola, cello, violone, continuo (harsichord)

Timbre

the character of quality of a particular song differetn from its pitch or intensity

Lindomania

the consumer craze for Jenny Lind related in the 1850s, especially in the US and England

Soprano

the highest of the four standard singing voices. "Pensieri voi mi tormente"

Tonality

the idea that different harmonic areas have different functions; refers to the hierarchy and relationship between home and tonic keys; the homing instinct that we sense in melodies

Theme and Variations

the initial theme is first presented, changing certain aspects of it in each variation; Haydn, Symphony No. 94 in G

Tutti

the orchestra all together

Fugue Subject

the principal theme or melodic idea

Fusion

the process of combining or synthesizing two or more distinct identities into a new instrumentation, rhythms, melodies, harmonies, narratives, inter alia; Orquesta Sinfonica, Simon Bolivar

Polytonality

the simultaneous use of two or more keys; Stravinsky's Signs of Spring, Girls' Dance

Fugue Exposition

the subject is first presented

Fugue Entry

the subject reappears in whole

Orientalism

the systematic study of the "East"

Bridge

the transition that includes modulation (a change in key)

Blackface Minstrelsy

theatrical presentation of ostensible elements in black life in song, dance, and speech performed by white actors impersonating blacks with burnt cork and presented life as blacks. Later, minstrelsy evolved to include the participation of black performance; Sportin Life in Porgy & Bess, The Original Jim Crow

Subdominant

tonic to dominant

Bebop

trumpet, saxophone, and rhythm section (with piano); smaller band again, high technical virtuositiy and improvisation; even more adventurous harmonies and rhythms Charlie Parker: bebop saxophonist; "Out of Nowhere" was the basis for bebop and swing

Polyphony

two or more melodic lines Handel, "Hallelujah"

Chromaticism

using all 12 notes of chromatic scale (all the white and black skills)

Teleology

viewing actions in terms of their ultimate end or goal