Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The Oxford Companion to Music describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory": The first is the "rudiments", that are needed to understand music notation (key signatures, time signatures, and rhythmic notation); the second is learning scholars' views on music from antiquity to the present; the third is a sub-topic of musicology ...
Music based on a single theme is called monothematic, while music based on several themes is called polythematic. Most fugues are monothematic and most pieces in sonata form are polythematic. [8] In the exposition of a fugue, the principal theme (usually called the subject) is announced successively in each voice – sometimes in a transposed form.
In music, form refers to the structure of a musical composition or performance.In his book, Worlds of Music, Jeff Todd Titon suggests that a number of organizational elements may determine the formal structure of a piece of music, such as "the arrangement of musical units of rhythm, melody, and/or harmony that show repetition or variation, the arrangement of the instruments (as in the order of ...
In theory, "music history" could refer to the study of the history of any type or genre of music, such as the music of India or rock music. In practice, these research topics are more often considered within ethnomusicology and "historical musicology" is typically assumed to imply Western Art music of the European tradition.
The concept of music appreciation is often taught as a subset of music theory in higher education and focuses predominantly on Western art music, commonly called "Classical music". This study of music is classified in a number of ways, including (but not limited to) examining music literacy and core musical elements such as pitch, duration ...
The Encyclopédie de la Pléiade defines a motif as a "melodic, rhythmic, or harmonic cell", whereas the 1958 Encyclopédie Fasquelle maintains that it may contain one or more cells, though it remains the smallest analyzable element or phrase within a subject. [5]
Some definitions refer to music as a score, or a composition: [18] [7] [19] music can be read as well as heard, and a piece of music written but never played is a piece of music notwithstanding. According to Edward E. Gordon the process of reading music , at least for trained musicians, involves a process, called "inner hearing" or "audiation ...
According to music theorist Ian Bent, music analysis "is the means of answering directly the question 'How does it work?'". [2] The method employed to answer this question, and indeed exactly what is meant by the question, differs from analyst to analyst, and according to the purpose of the analysis.