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Absolute Music
Music that is to be enjoyed for its own sake, without reference to any extramusical ideas or images, and that is not meant to be about anything. Compare with program music. Any music that has words cannot, by definition, be considered absolute music. Absolute music is also known as "abstract music".
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Arpeggio
A style of playing a chord, one note at a time rather than all together. It is sometimes referred to as a "broken chord."
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BB
An abbreviation for an entry in the Béla Bartók works catalog by Somfai in Bela Bartok: Composition, Concepts, and Autograph Sources; BB numbers supercede Sz. (Szöllösy) numbers.
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BWV
An abbreviation for an entry in the Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis or Bach works catalog, for the works of Johann Sebastian Bach.
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Cadenza
Part of a piece of music devoted to showing off the virtuosity of a solo instrument. Most often cadenzas occur at the end of a concerto movement and reflect the musical material that has come before. Cadenzas can be written out by the composer or improvised by the performer.
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Chord
A combination of two or more notes played simultaneously.
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Coda
A concluding section of a movement of music, added to enhance the movement's sense of closure. Codas are not a standard part of the form, but are added as composers see fit, especially to the first or last movements of symphonies.
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Concerto
A piece of music that contrasts the forces of an orchestra with a soloist or a small ensemble. Most concertos are three movements in length. The first one is usually fast; the second is usually slow; and the third one is usually fast. Most concertos also feature passages that showcase the soloist's virtuosity.
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Consonance
A combination of notes that is stable and does not require resolution. Compare with dissonance.
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D.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Schubert's works by Deutsch.
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Development
The word development refers to the act of working with or changing musical material in some way, or to the section in a piece in which this working out takes place. A composer develops musical material in a number of ways, he may, for example, break it down into smaller sections, write it in a different key, change some of its notes, rhythms or harmonies, rearrange its parts, etc.
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Dissonance
A combination of notes that creates musical tension and usually resolves to a consonance. The opening of "Chopsticks" is dissonant.
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Dodecophony
Also known as twelve tone, this is music that employs all twelve tones found within an octave. Unlike tonal music, twelve-tone music does not have a central tone or scale, but is based on an arrangement of the twelve tones known as a row. The composer manipulates the row in various ways, backwards, transposed, inverted, etc., to produce related rows from which the musical material for the piece is derived.
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Downbeat
Downbeat is a term that musicians use to refer to the first of a group of beats, see meter. A conductor literally moves his hand down to signify when this beat should occur.
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Dynamics
The various levels of loudness and softness in music. The application of dynamics is not an exact science, but a relative art, as performers decide just how to interpret a composer's indications. These indications are traditionally written in Italian with words such as piano meaning "soft," and forte meaning "loud." The word mezzo is added to suggest something in the middle, for example a passage marked mezzo piano is played "medium soft," while a passage marked mezzo forte is played "medium loud."
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Exposition
The exposition is a section of a fugue or a piece in sonata form that "exposes" or presents the important harmonies and themes.
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Fanfare
Music primarily played by brass instruments -- occasionally with percussion accompaniment -- for ceremonial purposes. "Hail to the Chief" is an example of a fanfare, as is the theme music for the Olympic games.
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Flat
A sign placed next to a note that lowers its pitch by a semitone. A D-flat is played on the piano, for example, by striking the black key immediately to the left of the white key D. Compare with sharp.
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Form
The organizing principle behind a piece of music, form, in a general sense, means nothing more than the manner in which the musical events flow through time. Composers like to have a game plan, so throughout the history of music, various forms, no more than solutions to the problem of "what should come next," have emerged. Some examples of form are sonata form, rondo, and fugue.
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Fugue
A musical form based on principles of imitation, whereby a theme is played successively by different instruments or voices.
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G.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Boccherini by Gérard.
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H.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach by Helm. H. numbers supercede W. (Wotquenne) number, which are, however, given in parentheses.
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HOB.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Haydn by Hoboken. The Roman numeral following "Hob." denotes the genre (e.g., "I" for symphonies, "III" for string quartets) followed by a slash and the Arabic number placing the owkr within that genre.
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Harmony
In general, harmony refers to the combination of notes into chords. Musicians also use the word to refer to the system by which chords are made and how they relate to one another.
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Interval
Musicians often have cause to describe pitches in relation to one another, using the concept of an interval to do so. The interval between two pitches is the distance between them, measured according to a somewhat complicated system of whole steps and half-steps that reflects their relative position in a scale.
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J.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Weber by Jähns.
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K.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Domenico Scarlatti by Kirkpatrick; Scarlatti's works also bear "L." (Longo) numbers and "P." (Pestelli) numbers.
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K.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Mozart by Köchel. "K. Anh." stands for works in Köchel's addendum (Anhang) to the main catalog. Köchel's name has been retained as author of the catalog, though other scholars have revised it. First published in 1862, the catalog is in its sixth edition—known as K6—published in 1964. When the Köchel number has been revised from the previous editions, the K6 number is given first, followed by the traditional number in parentheses.
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Key
A collection of notes that can be arranged to form one of 30 recognized scales. Keys are named for the first note of the scale; so, for example, the key of C Major includes the notes of the C Major scale; the key of G Major includes the notes of the G Major scale, and so forth.
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LÄndler
An Austrian and Bavarian dance form in slow triple meter. Originally a type of folk dance, it became popular in Viennese ballrooms in the early 19th century before eventually being overshadowed by the waltz.
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M.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Franck by Mohr.
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Melody
A series of tones played or sung one after another, rather than at the same time (see chords, harmony). To many, the term melody is just a more formal way of saying "tune." Each tone in a melody is made up of two things: pitch and duration.
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Meter
The organization of the beats of a piece of music into regular units, usually groups of two (duple) or three (triple).
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Minuet and Trio
An elegant dance of noble lineage containing two contrasting sections, both in triple meter. A product of the baroque era, it was danced in the court of Louis XIV and retained its implications of breeding and sophistication into the 19th century. Traditionally used in stylized form as the third movement in classical symphonies.
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Motive
A short musical phrase that is used and developed to unify a piece. Although some musicians use the words "motive" and "theme" interchangeably, most consider motives to be shorter and more fragmentary. From that point of view themes are made up of motives, so that the famous theme of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, for example, combines two versions of the "short-short-short-long" motive.
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Movement
A self-contained piece of music that is part of a larger work, such as a concerto, sonata, or symphony. There is often a brief pause between movements, though not always.
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Mute
A device used to muffle the sound of a string or brass instrument. String players place mutes on top of the bridge on their instrument in order to lessen the vibrations of the strings; brass players place the mute in the bell or opening of their instrument to deaden the sound as it escapes.
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Note Names
Notes in music are named for the letters of the alphabet, A through G. Because there are many more notes than letters, the letters repeat so that once G is reached, one starts again with A. The left-most white key on the piano is named A, the next one B, the next one C, and so on. Each black key has two names (at one point in music history they were actually different notes) which reflect the two white keys that surround it. The black key nestled between C and D, for example, is called either C-sharp, or D-flat.
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Octave
The distance from low do up to high do, the octave encompasses eight scalar tones (do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti, do), as in, for example the white keys on the piano, C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C. This distance also encompasses twelve chromatic tones, represented by the white and black keys, as in C, C#, D, D#, E, F, F#, G, G#, A, A#, B. Notes that are an octave apart have frequencies that are in a 1:2 ratio, that is, the higher of the two has a frequency that is twice that of the lower.
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Orchestration
The art of combining the sounds of different instruments. Orchestration plays a large role in determining the sound quality, or color, of any given piece of music.
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Pavane (puh - VAHN)
A slow, stately dance that came from Italy but became popular in French, German, and English courts in the 16th and 17th centuries. It is written in duple meter, that is, with beats organized in a slow 1-2, 1-2 count that is perfect for processionals and other dignified marches.
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Pitch
The highness or lowness of a tone, determined by the number of vibrations per second produced by the sound.
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Pizzicato
While string players usually produce sound by pulling a bow across the string, they sometimes pluck the string with a finger. This latter technique is known as pizzicato.
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Program Music
Music that is inspired by a nonmusical idea, or written to express one. Pieces of program music can depict moods, feelings, images, places, people, or stories. Compare with absolute music. Sometimes composers use instruments to imitate natural sounds, such as bird songs, thunder, or bones rattling, but they also try to depict more abstract emotions and feelings in musical terms.
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Recapitulation
The Recapitulation is the section of a piece in sonata form in which the musical material of the exposition is replayed so that it ends in the home key.
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Rest
A rest is a period of silence in music. Rests can be of any length and are notated by different signs accordingly.
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Rhythm
The organization of movement in time created by long and short notes within a phrase, in a section, or in an entire piece of music.
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Rondo
A lighthearted movement usually heard at the end of a symphony or concerto. The form comes from the medieval French form of poetry and music called rondeau, and features a sophisticated scheme of musical and poetic repeats. The rondo maintains the idea of repeating material and features a recurrent theme that alternates with new material.
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RV
An abbreviation for an entry in Ryom Verzeichnis, or Ryom's catalog of Vivaldi's works; Vivaldi's works also bear F. (Fanna) numbers and P. (Pincherle) numbers.
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S.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Liszt by Searle; Liszt's works also bear "R." (Raabe) numbers.
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Scale
An ordering of notes from low to high, or from high to low. Scales come in all different types depending on what pitches are involved and what patterns are formed by the pitches. A common type of scale, called the Major scale, is often sung to the familiar do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do syllables.
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Semitone
The smallest interval on the piano, a semitone is the distance between any two consecutive keys. Semitones can be found from a white key to a black key, from a black key to a white key, and in the few cases where there is no black key in between two white keys, from a white key to another white key.
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Sharp
A sign placed next to a note that raises its pitch by a semitone. A C-sharp is played on the piano by striking the black key immediately to the right of the white key C. Compare with flat.
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Sonata Form
The term refers to a form used for movements of symphonies, quartets, and concertos. The form was first used at the time of Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) and is still in use today. Sonata form consists of three sections, the exposition, the development, and the recapitulation. The composer introduces the musical themes in the exposition, works with them in the development, and restates them, with some changes, in the recapitulation.
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Suite
A collection of individual instrumental movements that are related in some way and usually performed together. Traditionally these are specific dances, such as the minuet, that were grouped into in a larger work. Many times portions of operas or ballets are also selected and arranged into an orchestral suite to be performed without staging the entire work.
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Symphony
A large orchestral work that is usually in four movements, each with its own tempo and mood. Not all works titled "Symphony" follow a strict four-movement structure, however.
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Syncopation
A rhythmic effect created by placing emphasis on on unexpected beats. For example, a piece that is written in groups of four beats per measure would normally place the emphasis on the first and third: 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4. A syncopated passage emphasizes the second and fourth beats: 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4.
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SZ. An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Bartók by Szöllöxy; Somfai's BB numbers have supplanted Sz. numbers.
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Theme
The melody on which a piece, or a section of a piece, is based.
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Timbre
Tone color, or the particular sound of an instrument. The timbre of a trumpet, for example, is bright and brassy while the timbre of cello is mellow and warm.
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Tonality
A system of composition in which one tone is established as central and all other tones are related to it. Although the term can be used to describe any system that follows this prescription, people usually use the term in a more restricted sense to mean music written in a key.
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Tonic
The first note of a scale, and thus the central note in a key. It is the tone to which all others are related.
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Tremolo
The rapid repetition of a single pitch. This effect can be achieved instrumentally or vocally. It is often used in the string and percussion sections of an orchestra.
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Triad
A three-note chord built on alternating notes of a scale. A triad can be found by counting out five consecutive white keys on the piano, and then playing the first, third, and fifth of them.
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Triple Meter
The organization of a musical composition’s pulse into a repeating three-beat pattern: 1 2 3 | 1 2 3 etc.
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Tuning
The process of adjusting the frequencies or pitches of instruments, usually in order to bring them into agreement with a pre-determined pitch
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Variations
Modifications of a given musical theme. Variation form is a structural organization in which a theme is presented and then followed by the modified versions of the original theme.
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W.
An abbreviation for an entry in the works catalog of Carl Phillipp Emanuel Bach by Wotquenne; H. numbers, based on Helm's newer catalog, have superceded the W. numbers (which are now given in parentheses following the H. numbers).
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Waltz
A triple-meter dance that emerged in the late 18th century and remains extremely popular in ballrooms today, particularly in its most famous incarnation—the Viennese waltz.
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WoO
An abbreviation for Werk ohne Opus (Work without opus [number]), for works that have been catalogued but bear no publisher's opus number.
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Zither
An Alpine folk instrument consisting of a box-like body, a fingerboard, and more than 35 strings. Its sound is somewhat similar to both a guitar and a harp.
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