Music Appreciation ppt 1 for test 3, Burnet High School, Mr. Goodman

1. Elements: Melody, Harmony, Texture
Music Appreciation
Unit 2

2. Texture
• Texture has to do with the way various musical
sounds and melodic lines blend.
• It is the interrelationship of voices and instruments.
• When hearing texture in music one must ask oneself
how many melodies are occurring and how are they
related?
• The three textures in music are .
– Monophonic
– Polyphonic
– Homophonic
• A composition can start in one texture and move
freely into another.

3. Monophonic
• One main melody. (mono=one, phony=sound).
• A single-line melody unadorned and
unaccompanied.
• Often monophonic texture is not enough
information to continue to hold ones attention
as an artistic experience.
• The exceptions are vocal chants such as
plainsong and certain pieces sung a cappella
such as, Amazing Grace.
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/gregoriancha
nt.mp3

4. Polyphonic
• Two or more melodies of equal importance
played or sung simultaneously.
• The term frequently applied to polyphonic
texture is counterpoint or contrapuntal.
• There are two types of polyphony.
– Imitative
– Non-Imitative

5. Imitative Polyphony
• Melodic lines sounding together with the same
or quite similar melodies at staggered time
intervals.
• Strict imitative polyphony uses the same melody
that copies itself which is called canon or round.
• In non-strict imitative polyphony you hear
imitation but it is not the exact melody chasing
itself but a very similar one.
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/fugue1.mp3

6. Non-Imitative Polyphony
• Two completely different melodies going on at
the same time.
• Two distinctly different melodic layers floating
in and out of each other.
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/cantata.
mp3

7. Homophonic
• One main melody of real interest combined with
other sounds that are markedly subsidiary.
• The "melody and accompaniment" of music.
• One main melody with every thing else
accompaniment.
• A principal melodic line with subordinate
sounds used as supportive accompaniment.
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/sym40moz.
mp3

8. Harmony
• The simultaneous sounding of two or more
pitches.
• Another word for harmony is chord.
• A chord usually consists of three notes that
make up what is called a triad.
• A triad consists of a root (the note that the
chord is named after) a third (the note three
steps away from the root) and a fifth (the note
five steps away from the root).
• 1 3 5 = triad.

9. Harmony
• Harmonies or chords can support a melody
by sounding together vertically in time.
• Or, when two or more melodies overlap, the
point of simultaneous sound is where the
harmony occurs.
• That is a more horizontal relationship.

10. Harmony
• When notes or a chord or harmony sound
simultaneously it can produce stability or
tension.
• These two types of harmonies are referred to
as:
– Consonance
– Dissonance

11. Consonance
• Harmony that is stable, non active,
agreeable, free of tension, blending and
resolved.

12. Dissonance
• Harmony that is unstable, in opposition,
conflicting, jarring and unresolved.
• A dissonant chord leaves the listener with a
feeling of expectation.
• It takes a consonant chord to complete the
gesture created by a dissonance.
• Most good music has a combination of
consonance and dissonance.

13. Harmony
• Harmonies move in progressions that help
form the key of a piece.
• Each key is positioned around a tonic and
harmony can be formed from the tonic note
or any other scale degree.
• Harmonies can also help to change the key of
a composition, when necessary.

14. Harmony
• The processes of changing keys in music is
called modulation.
• Harmony like scales can be major or minor
and classical music uses those two primarily
but eventually you will hear about or get to
know diminished, half-diminished,
augmented, dominant seventh and many
more types of chords or harmonies.