Blues Music

Blues Music Blues Music began as songs sung by black slaves in the mid - 19th century in the Southern United states. It has taken elements from African, European and American folk music. After the Civil War and emancipation the Blues spread, together with the species that sang and played it, from the cotton fields of the southern states to northern cities such as Chicago and Detroit, where the music became hugely popular. The notes in the blues scale are very dissonant. This may be because the black slaves were in misery working all day, and the scale represents their feelings. In the scale of C, the notes in the blues scale are: ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ This is the chord sequence in 12-bar blues music. It is still sometimes heard in popular music today. Chord of Chord of Chord of Chord Bars 1 - 4 C C C C Bars 5 - 8 F F C C Bars 9 - 12 G F C C Blues music has many characteristics in its melody that makes it typical to the style. It often rolls between 2 notes, and sometimes there is a glissando, which is sliding from one note to another. Blues music may also

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 355
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Integrated Task Commentary. For my performance I have chosen a Trinity Guildhall Grade 5 piece called Lime Tree Bay. It is a jazz piece composed by a session musician and composer called Malcolm Ball. I will play my own interpretation of this particular p

INTEGRATED TASK COMMENTARY For my performance I have chosen a Trinity Guildhall Grade 5 piece called Lime Tree Bay. It is a jazz piece composed by a session musician and composer called Malcolm Ball. I will play my own interpretation of this particular piece of music, which differs subtly in the "feel" from the way Malcolm ball plays it. Malcolm Ball's version lacks a degree of subtlety in the way it played, which modifies the way it sounds and the emotions conveyed. I believe my version is truer to the way traditional jazz is played which was reflective of the black people's liberation in back street clubs (the birthplace of jazz). Malcolm Ball's piece only provided a template for the piece which could be developed by the performer, acknowledging the supposition that a piece of music, much like a book can be interpreted in a variety of ways. The first twenty five bars are performed using brushes; this is not dissimilar to the way many big band pieces were played and so shares properties of both big band and traditional jazz. The use of brushes makes it easier to differentiate between accented notes and long legato "sweeps" on the snare drum, giving the piece a variance in timbre making the piece more interesting. It is difficult to sustain a homogenous sound that doesn't vary at the apex of the stir. Instead I chose to embrace the issue and accentuate the apogee of the

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 1010
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Mozart's Symphony No. 40 in G Minor Section B

Symphony No. 40 in G minor 1st movement By Crystal Wong 10S Mozart's Symphony No. 40 (1st movement) is written in sonata form which has been used very frequently in the Classical Period. A movement which is written sonata form has three sections, the exposition, development, and recapitulation. In the exposition, there is a "first subject", a theme that is established. It is followed by a transition section, with the end of this section marked by a general pause. The accompaniment in this section is more homophonic and is more by simple chords than in the previous subsections. There is use of imperfect cadences at the end to signify the continuity of the exposition. The last subsection of the exposition is the codetta, which in this piece, is very similar the first subject of the exposition. However, perfect cadences are repeated at the end of the codetta to signify the end of the Exposition. The Development section of a typical Classical-era sonata usually refers to where the first subject of the exposition is further explored and developed. As one can notice, there are uses of contrapuntal texture as well as a variety of key changes which will be explored later. The texture in this section begins as very heavy, with the use of the entire orchestra. However, at bar 140 and until the end of the development section, it begins to be lighter and sparser. The final

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 1412
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Pop music composition

Solo Ballads ? BALLADS -tell stories, they have been around since at the 15th century. Back then a ballad was a long song with lots of verses that told a story. It's the type of thing that was sung by wandering mistrels. ? POP/ROCK - ballads still tell stories, they are often slow and sad and tell some kind of love story. Songwriters like to put a romantic or spooky twist right at the end to keep people listening. You will hear ballads sung in many different styles - a rock ballad accompanied by heavy drums and amplified guitars e.g. a folk ballad played on a acoustic guitar. Singer-songwriters are artists who write and sing their own material. They usually accompany themselves on either the guitar or piano and write a fair few ballads. • Bob Dylan's most famous ballad is an anti-war song called 'Blowing in the Wind'. • He sings a simple major scale, diatonic tune and plays a acoustic guitar. • All the verses are the same music and the same last line. • When the last line is repeated this works like a mini-chorus. • Elton John's 'Candle in the Wind' is a love ballad about Marilyn Monroe. • Her real name was Norma Jean. • The first line goes 'Goodbye Norma Jean....' • At Princess Diana's funeral he changed the words to 'Goodbye English Rose...' • Elton accompanies most of his songs on the piano. • His accompaniments combine rhythmic

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 1144
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Music Composition Brief

COMPOSITION BRIEF I will compose a piece of music for my instrument keyboard My composition will be in a blues story. Blues, type of music was first developed during the late 19th century by African American performers, as a form the first recording of the blues was in 1895 George W. Johnson's recording of "laughing Song" which was the first song to be recorded, which all was after a civil war. 2 bar blues: The most common musical form of blues is the 12-bar blues. The term "12-bar" refers to the number of measures, or musical bars, used to express the theme of a typical blues song. Nearly all blues music is played to a 4/4 time signature, which means that there are four beats in every measure or bar and each quarter note is equal to one beat. I will use some of the features/techniques studied in my 3 study pieces Sprightly: Bass part uses a Pedal Note, the same not is repeated with a melody over the top. Key -C major 4 beats in a bar Right hand part is syncopated, it accents notes that are not on the beat structure ='AA' Melody use a Bb to create a C chord ( C E G B B ) Bar 5-6 are the same as bar 1-4 but with shortened rhythms (diminutia) using the C blues scale C Eb F C G Bb C the bass line also uses notes Melody use 3rds, 2 notes are played together CE, FA, GBb Keyboard Techniques Staccato - bass notes are played short sharp Right hand had accents,

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 531
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Composition analysis

MYP Music Year 11 Extended Twentieth Century Snapshots Ms. Neil Medora Choi 11AM 3th January, 2009 Composition analysis This expressionistic composition piece was named as "A Káosz Szeru Szafari", meaning the chaotic safari. As seen from the first bar, it starts off with a subtle tone, only playing with the right hand and staccato, building up the tension, but only for one bar. It reflected on a portrait of a leopard, hidden among the tall grass, having its eyes on its prey among the herd of zebras. The accents emphasizes each step the leopard takes, very fast but careful. Using crescendo, it moves on to the second bar, the leopard leaps out from the grass, and with a sforzando to show that the leopard has started the race with its prey, and by bar three, on the left hand of this bar, it had a whole bar of semiquavers, so the rhythm reflected on the leopard was using full force as the whole bar was fortissimo. In my first draft for the composition, it used too many triads therefore the composition changed to more cluster chords. Using cluster chords not only fits the twentieth century but it also creates more tension throughout this fast and exciting chase of the two safari animals. Therefore, it tension builds up in bar 5 where the time signature changes and the bass part is accented cluster chords, and the composition had an ascending pattern which reflected the

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 553
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Comment on How Schoenburg Uses the Following Music Elements in Peripetie from Five Orchestral Pieces

Rore Erica Okoh 10 Sharman Music GCSE Mrs Yard Comment on How Schoenburg Uses the Following Music Elements in Peripetie from Five Orchestral Pieces: . Structure 2. Texture 3. Instrumentation 4. Melody Five Orchestral Pieces is an atonal Expressionist piece. The piece Peripetie is the fourth movement. Peripetie means 'a sudden change of fortune'. The piece is atonal and often with Schoenberg his music is quite dissonant, uses 12 chromatic music notes, has a rondo structure, a wide range of dynamics so a lot of extremes almost like terrace dymanics, the range is from fff to ppp and so only virtuosic could play his music and there is a overly large woodwind section. The movement falls into five sections A B A C A which is a rondo form. The Five Orchestral Pieces containing the Peripetie is written for a very large orchestra using three flutes, oboes, clarinets and bassoons, also a piccolo, cor anglais, clarinet in D, bass clarinet and contrabassoon. There are extra horns, trumpets, trombones and a tuba and also with percussion. Schoenburg was famous for writing pieces for instruments where they often play at the extreme of their registers. The piece first starts of in the key of C, but because the piece lacks a key it continuously changes throughout. In the first few seconds of the piece the woodwind play triplets whilst the brass does a glissando and the strings are

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 569
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Describe the features of music in Electric Counterpoint

Electric Counterpoint . Electric Counterpoint was written in the 1980’s. 2. Electric Counterpoint was composed for Pat Metheny. 3. Electric Counterpoint is a diatonic piece of minimalistic music. Steve Reich wrote movement 3 of Electric Counterpoint for 8 guitars and 2 basses. It is called ‘Fast’. There are 9 pre-recorded parts and 1 live guitar. Electric counterpoint is written in 3/2. A rhythmic displacement occurs when the guitars come in. This is where a repeated ostinato begins on a different beat of the bar. The ostinato is heard continuously until the end of bar 73. At bar 82 all of the guitars shift to 12/8 apart from guitars 1-4. The effect of the guitars playing at the same time but in different rhythms produces an “interesting rhythmic counterpoint”. The sound of the two time signatures together undermines the metre. The bass guitars strengthen the triple metre. The melody of Electric Counterpoint is based on the ostinati. Reich builds the ostinato at the beginning of the movement by using note addition. This is where you build it up by adding notes in stages. This builds up a repeating idea. The resultant melody – a new melody that emerges when two or more different melodies are played at the same time- gives a new life to the ostinato. At bar 82 the bass guitars play a new ostinato. There are two basses, one which pans to the left and one that

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 497
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

Serialism and Minimalism

Area of Study 2 Changing directions in western classical music from 1900 Introduction * Since the Baroque period, harmony had been progressing and became more and more complex * In the late Romantic period, composers such as Wagner, Bruckner and Strauss used more chromatic notes and dissonant chords Impressionism * In France, composers such as Debussy were part of a new way of thinking called impressionism * This word first applied to a school of French painting * It's chief representative was Claude Monet * Impressionism tried to either give a glimpse/impression of something- not a concrete view * Impressionism didn't seek to express deeply felt emotions, but it evoked a mood/atmosphere * The tonality was not so defined and it did not have a definite 'key centre' Expressionism * Expressionism represented inner experience and was a rebellion against established order and accepted forms o Real objects in a distorted representation * Artists reflecting feelings about themselves and their surroundings * Artists (notably Kandinsky and Munch) created vivid pictures, distorting colour and shape to express their innermost emotions * In the same way, composers put intense emotional expression into their music * Expressionist music avoided cadence, repetition, sequence and balanced phrases * It had constantly changing textures, extremes of dynamics and used harmonic

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 478
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay

The Orchestra

The Orchestra The orchestra began to be used more from the time of Haydn and Mozart (the classical era), who wrote a total of 150 symphonies. It grew larger as composers added more parts for new instruments, and eventually it became the large symphony orchestra of the present day. The orchestra is made up of four main families of instruments; strings, woodwind, brass, and percussion. The string family is made up of violins, violas, cellos, and double basses. There are usually around fifteen first violins, fifteen second violins, twelve violas, ten cellos, and eight basses. In Mozart's time, sometimes only one or two were used. The woodwind family is made up of the flute, and instruments with a reed which are blown: clarinets, oboes, and bassoons. Usually there are at least two of each in the orchestra. There are other woodwind instruments, such as the double bassoon, the bass clarinet, the cor anglais (like an oboe, but with a curved reed and a lower and mellower tone) and the piccolo. In the classical orchestra of Mozart and Haydn, oboes, flutes, and bassoons were used a lot, but the other woodwind instruments were developed later. The clarinet appeared later still, at the beginning of the 18th century. It was not used much until Mozart realised its possibilities, and wrote his clarinet quintet and concerto. Brass instruments date back to beyond the Middle Ages, but

  • Ranking:
  • Word count: 629
  • Level: GCSE
  • Subject: Music
Access this essay