Music EC-12 (Listening) Flashcards
Audiation
Gordon’s music learning theory for newborn and young children offers the idea that audiation, or the cognitive steps taken in the brain when music is heard or remembered not as the result of outside stimuli, is imperative for a child to understand music and subsequently to perform or compose music. Aural perception differs from audiation in that aural perception occurs when a person hears the music that is being played. Musicians are special in that they can audiate with no outside reference points, which allows them to read, remember, write, improvise, and compose music. Children can develop rhythmic and tonal audiation which will allow them a better understanding of how to read music. Preparatory audiation involves acculturation, imitation, and assimilation.
Acculturation of preparatory audiation
As the first type of preparatory audiation, acculturation as the readiness period involves absorption, random response, and purposeful response where children learn from the sounds and music heard around them. Absorption lasts for the first 18months of a child’s life and includes listening. The second stage, random response occurs between 1 and 3 years where the child can participate in music through listening as well as creating and dancing. Purposeful response occurs between 18 months and 3 years so that the child can attempt to contribute to the music by copying movements or singing along. During this time, parents and teachers should play different styles of music and try to encourage any babbling or moving done by the child in response to the music. Children should be persuaded to create their own songs and should be introduced to the tonal and rhythmic patterns in music.
Imitation of preparatory audiation
The second type of preparatory audiation, imitation occurs between 3 and 5 and involves the child shedding his or her egocentricity and breaking the code. Many different aspects of the environment and personality of the child will determine how quickly and easily a child moves from one step to the next in the preparatory audiation stages. As a child enters the shedding of egocentricity stage, he or she becomes cognizant of how his or her movements or sounds may differ from other children’s or adults’ movements or sounds. The time required for the child to reach this level of awareness is important as young musicians must be able to differentiate between correct and incorrect imitation. The breaking the code stage involves a child realizing he or she can imitate the rhythmic or tonal patterns heard. Patience is the best way to proceed with children who are entering this stage.
Assimilation of preparatory audiation
The third type of preparatory audiation, assimilation involves the 2 stages of introspection and coordination. Between 3 and 6, a child may develop the ability to coordinate the movements involved in moving while singing. During the introspection stage, the child should discover with no assistance from the parent or teacher how the body movements coordinate with the rhythmic pulse of the chanting or singing. Once this awareness takes place, the child can then progress to the final stage of coordination. The coordination stage involves the child actively participating in timing the movements with the musical or rhythmic pattern of the song or chant. As this stage occurs around school time, the music educator at the school should be able to help students with any aspect of this process.
Acoustics
Acoustics refers to the study of the production and perception of sound within a particular room or area. By producing musical sound, musicians create mechanical vibrations from the stretching of strings or membranes, movement of wooden parts, and the oscillatory movement of air columns. This sound action affects the air, which carries the energy of the vibrations from the musician to the audience member. The sound is transmitted through to the brain where it is deciphered and interpreted. The perceived sound is referred to as a pure tone and has a frequency of full oscillations occurring each second. The human ear can perceive 20 to 20,000 cycles per second, or cps, and the corresponding frequency of the pure tone determines the pitch.
Frequency
Higher frequencies produced indicate higher pitches perceived. The concert A pitch corresponds to 440 cps, which is the frequency created by the vibrations on a tuning fork that moves back and forth 440 times a second. When that frequency is doubled, the pitch is raised an octave. The maximum pressure of the vibration or air displacement corresponds to the amount of energy in the vibrating action and the amount of energy that is available to be transmitted through the air. The energy that reacts with the air at that point reflects the current sound intensity. As the intensity increases, the sound is magnified; however, the intensity of sound can reflect more than the frequency and pitch.
Complex sounds and pitch
Any complex pattern or tone can be displayed as a total number of pure tones at different frequencies and different amplitudes, or strengths. These components that create the complex sounds are called partials and have corresponding partial frequencies. A decaying or continuously sounding musical tone shows the changes in frequencies and amplitudes and has partial frequencies that equal an integer times the single frequency. This mathematical equation is called the fundamental. Partial fundaments can be 440, 880, 1320, and on and register as 1f, 2f, 3f and on where f 1(frequency) is 440 cps; the frequency of the nth partial corresponds to n times the frequency of the fundamental. A harmonic set of partial frequencies characterizes the musical tones continuously produced.
Pitch and musical tone
Well-defined musical tones have a pitch relating to the frequency of the fundamental as established by the harmonic make-up of the tones. While the frequencies creating the concert A pitch may be 440, 880, or 1320 cps, the tone is still a concert A and is perceived individually, not as a chord. The association with the pitch of a particular tone is strong enough that the tone is heard in the harmonic set of partials even when the fundamental is removed from the tone. The harmonically related partials of intermediate percussion instruments, such as marimba or tympani, establish a definite pitch while the additional partials that are not related harmonically work together to produce the tonal quality of the instrument. Other instruments, like the bell, will create partial frequencies that do not contain harmonic sets or will create harmonics with rich partial frequencies and no definite pitch, like the cymbal.
Sound
Under the direction of the musician, a vibration is created within the instrument. As the modes of motion initiate the corresponding sound work, the frequencies create harmonic sets. For example, the string will vibrate in loops or segments of equal length for modes besides the first mode. The points between the loops are called nodes. Any excitation of the instrument will set the modes of the instrument into great vibrations so that the partial frequencies of the produced tone will be the regular frequencies created by the vibrating motion. With stringed instruments, any increased tension on the strings will raise the pitch. With wind instruments, the pressure change between the ends of the instrument determines the pitch. With percussion instruments, the density of the instrument and the corresponding mallet or beater determine the pitch. The vibrations occurring within the instrument are transferred out where they are perceived by the audience.
Sound envelope
More than timbre or tonal quality, the number of frequencies and amplitudes of the partials is an important consideration of the sound. The number of partials that make up the tone is an important facet of the timbre. The basic sound associated with certain instruments results from the related intensities of the partials. The ear and brain perceive the specific frequencies and amplitudes to identify the sound of the instrument, and the association with the start and end of the particular phrasing also defines an instrument and its characteristic sound. As a tone begins and completes a steady creation of sound, it forms the attack; as a tone dies away or ends, it forms the decay. The sounds of the attack and decay together create the sound envelope.
Architectural acoustics
The reflection of sound and speed of transmission are two important considerations regarding the determination of good sound. Sound created inside the music hall should reach the audience directly but also should bounce off the walls and ceiling to even out the effect. Some sounds travel faster than others and are more piercing when they reach the audience, after being bounced around the room and other objects within that room. If the sound takes too long to reach the audience, it may be perceived as an echo that is distracting. Sound perceived in a live room has obvious reflected qualities with a richer fullness while a dead room will absorb the sound without allowing for any reflection or bouncing back of sound waves. The walls, carpeting, drapes, and ceiling tiles can also contribute to the quality of the room and how well the sound waves will be reflected.
Perceptive listening
As art of sound, music is best appreciated by listeners who are attentive, and music educators can help students learn how to listen. Perceptive listening allows students not only to hear the notes but also to understand the structure and movement of the phrasing. This kind of listener can fathom how the elements of the piece go together and are sustained. Research has shown that even young children will cease all movement to listen or concentrate on a singer or some other instrument actively engaged in the production of music. Similar to learning a second language, the process of perceptive listening requires a period of just hearing the components of the sounds before attempting any kind of repetition or improvised creation.
Attentive listening
Most people are able to block out any kinds of usual sounds that are not related to their immediate environment, such as honking horns or conversations of others. Many rooms for public or group access also perpetuate this containment of sound with soundproofing created by walls or other barriers to the outside world. Being so removed from natural sounds, people will tune them out when they occur. Music educators work to keep the attention of children riveted on the sounds being played. Perceptive listening requires the child to develop an attitude or persona of attentive listening, or focused listening. Attentive listening is necessary in musical exercises as well as other areas of education and experience. Music educators should provide a time of specific music listening and focus so that children can pay attention to what is being played and learn from it.
Sound exploration areas
Young children need a place to experiment with musical instruments and sounds that is separated from other groups that may involved in more directed study. In these sections, children should be free to work with instruments such as the drums, bells, tambourines, shakers, claves, and castanets as loudly or as adamantly as the child chooses. All sound exploration should be hands-on so the child can become more familiar with the instrument and how it can change its sound when played in a different way. The walls of the sound exploration area can be decorated with musical depictions of storybook characters or nursery rhymes, and the words of simple rhymes such as “Hickory, Dickory Dock” can be written out so the children can practice reciting while using their instruments.
Introduction of musical instruments
Music educators should not just hand over rhythm or simple instruments to young children and expect them to figure out on their own the required technique or style to create a certain sound. The music educator should give instruction in how to use the instrument and then allow the child to replicate that instruction and eventually improvise from there. Music educators should comment on a child’s production of sound with positive and supportive comments, asking that child to make a louder or softer sound or to change the beat from fast to slow. By educating the child on how to make different sounds on the instrument with different mallets or ways of playing, the music educator can keep the exercise fresh and challenging for the child.