Terms #1 Flashcards
Psalmody/ Hymnody
- psalms and hymns were sung in unison either antiphonally (two choirs alternating) or responsorially (soloist alternating with one choir)
- the words were chanted primarily to simple melodic formulas in a way that helped project text across large spaces
- traditions of Jewish psalmody and hymnody played a vital role in the emergence of plainchant in the Christian church
- importantly is the association they created between music and feelings of intense spirituality
Greek Drama Chorus
- theatre Greek drama gave chorus a significant role
- chorus provided a running commentary and response to the actions unfolding on stage
- choruses gave voice to the feelings of the community through a combination of word, music, and dance
Ode
- Greek odes were primarily poetic pieces performed with musical accompaniment
- odes written by the 5th century BCE poet Pindar would commemorate the victors in the Olympic games and were clearly intended to be sung
Monophonic
-musical texture consisting of a single melodic line with the possibility of an accompanimental line that either doubled or modestly embellished the principal voice
melos
song with the fusion of melody/rhythm/words
Tetrachords (Greek)
-the musical system used in ancient Greece was based on a series of interlocking tetrachords, descending successions of four notes spanning the interval of a fourth
-there are three types (genera) of tetrachords:
Diatonic: whole tone-half tone
Chromatic: minor third-half tone-half tone
Enharmonic: major third- quarter tone-quarter tone
The Greater Perfect System
- made up of four, interlinked tetrachords, plus one pitch
- constitutes a two octave range
- melodies were organized according to the characteristics of one of the several tone (singular tons)
tonoi (singular: tonus)
- the names referred to Greek ethnic groups and regions and were related to the musical practices of those groups
- the names used to classify the modes much later in the late Middle Ages were taken from these names but the pitches and structures of of the medieval modes were altogether different from those of the original Greek tonoi
mese
-the pitch in the middle of the bonus that most melodies return to (like out tonic)
The Roman Empire
- we have no music (not even fragments) from this era
- Rome is a military power that spreads from the Mediterranean to Britain by the second century AD
- Romans absorbed aspects of Greek Culture including its music which played an important aspect in Roman life such as theatre and civic ritual
- instruments included brass instruments like the tuba and cornu (horn) which features detachable mouthpieces and were used in the military life to provide signalling to troops
The Byzantine Empire
-when the Western Roman Empire vanished, the Greek-speaking Eastern, or Byzantine Empire would endure until the fall of its capital, Constantinople (modern Istanbul), to the Turks in 1453
Harmony of the Spheres
- Pythagoras (6th century BCE) discovered the relationship between musical sound and number
- he considered the mathematical basis of sound a fundamental law governing the relationship of all physical bodies in the universe
- music prevents the planets and stars from colliding
Doctrine of Ethos
- music and its power over the soul
- has the power to change your emotional life
- plato recommended youths learn music in Dorian and Phrygian modes because it imparted courage
- Aristotle observed that some modes made men mournful and restrained in mood such as the Mixolydian
Theory/ Practice
- Pythagoras and his followers were not concerned with music as a creation or performance but as a mathematical basis in sound and as a discipline within the seven liberal arts
- Aristoxenus (ca 364 BCE-304BCE) preferred to base his theories on a mixture of abstract reason and empirical perception
Liberal arts: trivium
-the language arts of the Liberal Arts:
grammer, rhetoric, dialectic
