Wikipedia:WikiProject Music terminology

From Free net encyclopedia

(Difference between revisions)
Revision as of 05:00, 18 April 2006
Silence (Talk | contribs)
recat
Next diff →

Current revision

Template:WikiPortal Music <Wikipedia:WikiProject Music <Wikipedia:Manual of Style (music)

There are a lot of different schools of thought about how to speak about music, see: music theory, musical analysis, musicology, and chord symbols.

Through the course of putting together the Wikipedia, it has become apparent to several contributors that quite often we do not mean the same things when we say the same words, or even worse, we will use different words for (and create different articles about) the same things.

This page has been created, therefore, as a way to standardize the terminology used in the Wikipedia with reference to music. It is understood that this is not an attempt to in any way elevate one usage or system over another, but rather to simply establish a set of standards for talking about these things so that we all know what we mean when we say a certain word, and so that all articles will use a consistent form of symbolic analysis.

Hopefully, in time, this page will accumulate a glossary of terms which can serve as a standard for the authorship of articles relating to music and particularly music theory.

Contents

[edit]

Description of single notes

  • Note vs. pitch vs. frequency: Note is written on a page, or understood in a diatonic or other music theory context; pitch is the frequency of sound as perceived by a human listener; frequency something measured by instruments, for example in discussions of harmonics. Sound can be something that isn't a distinct pitch, such as a clap. Avoid tone; prefer the less ambiguous note or timbre.
  • Duration describes the absolute time of a note (measure, piece, etc.), note value the relative time as indicated by the written notation, rhythm a pattern of durations or note values.
  • timbre
  • intensity or dynamics prefered over volume unless referring to electronically amplified music
[edit]

Combinations of notes

[edit]

Elements of pieces

[edit]

Pieces of music

[edit]

Musical analysis

[edit]

Scale degrees

[edit]

Harmonic analysis

[edit]

Form

[edit]

Styles of music

  • genre, idiom, movement, period, era
  • Classical vs classical - "Classical music" is the classical music era or the specific time period beginning the 18th century in European art music while "classical music" is any established musical tradition which uses some form of notation and requires study or training to be an acceptable participant in, other than as an audience or listener, in any culture: List of classical music traditions. Any classical music may be discussed simply as "classical music" if at the beginning of an article it is specified which tradition is under discussion.
  • pop music vs popular music - pop music is a more or less specific genre, while popular music is a broader term that includes pop music as well as most folk music and any other music not classical.
  • common practice period - tonal non-folk music written from 1600 to 1825, "common practice" referring to the general adherance to strict guidelines or rules including the major scale or minor scale and its triads and their functions
[edit]

Tuning

[edit]

General usages

  • "musical blank" vs "blank (music)" - use the latter unless there is a reason to distinguish, such as musical bow and bow (music)
  • When refering to a key, one writes, for instance, C major, but when referring to a chord one writes C-major. Always write out major or minor; never use pop-chord symbols such as Cm except in captions, tables, formulas, etc.
  • crotchet, minim, quaver, etc vs quarter note, half note, etc - both the English "crotchet, quaver, minim" and the American "quarter note, eighth note, half note" are acceptable in articles, as noted in the Manual of Style, though the American forms are more common in practice. Whichever form is used, place the other in parentheses the first time it comes up for clarity, eg: "There is a minim (half note) followed by two crotchets (quarter notes)"
  • harmonic vs partial vs overtone - While the articles about each of these subjects should indicate that they are often used interchangeably, overtone should refer to both harmonics and partials, harmonics being the whole number or integer multiples and partials being all other multiples.
  • set, series, sequence - In mathematics a set is an unordered collection of things, a sequence is an ordered collection of things, and a series is the sum of a sequence. In music, specifically musical set theory a set is often used to mean unordered and/or ordered collections, but should be used only for unordered collections. Series is often used to mean an ordered collection of things and a sequence often means an ordered collection of pitches which is then repeated transposed (it is often used this way in tonal theory).
[edit]

See also

[edit]

External links

Retrieved from "http://www.netipedia.com/index.php/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Music_terminology"