Music: organization of sound (time/space); such organization in music is defined as the perception of patterns involving repetition, contrast, and variation.

Rhythm: musical time

Beat

Ongoing Pulse

The most fundamental aspect to perceiving patterns in music entails the concept of a beat (the feeling of an ongoing pulse).

1              2              3              4              1              2              3              4

1              2              3              4              1              2              3              4

When the evenly spaced numbers above are counted aloud they constitute the first step in perceiving a beat.  Repeat these counts a number of times until the feeling remains even though you have stopped counting aloud.  Practice changing tempo (the speed of the beat).  Next, listen to some music and try to figure out the beat.  The beat will not be too fast or too slow.

Meter

Patterns of accented and unaccented beats

When you feel the beat, then accent the first count (say it louder than the remaining numbers in the sequence).

1              2              3              4              1              2              3              4

1              2              3              4              1              2              3              4

When an accent is placed on one of the given numbers, the meter is articulated.  Practice counting the numbers aloud until the above accent is comfortable (the feeling that the first beat has more significance than the other counts, that beats 2-4 seem to all be leading or gravitating to the first beat).  This is a quadruple meter, the most common meter in popular musical styles.

Time-Keeping Instrument: Drum kit

Backbeat

Accents placed on beats 2 and 4

Popular music places special emphasis on beats two and four thus giving it a particular rhythmic feel.  Practice clapping these accents while counting the beat aloud.  Next, listen to some music (it’s probably best to turn on the radio for this exercise).

1              2              3              4              1              2              3              4

Beat Divisions

8 beat and 16 beat

The two most common types of divisions of beats which allows for a greater variety of rhythmic expression is to divide the beat into two parts:

8 Beat Feel (the words “rock” and “roll” always land on the beat while “and” goes in between beat counts)

1                              2                              3                              4                             

Rock      and         Roll         and         Rock      and         Roll         and        

16 Beat Feel (“par” and “funk” land on the beat)

1                                                              2                                                             

Par          li              ment       and         Funk       a              del           ic

Practice, at first, saying these mnemonics while tapping your foot to the beat.  When this is comfortable, then add the backbeat (claps on beats 2 and 4) along with each mnemonic.  Next, listen to some music and try to figure out which pattern fits with what you’re listening to.

Melody: Musical line

Riff-based melodies

Pitch

Pitch is the most fundamental aspect of listening to melodies.  This involves discriminating between higher and lower tones.  In popular musical styles, the most widely used approach is to build the formal larger units of music from riffs (smaller repeated musical phrases).  Phrases are musical sentences.  They are logical expressions that make sense on their own.  This is a bit more complicated to practice.  Try listening to something familiar and then try identifying a melody (riff) that runs throughout the piece.  This could include the singer’s part but could also come from another instrument.

Vocal Ranges: Tenor, Baritone, Bass, Soprano, Alto

Timbre: Smooth-Raspy; Regional Accents

 These are the basic types of electric guitars/basses. The main difference between the first two instruments are the amount of strings and one is pitched lower than the other. The first instrument is a solid-body electric guitar while the second is a solid-body electric bass guitar.

The following instrument is an example of a hollow-bodied electric guitar. The main difference in appearance are the "f-holes" on the body of the instrument.

Harmony: Musical Space

Chording Instruments: Guitar/Keyboard

Tonality

§  Chords

▪       Scales: I, IV, V

▪       Triads

▪       Sevenths

§  Chord Progression/Harmonic Rhythm

▪       Listen from the bottom (bass) up

Form: Musical Structure

¡  Principles of form

§  Repetition

§  Contrast

§  Variation

¡  Cadences

§  4 bar phrases

§  8 bar phrases

¡  Strophic, Blues, AABA, Verse/Chorus

Phrases

This is where listening to music becomes a bit more interesting.  To perceive phrases you need to feel the beat so that you can count the meter (4 beats).  Most musical sentences (phrases) in pop music follow a rather simple pattern of 4 bar phrases (remember that a bar is one sequence of 4 counts).  For this exercise, you will need to start with listening to a piece of music.  It would be better to do this with familiar music.

1. find the beat
2. start counting when you hear the first significant change in the song
3. this most likely be one of the major sections we discussed in class (Verse/Pre-Chorus/Chorus/Interlude)
4. when this gets comfortable, try listening to pieces you may have only heard a few times and try listening to the phrase structures so that you can identify where the major parts of the songs are located.

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