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Akousunesis musical terms

High note: The highest note of a melody at any moment in time, usually associated with a chord change.

High interval: The highest interval of a melody at any moment in time, usually associated with a chord change. CH5, DmH-2, FH2

Song Skelton: The highest interval at every chord change. Used as a composition, improvisation and ear training tool. 

C    Em    F

1   -3     2 

Pure modal scale:  A scale based on a known mode having modal alterations. see, also see a list of pure modal scales.

Keyed modal scale: A pure modal scale having a prefix default diatonic chord placing the scale withing a key signature. see.

Modal equivalence:  Two or more pure modal scales are considered equivalent if they have the same harmonic intervals series. see

Finger placement exercise: A finger placement exercise is designed to give you precise hand finger placements for melody patterns. see

Pitch: The pitch refers to the frequency of the note played. Pitches are considered enharmonically equivalent when having the same ratio within their octave range. Any note on the piano has enharmonically equivalent notes across the entire keyboard. There are only twelve unique enharmonically equivalent pitches on the piano and in western music in general.

Tone or Timbre: Is the quality of any note played. In mathematical terms, a tone is a Fourier series meaning every tone heard is made up of the addition of harmonics going up and down the frequency spectrum at reduced levels of amplitude. In plain English, if you're singing the note middle C, because you have a unique sounding voice, your also singing the note C multiple octaves higher and lower all at the same time. Your voice may contain more bass or more treble, but you're singing the same note, just like how the tone knob work on an amplifier, it doesn't change the pitch or key of the song, only removes or adds frequencies. 

General music terms

Tonality:  Every scale has a tonalities and all the modes of any scale have child tonalities. The western major scale has a particular strong tonality for western people. All the modes have their own unique tonality, however you may consider them as children of children of the founding western major scale.

Tonic: The root of any scale or mode is called the tonic. So the western major scale has seven tonics depending on which note is the root.

Subtonic: A semi-tone down from the root, the -7 interval.

Dominate: Is the fifth interval of any scale. It's considered important because of it's drive to be resolved back to the tonic.  

Harmony: Harmony is all the notes which make up a piece of music. They are most strongly felt when the notes are played at the same time, and less strongly felt when arpeggiated. 

Melody: This is usually the highest sounding note of a song although sub melodies may form with lower harmonising notes. It's good ear training to listen to different instruments in a song and focus on the sub melodies and see if you can reproduce them on the piano.

Key Signatures: In western music there are twelve notes in an octave, hence there are twelve major key signatures. Any song may be transposed to any of the twelve key signatures, meaning every note of the slides slides up the same interval amount. 

Mode: A mode is a scale and part of a family of scales all using the same notes of the original founding scale. There are unique and equivalent modes, a unique mode has a unique harmonic interval series while an equivalent mode has the same harmonic interval series. All the modes of the western major scale have unique harmonic interval series compared to all the modes of the whole tone scale only have one unique mode and six equivalent modes since every mode has the same harmonic interval series. 

Rhythm: There are two main categories of rhythm, harmonic and melodic rhythm and both have to play nicely together, most of the time anyway. Melodic rhythm is the subtle rhythmic flow of the melody. As a lead musician and singer, you have direct control over the melodic rhythm which needs to be roughly in sync with the constraints of the harmonic rhythm. The harmonic rhythm is the more primal beat of the music, a strong harmonic rhythm makes you want to dance as a good melodic rhythm will take you on an emotional journey.  It is interest to consider, when you're dancing, your not thinking or reflect as much since your body is too busy moving around. When your still and listening to a melody, your thinking and reflecting more to the emotional content of the music. This is one of the great conflicts in music requiring a good balance between harmonic and melodic rhythm. 

More Musical Terms