Melody
Basic Melodic Concepts
The coherent, ordered, and rational progression of single
pitches is called
melody. All melodies exist within the limits of some
kind of scale system.
A melody should be constructed of satisfying proportions, having a sense
of direction, inevitability, and completion. It will have a
low and high points of interest, and a climactic point situated near the
end. Note that a piece of music in its entirety is constructed in
a similar manner.
The are several types of melody:
- Principle Melody - may be enhanced by any type of accompaniment.
Generally, the top voice is heard as the main voice. If an inner
voice is to become the melody, it usually will be stressed dynamically,
or decreasing the activity of the surrounding voices.
- Countermelody - a deliberate contrasting voice to the principle
voice, both rhythmically and contrapuntally.
- Collateral Part - follows a melody rhythmically, often in thirds
or sixths. Generally this voice doesn’t deviate much from the main
voice in rhythm and contour.
- Cantus Firmus - implies a theme of regularly spaced notes, usually
part of a contrapuntal musical work with a fast-moving texture surrounding
it. This type of theme is usually associated with Baroque-era sacred
music.
- Tune - Two general categories are songs and dances. Song tunes are
written to match text, and very singable due to a relatively small range
(usually not more than a tenth), simple rhythms, and small intervals.
Dance tunes are similar but not as restricted. The instrumental character
of these pieces have wide skips and lively rhythms. Tunes have
a regular structure, such as four-bar phrase groups, strong tonic and dominant
relationships, and an organization in and between phrases that suggest
rhythmic and intervallic motives.
- Symphonic Melody - This type of melody is designed for use in a
large musical work. Often this melody is shorter than a tune, and
won’t have a strong candence on the tonic. This implies that something
must follow this melody. These melodies are subjected to many changes
and developments during the course of the work.
- Ostinato - A type of short melody that is played in the bass and
repeats over and over.
- Decorative or Connective Melodies - These are not themes
as such, but are used to connect tones or phrases in a flowing and smooth
manner.
- Figurational Melody - Constructed in a repeating pattern, these
melodies are used to primarily imply
harmony.
The pitches in a given melody are arranged by changes in range, direction,
high and low points, and the locations where these items occur in the melody.
The combination of these aspects make up the shape and character of the
melody.
A melody that is well constructed progresses in a wave-like manner.
It builds to a climax through a series of intermediate high and low point
combinations. Movements upward are balanced by movements downwards.
In general, melodies tend to flow in steps, using skips for variation.
Traditional melodies often respond to skips with stepwise motion in the
opposite direction.
When melodic lines arrive at their extreme points, they are said to
have reached their points of arrival, or climax. Most
of these points are the notes that are the loudest, highest, longest, or
most extreme of the musical components in the melody. These points
are pivotal in their construction. Other points are called cadences,
which occur at phrase endings. Candences achieve emphasis through duration.
The strongest cadence generally occurs last. . Melodic direction
moves from the beginning of the melody to these points of arrival, then
continuing from the cadence.
When watching the construction of a building, it can be seen that what
holds it up is the internal structure of the foundation, beams, and girders.
In the same way, musical structure holds the notes together, and elaborations
are the surface of the work. These structural levels put the
music together into a coherent whole.
The most important function of melody is that of the theme, which
occurs throughout a composition and contributes to the structure of a work.
However, not all themes are melodies, and not all melodies are themes.
In polyphonic music, an accompaniment part may be melodic, even though
the listener doesn’t hear it for its melodic individuality.
Phrase
Motives are fragments of melodies generally consisting of three to six
notes. These fragments provide significant amounts of material for
melodic development by repetition and transformation. A melodic
line can begin with such a fragment and develop into a complete melody
based on variations of the motive. Some methods to develop
motives into melody lines include:
- Exact repetitions of the motive
- Modified repetitions, through variation
- Reducing the musical fragment to its essential outline
- Augmenting and diminishing intervals within the melodic fragment
- Adding new notes between other notes, or to the beginning or end of the
fragment
- Inverting the motive
- Retrograde (reversing the motive)
- Augmenting and diminishing note lengths
A phrase is a musical statement, equivalent to a verbal sentence.
"Breathing" points are suggested by the fall of a line, or the completion
of a rhythmic unit. A musical phrase is best defined as being comparable
to the line in rhymed verse. Usually the phrase has a regular number
of measures, from four to eight. It ends in a cadence which flows
into the next phrase. The phrase is a like a sentence, a musical
thought, and implies that another phrase is to follow.
Phrases are punctuated by chord progressions known as cadences.
The fall of a voice to a conclusive point is also called a cadence.
There are three main categories of cadences:
-
Those that give the impression of rest, or completeness (perfect
and plagal cadences); consists of the progression V-I.
-
Those that give the impression of incompleteness (half and imperfect
cadences); includes cadences that end on V.
-
Those that give the impression of surprise (interrupted cadences).
Groupings of four phrases is quite common in western music. The four-phrase
grouping may have its origins in verse, such as a quatrain, which is a
common structure used all over the world. The phrase structure is
one of the most important controllers of musical time, as we immediately
perceive its tones organized by rhythm and meter, a regularly occurring
pattern of strong and weak beats.
Melodies often consist of pairs of phrases called antecedent
(statement) and consequent (response). The antecedent phrase
ends in an incomplete cadence and usually a rise in pitch. The following
consequent phrase will then resolve the the rising movement with downward
motion, and end with a complete cadence. Balance is then achieved
with phrase lengths, cadences, and motivic repetition in the phrases.
The antecedent-consequent phrase combination is known as a period
or sentence.
When a melody or harmonic progression is restated in succession and
transposed to another scale degree, the result is called a sequence.
The sequence maintains the harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic patterns of
the original phrase.
Harmonic progression can add direction to a melody. If the
harmonic vocabulary becomes more interesting than the melody, it will distract
from the melody, if its function is as accompaniment. To achieve
harmonic cadence, the use of the strongest chord progressions leading to
the most consonant of chords is the most common method. Staggering
harmonic and melodic cadences can be used for hiding the effect of "breathing"
in long lyrical lines.
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