How Music Works, Part II: Pitch

1. How Music Works, Part II: Pitch Chapter 4

2. Pitch and Melody • Pitch: the element of music having to do with the highness and lowness of tones • Flute is a high-pitched instrument • Tuba is a low-pitched instrument • Melody: the sequence of pitches that unfolds as a song progresses • Three distinctive features of a melody (e.g., “Mary Had a Little Lamb”): • Melodic range • Melodic direction • Melodic contour

3. Melody in Northern Arapaho “Eagle Dance” Song [PL 4-1] • Relatively large melodic range • Melodic starts high and descends each phrase (melodic direction) • Overall melodic contour: series of descending phrases (Fig. 4.2, p. 49) • Performance context • Music accompanies competitive dancing at powwow celebrations • Northern Arapaho are a Native American nation of the Great Plains region • Video of Northern Arapaho dancers in performance

4. Instruments of Determinate and Indeterminate Pitch • Determinate vs. indeterminate pitch instruments • Determinate: piano, guitar, flute, trumpet, voice • Indeterminate: cymbal, shaker, most drums • …rather than being dominated by just one pitch, the individual tones they produce generate many different pitches that compete for the ear’s attention all at once, with no clear “winner” among them. (p. 49) • See Fig. 4.3, p. 49, for computer-generated images of both types

5. Western Pitch System, Scale vs. Mode • Scale: an ascending and/or descending series of notes of different pitch • Scale vs. mode (I&P box, p. 51, top) • Beyond encompassing a scale or scales, a mode also includes other features, including rules for navigating the notes of the scale as well as extramusical associations, e.g., to time of day • PL 4-2 is a morning raga, PL 4-3 is an evening raga • Chromatic scale • All twelve evenly-spaced notes per octave on a piano keyboard • See labeled piano keyboard image of Fig 4.4, p. 50 • Online Musical Illustration (OMI) #1 and #2 • Naturals = the “white key” notes: C D E F G A B (C) • Sharps (#) and flats (♭)= the “black key” notes • C#, D#, F#, G#, A# • D♭, E♭, G♭, A♭, B♭

6. The Ups and Downs of Pitch • Our concepts of what high pitches and low pitches are, and of whether a scale is going up (ascending) or down (descending), though they may seem “obvious” to us, are not universal. In some cultures, the opposite conception of pitch exists • ’Are’arepeople of the Solomon Islands (see I&P box, top of p. 51) • Video sampler of ’Are’Are music (a panpipe ensemble like the one seen in the picture on p. 51 is featured from 2:07-3:47 of the video)

7. The Octave and Pitch Ranges • When men and women sing the “same” pitch or melody, or a tuba and a flute do likewise, they sound at once identical and different. This is because they are performing in different octaves • The pitch “C” played on a tuba is much lower than the pitch “C” played on a flute • This accounts for the different pitch ranges of different instruments and different voice types (male vs. female generally, and soprano, alto, tenor, bass) • PL 4-4 and 4-5: same piece (by J.S. Bach), but the first is performed on piano, the second on trombones. Which version is in athe higher pitch range?

8. Western Scales • Major • C-major scale = “white key” scale (major scale with C as the tonic, in the key of C major; OMI #3) • D-major scale = D E F# G A B C# (D) • Seven pitches per octave in major scales • “Happy” sounding (cultural meaning?). Example: Bobby McFerrin, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy”[PL 4-6] (key: B major) • Pentatonic • Five pitches per octave • C-pentatonic = C D E G A (OMI #4); D-pentatonic = D E F# A B [PL 4-7; OMI #5]; “black key” pentatonic (starts F#/Gb) • All of these are actually major pentatonic scales; there are other types as well (both Western and non-Western) • Minor • Different types (OMI #6), but all have lowered third degree, creating a minor third interval; “sad” character (OMI #7) • Melodic minor scale (different ascending/descending) • Harmonic minor scale (distinctive augmented second interval near top of scale) • Blues • Combines elements of major, minor, and pentatonic scales, as well as traditional African scales (OMI #8) • C Eb F (F#) G B♭ C (E♭, F#, and B♭ sometimes called blue notes); Etta James, “In the Evening” [PL 4-8]

9. Pitches and Scales in Non-Western Musical Systems • Indonesia • Slendro • 5 tones per octave (but not like Western pentatonic scales) • Pelog • 7 tones per octave (but again, distinct from Western scales) • First a slendro scale, then a pelog scale, are illustrated in OMI #10 • India • 22 distinct pitches per octave are recognized in some systems • These, plus additional microtones, partially account for the music’s melodic richness • Arab music traditions (Middle East) • Music theory system with 24 equal divisions of the octave: quarter tones • Quarter-tone accordion featured starting 1:53 in Middle Eastern example “Zeina,” PL 4-9 • Quarter-tone scale on alto saxophone illustrated in OMI #11

10. Pitch, Chords, and Harmony • “Generally speaking, a series of notes presented one after the other yields a melody, whereas a group of two or more notes of different pitch sounded simultaneously yields a chord.” (p. 55) • Harmony: a chord that “makes sense” in the context of its musical style • Sometimes, an entire piece of music is based on just a single chord, e.g., Tupac Shakur, “California Love” [PL 4-10] • Other times, based on a chord progression, or sequence of chords, e.g., Paul Desmond Quartet, “Wave” [PL 4-11]

11. Harmonization, Arpeggios, Modulation, Consonance and Dissonance • Harmonization, in our context, occurs when each note of a melody becomes the basis of its own chord, as in PL 4-12 (Fiji) • An arpeggio is essentially a chord in which the individual pitches are played sequentially (as in a melody) rather than all at the same time. Common in many musics, such as Spanish flamenco [PL 4-13] • Modulation occurs when the music changes from one key to another, as in Beyoncé’s “Love on Top” (at 1:44, conveniently cued by the costume change!) • Dissonance occurs when notes and chords from outside a given system are used, or when notes/chords within the system are used in unusual ways (i.e., not consonant). Some music may sound dissonant because it is from another culture, but it actually isn’t [PL 4-14]. In other cases, the dissonance is cultivated intentionally as part of a musical style [PL 4-15]