Class Notes: Chapter 4

Chapter 4 - The Organization of Musical Sounds
Pitch names for notes are the first seven letters of the alphabet which repeat when we reach an interval of 8th or an octave.

A B C D E F G A B C D E F G A B C D E F G etc...

When we hear any two notes an octave apart these two tones sound "the same".

In Western music, the octave is divided into twelve equal semitones, or half steps.  From these are built the major and minor scales (each with a different combination of seven notes).

The twelve half steps that make up the octave constitute what is known as the chromatic scale.  You can see these twelve half steps on the keyboard counting all the white and black keys from C to the C above it.  Virtually all Western music is made up of the same twelve tones and their duplications in higher and lower octaves.

The black keys on the piano are named in relation to their white-key neighbors.  The black key between C and D can be called C sharp or D flat depending on the context of the music.  This plan applies to all the black keys.  Thus a sharp raises a tone by a half step, and a flat lowers a tone a half step.  Note the distance between C and D is two half steps, or one whole step (two half steps).

In Western music, the first tone of the scale, the tonic, is the home base to which the music gravitates. The two main scale types - major and minor - function within this organization system known as tonality.  When we listen to a composition in the key of C major, we hear a piece built around the central tone C, using the harmonies formed from the C-major scale.

The major scale is the most familiar sequence of pitches.  You can produce a C major scale, a sequence of pitches arranged in ascending or descending order. Looking at the keyboard you will notice that there is no black key between E and F or between B and C.  These tones are a half step apart, while the other white keys are a whole step apart.  The major scale is created by a specific pattern of whole (W) and half (H) steps W W H W W W H

The minor scale sounds different from the major because the third degree is lowered, or flatted.  Therefore, in the scale of C minor, there is an E flat rather than the E natural (white key) of the major scale; the interval C to E flat is smaller than the interval C to E in the major.  The minor scale is very different from the major scale in mood and coloring.  the intervals of the minor scale is created by a specific patter of the whole (W) and half (H) steps W H W W H WW

Music in major or minor key focuses on the seven tones of the respective scale and is therefore considered diatonic.  In diatonic music, bot the melody and the harmony are firmly rotted in the key.  But some compositions introduce other tones that are foreign to the scale, drawing from the full gamut of the twelve half steps that span the octave.  these works are considered chromatic (meaning color).

Common chord progressions (movement from one chord to another) use the I IV and V chords.

The musical language of other cultures often dived the octave differently, producing different scale patterns.  Among the most common is the pentatonic, or five note, scale, used in some African, Asian, and Native American musics.