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Conjunct motion describes melodic movement primarily by step, with adjacent scale degrees following one another. This contrasts with disjunct motion, which emphasizes leaps between pitches. Recognizing the distinction helps in analyzing melodic contour and phrasing.
Every major key shares its key signature with a relative minor located a minor third below the tonic. Three flats belongs to E-flat major, and a minor third below E-flat is C, giving C minor. Both keys use B-flat, E-flat, and A-flat.
An authentic cadence moves from the dominant chord to the tonic, written V to I in major or V to i in minor. It is the strongest cadential gesture in tonal music because the leading tone resolves to the tonic. The progression I to V moves in the opposite direction and does not close a phrase.
Largo indicates a very slow, broad tempo and is generally the slowest of the common Italian tempo terms. Andante is a walking pace, Allegretto is moderately fast, and Moderato is moderate. Ordered from slow to fast, Largo precedes Adagio.
Bach composed the six Brandenburg Concertos around 1721 and dedicated them to Christian Ludwig, Margrave of Brandenburg. They are celebrated examples of Baroque concerto writing with varied instrumental groupings. Handel, Vivaldi, and Telemann were Baroque contemporaries but did not write this set.
Classical first movements usually employ sonata form, with an exposition, development, and recapitulation. This structure organizes two contrasting key areas and their resolution. Rondo and minuet-and-trio forms more often appear in later movements.
The leading tone is the seventh degree of the major scale, a half step below the tonic. Its strong tendency to resolve upward to the tonic gives it its name. The fourth and fifth degrees are the subdominant and dominant, respectively.
Monophony is music with one melodic line and no harmony or accompaniment, such as plainchant. Homophony features a melody with chordal accompaniment, while polyphony combines independent simultaneous lines. Heterophony involves simultaneous variants of the same melody.
Compound duple meter such as 6/8 groups six eighth notes into two beats, each worth a dotted quarter. Each beat subdivides into three eighth notes, giving the characteristic lilting compound feel. Simple triple meter such as 3/4 instead groups three quarter-note beats.
Raising the seventh degree of a natural minor scale by a half step produces a leading tone that resolves to the tonic. This raised seventh underlies the harmonic minor scale and strengthens dominant harmony. The sixth degree is sometimes raised for melodic reasons but does not create the leading tone.
In a major key the diatonic seventh chord on the second degree consists of a minor triad plus a minor seventh above the root, making it a minor seventh chord. For example, in C major the chord is D-F-A-C. Half-diminished sevenths occur on the leading tone of a major scale.
A sequence restates a motive or phrase at a different pitch level, often stepwise higher or lower. It is common in Baroque and Classical music for building momentum. Inversion, retrograde, and augmentation alter the motive's contour, direction, or rhythm rather than its pitch level.
A pivot chord is diatonic in both keys, and A minor functions as vi in C major and ii in G major. That dual function allows a smooth move toward the new key. F major and D minor are diatonic in only one of the two keys.
Twelve-tone serialism, developed by Arnold Schoenberg, orders all twelve pitch classes into a row that is used as the basis for melodic and harmonic material. The row may be transposed, inverted, and retrograded. Pandiatonicism, minimalism, and impressionism organize pitch differently.
Franz Liszt pioneered the symphonic poem, a single-movement orchestral work tied to a literary or pictorial idea. Les Préludes is among his best-known examples. Brahms and Bruckner favored absolute forms such as symphonies, and Chopin wrote mainly piano music.
Basso continuo is an accompanying bass line, usually played by a keyboard and a bass instrument, with figures that specify the harmonies. It is a defining feature of Baroque ensemble music. Bel canto refers to a vocal style, and cantus firmus is a preexisting melodic line used as a basis for polyphony.
Josquin des Prez composed the Missa Pange lingua, a Renaissance mass based on the hymn melody Pange lingua. It is a celebrated example of imitative polyphony. The Messiah, The Creation, and Carmina Burana belong to later periods.
Both IV and ii typically prepare the dominant and are classified as predominant chords. They lead smoothly into V, which then resolves to I. Tonic function belongs to I and its substitutes, while dominant function belongs to V and vii.
A trill alternates rapidly between the written note and the diatonic note above it. A mordent is a single quick alternation with the note below or above, and a turn circles around the principal note. An appoggiatura is an unprepared grace note that takes part of the principal note's value.
The Baroque era, roughly 1600 to 1750, saw the rise of opera, the widespread use of figured bass, and terraced dynamics. Its music often features continuous rhythmic drive and ornate melody. The Classical and Romantic eras developed different stylistic priorities.
Aaron Copland composed Appalachian Spring and used the Shaker tune Simple Gifts in its final section. His music often evokes American landscapes and folk idioms. Gershwin, Bernstein, and Ives are also American but did not compose Appalachian Spring.
A first-inversion tonic chord places the third of the chord in the bass, and the root-position dominant places the dominant root in the bass. In a key such as C major, the bass moves from E to G, which is a third in that specific voicing, so the general rule is that the bass moves to the dominant root by step or third depending on the inversion.
Ritornello form alternates a recurring orchestral refrain, the ritornello, with solo episodes that introduce new material. It is central to the Baroque concerto, especially in Vivaldi and Bach. Sonata form, strophic form, and through-composed form describe different structural principles.
Mozart composed both The Marriage of Figaro and the Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550. These works exemplify his mastery of opera and symphonic form in the Classical style. Haydn, Beethoven, and Schubert were important Classical or early Romantic figures but did not write these works.
The answer is the second statement of the fugue subject, typically transposed to the dominant. It may be tonal or real depending on slight intervallic adjustment. The countersubject is a contrasting line that accompanies the subject, and the exposition is the opening section containing the initial entries.
In a major scale, adjacent scale degrees are separated by either a major second or a minor second; degrees 5 and 6 are separated by a whole step, which is a major second. The half steps in a major scale occur only between 3–4 and 7–8.
An authentic cadence is V to I; it is perfect when both chords are in root position and the soprano resolves to the tonic scale degree. Plagal, deceptive, and half cadences all involve different chord successions or endpoints.
Conjunct motion proceeds mainly by adjacent scale steps, producing a smooth melodic line. Disjunct motion, by contrast, is characterized by leaps between pitches.
Simple triple meter places the primary accent on beat one, with beats two and three functioning as weaker beats. This hierarchy underlies the typical waltz accompaniment pattern of bass on one and chords on two and three.
In natural minor the seventh degree lies a minor second below the tonic and a minor third below the second degree, producing a diminished triad (vii°). Raising the leading tone to form the harmonic minor scale changes this chord to a major triad on the raised seventh.
The lowered sixth degree in a major key is diatonic to the parallel minor, and a major triad built on it is a common borrowed chord (flat VI). It typically progresses toward the dominant or serves as a deceptive substitute for the tonic.
The progression vi–ii–V–I follows root motion by descending fifths (or ascending fourths), the defining feature of a circle-of-fifths sequence. The other options either move by other intervals or do not complete the full fifth-cycle pattern.
A motive is the smallest recognizable melodic or rhythmic unit that can be developed and transformed across a movement. Phrases and periods are larger formal units, and a cadenza is a solo passage, not a recurring cell.
Homophony consists of a melody supported by chordal accompaniment, often with the accompaniment moving in block chords with the melody. Polyphony combines independent melodic lines, monophony has a single line, and heterophony varies a single line simultaneously.
Ternary form presents a statement, a contrasting section, and a return, ABA. Binary form lacks the return, rondo alternates a refrain with episodes, and strophic form repeats a single section for each stanza.
The exposition introduces the principal thematic material and normally moves from the tonic to a related key for the secondary theme. The development transforms that material, and the recapitulation restates it with both themes in the tonic.
A concerto sets a solo instrument against an orchestra and traditionally includes a cadenza in which the soloist plays alone. A symphony is for orchestra alone, a string quartet is chamber music, and a sonata is typically for solo instrument with piano or unaccompanied.
Vivaldi composed The Four Seasons as four violin concertos with descriptive programmatic titles and sonnets. Bach, Handel, and Corelli wrote concertos and other works but did not compose this set.
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony adds a chorus and soloists to the finale, setting Schiller's Ode to Joy, and his later works push toward Romantic expression. Mozart and Haydn are firmly Classical, and Schubert followed after Beethoven.
Schubert composed both song cycles for voice and piano, setting poems by Wilhelm Müller. Schumann, Brahms, and Wolf also wrote Lieder but not these two cycles.
Atonality describes music that avoids a tonal center and treats pitch classes without a hierarchical tonic. Serialism is a specific ordering method, and modality and tonality both retain pitch hierarchies.
Gershwin combined jazz idioms with classical forms in Porgy and Bess and An American in Paris. Copland wrote Appalachian Spring, Bernstein wrote West Side Story, and Ives wrote Three Places in New England.
A tonal answer modifies the subject's intervals so the answer fits the tonic scale, usually by answering the dominant with the tonic. A real answer transposes the subject exactly, and stretto is overlapping subject entries.
A diminished seventh on the raised fourth degree functions as a secondary leading-tone chord to the dominant, written vii°7/V. The Neapolitan is a major triad on flat II, augmented sixths are built on flat VI, and a borrowed mediant is a major triad on flat III.
Syncopation stresses a weak beat or the offbeat, disrupting the expected metric accent. Hemiola is a temporary shift to a two-against-three grouping, and augmentation and diminution alter note values.
Melodic inversion mirrors the contour of a subject by reversing the direction of each interval. Retrograde reverses the order of pitches, augmentation lengthens values, and fragmentation isolates short segments of the subject.
A chromatically descending bass line beneath sustained upper voices is a recognized ground-bass pattern that intensifies dissonance as the bass moves. Alberti bass is a broken-chord accompaniment, walking bass is a jazz-derived steady-quarter line, and a pedal point holds a single pitch.
The trio sonata typically pairs two violins over a basso continuo of cello and keyboard. Strings were the core of this genre, while brass, woodwinds, and percussion were not standard in the trio sonata texture.
Berlioz used the idée fixe in the Symphonie fantastique, and Wagner developed the leitmotif to represent characters and ideas in his operas. Ostinato is a repeated pattern, ritornello is a recurring tutti in Baroque forms, and cantus firmus is a pre-existing melody used as a structural basis.
In a I–IV progression, the leading tone of the tonic triad is a tendency tone that normally resolves upward to the tonic, while the sixth degree of the subdominant (the fourth degree of the key) tends to resolve downward to the dominant. Doubling the leading tone in four-part writing is avoided because it creates an unresolved tendency tone and an awkward doubled tendency. These resolutions keep the voice leading smooth and preserve the tonal function of each tendency tone.