Key Terms
Common practice era
The Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods. Composers shared musical vocabulary, syntax, and formal methods.
Modern era
Each composer invents a personal language. Two pieces written for the same instruments at the same time may be completel
Steady pulse (backbeat)
Provides continuity and predictability. Crucial to pop, jazz, world music.
Steady meter
Divides time into fixed cycles. Classical ballet and ballroom dancing depend on it.
Classical model (the huddle)
Ideas are introduced first, then developed. Exposition before development.
Modern model (no-huddle offense)
Exposition is abbreviated or skipped entirely. Development begins immediately.
Dissonance
An unstable tone (tendency tone) that demands resolution to a stable tone.
Classical promise
All dissonances will eventually resolve. Resolution may be delayed, but stability is guaranteed at the end.
Modern paradigm
Dissonances do not need to resolve. Stability and clarification are not guaranteed.
Harmony
The notes sounding simultaneously.
Classical coordination
All instruments share the same harmony. Harmonic coordination is the primary reason instruments "sound good together" ev
Modern independence
Instruments play harmonically unrelated lines simultaneously. No shared harmonic "menu." Getting a comprehensive overvie
Example
Berio's Sinfonia (1968). Mahler's Second Symphony scherzo plays continuously; on top of it, a collage of graffiti text,
Rhetorical reinforcement
When multiple musical parameters change simultaneously to mark a structural boundary clearly. Classical music uses it he
Classical model
Structural boundaries are clear. Beethoven's Symphony No.