27 votes
Accepted

What is the preferred musicology term for "classical music"?

Heh, the problem isn't really with the choice of label, it's that the thing it labels is really hard to pin down. Most attempts wind up meaningless or controversial. But there is a colloquial usage, ...
Andy Bonner's user avatar
  • 16.8k
18 votes

Why is a minor chord or key considered to be "lesser?"

The interval, that is the distance, from the root note in a minor or major scale to the third note is called a third. The interval called a third is either small or big which is called minor or major. ...
Lars Peter Schultz's user avatar
17 votes
Accepted

What is the word to describe the aspect of a chord being either minor or major?

The term you are looking for is "Quality": The quality of a chord (triad) refers to whether it is major, minor, diminished, augmented, etc. I believe it can also be extended to 7th chords. In your ...
awe lotta's user avatar
  • 1,760
15 votes
Accepted

Why is note B marked with H in Scandinavia and Germany?

PhD in music theory specializing in medieval theory here. M. Cuthbert's answer here is correct, but I thought that I would add some missing details. Heads up: this is going to be a long explanation, ...
M. Nace's user avatar
  • 306
15 votes
Accepted

Did baroque composers think of ritardando on their compositions?

Baroque music was all about expressiveness, and the rhythm was not necessarily meant to be held as strictly as the Renaissance tactus. Wheat Williams has mentioned historically informed performance, ...
Caleb Hines's user avatar
  • 20.7k
13 votes
Accepted

Do the instruments used in a piece of music play a role in determining its genre?

Yes and no. It mostly depends on the age in which the genre was born, but it should be noted that some labels often used as "genres" are more vague "instrumentation-based" (and, ...
musicamante's user avatar
  • 6,664
11 votes

Is it possible to transpose samples (in cents) from minor to major?

You can't just transpose a minor key into a major key, because a minor scale has a different structure than a major scale. Natural minor scale in steps: whole, half, whole, whole, half, whole, whole ...
Andy's user avatar
  • 2,921
10 votes

Did baroque composers think of ritardando on their compositions?

Wheat Williams covered the basics of historically-informed-performance quite well. I want to add that unmeasured preludes (not uncommon in Baroque music) indicate that Baroque composers did have a ...
TangledUpInBlue's user avatar
10 votes

Why is a minor chord or key considered to be "lesser?"

It isn't. The minor third between ^1 and ^3 of a minor scale is smaller than the major third of a major scale. That is the only way in which a minor key is 'less' than a major one. There is no ...
Laurence's user avatar
  • 92.3k
9 votes

Is it possible to transpose samples (in cents) from minor to major?

You could transpose the G minor sample to A minor, which is the relative minor of C Major, which means that it uses the same notes as C Major and the sample won't clash (too much) with other elements ...
Your Uncle Bob's user avatar
8 votes

What are the avoid notes for exotic scales in jazz music?

The definition of an avoid note is independent of the type of scale you use. What you need to define an avoid note is a (chord) scale and its related chord. If you define the basic chord of a scale as ...
Matt L.'s user avatar
  • 20.1k
8 votes

musical theory of lullabies

Studying lullabies? That sounds kind of interesting, actually! The lullaby is typically a soothing song, and it's typically used to help someone fall asleep. Indeed, the German word (Schlaflied) is ...
Richard's user avatar
  • 84.3k
8 votes

What are these overlapping notes with different rhythms called in Music Theory?

They are called voices, and according to the Finale web site, Finale Notepad has a "layer" system for writing multiple voices. https://usermanuals.finalemusic.com/NotePad2012Win/Content/...
piiperi Reinstate Monica's user avatar
7 votes
Accepted

Violin - Western Classical vs indian classical. How different are they?

Western classical and Indian classical violin are very, very different styles. The main similarity is that they use the same instrument, so if you learned one style, you would have a head start ...
Karen's user avatar
  • 6,439
7 votes
Accepted

How does Indian and Western Musical contain Seven Notes ? Is it a Coincidence?

In general, scales tend to have about seven notes in them, or "seven, plus/minus two". This number is believed to have to do with cognitive limitations; it would be difficult to recall more notes. On ...
oberdada's user avatar
  • 723
7 votes

How much do we know about how ancient Greek and Roman music sounded?

There's actually quite a lot of surviving information on how the Greeks tuned their scales. But as far as I know there's only one complete piece of music, the so-called "Seikilos Hymnus", a short ...
Scott Wallace's user avatar
7 votes

Violin - Western Classical vs indian classical. How different are they?

I learn Indian classical violin and here are basic differences in learning Indian and western style violin, apart from bowing and holding the violin Tuning: Western violin is tuned differently than ...
Vignesh's user avatar
  • 328
7 votes

Why did Beethoven include "in the Lydian Mode" in the title of String Quartet, Op.132 - 3?

The Lydian mode was associated with healing. See Lewis Lockwood's biography, Beethoven: The Music and the Life: That he chooses the Lydian mode betokens not only a desire to frame this poignant ...
guest's user avatar
  • 121
7 votes

Why is Eastern Music a Mode of Western Music?

It's a statistical coincidence. In cultures with twelve or fewer pitches per octave, there are only so many modes or maqamat or scales or ragas or pitch class sets or whatever. In this case, the ...
Camille Goudeseune's user avatar
7 votes

Minor third interval in minor scales: From tonic to?

major scales have a major third interval from the tonic of the scale to the 3rd scale degree Correct. That is why it's called a major scale. I would expect the same to be true in minor with a minor ...
phoog's user avatar
  • 22.3k
6 votes

Wood vs Stone first drum

Taking "drum" to mean "percussion instrument" where that instrument was used for a clearly musical purpose... (Among) The first known "drums", alongside perhaps wood and ...
Aaron's user avatar
  • 87.3k
6 votes
Accepted

Meaning of Capitalization on The Notation of Gregorian Psalm Tone Endings

Formulas for terminations: The different intonations of the antiphons have given place to the diverse final cadences in each mode, in order to facilitate the intonation of the antiphon, when psalm ...
reino's user avatar
  • 315
6 votes

Prevailing theories about discovery of harmonic intervals

How Paleolithic man discovered and shared knowledge about harmonic intervals? Their musical knowledge was discovered through observation and ingenuity, and communicated through their musical ...
Stinkfoot's user avatar
  • 6,833
6 votes

What is it that makes music from different cultures/regions sound different?

We know the number one difference between genres and musical cultures is the scales, harmonies, and rhythms used in composition. This becomes clear when music from one genre or culture is played on ...
Todd Wilcox's user avatar
  • 56.6k
6 votes

Latin voice denotations in Renaissance vocal music

These terms did not designate vocal ranges; rather, they designated relationships between the various parts. Voice-parts. The following designations of voice-parts are found in MSS. [manuscripts]: ...
Aaron's user avatar
  • 87.3k
6 votes

Confusion about Zarlino and his assertions about the diatessaron (perfect fourth)

What Zarlino (by way of the Greeks) is talking about is proportions of small integers. The octave, for example, has a ratio of 2:1; the fifth 3:2. Zarlino is arguing that since the fourth has a ratio ...
Aaron's user avatar
  • 87.3k
6 votes

Is a minor key based on the natural minor scale or all 3 minor scales?

Historically, minor tonality is largely based on the Dorian mode, but regardless of which scale you take as the basis of minor tonality, you will find that in most contexts, the sixth and seventh ...
phoog's user avatar
  • 22.3k

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