According to the Wikipedia article on Cell, it "may be distinguished from the figure", however the definition that is later quoted as "the smallest indivisible unit" is very similar to "the shortest idea in music", which appears in the article on Figure. This article exposes the idea of figures being in background, but later gives examples of melodic foreground figures, contradicting this initial description. Also, I have already read the term "segment" being used as an alternative for that idea. Are all these terms used interchangeably or there are differences?
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Keep in mind that Wikipedia articles are edited by people who may or may not know what they're talking about and may or may not agree. They may not even know that the other term exists, much less the other article. It is fairly common to find inconsistent statements across multiple articles and even self-contradictory statements in a single article. Also note that "cell" is a 20th century concept (despite the claim in the article) whereas "figure" goes back at least to the 17th century. It's quite possible that a modern theorist would use "figure" differently from its earlier meaning.– phoogCommented Jun 26 at 13:09
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2 Answers
The terms do tend to be used interchangeably, but a few distinctions that turn up with some frequency:
- Figure: often related to the a group of notes with a particular technical or structural aspect.
- Cell: often refers to the musical content, the sound of a particular melody and/or harmony.
- Segment: tends to refer to a longer musical bit, perhaps, though not necessarily, containing multiple cells or figures.
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According to just a few sources I found, I had the impression that segment would be really the smallest structure. Do you have some books about form or other sources in general that exemplify what you said? Commented Jun 4 at 20:47
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@AllanFelipe My answer is anecdotal, based on my experience with a variety of books, lectures, and discussions. The terms are used interchangeably, even within the same book/discussion, so this just reflects the overall pattern I've observed.– AaronCommented Jun 4 at 20:51
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I've thought "cell" implied not just a bit of content, but that the content would be reused repeatedly, often after being permuted. As in, "cell-based composition" would be taking what might otherwise be called a motive (the cell) and combining it with inversions, retrogrades, augmentations and diminutions of itself. Commented Jun 26 at 0:11
If you read the wiki page carefully, you will see the terms are put in context with either particular treatises or theoreticians. Unless you are speaking within one of those particular frameworks, these terms are more or less interchangeable.
My sense is that cell, figure, and motif are roughly applied to small scale units or about 1 or 2 beats. Segment is a bit longer, a few measures, and the next smaller level down from a complete phrase.
Of course there are exceptions.
Motif is sometimes used in the same way as theme.
For the term figure we should add figuration as in figuration prelude. figuration would be applying a rhythm pattern over a block chord progression or a melodic skeleton. Bach's first WTC prelude in C major is a famous example of a figuration prelude.
In fact, some baroque scores will present the beginning of a figuration prelude with written out rhythms and then continue to the end simply notating chords in whole notes. The expectation was for the play to continue playing the figuration over all the chords.
If you had a simple melody in mostly quarter notes, you could then make a series of variations on it, and you could describe the variations by figures. For example, varying the melody with dotted eighth note figures or triplet eighth note figures. In that sense, figure, has a meaning of beat subdivision patterning.
answered Jun 26 at 18:38
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Thanks, I had the impression of this author dependent - meaning. Since motif (and theme) has an additional semantic layer on top, it doesn't look like it belongs to the same category, that's why I didn't wrote these. Commented Jun 27 at 21:58