MUSIC APPRECIATION FINAL! Free Essay Example

Music can be defined as __________________. [an art based on the organization of sounds in time]

The relative highness or lowness of a sound is called ________. [pitch]

The __________ of a sound is decided by the frequency of its vibrations. [pitch]

If a pitch vibrates at 880 cycles, the octave below would vibrate at ___________cycles. [440]

The distance between the lowest and highest tones a voice or instrument can produce is called __________. [pitch range]

Dynamics in music refers to ______________. [degrees of loudness and softness]

A gradual increase in loudness is known as a _____________. [crescendo]

A gradual decrease in loudness is known as a _____________. [diminunendo]

Timbre is synonymous with ____________. [tone color]

Which of the following is not a normal classification of male voice ranges? [contralto]

When the string player causes small pitch fluctuations by rocking the left hand while pressing the string down, it is called __________. [vibrato]

A thin piece of cane, used singly or in pairs by woodwind players, is called a ___________. [reed]

Which of the following is not a double reed instrument? [clarinet]

The ____________ are the only orchestral drums of definite pitch. [timpani]

The piano has ____________ keys, spanning more than 7 octaves. [88]

The _________ has strings that are plucked by a set of plastic, leather, or quill wedges. [harpsichord]

The _______________ has many sets of pipes controlled from several keyboards, including a pedal keyboard. [pipe organ]

Which of the following is not a brass instrument? [bassoon]

The 17th century refers to what span of years? [1600’s]

The Italian dynamic markings traditionally used to indicate very soft, soft, and very loud are respectively ______________. [pianissimo, piano, fortissimo]

If a flute player were to play a solo without any other accompaniment, the texture would be __________. [monophonic]

A smooth, connected style of playing a melody is known as ______________. [legato]

In musical notation, pitches are written on a set of five horizontal lines called a ______________. [staff]

Classicism, as a stylistic period in western music, encompassed the years ___________. [1750-1820]

Many conductors use a thin stick called a ________ to beat time and indicate pulse and tempo. [baton]

When two or more melodic lines of equal interest are performed simultaneously, the texture is ___________. [polyphonic]

Homophonic texture consists of _____________. [one main melody accompanied by chords]

Modulation refers to _____________________. [a shift from one key to another within the same composition]

Tonality is another term for _________________. [key]

A gradual slowing down of tempo is indicated by the term ____________. [ritardando]

The texture of a single melodic line without accompaniment is ___________. [monophonic]

A chord is _______________________________. [a combination of three or more tones sounded at once]

Staccato refers to playing or singing a melody ____________. [in a short detached manner]

The term ___________ refers to the rate of speed of the beat of the music. [tempo]

A virtuoso is a performer who has ____________________. [developed an extraordinary technical mastery]

The earliest chant manuscripts show ______________. [simple symbols above the texts, indicating motion of the pitch up or down.]

In Hildegard’s PLAY OF VIRTUES, Satan does not sing, but ________________. [shouts his lines]

Gregorian Chant is named after Pope Gregory I, who _____________. [was said to have written the bulk of the standard chants, according to later legend.]

Syllabic setting is _______________. [text set to one note per syllable.]

Melismatic refers to _________________. [text set to multiple notes per syllable.]

Gregorian chant during the Middle Ages was chiefly ____________. [monophonic in texture.]

An important female composer of the Middle Ages was __________. [Hildegard of Bingen.]

Plainchant consists of _______________. [melody sung alone or by a group in unison.]

Which of the following is NOT true of Gregorian chant? [It is polyphonic in texture.]

Monophonic chant appears ___________. [in cultures throughout the world and across historical epochs.]

In Francesoco Landini’s BEHOLD SPRING, the two voices are similar, yet _____________. [the rhythms often diverge, then return to unison at a cadence.]

Organum was built by layering melodic lines above _____________. [existing plainchant melodies.]

_____________ are to music as periods are to verbal expression, indicating the end of a unit of thought. [Cadences]

Composers create musical form using all of the following EXCEPT: ______. [convolution]

In the Middle Ages every musical document had to be __________. [written by hand.]

Guillaume de Machaut’s MESSE DE NOSTRE DAME is ____________. [the first polyphonic setting of the Mass Ordinary by a single composer.]

In addition to being a composer, Machaut was famous for his work as a_______.  [poet.]

Two double-reed instruments used today are the ________. [bassoon and the oboe.]

Two single reed instruments used today are the _________. [clarinet and saxophone.]

Monophony is when __________. [all instruments play the same notes together, in unison.]

Heterophony is when _________. [two instruments play the same melody, but with different embellishments.]

How do we know that drums were central to many instrumental ensembles in the Middle Ages? [paintings]

Many composers in the Middle Ages __________. [are now anonymous.]

Pitch in music refers to the _________. [highness or lowness of a sound]

The teacher of this course is ________. [The teacher’s name is both Meredith and Nikki.]

Opera is best described as a __________. [drama sung from beginning to end.]

The first oratorios were based on ____________. [stories from the Bible.]

A type of opera singing that lies somewhere between singing and speaking is called _________. [recitative.]

The main keyboard instruments of the Baroque period were the organ and the _____________. [harpsichord.]

Dido and Aeneas, which many consider to be the finest opera ever written to an English text, was composed by ________.[Henry Purcell.]

Baroque style flourished in music during the period _________. [1600-1750.]

A baroque musical composition usually expresses ______________ within the same movement. [one basic mood]

Foreign-language opera should probably not be sung in English for all of the following reasons EXCEPT _____________. [It is impossible to create an opera in English that can be easily understood because of all the consonants and dialects.]

The more lyrical numbers in opera that convey deeper feeling are called _________. [arias]

Chamber music was _____________. [written for an intimate setting, such as a small room with a small group of instruments.]

_____________ refers to a vocal line that imitates the rhythms and pitch fluctuations of speech. [Recitative]

The word movement in music normally refers to __________. [a piece that sounds fairly complete and independent but is part of a larger composition.]

The ______________ is the person who beats time, indicates expression, cues in musicians, and controls the balance among instruments and voices. [conductor]

The two giants of baroque composition were George Frideric Handel and ___________. [Johann Sebastian Bach]

A large-scale composition for chorus, vocal soloists, and orchestra, usually set to a narrative biblical text, is called ______. [oratorio.]

The term “program music” refers to a(n) ____________. [instrumental work that is in some way associated with a story, event, or idea.]

The one musical genre in which Bach did not compose was that of _________. [operas.]

Orpheus goes to Hades in the hope of bringing _____________ back to life. [Eurydice]

An __________ is an orchestral composition performed before the curtain rises on a dramatic work. [overture]

The castrati ____________. [possessed both the high range of a woman’s voice and the physical power of a man’s voice.]

There are more _______ in an orchestra than any other instrument. [violins]

Handel’s Messiah is an example of ________. [an oratorio.]

An ____________ is a play, set to music, sung to orchestral accompaniment, with scenery, costumes, and action. [opera]

Oratorio differs from opera in that it has no _______. [acting, scenery, or costumes.]

The oratorio ___________. [is musically very similar to an opera, but is unstated and based on a sacred topic.]

At the end of a classical exposition there usually is a __________. [repeat sign.]

Haydn was fortunate in having a long and fruitful as well as financially stable, relationship with the noble Hungarian family of ____________. [Esterházy]

A classical concerto is a three-movement work for _________. [instrumental soloist and orchestra.]

The first movement of a classical symphony is almost always fast, and in ________ form. [sonata]

The most important form of classical chamber music is the __________. [string quartet.]

The classical string quartet is a musical composition for __________. [two violins, viola, and cello.]

Classicism, as a stylistic period in western art music, roughly encompassed the years ________. [1750-1800]

Theme-and-variations form may be schematically outlined as __________. [A A’ A” A”’]

A brilliant solo section in a concerto designed to display the performer’s virtuosity is called _________. [a cadenza.]

A common rondo pattern is __________. [ABACABA]

The minuet and trio movement of a classical symphony, string quartet, or other work, is in _______________ form. [ABA]

The musical heir of Haydn and Mozart, Beethoven bridged the ________ and ________ periods. [classical, romantic]

The usual order of movements in a classical symphony is __________. [fast, slow, dance-related, fast.]

Classical chamber music is designed ________. [for the intimate setting of a small room.]

Sonata form consists of four main sections: exposition, development, _________ and coda [recapitulation.]

In the exposition of a sonata-form movement _______. [the second theme is in a new key.]

Throughout the Classical Era, artists in every field looked to ___________ as a model. [nature]

In the 18th century, writers began to describe musical structure in terms of __________. [language]

The first movement of a Classical Era string quartet usually __________. [is in a fast tempo, in what came to be known as “sonata form.”]

Which is the lowest voice of the string quartet? [cello]

The kind of phrase structure with antecedent and consequent units is called the ___________ structure. [Periodic phrase]

Mozart was ________. [a child prodigy]

In Mozart’s THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO, who is the Count hoping to seduce? [Susanna]

In Mozart’s THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO, who is Basilio? [the music teacher]

In Mozart’s THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO, which role is the “pants role,” meaning a male role played by a female? [Cherubino]

Schubert’s songs number more than _________. [600]

Of all the inspirations for romantic art, none was more important than ________. [nature]

The deliberate intent to draw creative inspiration from the composer’s own homeland is known as ______. [nationalism.]

A slow, lyrical, intimate composition for piano, associated with evening and night time, is the _______. [nocturne.]

In many of Beethoven’s works, there is a _________ movement instead of the minuet. [scherzo]

Program music is _______. [instrumental music associated with a story, poem, idea, or scene.]

Instrumental music associated with a story, poem, idea, or scene, popular during the romantic period, is called _______. [program music.]

Clara Schumann frequently performed the works of her husband and of her close friend ________. [Johannes Brahms.]

A study piece, designed to help a performer master specific technical difficulties, is known as ________. [an étude.]

An art song is a musical composition for _________. [solo voice and piano.]

The mood of an art song is often set by a brief piano introduction and summed up at the end by a piano section called a _______. [postlude]

Which of the following composers is NOT associated with the romantic period? [Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart]

Which of the following operas was not composed by Giacomo Puccini? [I Pagliacci]

The course of Brahm’s artistic and personal life was shaped by the influence of the composer ________. [Robert Schumann and his wife Clara.]

The famous aria La donna è mobile is taken from Verdi’s opera _____. [Rigoletto.]

The contrasting episodes of Berlioz’s Fantastic Symphony are unified by the recurrence of a theme known as the _____. [idée fixe]

Romanticism, as a stylistic period in western art music, encompassed the years _________. [1820-1900]

A slight holding back or pressing forward of tempo in music is known as _______. [rubato.]

Which of the following is NOT a ballet by Tchaikovsky? [Coppelia]

Drawing creative inspiration from cultures of lands foreign to the composer is known as ____________. [exoticism.]

The Erlking, in Schubert’s song of that name, is a romantic personification of ____. [death]

Setting each strophe of the poem to the same music is simple __________ form. [strophic.]

Mimi and Rodolfo meet for the first time in La Bohème because she has come to his door to ask for a ________. [light for her candle.]

Which of the following is movement 4 of Berlioz’s SYMPHONIE FANTASTIQUE [March to the Scaffold]

Richard Wagner spins an orchestral web out of recurrent musical themes called _______. [leitmotifs]

“Scat singing,” which Louis Armstrong introduced into jazz, is _______. [vocalization of a melodic line with nonsense syllables.]

Although jazz began in bars and brothels, it is now considered _______. [an American art form. ]

Philip Glass’s Einstein on the Beach is an example of __________ music. [minimalist]

Minimalist music is characterized by _____. [a steady pulse, clear tonality, and insistent repetition of short melodic patterns.]

When a voice is answered by an instrument, or when one instrument (or group of instruments) is answered by a chorus, the pattern is referred to as _________. [call and response.]

Impressionist painting and symbolist poetry as artistic movements originated in ____. [France.]

An eerily expressive kind of declamation midway between song and speech, introduced during the expressionist period, is __________. [sprechstimme]

A scale made up of six different notes each a whole step away from the next is called a _________ scale and has NO half steps. [whole-tone]

Impressionism in music is characterized by ___________. [a stress on tone color, atmosphere, and fluidity.]

Alban Berg and Anton Webern were Arnold Schoenberg’s _______. [students.]

The most famous riot in music history occurred in Paris in 1913 at the first performance of ______. [Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring.]

______________ is generally acknowledged as the “king of ragtime.” [Scott Joplin]

The absence of key or atonality in a musical composition is known as ______. [atonality.]

Based on what you’ve listened to and studied, music in the early twentieth century was a time of _____. [revolt and change.]

The deliberate evocation of primitive power through insistent rhythms and percussive sounds is known as ______. [primitivism.]

The technique of using two or more tonal centers at the same time is called ______. [polytonality.]

The most important impressionist composer was _____. [Claude Debussy.]

The major center of jazz from about 1900 to 1917 was _______. [New Orleans.]

The most famous blues singer of the 1920’s, known as the “empress of blues,” was ______. [Bessie Smith.]

The term impressionist derived from a critic’s derogatory reaction to Impression: Sunrise, a painting by ______. [Claude Monet.]

Ragtime’s legacy for jazz includes ______. [syncopations]

The Renaissance maybe described as an age of ______. [the “rebirth” of arts and sciences from antiquity.]

The Renaissance was an age of growing confidence in _______. [the powers of human reason and individuality.]

In Josquin’s “The Cricket” when the text sings about drinking ____. [a cricket like chirping is heard that sounds like the hiccups.]

What is the name for the equal-voice texture that results from Renaissance counter point? [polyphony]

Josquin’s music makes the meaning of a text ___. [more vivid and memorable]

In “The Cricket” Josquin uses catchy clever themes to evoke the ______. [sound of the cricket]

madrigal is a ______. [secular vocal work set to a poem usually about love.]

“Since Robin Hood” is a _______. [madrigal]

The term “a capella” ________. [unaccompanied choral music or any unaccompanied singing]

William Byrd wrote that singing _______. [should be learned by everyone]

William Byrd gave the following reasons for learning to sing except ______. [it is a remedy for stuttering]

The texture of Renaissance music is chiefly _____. [polyphonic]

The two main forms of sacred Renaissance are the mass and the ______________. [motet]

The Renaissance motet is a ________. [polyphonic choral work set to a sacred Latin text other than the ordinary of the mass.]

Which of the following is not apart of the Renaissance mass? [Alleluia]

The Renaissance madrigal is a_________. [piece where solo voices are set to a short poem usually about love.]

Renaissance composers devoted special attention to __________. [both the language of the original text and the meanings of the individual words.]

The first printed book using movable printed type was ________. [Gutenberg’s Bible]

Ternary form has ______. [three parts, ABA]

Binary form is usually labeled ______. [AB]

The women that are recorded singing William Byrd’s “Sing Joyfully” are using very little vibrato _____. [to create a sound quality similar to those of boys.]

During the Renaissance, protestant Liturgy _________. [was written in languages other than Latin.]

Gregorian chant is _____. [monophonic texture.]

Which of the following is not a classification of male ranges? [soprano]

Sound created by multiple voices playing or singing together is _______. [harmony]