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Non-lexical Vocables In Music
Non-lexical vocables, which may be mixed with meaningful text, are a form of nonsense syllable used in a wide variety of music. Common English examples would be "la la la", "na na na" or "da da da". Traditional music Non-lexical vocables are used in yodeling, Blackfoot music and other Native American music, Pygmy music, the music of the Maldives. In Irish traditional music and Highland Scots music, it is called lilting, and in English traditional music it is called diddling. Vocables frequently act as formal markers, indicating the beginning and end of phrases, sections or songs themselves, and also as onomatopoeic references, cueing devices, and other purposes. The Blackfoot, like other Plains Indians, use the consonants ''h'', ''y'', ''w'', and vowels. They avoid ''n'', ''c'' (''ts'') and other consonants. ''i'' and ''e'' tend slightly to be higher pitches, ''a'', ''o'', and ''u'' lower ones. The AIM Song has its origins in the Plains; as such, it holds similar charact ...
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Vocable
In the broadest sense of the word, a vocable is any meaningful sound uttered by people, such as a word or term, that is fixed by their language and culture. Use of the words in the broad sense is archaic and the term is instead used for utterances which are not considered words, such as the English vocables of assent and denial, ''uh-huh'' and ''uh-uh'' , or the vocable of error, ''uh-oh'' . Such non-lexical vocables are often used in music, for example ''la la la'' or ''dum dee dum'', or in magical incantations, such as ''abra-cadabra''. Many Native American songs consist entirely of vocables; this may be due to both phonetic substitution to increase the resonance of the song, and to the trade of songs between nations speaking different languages. Jewish Nigunim also feature wordless melodies composed entirely of vocables such as ''Yai nai nai'' or ''Yai dai dai''. Vocables are common as pause fillers, such as ''um'' and ''er'' in English, where they have little formal me ...
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Pitch (music)
Pitch is a perceptual property of sounds that allows their ordering on a frequency-related scale, or more commonly, pitch is the quality that makes it possible to judge sounds as "higher" and "lower" in the sense associated with musical melodies. Pitch is a major auditory attribute of musical tones, along with duration, loudness, and timbre. Pitch may be quantified as a frequency, but pitch is not a purely objective physical property; it is a subjective psychoacoustical attribute of sound. Historically, the study of pitch and pitch perception has been a central problem in psychoacoustics, and has been instrumental in forming and testing theories of sound representation, processing, and perception in the auditory system. Perception Pitch and frequency Pitch is an auditory sensation in which a listener assigns musical tones to relative positions on a musical scale based primarily on their perception of the frequency of vibration. Pitch is closely related to frequency, bu ...
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Cab Calloway
Cabell Calloway III (December 25, 1907 – November 18, 1994) was an American singer, songwriter, bandleader, conductor and dancer. He was associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, where he was a regular performer and became a popular vocalist of the swing era. His niche of mixing jazz and vaudeville won him acclaim during a career that spanned over 65 years. Calloway was a master of energetic scat singing and led one of the most popular dance bands in the United States from the early 1930s to the late 1940s. His band included trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie, Jonah Jones, and Adolphus "Doc" Cheatham, saxophonists Ben Webster and Leon "Chu" Berry, guitarist Danny Barker, bassist Milt Hinton, and drummer Cozy Cole. Calloway had several hit records in the 1930s and 1940s, becoming known as the "Hi-de-ho" man of jazz for his most famous song, " Minnie the Moocher", originally recorded in 1931. He reached the '' Billboard'' charts in five consecutive decades (1930s–1970s). ...
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Gladys Bentley
Gladys Alberta Bentley (August 12, 1907 â€“ January 18, 1960) was an American blues singer, pianist, and entertainer during the Harlem Renaissance. Her career skyrocketed when she appeared at Harry Hansberry's Clam House in New York in the 1920s, as a black, lesbian, cross-dressing performer. She headlined in the early 1930s at Harlem's Ubangi Club, where she was backed up by a chorus line of drag queens. She dressed in men's clothes (including a signature tail coat and top hat), played piano, and sang her own raunchy lyrics to popular tunes of the day in a deep, growling voice while flirting with women in the audience. On the decline of the Harlem speakeasies with the repeal of Prohibition, she relocated to southern California, where she was billed as "America's Greatest Sepia Piano Player" and the "Brown Bomber of Sophisticated Songs". She was frequently harassed for wearing men's clothing. She tried to continue her musical career but did not achieve as much success as ...
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Louis Armstrong
Louis Daniel Armstrong (August 4, 1901 â€“ July 6, 1971), nicknamed "Satchmo", "Satch", and "Pops", was an American trumpeter and Singing, vocalist. He was among the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades and several eras in the history of jazz. Armstrong was born and raised in New Orleans. Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an inventive trumpet and cornet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence in jazz, shifting the focus of the music from collective improvisation to solo performance. Around 1922, he followed his mentor, King Oliver, Joe "King" Oliver, to Chicago to play in the . In Chicago, he spent time with other popular jazz musicians, reconnecting with his friend Bix Beiderbecke and spending time with Hoagy Carmichael and Lil Hardin Armstrong, Lil Hardin. He earned a reputation at "cutting contests", and his fame reached band leader Fletcher Henderson. Henderson persuaded Armstrong to come to New York City, where he became a featur ...
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Bobby McFerrin
Robert Keith McFerrin Jr. (born March 11, 1950) is an American folk and jazz singer. He is known for his vocal techniques, such as singing fluidly but with quick and considerable jumps in pitch—for example, sustaining a melody while also rapidly alternating with arpeggios and harmonies—as well as scat singing, polyphonic overtone singing, and improvisational vocal percussion. He is widely known for performing and recording regularly as an unaccompanied solo vocal artist. He has frequently collaborated with other artists from both the jazz and classical scenes. McFerrin's song " Don't Worry, Be Happy" was a No. 1 U.S. pop hit in 1988 and won Song of the Year and Record of the Year honors at the 1989 Grammy Awards. McFerrin has also worked in collaboration with instrumentalists, including the pianists Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, and Joe Zawinul, the drummer Tony Williams, and the cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Early life and education McFerrin was born in Manhattan, New York City, ...
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Scatman John
John Paul Larkin (March 13, 1942 – December 3, 1999), known professionally as Scatman John, was an American musician. A prolific jazz pianist and vocalist for several decades, he rose to prominence during the 1990s through his fusion of scat singing and dance music. He recorded five albums, which were released between 1986 and 2001. In the United States and Europe, Larkin is recognized for his 1995 singles "Scatman (Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop)" and " Scatman's World". He achieved his greatest success in Japan, where his album '' Scatman's World'' (1995) sold over a million copies. Larkin was also a recipient of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association's Annie Glenn Award for outstanding service to the stuttering community and a posthumous inductee to the National Stuttering Association Hall of Fame. Early life Larkin was born in El Monte, California. He had a severe stutter by the time he learned to speak. This stutter contributed to his emotionally traumatic childhood. ...
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Scat Singing
In vocal jazz, scat singing is vocal improvisation with wordless vocables, nonsense syllables or without words at all. In scat singing, the singer improvises melodies and rhythms using the voice as an instrument rather than a speaking medium. This is different from vocalese, which uses recognizable lyrics that are sung to pre-existing instrumental solos. Characteristics Structure and syllable choice Though scat singing is improvised, the melodic lines are often variations on scale and arpeggio fragments, stock patterns and riffs, as is the case with instrumental improvisers. As well, scatting usually incorporates musical structure. All of Ella Fitzgerald's scat performances of "How High the Moon", for instance, use the same tempo, begin with a chorus of a straight reading of the lyric, move to a "specialty chorus" introducing the scat chorus, and then the scat itself. Will Friedwald has compared Ella Fitzgerald to Chuck Jones directing his Roadrunner cartoon—each us ...
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Sami People
Acronyms * SAMI, ''Synchronized Accessible Media Interchange'', a closed-captioning format developed by Microsoft * Saudi Arabian Military Industries, a government-owned defence company * South African Malaria Initiative, a virtual expertise network of malaria researchers People * Samee, also spelled Sami, a male given name * Sami (name), including lists of people with the given name or surname * Sámi people, indigenous people of the Scandinavian Peninsula, the Kola Peninsula, Karelia and Finland ** Sámi cuisine ** Sámi languages, of the Sami people ** Sámi shamanism, a faith of the Sami people Places * Sápmi, a cultural region in Northern Europe * Sami (ancient city), in Elis, Greece * Sami Bay, east of Sami, Cephalonia * Sami District, Gambia * Sami, Burkina Faso, a district of the Banwa Province * Sami, Cephalonia, a municipality in Greece * Sami, Gujarat, a town in Patan district of Gujarat, India * Sami, Paletwa, a town in Chin State, Myanmar * Sämi, ...
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Joik
A joik or yoik (anglicised, where the latter spelling in English conforms with the pronunciation; also named , , , or in the Sámi languages) is a traditional form of song in Sámi music performed by the Sámi people of Sapmi in Northern Europe. A performer of joik is called a (in Finnish), a (in Norwegian, and anglicised) or (in Swedish). Originally, ''joik'' referred to only one of several Sami singing styles, but in English the word is often used to refer to all types of traditional Sami singing. As an art form, each joik is meant to reflect or evoke a person, animal, or place.. The sound of joik is comparable to the traditional chanting of some Native American cultures. Joik shares some features with the shamanistic cultures of Siberia, which mimic the sounds of nature. History As the Sami culture had no written language in the past, the origins of joik are not documented. According to oral traditions, the fairies and elves of the arctic lands gave joiks to the Sà ...
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Nigun
A nigun ( he, ניגון meaning "tune" or "melody", plural nigunim) or niggun (plural niggunim) is a form of Jewish religious song or tune sung by groups. It is vocal music, often with repetitive sounds such as "Bim-Bim-Bam", "Lai-Lai-Lai", "Yai-Yai-Yai" or "Ai-Ai-Ai" instead of formal lyrics. Sometimes, Bible verses or quotes from other classical Jewish texts are sung repetitively to form a nigun. Some nigunim are sung as prayers of lament, while others may be joyous or victorious. Nigunim are largely improvisations, though they can be based on thematic passages and are stylized in form, reflecting the teachings and charisma of the spiritual leadership of the congregation or its religious movement. Nigunim are especially central to worship in Hasidic Judaism, which evolved its own structured, soulful forms to reflect the mystical joy of intense prayer ( devekut). Hasidic nigunim A revival of interest in Jewish music was sparked as part of Hasidism. Different Hasidic gro ...
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Puirt à Beul
Puirt à beul (, literally "tunes from a mouth") is a traditional form of song native to Scotland (known as ''portaireacht'' in Ireland) that sets Gaelic lyrics to instrumental tune melodies. Historically, they were used to accompany dancing in the absence of instruments and to transmit instrumental tunes orally. Term The Scottish Gaelic term ''port à beul'' refers to "a tune from a mouth—specifically a ''cheerful'' tune—which in the plural becomes ''puirt à beul''". In Scotland, they are usually referred to as ''puirt à beul'' but a variety of other spellings and misspellings also exists, for example ''port-a-beul'', ''puirt a bheul'', ''puirt a' bhéil'', etc. These are mostly because a number of grammatical particles in Gaelic are very similar in nature, such as the definite article ''a'', the prepositions "of" and "to" which can both be ''a'' and the preposition ''á'' "from" which can appear without the acute accent. Modern Irish dictionaries give ''port (aireacht) bà ...
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