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In
music
Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspe ...
, texture is how the
tempo
In musical terminology, tempo ( Italian, 'time'; plural ''tempos'', or ''tempi'' from the Italian plural) is the speed or pace of a given piece. In classical music, tempo is typically indicated with an instruction at the start of a piece (ofte ...
,
melodic
A melody (from Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most literal sense, a melody is a combinat ...
, and
harmonic materials are combined in a
musical composition, determining the overall quality of the sound in a piece. The texture is often described in regard to the density, or thickness, and
range
Range may refer to:
Geography
* Range (geographic), a chain of hills or mountains; a somewhat linear, complex mountainous or hilly area (cordillera, sierra)
** Mountain range, a group of mountains bordered by lowlands
* Range, a term used to i ...
, or width, between lowest and highest
pitches, in relative terms as well as more specifically distinguished according to the number of voices, or parts, and the relationship between these voices (see
Common types below). For example, a thick texture contains many 'layers' of instruments. One of these layers could be a string section or another brass. The thickness also is changed by the amount and the richness of the instruments playing the piece. The thickness varies from light to thick. A piece's texture may be changed by the number and character of parts playing at once, the
timbre
In music, timbre ( ), also known as tone color or tone quality (from psychoacoustics), is the perceived sound quality of a musical note, sound or tone. Timbre distinguishes different types of sound production, such as choir voices and musica ...
of the instruments or voices playing these parts and the harmony,
tempo
In musical terminology, tempo ( Italian, 'time'; plural ''tempos'', or ''tempi'' from the Italian plural) is the speed or pace of a given piece. In classical music, tempo is typically indicated with an instruction at the start of a piece (ofte ...
, and rhythms used. The types categorized by number and relationship of parts are analyzed and determined through the labeling of primary textural elements: primary melody (PM),
secondary melody (SM), parallel supporting melody (PSM), static support (SS), harmonic support (HS), rhythmic support (RS), and harmonic and rhythmic support (HRS).
Common types
In musical terms, particularly in the fields of music history and music analysis, some common terms for different types of texture are:
Many classical pieces feature different kinds of texture within a short space of time. An example is the Scherzo from
Schubert’s piano sonata in B major, D575. The first four bars are
monophonic
Monaural or monophonic sound reproduction (often shortened to mono) is sound intended to be heard as if it were emanating from one position. This contrasts with stereophonic sound or ''stereo'', which uses two separate audio channels to reproduc ...
, with both hands performing the same melody an octave apart:
Bars 5–10 are
homophonic
In music, homophony (;, Greek: ὁμόφωνος, ''homóphōnos'', from ὁμός, ''homós'', "same" and φωνή, ''phōnē'', "sound, tone") is a texture in which a primary part is supported by one or more additional strands that flesh ...
, with all voices coinciding rhythmically:
Bars 11–20 are
polyphonic. There are three parts, the top two moving in parallel (interval of a tenth). The lowest part imitates the rhythm of the upper two at the distance of three beats. The passage climaxes abruptly with a bar’s silence:
After the silence, the polyphonic texture expands from three to four independent parts moving simultaneously in bars 21–24. The upper two parts are
imitative, the lowest part consists of a repeated note (
pedal point
In music, a pedal point (also pedal note, organ point, pedal tone, or pedal) is a sustained tone, typically in the bass, during which at least one foreign (i.e. dissonant) harmony is sounded in the other parts. A pedal point sometimes function ...
) and the remaining part weaves an independent melodic line:
The final four bars revert to
homophony
In music, homophony (;, Greek: ὁμόφωνος, ''homóphōnos'', from ὁμός, ''homós'', "same" and φωνή, ''phōnē'', "sound, tone") is a texture in which a primary part is supported by one or more additional strands that flesh ...
, bringing the section to a close; A complete performance can be heard by following this link
Listen
Additional types
Although in music instruction certain styles or repertoires of music are often identified with one of these descriptions this is basically added music (for example, Gregorian chant is described as monophonic, Bach Chorales are described as homophonic and fugues as polyphonic), many composers use more than one type of texture in the same piece of music.
A simultaneity is more than one complete musical texture occurring at the same time, rather than in succession.
A more recent type of texture first used by
György Ligeti
György Sándor Ligeti (; ; 28 May 1923 – 12 June 2006) was a Hungarian-Austrian composer of contemporary classical music. He has been described as "one of the most important avant-garde composers in the latter half of the twentieth century ...
is
micropolyphony
Micropolyphony is a kind of polyphonic musical texture developed by György Ligeti which consists of many lines of dense canons moving at different tempos or rhythms, thus resulting in tone clusters vertically. According to David Cope, "micropol ...
. Other textures include
polythematic, polyrhythmic, onomatopoeic, compound, and mixed or composite textures.
See also
*
Style brisé
References
Sources
*
*
*
Further reading
* Anon.: "Monophony", ''
Grove Music Online'', edited by Deane L. Root .
*
Copland, Aaron. (1957). ''What to Listen for in Music'', revised edition. New York: McGraw-Hill
*
Demuth, Norman. 1964. ''Musical Forms and Textures: A Reference Guide'', second edition. London: Barrie and Rockliff.
* Frobenius, Wolf, Peter Cooke, Caroline Bithell, and Izaly Zemtsovsky: "Polyphony", ''Grove Music Online''. edited by Deane Root .
*
Hanning, Barbara Russano, ''Concise History of Western Music'', based on
Donald Jay Grout
Donald Jay Grout (September 28, 1902 – March 9, 1987) was an American musicologist. He is best known as the author of ''A Short History of Opera,'' first published in 1947. The fourth edition was published by Columbia University Press in 2003.
...
and
Claude V. Palisca's ''A History of Western Music'', fifth edition. Published by W. W. Norton, New York. .
* Hyer, Brian: "Homophony", ''Grove Music Online'', edited by Deane Root .
*
Keys, Ivor. 1961. ''The Texture of Music: From Purcell to Brahms''. London: D. Dobson.
*
Kokoras, Panayiotis (2005).
Towards a Holophonic Musical Texture'. In ''Proceedings of the ICMC2005 – International Computer Music Conference'',. Barcelona: International Computer Music Conference.
* White, John David. 1995. ''Theories of Musical Texture in Western History''. Perspectives in Music Criticism and Theory 1; Garland Reference Library of the Humanities 1678. New York: Garland Publishers.
External links
Add Texture: A web app with examples of different sonic textures
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Musical texture
Music theory