An aspect of music is any characteristic, dimension, or element taken as a part or component of music. The traditional musicological or European-influenced aspects of music often listed are those elements given primacy in European-influenced classical music: melody, harmony, rhythm, tone color, and form. The word characteristic has several meanings: In mathematics, see characteristic (algebra) characteristic function characteristic subgroup Euler characteristic method of characteristics In genetics, see characteristic (genetics). ... Dimension (from Latin measured out) is, in essence, the number of degrees of freedom available for movement in a space. ... Generally, an element is a basic part that is the foundation of something. ... Music is an art, entertainment, or other human activity which involves organized sound, though definitions may vary. ... }} Wiktionary has a definition of: Melody In music, a melody is a series of linear events or a succession, not a simultaneity as in a chord. ... This article is about musical harmony. ... Rhythm (Greek ρυθμός = tempo) is the variation of the duration of sounds or other events over time. ... In music, timbre is the quality of a musical note which distinguishes different types of musical instrument. ... This article is about the meanings of the word form connected with shape or structure. ...

• Melody is a succession of notes heard as some sort of unit.
• Harmony is the relationship between two or more simultaneous pitches or pitch simultaneities.
• Rhythm is the organization of the durational aspects of music.
• Tone color is timbre, see list below.
• Form is the structure of a particular piece, how its parts are put together to make the whole.

However, a more comprehensive list is given by stating the aspects of sound: pitch, timbre, intensity, and duration. (Owen 2000:6) In music, pitch is the perception of the frequency of a note. ... In music, timbre is the quality of a musical note which distinguishes different types of musical instrument. ... Loudness is the quality of a sound which is high in volume (amplitude, or sound pressure). ... A duration is an amount of time or a particular time interval. ...

• Pitch is the perception of the frequency of the sound experienced, and is perceived as how "low" or "high" a sound is, and may be further described as definite pitch or indefinite pitch. It includes: melody, harmony, tonality, tessitura, and tuning or temperament (ibid).
• Timbre is the quality of a sound, determined by the fundamental and its spectra: overtones or harmonics and envelope, and varies between voices and types and kinds of musical instruments, which are tools used to produce sound. It includes: tone color and articulation (ibid).
• Intensity, or dynamics, is how loud or quiet a sound is and includes how stressed a sound is or articulation.
• Duration is the temporal aspect of music; time. It includes: pulse, beat, rhythm, rhythmic density, meter, tempo (ibid).

These aspects combine to create secondary aspects including form or structure, texture, and style. Other commonly included aspects include the spatial location or the movement in space of sounds, gesture, and dance. Silence is also often considered an aspect of music, if it is considered to exist. Sine waves of various frequencies; the lower waves have higher frequencies than those above. ... In music a sound or note of definite pitch is one of which it is possible or relatively easy to discern the pitch or frequency of the fundamental, as opposed to sounds of indefinite pitch. ... In music a sound or note of indefinite pitch is one of which it is impossible or relatively difficult to discern the pitch or frequency of the fundamental, as opposed to sounds of definite pitch. ... Tonality is the character of music written with hierarchical relationships of pitches, rhythms, and chords to a center or tonic. ... Tessitura (Italian: texture) is a musical term. ... This page is about the musical process of tuning, for musical systems of tuning see musical tuning. ... In psychology, Temperament is the general nature of an individuals personality, such as introversion or extraversion, it derives from the theory of the humours. ... A fundamental is something basic and important which other things are built upon. ... Spectra is the plural of spectrum. ... An overtone is a sinusoidal component of a waveform, of greater frequency than its fundamental frequency. ... In acoustics and telecommunication, the harmonic of a wave is a component frequency of the signal that is an integral multiple of the fundamental frequency. ... An envelope is a packaging product, usually made of flat, planar material such as paper or cardboard, designed to contain a flat object such as a letter. ... The word voice can mean: The human voice. ... A musical instrument is a device that has been constructed or modified with the purpose of making music. ... In music, dynamics refers to the volume or loudness of the sound or note, in particular to the range from soft (quiet) to loud. ... Stress has different meanings in different fields: Stress in physics, see also pressure. ... 8:17 am, August 6, 1945, Japanese time. ... In medicine, a persons pulse is the throbbing of their arteries as an effect of the heart beat. ... Beating is striking more than once, in violence, beating a drum, etc. ... metre or meter, see meter (disambiguation) The metre is the basic unit of length in the International System of Units. ... In musical terminology, tempo (Italian for time) is the speed or pace of a given piece. ... The structure of a thing is how the parts of it relate to each other, how it is put together. This contrast with process, which is how the thing works; but process requires a viable structure. ... Texture is the properties held and sensations caused by the external surface of objects received through the sense of touch. ... Clothing, see Fashion Writing, see style guide Flower part, see Flower Style (manner of address) Chinese courtesy name, see zi Web design, see Cascading Style Sheets Sundials, see sundial See also: Wikipedia:Manual of Style This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise... A contemporary dancer rehearsing in a dance studio Dance generally refers to human movement either used as a form of expression or presented in a social, spiritual or performance setting. ... Silence is a relative or total lack of sound. ...

• Structure includes: motive, subphrase, phrase, phrase group, period, section, exposition, repetition, variation, development, and other formal units, textural continuity (ibid).
• Texture is the interaction of temporal and pitch elements. It includes: homophony, polyphony, heterophony, and simultaneity. (ibid)
• Style is what distinguishes an individual composer or group, period, genre, region, or manner of performance (ibid).

Often a definition of music lists the aspects or elements that make up music under that definition. However, in addition to a lack of consensus, Jean Molino (1975: 43) also points out that "any element belonging to the total musical fact can be isolted, or taken as a strategic variable of musical production." Nattiez gives as examples Mauricio Kagel's Con Voce [with voice], where a masked trio silently mimes playing instruments. In this example sound, a common element, is excluded, while gesture, a less common element, is given primacy. In classical music of the common practice period, for instance, melody and harmony are often considered to be given more importance at the expense of rhythm and timbre. John Cage considers duration the primary aspect of music as, being the temporal aspect of music, it is the only aspect common to both "sound" and "silence". For other meanings of motive see motive (algebraic geometry) and (alternate spelling of) motif (music). ... A phrase is a group of words that functions as a single unit in the syntax of a sentence. ... A period is an arbitrary interval of time. ... Section can be: A cross section (in the common sense or the physics sense) In mathematics: A conic section A section of a fiber bundle or sheaf A Caesarean section In UK law, Section 28 In the fictional Star Trek universe, Section 31 A military unit A section (land) is... An exposition may be one of the following: In music an exposition is the first of the sections in sonata allegro form. ... Repetition is the occurrence of an event which has occurred before. ... In music, variation is a formal technique where material is altered during repetition; reiteration with changes. ... Development has meaning in several contexts: Biological development of embryos in the context of developmental biology Child development or post-natal human development (pediatrics, etc) Personal development (New Age self improvement) Economic development in economics and international relations Human development - to improve the health, education and range of choices of... Homophony is music in which the top line has a dominant melody, and all the voices accompany it with chords in the same rhythm. ... Polyphony is a musical texture consisting of several independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony). ... One of various musical textures, heterophony is a kind of complex monophony - there is only one melody, but multiple voices each of which play the melody differently, either in a different rhythm or tempo, with different embellishments and figures, or idiomatically different. ... Jean Molino is professeur ordinaire at the University of Lausanne and a semiologist. ... Mauricio Kagel (born Buenos Aires, December 24, 1931) is an Argentine composer noted for his interest in developing the theatrical side of musical performance. ... In music the common practice period is a long period in western musical history spanning from before the classical era proper to today, dated, on the outside, as 1600-1900. ... John Cage John Milton Cage (September 5, 1912–August 12, 1992) was an experimental music composer and writer, possibly best known (some might say notorious) for his piece 4′ 33″, often described (somewhat erroneously) as four and a half minutes of silence. ...

It is often debated whether there are aspects of music which are universal. The debate often hinges on definitions, for instance the fairly common assertion that "tonality" is a universal of all music may necessarily require an expansive definition of tonality. A pulse is sometimes taken as a universal, yet there exist solo vocal and instrumental genres with free and improvisational rhythms no regular pulse (Johnson 2002), one example being the alap section of an Indian classical music performance. "We must ask whether a cross-cultural musical universal is to be found in the music itself (either its structure or function) or the way in which music is made. By 'music-making,' I intend not only actual performance but also how music is heard, understood, even learned." (Dane Harwood 1976:522) Universal has several meanings: For the concept of a universal in metaphysics, see Universal (metaphysics). ... In music, a pulse is an unbroken series of distinct yet identical periodically occurring short stimuli perceived as points in time (DeLone et. ... The alap (pronounced ah-laap) is the introductory section of any Hindustani music performance. ... The origins of Indian classical music can be found from the oldest of scriptures, part of the Hindu tradition, the Vedas. ...

According to Merriam (1964, p.32-33) there are three aspects always present in musical activity: concept, behaviour, and sound. Virgil Thomson (Erickson 1957, p. vii) lists the "raw materials" of music in order of their discovery: rhythm, melody, and harmony; with the construction of these materials using two major techniques: counterpoint (the simultaneity and organization of different melodies) and orchestration. Rhythm does not require melody or harmony, but it does require melody if the instrument produces a continuous sound, harmony arises from reverberation causing the overlap of different pitches, and counterpoint arises from multiple melodies. A concept is an abstract, universal idea, notion or entity that serves to designate a category or class of entities, events or relations. ... Behavior (U.S.) or behaviour (U.K.) refers to the actions or reactions of an object or organism, usually in relation to the environment. ... Virgil Thomson, photographed by Carl Van Vechten, 1947 Virgil Thomson (November 25, 1896 - September 30, 1989) was an American composer from Missouri, whose rural background gave a sense of place in his compositions. ... Counterpoint is a very general feature of music (especially prominent in much Western music) whereby two or more melodic strands occur simultaneously - in separate voices, either literally or metaphorically (if the music is instrumental). ... For the use of the term orchestration in computer science, see orchestration (computers) Orchestration or arrangement is the study and practice of arranging music for an orchestra or musical ensemble. ...

Kenneth Gorlay recounts that, "Writing of her own Igbo music, the Nigerian musicologist Chinyere Nwachukwu maintains that the 'concept of music nkwa combines singing, playing musical instruments, and dancing into one act' (1981: 59). Whatever concept of 'music' is held by members of wester society, it is highly improbable that, apart from forward-looking scholars and composers, it will contain all three elements. Nkwa in fact is not 'music' but a wider affective channel that is closer to the karimojong mode of expression than to western practice. The point of interest here is that Nwachukwu feels constrained to use the erroneous term 'music': not because she is producing a 'musical dissertation,' but because the 'one act' which the Igbos perform has no equivalent in the English language. By forcing the Igbo concept into the Procrustean bed of western conceptualization, she is in effect surrendering to the dominance of western ideas--or at least to the dominance of the English language! How different things would have been if the Igbo tongue had attained the same 'universality' as English!" (1984, p.35) He then concludes that there exists "nonuniversality of music and the universality of nonmusic."

Other common aspects and terms

Other terms used to discuss particular pieces include note, which is an abstraction which refers to either a specific pitch and/or rhythm or the written symbol; chord, which is a simultaneity of notes heard as some sort of unit; and chord progression which is a succession of chords (simultaneity succession). In music and music theory a chord (from the middle English cord, short for accord) is three or more notes sounding simultaneously, or near simultaneously over a period of time. ... Simultaneity is the property of two events happening at the same time. ... A chord progression (also chord sequence and harmonic progression), as its name implies, is a series of chords played in an order. ... Succession is the act or process of following in order or sequence. ... In music and music theory a simultaneity succession a series of different groups of pitches or pitch classes, each of which is played at the same as the other pitches of its group. ...

For a more comprehensive list of terms see: List of musical topics This page aims to list articles related to music. ...

Sources

• Erickson, Robert (1957). The Structure of Music: A Listener's Guide. New York: Noonday Press. Subtitled "a study of music in terms of melody and counterpoint".
  • Thomson, Virgil. "Introduction"
• Nattiez, Jean-Jacques (1987). Music and Discourse: Toward a Semiology of Music (Musicologie générale et sémiologue, 1987). Translated by Carolyn Abbate (1990). ISBN 0691027145.
  • Molino, J. (1975). "Fait musical et sémiologue de la musique", Musique en Jeu, no. 17:37-62.
  • Harwood, Dane (1976). "Universals in Music: A Perspective from Cognitive Psychology", Ethnomusicology 20, no. 3:521-33
  • Gourlay, Kenneth (1984).
• Owen, Harold (2000). Music Theory Resource Book. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195115392.
• Johnson, Julian (2002). Who Needs Classical Music?: Cultural Choice and Musical Value. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195146816.