11.22.2010 Brittney’s Homework

MOV00798:

In this video, I see three males on the stage dressed up as in North American Indians. This video’s music is very melodic and in those very short seconds, I heard not so much layers that are complex, but it seems like it can become very complex. There seems to be a drum that is playing under neat which sound like a melodic instrument also. There is a flute that seems to play the melody line of this piece.

 

Mov00799:

For this video, I see three males and one female performer on the stage. There is a male who is playing pan-pipes, one male who is playing shaker, one male who is playing a flute, and a female who is playing a flute as well. This video contains the continuation of the first video’s music. This music is very melodic. The range of the piece seems to be pretty narrow and has the contThe harmony created between the pan-pipes and the flutes are very constant. It is hard to identify the meter system for this piece, since the piece is pretty short. The dynamic and the tempo of this video’s music is constant.

 

MOV00805:

This video’s music sounds a lot like western classical music. There are three Native American looking performers on the stage. They are also playing flutes. This piece is melodic as the first two video’s music. The movement of each note seems fairly slow. There are three layers that are moving together, but with different melodic and rhythmic lines. They are creating very constant harmony.

 

The music from the video clips are fair easy to pick and demonstrate by humming, I would say if a person is from Andean culture. This music sounds like it is performed for everyone, not for just a particular group. I do not believe that this piece contains many different phrases. It sounds like the melodic line is repeated, but I am not 100% sure because of the length of the video.

From what we have discussed about the Andean music, it is obvious that I can see the flutes and panpipes on the stage as well as the drums such as shakers. However, from what we have talked about I feel that the video is not the best example of Andean music, since the musicians are play both melodic instruments and percussion instruments. In this piece, I only see four performers playing flutes and one of them is playing the percussion instrument, a shaker.

 

11.13.2010 Saturday Homework Critique

I really think that the homework showed what Paul was going to do related to the classroom. He tied his first lesson to the homework assignment that was due indirectly. Since Paul decided to do this, students could have understand or figure out that the next lesson would  somehow be connected to how African music has impacted the music throughout different countries.

Paul used video clips for the musical examples so students actually had the chance to see what was going on while the music was made. I believe that this will help the students see what is exactly going on and help them understand the concepts better. To improve his lesson, I think that Paul could have used an alternative to video-clips such as mp3 files to see if  the students were able to see where the music was created.

09/11/2010 Track#27 “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua”

“Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua” is a piece recorded by singers from the Cook Islands National Arts Theater. This piece is a Polynesian homogeneous choral song or chant from the Cook Islands, in the joyous old style called ute. This piece has many different voices singing the essential melody line and also both male and female singers with varying ranges creating harmonies. “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua” has a melody line that is fairly simple to follow along.

The melody of this piece is sung by many voices in different ranges. The melody line moves in a fairly closed step-wise motion. The range of the actual melody line is fairly narrow.  However, some parts of the harmony makes “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua”  have a very wide range in the melody. The melody shows a lot of conjunct motion. If audiences have some background in musical phrasing, they will be able to see that every two measures, the singers make the phrases. This can be identified and found out by tapping out the down beat of this piece, and then counting to see how many measures the singers sing for.

The piece has a call and response form of singing style. There is a small group or the song leaders that start to sing and then the ensemble sings back to the lead singers. This pattern is kept throughout the piece and it gives audiences a change to hear the melody line repeated many times and, in turn, help them recognize the melody line and follow along. The level of the melody line is easy for this reason.

There are about three to four different instruments that are used: male voices, female voices, and clapping or stomping. The voices of both females and males are obviously divided in many different layers depending on their ranges. Individual voices do not overpower the group unless they are adding a different technique for the purpose of  decorating the piece. Throughout the piece, audiences can hear a female voice that is heard through the group, but she still does not overpower the group. She actually balances out “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua”  and is essentially just adding a flavor to the piece. The singers clap and stomp throughout the piece. The bodies of the singers become the instrument part for this piece which is called corpophones. The use of corpophones allows singers to fill the song and keep its tempo.

This piece is played in the duple meter system with no changes.  “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua” is performed in a 4/4 meter which means for each measure a quarter note will get a beat. Audiences will realize that they sing the same melody over and over again and that the rhythmic pattern does not change during the performance. The tempo of “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua” is about 122 per-beat which is a fairly fast tempo. The majority of the voice parts sing on the down beat, but if audiences carefully listen to the piece, they will hear a small group of singers sing in syncopated rhythm which creates a richer and more colorful piece.

The primary harmony used in “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua” is called homophony which means that singers sing a melody in unison. However, audiences will notice that there is more than one harmony. Though the singers are just singing one melody, there are groups singing different parts in this piece. There is a female group or solo singer who adds the ornaments during this piece (0:11 and 0:16). “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua” almost sounds like an imitative polyphony piece because of the repetition of the basic melody and the rhythmic patterns.

The dynamic of “Te Kuki Airani Nui Maruarua”is fairly constant throughout the piece. The volume is almost fortissimo from the beginning. The dynamic gets louder and is especially loud when all of the parts are in and also when the a female solo or group enters. When the singers start to clap and stomp, the dynamic of this piece gets much louder and towards the ending they slowly fade away.

09/07/2010 Track# 22 – Andean Panpipes:Three Cortes

“Andean Panpipes: Three Cortes” is a piece performed by Patricia Hinostroza, Jesus Jaramillo, Vanessa Luyo, Jose Carlos Pomari, Illich Ivan Montes, Hubert Yauri, and the traditional Sikuris ensemble. This piece was recorded in Andean highlands, a city of Puno and was performed during the festival La Candelaria in 1991. (Wade xix).

The piece has a melody that is fairly easy to follow and identify. In the beginning, the melody of “Toril” genre is played by the one of the cortes called the chili or suli which has the highest pitch register. This part is played for 30 seconds from the beginning. Then, the middle pitch register corte called the malta plays the same melody that the chili or suli has played. Musicians that are familiar with the cortes consider the malta as the melody carrier. This part is played for 30 seconds also. As soon as the malta part is done, the lower-register sanja is played  for another 30 seconds.Then, the highest pitch register instrument or chili starts to play the melody again followed by the malta or melody carrier followed by the sanja playing the melody together in an imitative polyphony manner. The chili, malta, and sanja play the melody at least once before they cut-off. Then,they all start to play again at the same time, but this time the traditional Sikuris ensemble accompanies them.

As the listeners pay attention to this piece, they might begin to understand the basic pattern of this piece. The basic melody is played three times, but in different registers. Listeners might get the feel of Western choral music pieces that traditionally repeat the same melody with different voice parts. The theory or explanation of the similarity could possibly be because of European influences or the captivation during the 15th century. One might think that the instruments in this piece are demonstrating a call and response texture; however, there is not much evidence to support this theory.

If audiences clap along with this piece, people will discover that this piece is played in a  3/4 meter. The first beat of the every measure is  accented. There is only one melody throughout the piece which is repeated over and over again. For that reason, “Andean Panpipes: Three Cortes” does not have any critical rhythmic changes that occur during the entire piece. There are many layers played once by the three cortes: the chili, the malta, and the sanja accompanied by the traditional Sikuris ensemble which is played in an imitative polyphony manner. This manner might sound like there is a change in the rhythmic pattern, but there is none.

The tempo of this piece is kept pretty constant throughout. The tempo of this piece equals about 124~129 per-beat. The tempo remains constant even when the three instruments with an ensemble play together.

The harmony that is created when all three instruments and the ensemble play is not so dissonant.  However, when the ensemble plays, they might sound little off from other lines, but they keep their balance very well so as to not sound disorganized. As a whole ensemble, they are very well in tune and are harmonized. This harmony can be considered the consonant harmony, since there is too much tension among the lines. The dynamic changes whenever the number of instruments increase from being one instrument to the whole ensemble. When three instruments play their solos, there is not a big dynamic change that is marked, but they do fade out at the end of their solos.

The timbre of this piece is simply all woodwind instruments composed of the Chili, malta, sanja, and sikuris. The instruments that are played have various pitch ranges.  When the instruments are added onto the measure lines, this piece has a fairly large range. Though this piece might have a wide range, the melody is very conjunct. There is not a lot of leaps or descending between the wide intervals.

The melody of this piece is very easy to remember and follow along. The melody line is only about 17 to 18 measures long and without the big leaps either descending or ascending, this piece is very easy to follow. The reason why it is so easy to follow might be the intention of the composer who may have wanted this piece to be played easily and reproduced by anyone who could play a woodwind instrument.