WESTERN

MUSIC
NAME : NITHIN SAJI
REG NO : 2001711010063
CLASS : BA ENGLISH
Summary

Western music was involved in developments outside the colonial possessions of the enlarged Europe that came to
define itself as the West. The most fundamental aspect of musical modernization lies in the influence of Western
aesthetic values. The Western pop basis of world music, the real common practice style of the late twentieth and
early twenty-first century, provides a structure that is as ubiquitous and universal as Western science and
engineering, while local elements merely add exotic color. Both indigenous and Spanish musics were performed on
ceremonial occasions in the missions of sixteenth-century Florida, while European visitors frequently commented on
the general excellence of Indian musicians, singers and instrumentalists. The twentieth-century Africanization of
popular music represents a massive countercurrent to the established hegemonies of global capitalism. Western
classical music is a form of musical utopia and can therefore act as world music.

What Is Western Music?

The term 'Western' refers to European traditions and social structures and has come to include societies that were
established and shaped primarily by European immigrants, such as those in the Americas. Thus, Western music may be
defined as organized instrumentation and sound created and produced in Europe, the United States, and other societies
established and shaped by European immigrants. This includes a wide assortment of musical genres, from classical music
and jazz to rock and roll and country-western music. In this lesson, we'll outline the evolution of music from the ancient
world of the Greeks and Romans through all six eras of artistic history.

Music of the Ancient World

The history of Western music is primarily rooted in Greek and Roman antiquity, though music existed in virtually every
culture long before this. Nevertheless, music was an important part of the lives of the ancient Greeks. Greek
philosophers wrote about the power of music, the mathematician Pythagoras explored the mathematics behind musical
sounds, and well-known Greek playwrights, such as Sophocles and Aristophanes, used music in their tragedies and
comedies.

The Greeks and Romans had many musical instruments, including the lyre, harp, and the cornu horn, which were used in
a variety of ceremonies and festivals. The Greeks also developed different systems of music notation, such as the more
general harmonia and the more specific Dorian or Lydian, which were names after specific tribes and based upon unique
modes, or the specific ordering of musical tones and their corresponding notes. All of these helped music to thrive, and
it probably would have evolved in a different way if it hadn't been for two major factors: the birth of Christianity and the
fall of Rome.

STAGES OF MUSIC

Gregorian chant: Solo and unison plainsong choral chants associated with Pope Gregory I which became the
fundamental music of the Roman Catholic Church.
Baroque: [Fr.] Bizarre. Term applied to the ornate architecture of German and Austria during the 17th and 18th
centuries and borrowed to describe comparable music developments from about 1600 to the deaths of Bach and Handel
in mid-18th century.

Classical: Music composition roughly between 1750 and 1830 (i.e. post-Baroque and pre-Romantic), which covers the
development of the classical symphony and concerto; music of an orderly nature, with qualities of clarity and balance,
and emphasising formal beauty rather than emotional expression.

March: (marche [Fr.], Marsch [Ger.], Marcia [It.]) Form of music to accompany the orderly progress of large group of
people, especially soldiers; one of earliest known music forms.

Ragtime: Early precursor of jazz. Instrumental style, highly syncopated, with the piano forte predominant (though a few
rags had words and were sung). Among the leading exponents of the piano forte rag were Scott Joplin, Jelly Roll Morton,
and J. P. Johnson, with the cornettists Buddy Bolden and King Oliver.

Jazz: A term, which came into general use circa 1913–15, for a type of music that developed in the Southern States of
USA in the late 19th century and came into prominence at the turn of the century in New Orleans, chiefly (but not
exclusively) among black musicians.

Soul: Genre of African-American popular music. Soul music combines the emotive, embellished singing style of gospel
with the rhythmic drive of rhythm and blues.

Blues: Slow jazz song of lamentation, generally for an unhappy love affair. Usually in groups of 12 bars, each stanza being
three lines covering four bars of music.

Motown: American record label, founded in 1960. Name derives from its home town of Detroit (‘the motor town’). A
blend of African-American pop and soul, combining dense arrangements (often featuring brass or string), emotionally
direct lyrics, and songs based on prominent hooks or grooves, epitomized by such artists as the Four Tops, Diana Ross
and the Supremes, Marvin Gaye, and Stevie Wonder.

Reggae: Style of Jamaican popular music; also used generically for all popular music of that country. Originated in
combination of calypso, ska, and rhythm and blues. Its characteristic rhythm, a 4/4 shuffle with accented offbeats
derived from ska, was codified in recordings of the late 1960s.

Bluegrass: Genre of country music that originated in rural south eastern USA in 1940s as combination of dance,
entertainment, and religious folk music. Name comes from Bill Monroe’s ‘Blue Grass Boys’ group who pioneered the
genre.

Disco: Genre of dance music especially popular in the late 1970s. It is generally characterized by soulful vocals, Latin
percussion instruments, rich orchestra, frequent use of synthesizers, and bass drum accents on every beat.

Punk: Genre of popular music and wider cultural movement with which it was associated. Originated in America around
1975 with bands such as the Ramones and Television, who looked to the simplicity of 1960s garage rock to restore spirit
of rebellion and a DIY spirit to rock and roll.

Heavy metal: Genre of rock music. First applied to style of rock featuring guitar distortion, heavy bass and drums, and
virtuoso solos developed, after Jimi Hendrix, by groups such as Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin.

Rap: Highly rhythmicized, semi-spoken vocal style originating in African-American music in late 1970s.
House: Genre of electronic dance music. Originated in Chicago clubs in the early 1980s, particularly through DJ and
producer Frankie Knuckles, achieving mainstream popularity by the end of that decade.

Dubstep: A form of dance music, typically instrumental, characterized by a sparse, syncopated rhythm and a strong
bassline.

Some common characteristics, which are not always present and are not only specific to this period, include:

 Fewer lyrical melodies than other periods.

 Dissonant Harmonies.

 Complex rhythms.

 Percussiveness.

 Greater use of percussion,brass,and woodwind.

 Uses synthetic and electronic sounds.

GENERAL BACKGROUND ON EARLY MUSIC

Like so many aspects of Western culture, the history of Western music begins in Ancient Greece, at least seven centuries
before the birth of Christ. Greek traditions were adapted and passed on with very little change by their Roman
conquerors, who built a massive Empire that crumbled by the mid-400s. Over the next 1,000 years during the so-called
"Middle Ages," the Roman Empire was superseded by the establishment of the Western Christian Church centered in
Rome, and the development of several separate kingdoms that later became the basis for the major countries of
modern Europe. Thus, the "Early Music" era includes:

- Ancient Greek/Roman music (700BC-450AD),

- Medieval music ["The Middle Ages"] (c450-1450),

- Renaissance music (c1450-1600),

- early-Baroque music (c1600-1700)

In various countries

Korea[edit]
Jeongganbo musical notation system

Jeongganbo is a unique traditional musical notation system created during the time of Sejong the Great that was the
first East Asian system to represent rhythm, pitch, and time. [19][20] Among various kinds of Korean traditional music,
Jeong-gan-bo targets a particular genre, Jeong-ak (정악, 正樂).

Jeong-gan-bo tells the pitch by writing the pitch's name down in a box called 'jeong-gan' (this is where the name
comes from). One jeong-gan is one beat each, and it can be split into two, three or more to hold half beats and
quarter beats, and more. This makes it easy for the reader to figure out the beat.

Also, there are many markings indicating things such as ornaments. Most of these were later created by Ki-su Kim

IndiaN

Indian music, early 20th century.

The Samaveda text (1200 BC – 1000 BC) contains notated melodies, and these are probably the world's oldest
surviving ones.[21] The musical notation is written usually immediately above, sometimes within, the line of Samaveda
text, either in syllabic or a numerical form depending on the Samavedic Sakha (school).[22] The Indian scholar and
musical theorist Pingala (c. 200 BC), in his Chanda Sutra, used marks indicating long and short syllables to indicate
meters in Sanskrit poetry.

A rock inscription from circa 7th–8th century CE at Kudumiyanmalai, Tamil Nadu contains an early example of a
musical notation. It was first identified and published by archaeologist/epigraphist D. R. Bhandarkar.[23] Written in the
Pallava-grantha script of the 7th century, it contains 38 horizontal lines of notations inscribed on a rectangular rock
face (dimension of around 13 by 14 feet). Each line of the notation contains 64 characters (characters representing
musical notes), written in groups of four notes. The basic characters for the seven notes, 'sa ri ga ma pa dha ni', are
seen to be suffixed with the vowels a, i, u, e. For example, in the place of 'sa', any one of 'sa', 'si', 'su' or 'se' is used.
Similarly, in place of ri, any one of 'ra', 'ri', 'ru' or 're' is used. Horizontal lines divide the notation into 7 sections. Each
section contains 4 to 7 lines of notation, with a title indicating its musical 'mode'. These modes may have been
popular at least from the 6th century CE and were incorporated into the Indian 'raga' system that developed later. But
some of the unusual features seen in this notation have been given several non-conclusive interpretations by
scholars.[24]

Japan[edit]

Further information:  Shakuhachi musical notation  and  Kunkunshi

Tempyō Biwa Fu 天平琵琶譜 (circa 738 AD), musical notation for Biwa. (Shōsōin, at Nara, Japan)

Japanese music is highly diversified, and therefore requires various systems of notation. In
Japanese shakuhachi music, for example, glissandos and timbres are often more significant than distinct pitches,
whereas taiko notation focuses on discrete strokes.

Ryukyuan sanshin music uses kunkunshi, a notation system of kanji with each character corresponding to a finger

Sieges, famine, and internal disputes caused the ancient world to crumble, giving way to the Middle Ages. Almost all
technological advances vanished when Rome fell. Without effective leaders to organize such complex societies, many
people grew poor and lived in relatively isolated villages. Life was difficult, and the primary focus was survival. Few
people had the time or desire to make music. However, one bright spot in the dark world of the Medieval Era was the
stability provided by the Church.

Church leaders recognized the power of music and began using it in as a tool for meditation and prayer. This religious
music was called plainchant, and it consisted of a single melody sung in Latin, the language of the church. Because
musical instruments were associated with the pagan culture of the Greeks and Romans, Church leaders did not
approve of their use. Therefore, all plainchant was unaccompanied vocal music, which became known as a cappella, a
term that basically means 'in the style of the chapel.'

The Renaissance Era (1450 CE - 1600 CE)

Renaissance means 'rebirth,' and in the Renaissance Era, people rediscovered the ideas and technologies of the
ancient world. Society developed into more distinct social classes, and educated citizens were expected to be
proficient in music. The advent of printing allowed music to become increasingly accessible, and a wide variety of
styles and genres of music emerged as composers started sharing ideas. Renaissance composers developed the single-
melody plainchant by combining several complex melodies at once, and some upper-class citizens hired musicians and
composers as resident members of their courts. Secular music thrived during this era and was often played by small
groups of musicians known as consorts.