What is music?

It is an art that deals with sound. Just like the visual arts and literature, music represents ones culture and it is primarily one of the ways of expressing ones thoughts, beliefs and ideas.

Indigenous Classical Pop Rock Standard

Properties of Musical Sound

Properties
Pitch
Duration

Definition
It refers to the highness or lowness of tone.
The property of sound that depends on the length of time over which vibration is maintained. It is the force or percussive effects as a result of which the tone strikes us as being loud or soft.

Volume

Timbre color

or

tone It is the individual quality of the sound produced by other instruments.

Mediums of Music
Mediums Definition/ Characteristic

Vocal Medium

It refers to the human voice which is considered as the oldest and still the most popular form of all instruments. It is the most personal and direct of all instruments as it comes from within the body. The song projected by the human voice is also the most natural form of music.
It refers to musical instruments that are used in producing sound. The 3 main types of musical instruments are: those which are bowed (strings) those which are blown (brasses and woodwinds) those which are struck (percussion

Instrumental Medium

The String Instruments

The string instruments, also called stringed instruments, provide the basic orchestral sounds. They produce tones by means of the vibration of a stretched string.

The two main types of string instruments are

Bowed strings (produce tones by means of a bow of horsehair drawn across the strings and by means of plucking the strings) Plucked strings (produce tones solely by plucking the strings with your fingers or with a plectrum)

Examples of bowed strings

Violin

It is the highest member of the string section of the orchestra.

It is universally admired for its voicelike quality. It is also capable of brilliance and dramatic effect thus making it preeminent in lyric melody.

Viola
It

is slightly larger than the violin.

Its

strings are longer, thicker and heavier; it is lower in range.

is used more for harmony than for melody.

It

Violoncello (cello)

It is much longer than the viola.

It is lower in range than the viola and the strings are thicker and heavier than those of the viola. Its bow is shorter and heavier and the instrument has to be held between the knee of a seated performer.

Double bass (contrabass)

It is the largest member of the string family. It rests upon the floor and the performer stands to play it. It is the lowest in range of the string group.

Example of plucked strings

The Guitar Family

This seems to be the most popular stringed instrument. It varies considerably in shape and in the number of strings, but basically, it consists of a finger board with frets attached to a light wooden body with flat top and back.

The Woodwind Instruments

The woodwind instruments consist of members of four different families:

Flute and piccolo Oboe and English horn Clarinet and bass clarinet Bassoon and contrabassoon

These instruments are blown by the player. The pitch of the notes are altered by shortening or lengthening the column of air vibrating inside the instrument.

Examples of woodwind instruments

Flute

The first instrument of the woodwinds in the order of ceremonies and a has a nature somewhat distinct from that of other instruments of the section. It is a cylindrical tube made of a silver alloy or metal. Its sound is liquid and cool.

Piccolo
It

is a smaller flute which produces the highest notes in the orchestra. tones produces are piercing and shrill.

The

Oboe

It is made of wood. The body is a tube which gets wider at the end.
Because of such, the tone is focused and intense in all registers. The instrument is associated with pastoral effects and with nostalgic melodies.

English horn
It

is a large oboe. The oboe and the English horn look very much alike except that the English horn is wider and longer and ends in a pear-shaped bell, which accounts for its soft, mournful timbre.

Clarinet
It

is the instrument that often takes the part of the violin in band music. has a remarkably wide rangefrom low to high and from soft to loud.

It

Bassoon and contrabassoon

These

are the tenor and the bass, respectively, of the oboe family. tone is weighty, thick, and intense. They can create a humorous effect.

Their

Saxophone
It

has a single reed that combines the reed mouthpiece of a clarinet with a curved conical metal tube.

It

blends well with either the woodwind instruments or the brasses.

The Woodwind Instruments

Bassoon

Contrabassoon

Saxophone