Cannon in D
Introduction to music notation
Explaining the elements of music
These are the clefs which the
instruments are played in,
the treble clef which is the
top one is and bass clef which
is underneath are in all songs,
these are the two most
important clefs, in Cannon in
D there is there treble, bass
and alto clef
The title and composer of the song,
these are located at the very top of the
score, the title in the middle and the
composer in the top right.
The key signature and the time
signature are very important in music as
well, the key signature, this determines
what note or notes you will play a sharp
or a flat on and this is done throughout
the whole song.
The time signature is a fundamental part
of a score sheet because it will tell you
the tempo of the music and how many
beats in each bar.
The red highlighted box is the key
signature and the blue is the time
signature. Pizzicato which mean to pluck
the stings.
Rests in music, tell the person who is
playing it when to take a shot pause, and
sometimes when not to even play at all for
example the purple highlighted symbol
means rest for 4beats.
Timing in music which is also important, at
the top of the page it shows a number and
a quaver next to it which show the
amount of quavers per min which is like
the BMP.
Instrumentation, the instruments in this piece are all
located on the far left of the sheet music, the tell the
artist what instruments they need to play.
They are very important as is everything on a score,
but dependent on what the instruments are they are
written differently on a score, for example, all the
instruments on this score are the same family
grouping, which means that they are all very similar,
and work in similar way that is why the bar next to
them is open (highlighted in yellow in the image), you
can see the bar.
The make up of the instruments in this piece is all
stringed instruments descendant from the violin, this
is done by composers to thicken the texture of the
song and create tension when needed, although this
is the watered down version of The Cannon in D
breaking down the score there is still a lot of things
that the artist will need to know to play this music
correctly.
The composer has chosen to use the key signature D major because it suites
stringed instruments, this is because of how the instrument is played, it is
tuned to G D A E which means that the sound will become harmonic
The composer choses the clefs for each instrument because of the sound
which the instrument make for example the cello used in the piece has the
deepest sound to it that is why it is used in the bass clef
The composer has used a ground bass because it will bring out the melody
lines a lot more because the bass is repeating continuously
The composer has chosen to use pizzicato in this piece because it add more
dynamics to the music and gives it a three dimensional feel as well as playing
Arco
This score is the Prelude of Bizet’s Carmen, it
consists of a full orchestra the instruments are
located on the far left highlighted in purple
they also order like this because that is how
they would sit in an orchestra, there are three
different clefs used ;in this piece, the treble
clef, alto clef and bass clef this is another
indication that this is a classical piece of music.
The main difference between this score and
the other is the amount of instruments used
and the dynamics used, the dynamic used can
also suggest the genre of music, and this is a
romantic piece of music but it is only the
prelude that is why some of the instruments
do not play and also why there is breaks in
some of the notation.
The bmp for a classical and romantic piece of
music is quite high at 114 beats per minute.
A Prelude of a song is like, and into before the
full song actually starts there is a little piece
which is played at the start, and as you can see
by this Prelude, that this song will have a lot of
further dynamics added in, and maybe a little
more complex notation, which will all be
directed by a conductor.
The reason that the instruments used are in that order is because that is the order
which the orchestra sit in, the reason the composer has chosen to use that
amount of instruments, is because it will make the piece sound grand, that is
what most classical music is like and that is why they use orchestras, the
composer also used the dynamics chosen is because it makes the music sound like
the genre chosen which is romantic music, this can also link to the reason which
the harp has 2 staves, because the instruments has a lot of octaves, the composer
chose to use them because it could show the ups and downs or romance which a
lot of composers tend to do with romance music.
The reason which a composer may chose to double up some instruments, is to
make the melody stand out a lot more than it already does, which also give a
3dymentional feel to the piece and adds to the dynamics or your song, it could
also be used in riffs of a song as well, And this also relates to why music has
sequencing in it, this is because it shows that your song/score has some kind
of structure, and if you are using a versus chorus style of sequencing it makes
the chorus repetitive and catchy.
Different traditions of notation;
blues/jazz
In the score
The things that are common in most scores can be
found here but there are also other things which
make this jazz and blues score much different to a
classical score.
For example the time signature, the key signature
and the clef that the instrument should be played
in are found in all score and is found in this one,
but there is also or things for example the chords
written above the notation which is for the
guitarist in the piece.
The structure to this is very simple but works,
there first piece is the intro, then as the score goes
along, the 5th bar is is the head of the song, the
verse or the piece after the intro which some
people call it, these are commonly found in blues
and jazz score and is the major differences
The things that are missing for the sore are the
other instruments in the band that are not on this
score.
This Jazz score is very different to the rest of the other scores shown because,
all of the notation written above it, on the guitarist piece helps the artist to
play the instrument, it is also very different because, there are many different
interpretations of this song, and just looking at the score I would expect the
rhythm upbeat/ swing rhythm to it especially because it is a jazz piece but
because this score is a freestyle score which means that, the tempo can
always change, it also means there is no limitations to the song.
There is no performance of this piece that is the same as stated above this is
because it is a freestyle score, and the tempo is for every changing, so
different performers may have different interpretations of the song some
example are.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8GjJD826vc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmKQOqUgFIM
The main difference between these two performances are one is very slow,
and the tempo gradually builds and the the other starts of very upbeat, and
has slight breaks were the tempo slows down.
Berio Sequenza
In this screenshot it show a much more complex
notation than previous score shown before it. This
piece is called Berio Sequenza 3rd and it is a less
traditional piece in comparison to other scores as it
can be performed through matter of perception.
There is specific instruction within this piece however no tempo is shown on the score so each
performance will be performed differently.
Words are also included in this score to make it a
little easier to understand.
Some advantages of this piece are that it is solely
based on interpretation of the performer therefor is
very unique.
A disadvantage of this piece is that it has to be a solo
performance as many composers all have different
interpretations of it.