When I say music you say theory! Music! Music!
Hi you guys! Welcome back to The Singing Studio. And based on my intro, yes, today we are going to be talking about music theory. Now I’m going to title these videos, “Theory Factory”. I’m really excited to dive into some theory because I feel like all of us as singers and musicians need to have some sort of understanding of certain terms that you will hear and see often in music.
We aren’t singing today. However, you should still be taking notes on all of these terms so that you can remember them and so that you can recognize them in the future.
Music theory. What does that even mean? Music theory. Basically music theory is referring to all of the elements that make up music composition. Music theory – all the elements that make up music composition.
So the first two terms I’m going to be teaching you are staccato and legato. This is what staccato looks like. This is what legato looks like. So let’s start with staccato. Staccato means sharp and choppy. And it kind of sounds like this. I’m going to use one of my favorite phrases, “Mommy Made Me Mash My M&M’s”, to demonstrate how staccato sounds like. Did you hear how it was nice and choppy and quick? That is what staccato means.
Now legato means the exact opposite. It means smooth and connected. This is what legato sounds like. Do you see how the whole phrase is nice and connecting and really smooth? That’s what legato means. So staccato means choppy and then you’ve got legato which means smooth.
Now we’re going to dive into dynamics. Dynamics is defined as the indication for what volume a phrase, song, or measure in music should be. I’m going to go through some of the basic dynamics that we see and hear often in music.
The first dynamic I’m going to teach you is piano and it looks like this. Piano simply means soft or quiet. Next is forte. Forte looks like this. And it means loud. What if we only want something kind of loud or something kind of soft? Well we have dynamics for that as well. So whenever there is an “m” put in front of a piano or a forte symbol, it means mezzo-piano or medium soft and then mezzo-forte or medium loud.
The final two terms I’m going to talk about today are crescendo and decrescendo. This also goes along with dynamics. Crescendo looks like this. It means to gradually get louder. Decrescendo: you guessed it! It’s the exact opposite. It means to gradually get softer and this is what it looks like.
Talking about these specific theory terms I feel is really important because we can play around with them as we practice our exercises. Like the example I used with “Mommy Made Me Mash My M&M’s”. You could sing it staccato and forte meaning choppy and loud. Or you could sing piano and legato.
So you might hear me use these words in future videos and if you do, now you’ll know what they mean. That is the beauty of learning more about music theory.
So let’s do a short recap on all the terms we talked about today.
Staccato – That means short and choppy.
Legato – That means smooth and connected.
Dynamics – Dynamics in music indicate the volume.
Piano – It means soft.
Forte – It means loud.
Mezzo-piano means medium soft.
Mezzo-forte means medium loud.
Crescendo – gradually getting louder.
Decrescendo – gradually getting softer.
Finally, theory. Music theory – the elements that make up music composition.
That’s all for our “Theory Factory” video today. Be sure to like this video and I can’t wait to see you in our next episode. Thanks and have a great day!
I do these videos every other week, but if you still want more musical theatre, check out my newsletter! It’s called Beyond The Score, and it just takes a closer look at musical theatre history. You can find that at jskstories.com.