Week 2 

Definitions 

ASSIGNMENT : 
YOUR ASSIGNMENT THIS WEEK IS TO COMPLETE THE 2 ACTIVITIES IN THIS CLASS PAGE LISTED IN RED AS ACTIVITY #1 AND ACTIVITY #2 . There is also a Discussion / Forum  at the end of this page.  BE SURE TO SUBMIT THESE ACTIVITIES IN THE ACTIVITY / DISCUSSION PAGE ON THE CANVAS COURSE.

Musical Instrument 
in·stru·ment
/ˈinstrəmənt/

Long Definition: 
A musical instrument is an instrument created or adapted to make musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be considered a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. The history of musical instruments dates to the beginnings of human culture

Short Definition: 
 a device (such as a violin, piano, or flute) used to make music

Instrumentation
in·stru·men·ta·tion
/ˌinstrəmənˈtāSH(ə)n/

Long Definition: 
In music, instrumentation is the particular combination of musical instruments employed in a composition, and the properties of those instruments individually.

Short Definition: 
the particular instruments used in a piece of music; the manner in which a piece is arranged for instruments.
​

Musical genre
   mu·si·cal   gen·re
/ˈmyo͞ozək  /ˈZHänrə/

A music genre is a conventional category that identifies some pieces of music as belonging to a shared tradition or set of conventions.


Musical Ensemble: ​
mu·si·cal​    en·sem·ble
ˈmyo͞ozək  /änˈsämbəl 

Long Definition : 
A musical ensemble, also known as a music groupor musical group, is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music, with the ensembletypically known by a distinct name. Some music ensembles consist solely of instruments, such as the jazz quartet or the orchestra.

Short Definition 
 A Group of musical instruments working together with the intention of creating a song. 

Instrumentation : Different Ensemble Sizes

  • For listening examples, it is always useful to listen for yourself once while jotting some observations, then read the observations I have guided (so you know what the description is talking about and can hear it in your head)
  • THE SMALLEST instrumentation - just 1 single instrument: Piano
  • Think of other songs that have just 1 instrument that you listen to......... can you think of any ? ......unless you listen to classical / jazz piano , or guitar, the answer is most likely no !
  • One important thing about instrumentation is that we like to hear a combination of different instruments, not just one !
  • Also one thing any solo instrument (solo = just one) is that we have a lack of VOCALS and LYRICS - for most peoples musical tastes, this is a big no-no !
    • 2 Instruments (Adding just 1 more instrument ) :  Piano and Male Vocals 
    • Now with the addition of vocals, we get Lyrics , which is a game changer ! If you think of how many things we have to pay attention to in the song, we just got 2 extra things added - an instrument or new sound, and words .  
    • Can you think of other instrumentations that would have just 2 instruments ?  .... Guitar/Vocals , Piano/Horn (trumpet or saxophone etc).  
    • This is considerably more common than just 1 instrument, but still not something we hear ALOT on the radio , unless someone like Jon Legend or Adelle makes a piano/vocals song...

One important thing to notice about the previous video -  There is only 1 person, but he is providing 2 instruments (piano and vocals) - often time (especially when vocals are present) we hear one person providing multiple sounds / instruments 

  • 3 Instruments : Electric Piano, Electric Bass, and Drums 
  • Now we are starting to fill out the instrumentation a little more , we have Drums to provide the Rhythm , Piano as a Melodic instrument , and Bass to cover the Low range (we will talk about all these terms later!)
  • This would be an extremely common instrumentation to back up a singer in a plethora of different genres (throw a guitar on top of that and we have the instrumentation of a large chunk of popular music)
  • 4 instruments:  Male Vocals, Electric Guitar, Electric Bass, Drums
  • Here we have maybe the most common instrumentation we hear in popular music on the radio today ( with the exception interchanging Male/Female vocals )
  • Like the second example, we have only 3 people, but 4 instruments or different sounds 
  • Really , this instrumentation is similar to the 3 instrument video, with the vocals added 
Check out these examples of Musical Scores ( "Score" is the term for a piece of sheet music that has all the instruments' respective musical parts. this is what the conductor of the orchestra is looking at)
  • Notice we have each individual instrument listed down the left column of the page
​​

  • Even if we don't all read music, we can see the notes in the staff for each instrument (rests in the top half, notes in the bottom) representing when each instrument is playing 

  • This would be for a rock band, typical rock instrumentation listed ...
  • Contrast the rock band score with this orchestra score 
  • A couple observations here: 
    • # of total Instruments : There are far MORE  instruments (15 vs. 4)
    • Type of instruments : This combination of instruments looks much different from the more common guitar/vocals combo. Here we have male & female vocals, along with a huge case of 13 other instruments in the ACCOMPANIMENT, rather than just 4. 
SO.... 
When dealing with instrumentation, we are observing these 2 variables :
1. How many instruments are present
2. What types of instruments are present 

Activity #1 : 

For the following examples, watch and make some observations about the instrumentation.  You should have some bullet points for our 2 main instrumentation questions : 
1.  How many Instruments are present 
  • # of Instruments ?  
  • Is it a similar # of instruments to the music you usually listen to ? 

2. What types of instruments are present ? 
  • List the instruments - say the name if you know it, or describe the sound / look  - you may have to do some research !​ 

**** Do this for EACH OF THESE 6 examples Below******

****** Sometimes instruments don't come in until later in the song - check out whole thing so you don't miss any ******

Example:
1. How many Instruments are Present : 
  • 2 Instruments
  • Small / Thin instrumentation - only two instruments making it soft and quiet . 
  • Only 2 instruments means its easier to hear the lyrics and focus on the words / poem

2. What types of instruments are present ?
  • Male Vocals and Guitar
  • Common instrumentation.... not much unique. 
Bob Dylan - Mr. Tambourin Man


​1.  How many Instruments are present 




2. What types of instruments are present ? 

**** Notice it is a test for your ears when you don't have the luxury of a visual aid like a video with the band*****

Keith Jarrett - Standards Trio


​1.  How many Instruments are present 




2. What types of instruments are present ? 
Esperanza Spalding - Junjo


​1.  How many Instruments are present 




2. What types of instruments are present ? 

*** If you are not as used to these instruments - you may have more difficulty picking them out ! *** 

Heart of Gold - Neil Young 


​1.  How many Instruments are present 




2. What types of instruments are present ? 
Sonny Stitt -  


​1.  How many Instruments are present 




2. What types of instruments are present ? 


**** It can get increasingly harder as more timbres get added in and the instrumentation gets "thicker"  
-  Some instruments are very obvious and audible - like the vocals or a guitar or harmonica solo
OR
- Some are less easily heard - such as bass or background vocals - 
​

Re-Arrangin Instrumentation

Take a listen to the 2 videos below, the Original being on the left and New version on the right 
  • This is a technique that has become popular in the last few years, fueled by social media and the 'viral video affect'  (creep cover is sporting a cool 60 million views...).  
  • You can see this all over -pop tunes that get played by a brass band, country version of  a funk song etc....
  • Groups like Postmodern Jukebox specialize in taking pop tunes and putting an old-timey spin on them 
  • one of the main things that changes when groups do this is the instrumentation
  • We call this 'Re-Arranging' the instrumentation : arranging or manipulating the Instrumentation of a given song, making a new version of the song. 

take a few minutes and listen to each example below .  Each one represents a genre.  For each video do 2 things (actually take out a piece of paper and write these down as if we were in class..) :  
  1. See if you can list the instrumentation  in each video 
    • after you have all the instruments look them over - are any of them unique , like we wouldn't see them in a lot of other genres ? (i.e. if bagpipes were present, that would be rare/unique)
  • Pay attention to the specific elements of the songs that are changing​
    • Instrumentation will be one !
    • they could be big changes such as : different instruments, instruments added or instruments taken away, lack of any lyrics, 
    • they could be small things: an accent or way the artist is talking, or maybe a slower/faster speed
  • We know that they 'sound' different, but what specifically is going on musically that changes the song 

Uptown Funk....


​Instrumentation : 
  • Male Vocals, Background Vocals, Drums, Synthesizers, Electric Piano, Horn section, trumpet, saxophone, trombone, guitar, electric bass, other Electric Sound effects

Original 

Jazz 

Country

Orchestral 

Salsa

Activity #2  : 

Questions to Answer about each Video :
  1. How would you categorize the genre for each of these examples ?
  2. What is the instrumentation of each ? 
  3. Has it changed from the original genre ?  Why  ? what are you hearing musically that makes you say that ?   
​**** Answer these 3 questions for each Video *****
Original..


1. 



2. 




3. 
Lucky Chops - Hello 


1. 



2. 




3. 


​
Fame on Fire - Hello 


​1. 



2. 




3. 


​
Mandinga - Hello 


​1. 



2. 




3. 


​
Jazz and Jass - Hello 


​1. 



2. 




3. 

Week 2 Discussion

Check out the last 2 listening exercises ( Uptown funk and Adele....).  For your forum, you will pick an original song, and find 5 new versions were the instrumentation has been re-arranged, resulting in a change in genre.  See timeline and forum for further instructions.