I am finally posting my master class ideas from last year. Enjoy!
The Sound of Silence
What is its relationship with music?
Sound?
Melody?
Harmony?
Rhythmic patterns?
All the above need sound to exist.
Forms of Silence in Music
1. Rests instead of pitch:
Rests tell musicians to be silent for a specific amount of time.
(Other forms of silence)
2. Tacet- whenever an instrument is not playing during a piece, it is tacet.
3. // Caesura indicates a small pause
4. ^ breath marks
Most Famous Piece Composed Based on Silence
Who is the famous composer who wrote a piece with silence? John Cage
“4’33”
He considers the sounds around the silence to be the music.
Do you consider it music?
An Instrument Built on the Theory of Silence
“Dotaku Bell” https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/art-asia/art-japan/x97ec695a:yayoi-period/a/dotaku-ritual-bells
Used for 400 years/beginning of the bronze age, Japanese
Farmers used them, thinking they could be used to improve their harvest.
Had a clapper in some of them. But most did not.
It was considered “mute”. The clappers only produced a muffled tone.
May be considered ritual objects.
Examples of Silence in Music:
Monteverdi Lullaby: “Oblivion Soave”
Baroque music uses rests in a literal way-silence depicts sleep or death.
A” drone type” sound
Types of silence:
Mystical
Dramatic
Explosive
Liminal ( Definition: barely perceptible or capable of eliciting a response. Or in-between transitional) Ex. …in the liminal state between life and death)
20th century -emancipation of musical silence
Eroica Symphony/ Fifth Symphony -Beethoven
Tension and void
Musicologists Grosvenor Cooper and Leonard Meyer called this: The loudest silence in musical literature”.
Miles Davis “The notes one does not play” Round Midnight
Glenn Gould Aria from Bachs Goldberg Variations
John Stevens, a Jazz musician, “ Music and Science are equal
In the West, Silence is defined by many as “the absence of sound.”
“Silence is flow; it can extend movement beyond the movement.”
“Silence is flexible.”
Silence can be found in literature, painting, dance, theater, and tea ceremonies.
Example of the Cadenza of the Concerto of Jan Van Der Waart (1914-1992)
Movement 3
Higher levels of silence and maturity in Music Performance: Eva Wasserman Margolis
Body language
The aura of the body during the performance
Facial expressions
The quiet you produce in your music
The beginning of your presence on stage and end and what you leave for the audience?
What is immature and mature silence? How can we know the difference? The audience tells you its truth. How? It's the silence that can be felt before their emotional outburst or standing ovation occurs.
Silence brings us more of the ability to listen, heed, and pay attention.
It's about being sensitive to what is embracing us on a higher level.
“Silence is a real experience, Maybe we will all pay more attention to movements of quiet once we know we can hear the “sounds” of silence. Mr. Goh
“Crowds are moved by great speakers, but lives are changed by great listeners. Whether between us and God or us and other people, listening is the prelude to love.[8]” Rabbi Sacks
“Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent” - Victor Hugo.
NY TIMES “Silence in the Sound you hear.”
New York Times “How the Silence makes the music” 2019
International Journal of Music Science, Technology and Art
Identifying New Parameters Informingthe relationship Between Silence and Sound in diverse musical performance practices and perception (IJMSTA)3 (1):7-17, Music Academy “Studio Musica”, 2021 ISSN:2612-2146 (Online)
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