1. The Elements of Music Melody Rhythm Harmony Texture Timbre Dynamics
Word-music relationships
Form

2. Genre Genre is the category of a given work
Ex., symphony, sonata, song, anthem,etc.
Genre is generally determined by the work’s performance medium and social function
Question: You know what a national anthem will be like, even one you’ve never heard. How do you know this?

3. Genres of the Middle Ages
Plainchant (Gregorian chant)
Secular song
Instrumental music (dance music, also secular)

4. The Middle Ages Begins 476 A.D. with fall of the Roman Empire
Nothing is known about the ancient music of Rome or Greece (no notation)
Western music history begins with the ascendance of the Roman Catholic church, c. 800
The church succeeds in creating a written record of, i.e., preserving, its music
Music of the church is only a part of music existing at the time (sacred vs. secular)

5. Plainchant (Gregorian chant)
Monophony
Conjunct (by step)and disjunct (by leap)motion
Cadences
Free vs. metered rhythm
Melismatic and syllabic text-setting
(more than one note per syllable vs. one note per syllable)
Medieval modes

6. The Mass
In any church service, some texts were invariable. The “ordinary”
Some texts were variable, determined by the day or season of the church year. The “proper”. Ex. Feast days of specific saints, The Feast of St. Stephen. Also many Feasts of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Remember that Mass is said every day of the year.

7. The Ordinary Kyrie Gloria Credo Sanctus Agnus Dei
The texts of the Kyrie, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei are all short, so they are given melismatic settings. The Gloria and Credo are longer texts, so the melodic setting is syllabic.

8. Modes and Notation
The theory of modes was developed in the 10th and 11th centuries. Modes were in actual use much earlier.
The first attempts at notation occur around the late 10th/early 11th century.
Next: Organum