nationalism (1) In politics and culture, an attempt to unify or represent a particular group of people by creating a national identity through characteristics such as common language, shared culture, historical traditions, and national institutions and rituals. (2) Nineteenth- and twentieth-century trend in music in which composers were eager to embrace elements in their music that claimed a national identity.
neoclassicism Trend in music from the 1910s to the 1950s in which composers revived, imitated, or evoked the styles, GENRES, and FORMS of pre-ROMANTIC music, especially those of the eighteenth century.
neo-Romanticism A trend of the late twentieth century in which composers adopted the familiar tonal idiom of nineteenth-century ROMANTIC music and incorporated its sounds and gestures.
neotonal Term for music since the early 1900s that establishes a single pitch as a tonal center, but does not follow the traditional rules of TONALITY.
neumatic In CHANT, having about one to six NOTES (or one NEUME) sung to each syllable of text.
neume A sign used in NOTATION of CHANT to indicate a certain number of NOTES and general MELODIC direction (in early forms of notation) or particular pitches (in later forms).
New Objectivity Term coined in the 1920s to describe a kind of new realism in music,
in reaction to the emotional intensity of the late ROMANTICS and the EXPRESSIONISM of Schoenberg and Berg.
New Orleans jazz Leading style of JAZZ just after World War I, which centers on group VARIATION of a given tune, either IMPROVISED or in the style of improvisation.
nocturne Type of short PIANO piece popular during the ROMANTIC PERIOD, marked by highly embellished MELODY, sonorous accompaniments, and a contemplative mood..
nondiegetic music or underscoring In film, background music that conveys to the viewer a mood or other aspect of a scene or character but is not heard by the characters themselves. Compare DIEGETIC MUSIC.
notation A system for writing down musical sounds, or the process of writing down music. The principal notation systems of European music use a staff of lines and signs that define the pitch, duration, and other qualities of sound.
note (1) A musical TONE. (2) A symbol denoting a musical tone.
notes inégales (French, "unequal notes"; pronounced NOTS an-ay GALL) Seventeenth-century convention of performing French music in which passages notated in short, even durations, such as a succession of eighth notes, are performed by alternating longer notes on the beat with shorter offbeats to produce a lilting rhythm.
Notre Dame polyphony Style of POLYPHONY from the late twelfth and thirteenth centuries, associated with the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris.
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