parallel organum Type of POLYPHONY in which an added voice moves in exact parallel to a CHANT, normally a perfect fifth below it. Either voice may be doubled at the octave.
paraphrase Technique in which a CHANT or other MELODY is reworked, often by altering rhythms and adding NOTES, and placed in a POLYPHONIC setting.
paraphrase mass POLYPHONIC MASS in which each MOVEMENT is based on the same MONOPHONIC MELODY, normally a CHANT, which is PARAPHRASED in most or all voices rather than being used as a CANTUS FIRMUS in one voice.
parlor song Song for home music-making, sometimes performed in public concerts as well.
parody mass IMITATION MASS.
partbook A manuscript or printed book containing the music for one voice or instrumental part of a POLYPHONIC COMPOSITION (most often, an anthology of pieces); to perform any piece, a complete set of partbooks is needed, so that all the parts are represented.
partita BAROQUE term for a set of VARIATIONS on a MELODY or BASS line.
partsong (1) A song for more than one voice. (2) In the nineteenth century, a song for CHORUS, parallel in function and style to the LIED or PARLOR SONG.
passacaglia BAROQUE GENRE of VARIATIONS over a repeated BASS line or HARMONIC PROGRESSION in triple METER.
Passion A musical setting of one of the biblical accounts of Jesus' crucifixion, the most common type of HISTORIA.
pastoral drama Play in verse with incidental music and songs, normally set in idealized rural surroundings, often in ancient times; a source for the earliest OPERA LIBRETTOS.
pavane (pavan) Sixteenth-century dance in slow duple METER with three repeated sections (AABBCC). Often followed by a GALLIARD.
perfect (or major) division In medieval and RENAISSANCE NOTATION, a division of a NOTE value into three (rather than two) of the next smaller unit. See MODE, TIME, AND PROLATION.
perfection (1) What we all strive for. (2) In medieval systems of NOTATION, a unit of duration equal to three TEMPORA, akin to a MEASURE of three beats.
performance art A type of art that first came to prominence in the 1960s, based on the idea that performing a prescribed action in a public place constitutes a work of art.
period (1) In music history, an era whose music is understood to have common attributes of style, conventions, approach, and function, in contrast to the previous and following eras. (2) In musical FORM, especially since the eighteenth century, a complete musical thought concluded by a CADENCE and normally containing at least two PHRASES.
periodic Organized in discrete PHRASES or PERIODS.
periodicity The quality of being PERIODIC, especially when this is emphasized through frequent resting points and articulations between PHRASES and PERIODS.
petit motet (French, "little motet") French version of the SMALL SACRED CONCERTO, for one, two, or three voices and CONTINUO.
phrase A unit of MELODY or of an entire musical TEXTURE that has a distinct beginning and ending and is followed by a pause or other articulation but does not express a complete musical thought. See PERIOD (2).
Phrygian cadence CADENCE in which the bottom voice moves down a semitone and upper voices move up a whole tone to form a fifth and octave over the cadential NOTE.
piano or pianoforte A keyboard instrument invented in 1700 that uses a mechanism in which the strings are struck, rather than plucked as the HARPSICHORD was, and which allowed for crescendos, dimuendos, and other effects.
pipe and tabor Two instruments played by one player, respectively a high whistle fingered with one hand and a small drum beaten with a stick or mallet.
pitch-class Any one of the twelve NOTES of the CHROMATIC SCALE, including its ENHARMONIC equivalents, in any octave.
pitch-class set (or set) A collection of PITCH-CLASSES that preserves its identity when transposed, inverted, or reordered and used MELODICALLY or HARMONICALLY.
plagal mode A MODE (2) in a which the RANGE normally extends from a fourth (or fifth) below the FINAL to a fifth or sixth above it. See also AUTHENTIC MODE.
plainchant, plainsong A unison unaccompanied song, particularly a LITURGICAL song to a Latin text.
plainsong mass A MASS in which each MOVEMENT is based on a CHANT to the same text (the KYRIE is based on a chant Kyrie, the GLORIA on a chant Gloria, and so on).
point of imitation Passage in a POLYPHONIC work in which two or more parts enter in IMITATION.
polonaise A stately Polish processional DANCE in triple METER, or a stylized piece in the style of such a dance.
polychoral For more than one CHOIR.
polychoral motet MOTET for two or more choirs.
polyphony Music or musical TEXTURE consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent MELODY. See also COUNTERPOINT.
polystylism Term coined by Alfred Schnittke for a combination of newer and older musical styles created through QUOTATION or stylistic allusion.
polytonality The simultaneous use of two or more KEYS, each in a different layer of the music (such as MELODY and accompaniment).
pop music Term coined in the 1950s for music that reflected the tastes and styles popular with the teen and young adult market.
popular music Music, primarily intended as entertainment, that is sold in printed or recorded form. It is distinguished from FOLK MUSIC by being written down and marketed as a commodity, and from CLASSICAL MUSIC by being centered on the performer and the performance, allowing great latitude in rearranging the notated music.
popular song Song that is intended primarily to entertain an audience, accommodate amateur performers, and sell as many copies as possible. Compare ART SONG.
portative organ Medieval or RENAISSANCE organ small enough to be carried, played by one hand while the other worked the bellows.
positive organ Organ from the medieval through BAROQUE PERIODS that was small enough to be moved, usually placed on a table.
postmodernism Trend in the late twentieth century that blurs the boundaries between high and popular art, and in which styles of all epochs and cultures are equally available for creating music.
post-tonal General term for music after 1900 that does not adhere to TONALITY but instead uses any of the new ways that composers found to organize pitch, from ATONALITY to NEOTONALITY.
prelude Introductory piece for solo instrument, often in the style of an IMPROVISATION, or introductory MOVEMENT in a multimovement work such as an OPERA or SUITE.
prepared piano An invention of John Cage in which various objects-such as pennies, bolts, screws, or pieces of wood, rubber, plastic, or slit bamboo-are inserted between the strings of a PIANO, resulting in complex percussive sounds when the piano is played from the keyboard.
prima donna (Italian, "first lady") A soprano singing the leading female role in an OPERA. See also DIVA.
prima pratica (Italian, "first practice") Claudio Monteverdi's term for the style and practice of sixteenth-century POLYPHONY, in contradistinction to the SECONDA PRATICA.
prime In TWELVE-TONE music based on a particular ROW, the original form of the row, transposed or untransposed, as opposed to the INVERSION, RETROGRADE, or RETROGRADE INVERSION.
principal voice (Latin, vox principalis) In an ORGANUM, the original CHANT MELODY.
program Text to accompany an instrumental work of PROGRAM MUSIC, describing the sequence of events depicted in the music.
program music Instrumental music that tells a story or follows a narrative or other sequence of events, often spelled out in an accompanying text called a PROGRAM.
prolation See MODE, TIME, AND PROLATION.
Proper (from Latin proprium, "particular" or "appropriate") Texts of the MASS that are assigned to a particular day in the CHURCH CALENDAR.
psalm A poem of praise to God, one of 150 in the Book of Psalms in the Hebrew Scriptures (the Christian Old Testament). Singing psalms was a central part of Jewish, Christian, Catholic, and Protestant worship.
psalm tone A MELODIC formula for singing PSALMS in the OFFICE. There is one psalm tone for each MODE.
psalmody The singing of PSALMS.
psalter A published collection of METRICAL PSALMS.
psaltery A plucked string instrument whose strings are attached to a frame over a wooden sounding board.
Pythagorean intonation A system of tuning NOTES in the SCALE, common in the Middle Ages, in which all perfect fourths and fifths are in perfect tune.
W. W. Norton & Company | Credits | Site Feedback | Technical Support | Print This Page