Music is a temporal art. Unlike a painting or novel, one cannot perceive it at a speed and order of one's own choosing -- as soon as a we listen to a musical moment it is past. This nature presents a great challenge to those who seek to describe or analyze music. Musicians often overcome this difficulty by relying on musical notation, which can of course be studied in "non-real time." However, even for those who have mastered this difficult skill of reading and internally hearing music when viewing notation, the ability to listen critically and analytically without a score gives us wonderfully rewarding insights into this art.
One way to approach an understanding of the inner workings of musical sound is to first consider its most fundamental, or generic, characteristics. Sound is made of vibrations that can be physically described, although when we hear them they are interpreted through a complex cognitive, psychological, and cultural filters. At its most basic, our perception of a sound can be described through four generic characteristics:
The ways in which these elements vary over time usually comes under the heading of rhythm. Variation in pitch over time (that is, together with rhythm) we call melody. Several pitches can occur simultaneously, which we call harmony. Timbre is usually varied through the use of different musical instruments, though it can also be defined with electronics. We will not be distinguishing a theory of loudness or direction, though both are important in much film music.
