Lesson video

Hello, welcome to today's lesson entitled, Identifying Melodic Shape.

My name is Mr. Norris, and today we're gonna be taking a look at how we can use melodic shape and identifying that to help us with melodic dictation.

In outcome is I can identify the shape of a melody and represent it visually.

Here's some keywords, melodic dictation.

This is the process of listening to a melody and writing it down.

Melodic shape, this is the shape of a melody, including how it ascends and descends and where it's conjunct and disjunct.

Conjunct, this is a melody or part of a melody that moves by small intervals, so semitones or tones.

And disjunct, this is a melody or part of a melody that moves by intervals larger than a tone, so bigger intervals.

The first part of today's lesson is looking at identifying melodic shape.

An important skill as a musician is developing the ability to hear music, and recreate it.

In many musical traditions, this is an important part of how musicians create music and how they learn music and how they pass it on between generations.

The process of listening to a melody and writing it down is called melodic dictation.

Though this does seem quite challenging at first, if we use and practice specific strategies, it means anyone can develop this skill with practice.

Identifying the melodic shape of the melody is the first step in melodic dictation.

One key aspect of melodic shape is how the melody ascends and descends in pitch.

So in this example, you can see here the melody starts by going up, it's ascending in pitch, and then at descend it's going down in pitch.

I'd like to listen to this melody.

How could you describe its shape using the words ascending and descending? Let's have a listen.

(instrumental upbeat music) So you have a quick think about how you describe the shape.

Is it ascending or descending? And for this one, we'd say the melody ascend.

We can see every pitch is rising.

So when a melody sends the pitch rises.

Have a look at this melody here, and we'll have a listen to it in a second.

What's different about the melodic shape here? Let's have a listen.

(bright upbeat music) The quick thing, what's different about that melodic shape compared to the previous one? And in this one, the melody ascends, then it descends slightly, then it ascends again.

So it's a little bit more complex in terms of the melodic shape going up.

Then down, then up again.

A second key aspect of melodic shape is the size of the intervals.

Intervals can be described as conjunct.

That's where we move by semitone or tones.

So by small intervals, or disjunct, this is when we use larger intervals.

Have a look at this melody here, and we'll have a list in a sec as well.

How would you describe it using the words conjunct and disjunct.

So it's thinking about the intervals between those notes.

Let's have a quick listen.

(upbeat music) Let's see, one more time.

(upbeat music) Hopefully there.

You described that as a disjunct melody.

All of the intervals in are larger than a tone and they're all quite large intervals.

Have a look at this one here.

I'd like you to think about how the melodic shape is different here.

And we're focusing here on the conjunct and disjunct movement.

So there's your notation.

Let's have a listen to this one.

(bright upbeat music) Have one more listen.

(bright upbeat music) So how is that melodic shape different to the previous one thinking about conjunct and disjunct movement? For this one, we could have said the melody is conjunct at the start, and then it's disjunct towards the end.

So we can see in that first bar there, all the intervals are quite small.

The notes are next to each other.

In the second bar, we've got bigger intervals between the notes.

So it's disjunct.

Well done if you correctly identified those two different parts.

So a description of melodic shape should combine both features.

So we should mention whether it's ascending or descending, and whether it's conjunct or disjunct.

Take a look at this melody here.

How could we describe it using both descriptions of ascending or descending pitch, and descriptions of conjunct or disjunct movement.

Let's have a listen to it and follow the notation through as we listen.

(bright upbeat music) Play it one more time.

(bright upbeat music) So I have a quick think.

How would you describe that using the words ascending, descending, conjunct and disjunct? Take a few seconds.

And here's what we might say for this one.

The melody starts with a descending conjunct phrase.

So if you look at that first bar, the pitch is descending, and all the intervals are quite small, so it's moving by step, it's conjunct.

In the second bar, there's a short, repeated, ascending and disjunct phrase.

So that little pattern that repeats twice in the second bar, ascends, and it's disjunct 'cause the intervals are slightly bigger.

So there we've given quite a thorough description of the melodic shape of that melody.

Let's check your understanding.

What is the largest possible interval in a conjunct melody? Is it a semitone, tone, third, or fifth? Give you a few seconds to choose your answer.

And the correct answer here is a tone.

So a conjunct melody uses semitone and tones.

The next step in melodic dictation is to represent the melodic shape visually.

I'd like to have a think about the shape of this melody.

How would you describe it? Let's have a listen.

(gentle music) Let this one one more time thinking about the shape of it.

(gentle music) So this is a conjunct melody that ascends then descends slightly, and ascends again.

So we can represent it with this line, whereas ascending and then it descends slightly in the middle and then it ascends even higher again at the end.

That's a good visual representation of that melodic shape.

If the melody has disjunct intervals, we can represent this by drawing a steeper line to represent the larger intervals.

Have a listen to this example.

(bright upbeat music) So we could represent it with this shape.

We've got conjunct movement in the first section where there's quite a gentle line so it's not steep.

And then when we've got the disjunct movement in the second half, we've got that steeper line.

So we're trying as much as possible to represent the shape in as much detail with that line as we can.

If we compare that to the notation of this melody, which we've got there, the line roughly matches the position of the notes.

So really what we're doing these with these lines is sort of approximating where the notes would sit on the stave and we can see that demonstrated there.

Disjunct intervals can be many different sizes.

They can be as small as a third, so that's the smallest disjunct interval we can have, or they can be an octave or even bigger.

So there's a huge range of sizes of disjunct intervals.

When we're identifying them, try to pick out if the leaps are relatively small or if they're big leaps.

So I'd like you to listen to this melody.

Now, this has an ascending sequence where each phrase is conjunct but starts slightly higher each time.

Have a think about how you'd represent the shape of this with a line.

Let's have a listen.

(bright upbeat music) Let's hear it again thinking about how you'd represent this shape with a line.

(bright upbeat music) I thought you meant for something like this, where it's a gradual gradient so it's not steep because it's all conjunct, but each time the pattern repeats, it starts slightly higher.

So we get the sort of wavy effect there.

And if we superimpose that over the notation, we can see it roughly matches the position of the notes.

Obviously it's not exact 'cause we're just drawing these lines approximately, but it roughly matches the positions of the notes.

And that's what we're going for when we are doing these melodic shape lines.

How could you represent the melodic shape of this one with a line? Let's have a listen.

(gentle music) Play it one more time.

Make sure you're thinking about ascending and descending movement as well as conjunct disjunct movement.

(gentle music) So you think about how you would represent that with a line.

And hopefully you would've done something like this, where we've got the line gradually ascending in the first half, and then jumping up and doing a steeper gradient in the second half because we've got that disjunct movement.

So there that line nicely captures the ascending descending movement, and the conjunct and disjunct movement.

Have listened to this contrasting one.

How would you represent this one? (upbeat music) Listen again, again, making sure you're thinking about ascending and descending, conjunct and disjunct.

Here we go.

(upbeat music) So quickly thinking about how you would represent that.

I'm sure you got to something like this, where we've got quite a sort of jaggy first half because we've got these big intervals alternating, repeating, and then it drops right down and does a slow rising conjunct movement in the second half.

And again, as you can see in both of these examples, those lines that we're approximating the shape width, correspond roughly to the pitch on the notation.

Let's check your understanding.

Which of these lines best represents the shape of this melody? Let's have a listen.

(bright upbeat music) Let's here a second time.

(bright upbeat music) And third and final time.

(bright upbeat music) I am making sure you've chosen an answer.

And the quick answer then is that third one there, it's conjunct, so there's no big intervals.

It drops down slightly at the start, rises slightly through the middle, and then descends again at the end.

So well done if you chose that one.

Let's try the same with this example.

Which line best represents the shape of this melody? (bright upbeat music) Let's hear it again.

(bright upbeat music) And the third and final time.

(bright upbeat music) So taking a few seconds to make sure you've chosen your answer.

And the correct answer is option B.

It starts with a big disjunct movement jumping upwards at the start, then it descends, and it drops down lower than it began, and then it ascends and descends again at the end.

So slightly trickier that one.

They're quite a complex melodic shape.

Well done if you've got that.

Now for task A, we're gonna listen to each melody and draw its melodic shape using a line.

I'm gonna play the first clip for you now.

And remember when you're doing this, make sure you're thinking both about ascending and descending shape and also conjunct and disjunct movement.

So how steep is the line to represent that? Here's question one.

(gentle music) I'll pay you it a second time.

(gentle music) Third time.

(gentle music) Fourth time.

(gentle music) And the fifth and final time.

So making sure you've got your answer here and you've checked it.

(gentle music) So finishing that answer.

And now question two, here we go.

(upbeat music) Let's hear question two for the second time.

(upbeat music) Let's hear it for the third time.

(upbeat music) The fourth time.

(upbeat music) And the fifth and final time.

So finishing and checking your answer.

Here we go.

(upbeat music) And now then let's move on to question three.

Here it is for the first time.

(bright upbeat music) And the second time, question three.

(bright upbeat music) Third time.

(bright upbeat music) The fourth time.

(bright upbeat music) The fifth and final time.

So making sure you've drawn and checked your line for question three.

Here we go.

(bright upbeat music) Now we're gonna move on to question four and we're gonna flip it around.

So this melody is represented by this line.

Which of the three clips best matches the melodic shape of that line? So you're gonna choose A, B, or C.

Here's option A.

(slow gentle music) I'll show you A one more time.

(slow gentle music) Now option B.

(gentle music) Option B for the second time.

(gentle music) And finally option C.

(bright gentle music) And final time option C.

(bright gentle music) So making sure you've chosen either A, B, or C as the clip, which best matches that line.

I'll give you a few seconds to make sure you've got an answer then.

Let's review this task then.

So for question one, our line will hopefully look something like this.

Let's just have a listen to that melody again.

(slow gentle music) So it's ascending in the first half.

There's a little bit of down and up in the middle with some conjunct movement, and then it descends with some disjunct movement again at the end, your line might not look exactly the same as that, but try and make sure you're catching the overall shape of it.

Here's question two.

So our line should look something like that.

And this was what it sounded like.

(gentle music) So there we've got sort of descending and ascending, then descending again in the first half, with lots of conjunct movement, and then this shorter repeated pattern in the second half that plays three times.

And then question three, our answer should look something like this, and this is what it sounded like.

(bright gentle music) So there you'll see that big disjunct interval at the start.

So a big leap that descends again, got a little bit of up and a little bit down in the middle, and then it slowly ascends through some conjunct intervals in the second half before dropping off at the end.

So check that your shapes roughly matched those three lines.

For question four, we had to choose one of these clips that best matched this line.

And the correct answer here was option C.

That was this one.

(bright upbeat music) So a big ascending interval at the start, that steeper line showing the disjunct interval.

And then we've got some conjunct movement going down, up and back down again at the end.

So well done if you chose that one.

The second part of today's lesson is looking at notating melodic shape.

The melodic shape, as we've seen, matches the position of the notes on the stave.

If we know what the first note is, and we know the shape of the melody, we can then draw notes into approximate the correct pitches.

So if we had this melodic shape here, it would match these notes.

Identifying the difference between conjunct and disjunct movement when we're doing this is quite important, conjunct notes we draw pictures that are close together.

So if we can hear that small intervals, we're gonna be drawing something like this, where we've got notes that are next to each other on the stage.

For disjunct intervals, we should be drawing some bigger intervals, so bigger spaces between the pitches.

And when we're drawing ascending notes, the notes are gonna go higher up the stave and descending notes are gonna move lower down the stage.

So we're trying to match that melodic shape and the steepness of the gradient that disjunct the conjunct movement in the notes that we are drawing.

And at this stage, the priority is getting the rough shape right rather than the exact intervals.

So when we're doing this, we're not thinking about exactly what note is that there.

We're trying to approximate the pitches that are ascending and descending notes and the conjunct and disjunct movement using the melodic shape.

Have a quick listen to this melody.

(bright upbeat music) It's quite a simple melody that one.

we've got this melodic shape where we've got conjunct ascending movement in the first half, and then disjunct descending movement in the second half.

So roughly that shape.

If we know the rhythm and we know that the starting note, for example, in this case is A, we can choose pitches that fit the shape.

So we've got a starting note there, got a rhythm notated above.

We can draw that conjunct sending pattern in the first bar by doing ascending notes at the stave and notes that are close to each other because it's conjunct.

And then in the second half we do some bigger intervals in a descending shape and that will approximate those notes.

And there we've matched that melodic shape there.

So this is the key.

We're trying to match the melodic shape by the notes that we're choosing to draw.

Have a think about how you draw this melodic shape.

Have a listen.

(upbeat music) Have a quick think.

I'll show you one more time.

(upbeat music) So hopefully it came up with something like this, where we've got the conjunct movement going up and down in the first half and then the much steeper hill because we've got that disjunct interval going up and down in the second half.

Now let's say I've shown you the starting note and the rhythm.

So here we've got the starting note in this case A, and I've drawn the rhythm above the stave.

I'd like to try and work out approximately what would the pitches be.

So think about how you would copy that melodic shape into the actual notes.

Pause my video while you do that.

So it would look something like this.

We've got the conjunct by ascending and descending notes in the first bar, and then we've got that much bigger interval in the second bar going up and then down.

So by copying that melodic shape with our starting note in our rhythm, we're correctly notating this melody.

Let's have a look at this one.

So have a listen to it.

How would you draw this melodic shape? (bright upbeat music) Listen to it one more time, just thinking about that melodic shape.

(bright upbeat music) And hopefully it's something like this got a big disjunct leap ascending at the start, and then after that it's all descending using conjunct movement.

So it's a much gentler gradient, a much gentler slope.

Here's the starting note and the rhythm.

So we're starting on an A and we've got that rhythm notated above the stave.

Let's try and approximate what would the pitches be.

And there's a little hint there.

The last note is the same as the starting note, so pause my video, see if you can approximate what these pitches would be.

So we should come up with something like this.

We've got that big disjunct interval at the start.

That's a large octave leap.

And then we've got the gradual descending conjunct movement after that that takes us all the way back down the scale.

So there we've taken that melodic shape, we've got the starting note and we've got the rhythm, and we've correctly approximated the notes of this melody.

Let's check your understanding.

Which shape best matches this melody.

Have a listen.

(intense dramatic music) Have another listen.

(intense dramatic music) And final time.

(intense dramatic music) And the correct answer here is the first one, all conjunct movement.

We've got ascending and descending, ascending and descending, and then ascends slightly, to that last note that stays the same.

So well done if you correctly got that one there.

Which notation best matches this melodic shape? You can pause my video while you have a look and work this one out.

And the correct answer is that second one there again, ascending and then descending, ascending then descending, and then ascending slightly to the last note, so that melodic shape matches that notation.

True or false, only expert musicians can work out a set of notes by listening to them.

I'll give you a few seconds to choose an answer.

And the correct answer here is false.

I'd like to justify why.

Why is that false? Take a few seconds to have a think.

And here we'd say that anyone can work out notes by ear if they practice the correct strategies.

Identifying the melodic shape, representing it with a line, and carefully converting it into notes is a really effective first step in melodic dictation.

That's the process that we've been exploring today.

So for our final task, we're gonna listen to each melody, draw the melodic shape, then use the starting note and rhythm to draw notes in approximating the correct pictures.

So we're working through that process that we've been doing.

Start by drawing the line to represent the shape, then carefully try and convert that into notation.

Here is our first question here, question one.

(bright upbeat music) So you're getting that melodic shape to start with.

I'll play it a second time.

(bright upbeat music) You're gonna hear it three more times.

So you wanna start turning that into notes quite soon.

The third time.

(bright upbeat music) The fourth time.

(bright upbeat music) And the fifth and final time.

(bright upbeat music) Pausing my video while you finish off your answer.

Let's move on to question two.

Here it is for the first time.

(gentle music) So again, starting off with that melodic shape here.

It's for the second time.

(gentle music) Now for the third time.

(gentle music) Starting now to convert that into notes.

Here's the fourth time.

(gentle music) And now the fifth and final time.

So finishing your answer here.

(gentle music) I am pausing my video just while you're getting those notes down.

And final eight, question three.

Here it is for the first time.

(bright upbeat music) Starting off with that melodic shape remember.

Here it's for the second time.

(bright upbeat music) The third time.

(bright upbeat music) The fourth time.

So starting to turn that shape into notes now.

(bright upbeat music) And the fifth and final time, here we go.

(bright upbeat music) So closing my video while you finish off your answer.

And let's review this then.

So for the first one, we should have had a melodic shape roughly like that, ascending gently, and then a steeper descending line at the end.

And those were our notes that we hopefully drew.

So this was how it sounded.

(upbeat music) Well done if you've got something close to that.

Remember, at this point, we're not focusing on getting the exact correct notes.

We're looking to approximate the shape and the intervals.

So if you've got that rough shape, but ascending and descending with the conjunct and the disjunct at the end, and using the correct rhythm as it's notated there, really well done.

Let's have a look at question two.

So slightly more complex melodic shape here.

Ascends, then descends, then ascends again.

And this one mostly uses bigger intervals and disjunct movement.

In this one let's have a listen to it.

(upbeat music) So it's a little bit harder to approximate the intervals when they are disjunct.

So again, just getting the shape is the key at this point with the ascending, then descending them, ascending again, and making sure you've got that crotchet rhythm written correctly as well.

And then final question three.

Big octave leaps in this one, in both bar one and bar two, and then a tiny bit of conjunct movement in the middle as well.

So more complex, let's have a listen.

(gentle music) So give yourself some credit if you've got that rough shape, even if the exact notes and intervals weren't correct and just double check that you've copied the rhythm correctly.

That's a really important thing to make sure we're doing in these kind of questions.

Let's review today's lesson.

Melodic dictation involves recognizing ascending and descending pitch as well as conjunct and disjunct movement.

It's important to listen carefully to notice whether disjunct intervals are large or small leaps.

Melodic shape can be represented using a line where we show conjunct movement with a less steep line and disjunct movement with a steeper line.

And this helps us to approximate the correct pictures before drawing the notes in so we can see that example there where the line has been converted into notation.

So that's the end of today's lesson.

I hope you feel that you've started to develop your skills with melodic dictation here.

And again, remember, we're just looking at the first steps here.

It can be quite intimidating and challenging task to do, but if we practice these strategies, work hard on them, make sure we're using them properly, then we'll develop those skills with time.

Thanks for taking part and see you in another lesson.