Lesson 4 - Texture
Texture is the organizational manner in which the chords are constructed. Basically, chords can be arrived at in either of three ways:- by three or more independent melodic lines occuring at the same time -- Melodic texture;
- by intentional performance of block chords -- harmonic texture; or
- by a combination of independent melody lines and block chords.
Music created by early classical composers, such as Bach, Mozart and Beethoven, most often exibited the first type of texture. The reason for this is that most instruments used in those days were melodic instruments -- that is, they could only play one or two notes at the same time. For this reason, composers envisioned their music as individual parts rather than a large whole.
These days, most music is heard and created as a whole and then broken down into its' harmonic parts. That's because keyboards and guitars are usually played chordally rather than melodically.
Many types of music also employee a combination of melodic and harmonic textures.
©2004 Keith Prater