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Music Terms Glossary - P
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

paraphrase The practice by Renaissance composers of embellishing or elaborating a cantus firmus in polyphonic vocal works.

parlante Nineteenth-century operatic style in which the voices declaim in a rapid, speechlike manner against a backdrop of melody and accompaniment.

part (1) One of the voices in a polyphonic work; (2) the written music for a single player in an ensemble.

partial Same as overtone.

passacaglia Baroque technique in which a brief melodic idea repeats over and over while the other voices are varied freely.

passage work Descriptive term for figuration consisting of rapid runs and scales, common in keyboard music.

patch chords On early synthesizers, the cables required to connect various components.

PCM  Pulse-code modulation. A more sophisticated method of sampling introduced into the consumer synthesizer market in the late 1980s.

pedal board An organ's foot-operated keyboard.

pedal point Long-held tones, usually in the bass of a polyphonic passage.

pentatonic scale A five-note scale found in numerous non-Western musics and adopted as an exotic element by many twentieth-century Western composers.

percussion Instruments, either tuned or untuned, that produce sounds by being struck, rattled, or scraped. Common percussion include drums, cymbals, and bells.

performance directions Words or symbols provided by composers to instruct performers in how their music is to be played, including articulation, dynamics, expression, and phrasing.

period The musical equivalent of a paragraph. period instrument An instrument of a type that was in use at the time a work was originally performed. phrase The coherent segments that make up a melody; roughly equivalent to a sentence in prose.

phrasing The manner in which a performer organizes and presents the parts of a composition.

piano A keyboard instrument whose tone is produced by hammers striking strings tightly stretched over a large soundboard. A foot pedal controls the damping of the strings.

piano; pianissimo Soft; very soft. piano trio A chamber work for piano and two other instruments, usually violin and cello. pitch (1) The high and low of sounds, measured in acoustical frequencies; (2) a particular note, such as middle C.

pizzicato Playing a string instrument that is normally bowed by plucking the strings with the finger.

plainchant (plainsong, Gregorian chant) Monophonic unison music sung during Catholic church services since the Middle Ages.

poles of attraction A term introduced by Stravinsky to describe the harmonic equilibrium of his neoclassical works.

polyphony;polyphonic (po-lif-ony;poly-fon-ick)A musical texture in which the individual voices move independently of one another.

polyrhythm A texture in which the rhythms of various voices seem to exist independently of one another.

pop A generic term for popular music in contemporary America, overlapping but not identical with rock.

postmodern A term adopted around the mid- 1970s to describe our current eclectic, experimental age.

prelude An introductory piece (though Chopin and other nineteenth-century composers wrote independent preludes).

premiere The first public performance of a musical or dramatic work.

prepared piano In contemporary music, the modifying of a traditional grand piano by such techniques as placing various objects between the strings.

presto; prestissimo Very fast; extremely fast.

primary area In a movement in sonata form, the first stage in an exposition; establishes the tonic key with one or more themes.

program music An instrumental work associated explicitly by the composer with a story or other extramusical idea.

Proper of the Mass The parts of the Mass that vary from day to day according to the church calendar.

punk A descriptive term adopted by the most rebellious heavy metal bands and their followers.

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