What was the name of the band or ensemble you saw?
How did you hear about the concert?
In what type of venue was the concert held? Describe the concert space.
How large was the audience? What was the general makeup of the listeners—young? old? non-musicians? general public? music scholars?
What style of music did the performer(s) play? Would you consider the music to be contemporary or classical? Is this style popular?
What work(s) did you hear? Provide the title(s).
Who composed the work(s)?
What instruments were played at the performance? Were any of these instruments in use 100 years ago? Were voices used in the music? Does the music use instruments, voices, or both? How many of each do you notice?
If you listen to a song, how does the music express the words through its melody, harmony, rhythm, tempo, dynamics, and accompaniment?
What individual musical elements do you hear? What words might you use to describe each one?
Do any elements change as the composition progresses? If so, which elements change and in what way do they change?
Would you say the overall impression of the music was consonant or dissonant? Explain.
Here are some additional questions to get you thinking.
Character: Find some adjectives to describe the general mood of the music. If this were the soundtrack to a film, what would be happening in the film? Think about how the composer manipulated the sound (utilizes the elements) to create this feeling.
Melody: What instrument has the melody? In what part of the instrument’s range is the melody? Does more than one instrument have the melody? Does a theme, motive, or idea recur throughout the piece? Is the melody “singable” or easy to remember or it disjoint and unpredictable?
Rhythm: Is the beat easy to distinguish? Can you tap your foot to it? Does the tempo stay steady or does it fluctuate? What would be the appropriate tempo marking?
Dynamics: Is the piece generally soft, loud, or somewhere in between? Does it stay at one dynamic level, change gradually, or change abruptly throughout the piece/movement?
Harmony: Is the piece generally consonant or dissonant?
Texture: Does the piece have one main melody with an accompaniment or more than one melodic idea occurring at once?
How did the music relate to the current time period? Did it comment on events directly through lyrics, or was it more abstract in its messages? Discuss how the world in which you live affected your interpretation and enjoyment of the music.
