Meaning

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Music Words Meaning

O

OBBLIGATO

In musical notation, obbligato indicates that an instrument or voice is essential and not to be omitted. However, some composers have used this term with the opposite meaning in mind: that an instrument or voice may be omitted if so desired. Generally, the older the notation, the more likely it is that obbligato retains its original meaning of an 'obliged', essential part.

OBLIQUE MOTION

In music an oblique motion is a kind of motion or progression in which one part ascends or descends, while the other prolongs or repeats the same tone.

OBOE

The oboe is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. It is a double-reed wind instrument with a wood body and narrow conical bore invented by the French musicians Jean Hotteterre and Michel Philidor, who modified the louder shawm (the prevailing double-reed instrument) for indoor use. Their oboe, called hautbois, as was the shawm, had a narrower bore than the shawm' s, a body in three sections instead of one, and a smaller reed grasped near its tip by the player's lips (on a shawm the mouth encloses the entire reed, the lips resting on a wooden disk at the base of the reed) . By 1700 most orchestras included a pair of oboes. Early oboes had seven finger holes and two keys; by the 1700s, four-keyed models were also in use. In the 1800s additional keys were added, reaching fifteen or more, and the bore and sound holes were redesigned. Oboes of the French school (played in most countries today) have a very narrow bore and a penetrating, focused sound. Those of the German school (also played in Vienna and Vienna-influenced countries) have a wider bore and a more easily blending sound. The range of the modern oboe extends two and one-half octaves upward from the B below middle C. Composers of solo works for the oboe include George Frideric Handel, Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig van Beethoven, Robert Schumann, and Carl Nielsen.

OBOE D'AMORE

An oboe d'amore is a type of oboe pitched a minor third lower than the oboe itself. It is used chiefly in the performance of baroque music.

OBOE DA CACCIA

The oboe da caccia was a woodwind instrument of the oboe family. It was the predecessor of the cor anglais.

OCARINA

The ocarina is a small wind instrument consisting of a pipe pierced with holes for the fingers. They are usually made of terra-cotta, but sometimes of metal. The modern ocarina originated in Italy in the early 19th century and gained popularity among street players and was made in families from soprano to bass for ensemble playing.

OCTACHORD

An octachord is an eight-stringed musical instrument.

OCTAVE

An octave is the eighth tone in the scale; the interval between one and eight of the scale, or any interval of equal length; an interval of five tones and two semitones. The term octave is also applied to the whole diatonic scale itself. The ratio of a musical tone to its octave above is 1: 2 as regards the number of vibrations producing the tones.

OCTET

An octet is a musical composition for eight parts, usually for eight solo instruments or voices.

OLEG TAMBULILINGAN

Oleg Tambulilingan is a Balinese dance depicting the flirtation and eventual falling in love of two bumble-bees.

OLIO

In music an olio is a collection of miscellaneous pieces.

OLIVIER MESSIAEN

Olivier Messiaen was a French composer and organist. He was born in 1908 and died in 1992.

OPEN DIAPASON

An open diapason is a certain stop in an organ, in which the pipes or tubes are formed like the mouthpiece of a flageolet at the end where the wind enters, and are open at the other end.

OPEN HARMONY

In music, an open harmony is a harmony the tones of which are widely dispersed, or separated by wide intervals.

OPEN PIPE

In music, an open pipe is a pipe open at the top. It has a pitch about an octave higher than a closed pipe of the same length.

OPERA

Opera is a stage entertainment consisting of a play sung to music in its entirety, with no spoken dialogue at all. Opera originated in Italy around 1600 and has subsequently spread throughout the world.

OPERA BOUFFE

An opera bouffe was a type of light or satirical opera common in France during the 19th century.

OPERA BUFFA

An opera buffa is a comic opera.

OPERA COMIQUE

An opera comique was a type of opera, not necessarily comic, current in France during the 19th century and characterised by spoken dialogue. It originated in satirical parodies of grand opera.

OPERETTA

An operetta is a short, light, musical drama.

OPHICLEIDE

The ophicleide was a brass wind instrument, now replaced by the brass tuba, developed about the beginning of the 19th century from an ancient wind instrument called the serpent. It had a bell bottom, conical tube, and cupped mouthpiece, and usually contained eleven keys. Alto and double- bass forms of the instrument were constructed: but it was usually set in C, and had its music written in the bass clef.

ORATORIO

An oratorio is a musical setting of religious incidents scored for an orchestra, choir, or solo voices on a scale larger and more dramatic than a cantata. The term originates from the 16th century when the first oratory was performed in Rome.

ORATORY

See "Oratorio"

ORGAN

In music, an organ is a wind instrument containing numerous pipes of various dimensions and kinds, which are filled with wind from a bellows, and played upon by means of keys similar to those of a piano, and sometimes by foot keys or pedals.

ORGAN POINT

In music, the organ point is a passage in which the tonic or dominant is sustained continuously by one part, while the other parts move.

ORLANDO GIBBONS

Orlando Gibbons was an English composer. He was born in 1583 at Cambridge and died in 1625. He is associated with the development of music for stringed instruments, although he was an organ player.

ORPHISM

Orphism was a mystic cult of ancient Greece, believed to have been drawn from the writings of the legendary poet and musician Orpheus. Fragmentary poetic passages, including inscriptions on gold tablets found in the graves of Orphic followers from the 6th century BC, indicate that Orphism was based on a cosmogony that centred on the myth of the god Dionysus Zagreus, the son of the deities Zeus and Persephone. Furious because Zeus wished to make his son ruler of the universe, the jealous Titans dismembered and devoured the young god. Athena, goddess of wisdom, was able to rescue his heart, which she brought to Zeus, who swallowed it and gave birth to a new Dionysus. Zeus then punished the Titans by destroying them with his lightning and from their ashes created the human race. As a result, humans had a dual nature: the earthly body was the heritage of the earth-born Titans; the soul came from the divinity of Dionysus, whose remains had been mingled with that of the Titans. According to the tenets of Orphism, people should endeavour to rid themselves of the Titanic or evil element in their nature and should seek to preserve the Dionysiac or divine nature of their being. The triumph of the Dionysiac element would be assured by following the Orphic rites of purification and asceticism. Through a long series of reincarnated lives, people would prepare for the afterlife. If they had lived in evil, they would be punished, but if they had lived in holiness, after death their souls would be completely liberated from Titanic elements and reunited with the divinity.

OVERTONE

In music, an overtone is one of the harmonics faintly heard with and above a tone as it dies away, produced by some aliquot portion of the vibrating sting or column of air which yields the fundamental tone; one of the natural harmonic scale of tones, as the octave, twelfth, fifteenth, etc.

OVERTURE

An overture is a series of musical composition which for a considerable period existed only in the form of a short instrumental introduction to an operatic work. Lully was the first to develop the overture to dimensions of importance, and the form originated by him was still further enlarged by Purcell, Handel, and others. Gluck was the earliest of the operatic composers who wrote the overture in a form which portrays the dramatic action of the work it proceeds; in overtures belonging to this class that to Mozart's Magic Flute is second only to the greatest of all - Beethoven's Leonara No. 3. Some operatic overtures consist entirely of subject-matter contained in the following work; in this form Weber and Wagner have left unrivalled examples. The title is also given to orchestral productions written solely for concert use.