A part is the music played by an individual instrument or voice (or group of identical instruments or voices) within a larger work, such as a melody. It also refers to the printed copy of the music for each instrument, as distinct from the score, which holds the music for all instruments in an ensemble. For example in a string ensemble you would have separate parts for Violin 1, Violin 2, Viola and Cello, even though there might be several of each instrument (and therefore several copies of each part).
Parts may be an outer part, the two on the top and bottom, or inner part, those in between. Part-writing is the composition of parts in consideration of harmony and counterpoint. Melody can be distinguished from harmony from the fact that Melody can be described as "Notes Over Time" whereas Harmony can be described as "Notes At One Time".
A part in great Highland Bagpipe music is a musical sentence. Usually each part consists of four phrases, either one or two bars long. Several sentences combine to produce a paragraph or complete work or tune.
In a polyphonic context the term voice is used to denote a single melodic line or textural layer. The term is generic, and is not meant to imply that the line should necessarily be vocal in character, instead referring to instrumentation or simply to register.
Read more about this topic: Melody
Famous quotes containing the word part:
“For my own part I think no innocent species of wit or pleasantry should be suppressed: and that a good pun may be admitted among the smaller excellencies of lively conversation.”
—James Boswell (1740–1795)
“In dark places and dungeons the preacher’s words might perhaps strike root and grow, but not in broad daylight in any part of the world that I know.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“And shall the earth
Seem all of paradise that we shall know?
The sky will be much friendlier then than now,
A part of labor and a part of pain,
And next in glory to enduring love,
Not this dividing and indifferent blue.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)