* . *
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
Tuesday, October 7, 2025
Earth-News
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    Row K Entertainment Emerges as Major New Hollywood Buyer With Splashy TIFF Shopping Spree – TheWrap

    Row K Entertainment Emerges as Major New Hollywood Buyer With Splashy TIFF Shopping Spree – TheWrap

    Charlie Hunnam Reflects on Playing a Serial Killer in Monster: The Ed Gein Story – Yahoo

    Charlie Hunnam Reveals the Dark Challenges of Playing a Serial Killer in Monster: The Ed Gein Story

    “Reba” cast, then and now: See the stars 24 years later (and who’s reunited for another show) – Yahoo

    “Reba” cast, then and now: See the stars 24 years later (and who’s reunited for another show) – Yahoo

    Why Taylor Swift Name-Dropped Elizabeth Taylor in Her New Album – Yahoo

    Here’s Why Taylor Swift Dropped Elizabeth Taylor’s Name in Her New Album

    Al Roker Gives Olivia Dean an Unexpected ‘New Job’ on the ‘Today’ Show – Yahoo

    Al Roker Shocks Olivia Dean with an Exciting New Role on the ‘Today’ Show

    Books about the arts and some haunts for a Denton October – Denton Record-Chronicle

    Uncover Artistic Treasures and Spooky Adventures to Experience in Denton This October

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Is Light-Speed Analog Computing the Future of Technology? – BIOENGINEER.ORG

    Could Light-Speed Analog Computing Transform the Future of Technology?

    ARM Institute opens technology project call to speed submarine manufacturing – The Robot Report

    ARM Institute Unveils Cutting-Edge Technology Project to Revolutionize Submarine Manufacturing

    Forget Cowbells. Cows Wear High-Tech Collars Now. – The New York Times

    Ditch the Cowbells: Discover the High-Tech Collars Transforming Cattle Care

    What the Recent Price Surge Means for Figure Technology Solutions After SEC Settlement – Yahoo Finance

    What the Recent Price Surge Reveals About Figure Technology Solutions Following SEC Settlement

    MAC Brings iPad Technology to Football Sidelines Across All 13 Member Schools – Sports Video Group

    MAC Brings iPad Technology to Football Sidelines Across All 13 Member Schools – Sports Video Group

    Technology Is Becoming More Important Than Humans In CX – No Jitter

    Technology Is Becoming More Important Than Humans In CX – No Jitter

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    Row K Entertainment Emerges as Major New Hollywood Buyer With Splashy TIFF Shopping Spree – TheWrap

    Row K Entertainment Emerges as Major New Hollywood Buyer With Splashy TIFF Shopping Spree – TheWrap

    Charlie Hunnam Reflects on Playing a Serial Killer in Monster: The Ed Gein Story – Yahoo

    Charlie Hunnam Reveals the Dark Challenges of Playing a Serial Killer in Monster: The Ed Gein Story

    “Reba” cast, then and now: See the stars 24 years later (and who’s reunited for another show) – Yahoo

    “Reba” cast, then and now: See the stars 24 years later (and who’s reunited for another show) – Yahoo

    Why Taylor Swift Name-Dropped Elizabeth Taylor in Her New Album – Yahoo

    Here’s Why Taylor Swift Dropped Elizabeth Taylor’s Name in Her New Album

    Al Roker Gives Olivia Dean an Unexpected ‘New Job’ on the ‘Today’ Show – Yahoo

    Al Roker Shocks Olivia Dean with an Exciting New Role on the ‘Today’ Show

    Books about the arts and some haunts for a Denton October – Denton Record-Chronicle

    Uncover Artistic Treasures and Spooky Adventures to Experience in Denton This October

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Is Light-Speed Analog Computing the Future of Technology? – BIOENGINEER.ORG

    Could Light-Speed Analog Computing Transform the Future of Technology?

    ARM Institute opens technology project call to speed submarine manufacturing – The Robot Report

    ARM Institute Unveils Cutting-Edge Technology Project to Revolutionize Submarine Manufacturing

    Forget Cowbells. Cows Wear High-Tech Collars Now. – The New York Times

    Ditch the Cowbells: Discover the High-Tech Collars Transforming Cattle Care

    What the Recent Price Surge Means for Figure Technology Solutions After SEC Settlement – Yahoo Finance

    What the Recent Price Surge Reveals About Figure Technology Solutions Following SEC Settlement

    MAC Brings iPad Technology to Football Sidelines Across All 13 Member Schools – Sports Video Group

    MAC Brings iPad Technology to Football Sidelines Across All 13 Member Schools – Sports Video Group

    Technology Is Becoming More Important Than Humans In CX – No Jitter

    Technology Is Becoming More Important Than Humans In CX – No Jitter

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
Earth-News
No Result
View All Result
Home Entertainment

Learn the Power of Motivic Development Through This Modern Fiddle Tune

July 27, 2024
in Entertainment
Learn the Power of Motivic Development Through This Modern Fiddle Tune
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

One of the most fascinating aspects of composition and improvisation is motivic development:taking a short musical idea (or motif), and varying it in numerous ways throughout a composition. It’s a cornerstone of all great music, regardless of genre: Beethoven string quartets, Miles Davis solos, rock riffs, and fiddle tunes all contain it in spades. It’s also a key component of what makes for compelling listening. When we hear something familiar presented in a newer or slightly different way, it helps give our ears a sense of form and narrative, leaving a trail of sonic breadcrumbs to guide our listeners along.

While this is true of both instrumental and vocal music, I think its use is especially important when our ears don’t have a lyric to latch on to. In this lesson, I’ll show you how I applied motivic development to composing a long-form fiddle tune, using “Blue Moose” from my latest album, Passages, as a study.

I’ll dive deep into the melody and harmony to show you how motivic development is used throughout to get maximum musical mileage out of a few ideas. If this analysis feels overly technical or academic, rest assured that each choice was made for musical reasons first and foremost: I liked how it sounded, and it was fun to play!

The Basic Structure

For our purposes, a fiddle tune is an instrumental piece of music played by string-band musicians. They’re called that because many originated with fiddlers, but you can write and play a fiddle tune on any instrument. You’ll hear them at bluegrass festivals, old-time jams, and Irish bars, among other places. While many classic fiddle tunes in the American acoustic music canon are old enough to mostly be considered traditional, there is also a parallel tradition of contemporary folk musicians writing new, original fiddle tunes.

Many popular fiddle tunes in the bluegrass world have an AABB form—two parts, each played twice. A hallmark of modern fiddle-tune writing is expanding the form by adding more parts, and integrating compositional ideas from other musical traditions outside the idiom.

“Blue Moose” is a four-part fiddle tune (ABCD form). The band arrangement on Passages jumps around those parts somewhat, with the melody passed around among guitar, banjo, mandolin, fiddle, and dobro (and often two or more of those simultaneously). However, this is Acoustic Guitar magazine after all, so I’ve presented “Blue Moose” here more straightforwardly as a flatpicking tune, with each part played in order. 

Passages_Album-Art-Ethan-Sherman-PassagesEthan Sherman, Passages (Indoor Recordings)

Breaking Down the Developments

Let’s begin at the top: the foundation of the A section is its first two-bar phrase. We hear this repeated verbatim at bars 5–6, but phrases 2 and 4 mix things up a bit. At bar 3, the phrase first heard in bars 1–2 has been lowered by a perfect fourth. If you zoom in, you’ll notice that the intervals aren’t transposed exactly, though. 

The beginning of bar 1 is a descending D minor arpeggio, beginning with the F (the third of the chord). The arpeggio in bar 3, however, begins with a C, which is not the third but the root of the accompanying Cm chord. Here, the development of the chords influenced the development of the melody: I liked the way the Cm chord sounded after hearing Dm and Am under the first phrase, so I altered the melody to outline it. This approach provides both familiarity and variation: the rhythm and downward direction of the notes stay the same, but the underlying harmony changes.

The first ending (bars 6–9) extends the variation from bars 3–4, turning it into a four-measure phrase. From there, we repeat from the top of A and play through this section again, this time taking the second ending at bar 10. Melodically, the notes in bar 11 are exactly the same as bar 3, but this time the meteris different. Whereas bars 3 and 4 alternate between 3/4 and 4/4 time, bars 10–12 are both in common time. This is mainly to set up the melody at bar 12, which in turn sets up the B section. 

The next instance of melodic development occurs at the beginning of the C section. The phrase that takes up most of bar 21 has the same rhythm and shape of the main motif of B, but here, the qualityof the melody—and the accompanying chords—shifts: what was once minor is now major. To emphasize the connection to B, the 2/4 bar at bar 25 has the exact same notes from the ends of bars 15 and 19.

By the way, this section is the first time in the tune that we’re in a really clear key center (A major, mostly). This gives our ears a nice break from all the shifting tonalities of the previous two sections—a harmonic exhale, if you will.

The D section wraps up the tune and ties everything together. Here, we’re returning to the main idea from A, with some newish developments. We’re continuing to use the quality-change device, turning the once-minor descending arpeggio to major. This shift is reflected in the chords, too—where in part A we heard Dm and Cm chords under this idea, now we’re hearing C, D, and G major.

As the D section continues, this little melodic nugget is repeated twice at bars 29 and 32, but extended. What began as a two-bar phrase is now three measures. (Remember when that happened in the A part?) The ends of these extensions (bars 31 and 34) climb up in pitch, which sets up the seemingly inevitable final phrase of the tune: the exact second phrase of the A part, an octave higher than the original.

That concludes our guided tour through “Blue Moose.” The various approaches to motivic development we covered are repetition, transposition, reharmonization, syncopation, and metric modulation. How I used these ideas shows just one way things could have gone—the possibilities they open up are infinite. If you aspire to write your own fiddle tunes, I hope this deconstruction offers some insight and inspires you to go exploring yourself. I’d love to hear your take on “Blue Moose”!

Ethan Sherman is a guitarist-composer and educator based in Los Angeles. He is the co-author (with Adam Levy) of String Theories: Tips, Challenges, and Reflections for the Lifelong Guitarist.

Motivic Development Through a Modern Fiddle Tune acoustic guitar lesson sheet 2Motivic Development Through a Modern Fiddle Tune acoustic guitar lesson sheet 2

Acoustic Guitar magazine cover for issue 347

This article originally appeared in the July/August 2024 issue of Acoustic Guitar magazine.

>>> Read full article>>>
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source : AcousticGuitar – https://acousticguitar.com/learn-the-power-of-motivic-development/

Tags: entertainmentLearnPower
Previous Post

Kobra Paige releases title track “Like No Other” from upcoming solo album to be released August 30

Next Post

Australia’s Hockey Teams Adjust for Opener

Learned use of an innate sound-meaning association in birds – Nature

How Birds Unlock Natural Sound-Meaning Links Through Learning

October 7, 2025
This Ancient Statue Was Discarded by Raiders. Scientists Think It’s a Rare Treasure. – Popular Mechanics

Forgotten by Raiders, This Ancient Statue Could Be a Priceless Treasure

October 7, 2025
Scientists used AI to map uncharted areas of the mouse brain – Live Science

Scientists Harness AI to Uncover Hidden Regions of the Mouse Brain

October 7, 2025
Pets of the Day: Sweep the clouds away with Zoe, Telly and Elmo – Yahoo

Meet Zoe, Telly, and Elmo: Your Daily Dose of Sunshine and Smiles

October 7, 2025
Is Light-Speed Analog Computing the Future of Technology? – BIOENGINEER.ORG

Could Light-Speed Analog Computing Transform the Future of Technology?

October 7, 2025
Frustrations grow around Bill Belichick and North Carolina after team’s porous start to the 2025 season – Yahoo Sports

Frustrations grow around Bill Belichick and North Carolina after team’s porous start to the 2025 season – Yahoo Sports

October 7, 2025
Jason Anderson Signs for Suzuki for 2026 SMX World Championship – Monster Energy AMA Supercross

Jason Anderson Signs for Suzuki for 2026 SMX World Championship – Monster Energy AMA Supercross

October 7, 2025
Downtown St. Paul’s economy showing new life after state employees mandated to return to office – 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS

Downtown St. Paul Thrives Again as State Employees Return to the Office

October 7, 2025
No, Anthony Boyle Didn’t Use a Prosthetic in His House of Guinness Bath Scene – Yahoo

Anthony Boyle Opens Up About the Shocking Truth Behind His House of Gucci Bath Scene

October 7, 2025
Ozzy Osbourne documentary reveals agonizing health struggles of his final years – USA Today

Inside Ozzy Osbourne’s Heartbreaking Battle with Health in His Final Years

October 7, 2025

Categories

Archives

October 2025
M T W T F S S
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
2728293031  
« Sep    
Earth-News.info

The Earth News is an independent English-language daily published Website from all around the World News

Browse by Category

  • Business (20,132)
  • Ecology (856)
  • Economy (876)
  • Entertainment (21,749)
  • General (17,463)
  • Health (9,918)
  • Lifestyle (889)
  • News (22,149)
  • People (878)
  • Politics (887)
  • Science (16,087)
  • Sports (21,377)
  • Technology (15,857)
  • World (859)

Recent News

Learned use of an innate sound-meaning association in birds – Nature

How Birds Unlock Natural Sound-Meaning Links Through Learning

October 7, 2025
This Ancient Statue Was Discarded by Raiders. Scientists Think It’s a Rare Treasure. – Popular Mechanics

Forgotten by Raiders, This Ancient Statue Could Be a Priceless Treasure

October 7, 2025
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

Go to mobile version