When I photograph landscapes, the scene is framed to create a sense of balance, depth and form. I compose so the viewer's eye is drawn to the subject. Musicians design the texture and form of their soundscapes as precisely and deliberately as visual artists. Let's look at the basic types of musical texture and form.
Praying for Surf | Ala Moana Beach Park | Peter Kun Frary
Musical Texture
The term, musical texture, refers to how melodic, rhythmic, and harmonic elements combine in a composition. We are mainly concerned with your perception of the horizontal and vertical aspects of texture.
Horizontal
The horizontal or linear aspects of texture revolve around melodic lines: a memorable succession of notes. In layman's terms, a melody. Sing a song with no instrumental or vocal backup and you have a melodic line.
Vertical
The vertical aspect of texture involves how melodic lines combine together to form harmony (chords) or counterpoint. For example, singing with a friend while strumming a guitar creates layers of melodic lines and chords. How the two voices and guitar sound together at any given point is the vertical aspect of texture.
Musicians are picky about texture and spend a lifetime learning how to create and control texture for expressive purposes. And, of course, we have names for the various textures: monophonic, polyphonic and homophonic. There are also textural subclasses but we'll focus on these three main types for now.
Monophonic
Monophonic texture consists of a single melodic line. Imagine singing Row, Row, Row Your Boat in the shower by yourself. The sounding of a single melodic line is called monophonic texture. It's still monophonic even if twenty friends join you as long as they sing unison and don't harmonize.
Monophonic | Row, Row, Row Your Boat
Polyphonic
Polyphonic texture consists of two or more lines of relatively equal importance. Again, you're singing Row, Row, Row Your Boat but this time a friend joins in with "Row, Row" when you get to the word "Gently." And, two measures later, your neighbor follows suit. You now have three independent melodic lines of equal importance. This is an example of polyphonic texture. The particular technique used in Row, Row, Row Your Boat is called imitation, i.e., you and your friends are imitating or echoing one another. The compositional technique of writing layers of independent melodic lines is called counterpoint.
Polyphonic | Row, Row, Row Your Boat
Homophonic
Finally, you sing Row, Row, Row Your Boat but accompany yourself by strumming chords on a guitar while your little sister grooves on bass. This texture—melody with supportive chords—is called homophonic texture.
Homophonic | Row, Row, Row Your Boat
These three textures—monophonic, polyphonic and homophonic—are important characteristics of style and one of many clues to help describe music and distinguish one style from another. With that said, it is not unusual, especially after the seventeenth century, for composers to create contrast by featuring different textures within a short span of time.
Repetition | Repetition is a crucial component of musical form. | Peter Kun Frary
Musical Form
A key element of music is its temporal quality: musical sounds are connected to one another and unfold over through time, rather than being heard in an isolated moment. As we listen to music, important ideas—melodies, harmonic progressions, rhythm, etc.—stick in our memory. A sense of form is created as prior ideas return and are contrasted with new material. This organization of musical ideas in time is called musical form.
At this point we merely need to examine the universals of musical form. Later, as we work through different musical styles, we'll address the details of specific forms.
The details of musical forms vary throughout history but most forms are based on the techniques of repetition, variation and contrast.
Repetition
Repetition creates unity, balance and symmetry in a musical work, drawing on our enjoyment of recognizing and remembering something. The easiest thing to recognize is a melody you just heard. Thus, composers repeat melodies to create shape and unity in a composition.
Variation
A key principle of repetition technique is to repeat a musical idea enough to make it memorable. Too many repeats would be monotonous. The answer to excess repetition is variation. A variation is simply a repeat of a prior musical idea—a melody or even fragments of a melody—but with changes to keep it interesting without losing its essential character. Variation has the power of repetition but adds tension and drama due to changes in melody, harmony, rhythm, instruments, key, dynamics, or texture.
Contrast
Finally, contrast is used to create variety, conflict and mood changes. The return of a prior idea is stronger if preceded with a contrasting section. Contrasts may involve a new melody, harmony, instruments, key, tempo, etc.
Simple Songs
Simple songs such as Ode to Joy create form by grouping phrases into patterns. For example, the song structure of chorus and verse is a common musical form.
To determine a song's musical form, we begin by labeling each phrase with a lower case letter: a, b, c, etc.
Identical phrases are labeled with the same letter, e.g., a a.
If phrases are similar but one has a variation, a prime symbol is added: a a'.
A phrase consisting of new material is labeled with a different letter, e.g., a b.
Phrase analysis allows depiction of phrase repetitions, variations and appearance of new material. The two phrases of Ode to Joy are organized in an a a' relationship, same melodic material but with differing cadences:
Ode to Joy | First phrase: a
Ode to Joy | Second phrase: a'
Larger Instrumental Works
Like simple songs, larger works employ the same principles of repetition, variation and contrast to create form. However, these principles are applied at multiple levels: motive (short melodic idea), phrase and major sections of the work.
Repetition
Listen to how Beethoven introduces a simple four-note motive at the beginning of the first movement of his Symphony No. 5:
Four-Note Motive | Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, Allegro con brio
Variation
Beethoven imprints this four-note motive into your memory by repeating and varying it motive incessantly.
Contrast
Near the end of the track, Beethoven introduces a contrasting melody, a more lyrical and gentle theme:
Symphony No. 5: 1. Allegro con brio | Beethoven excerpt (1:04) )
Ternary Form
Musical form is a template composers pour their ideas into. For example, millions of songs are organized around the chorus-verse form. Although they use the same formal structure, each song sounds different. If every song had a new formal structure, listeners would be confused. We expect music to be organized a certain way.
In form analysis we use capital letters (A) to stand for major sections of a piece and the prime symbol to indicate variation of repeated sections (lower case is used for phrases). For example, A B A means there are three sections: two identical outer sections (A) and a contrasting middle section (B). This use of two identical or similar outer sections to frame a contrasting middle section is one of the most universal formal structures. It even has a name: ternary form (three-part form). This basic three-part design has been varied endlessly throughout history: minuet and trio, sonata form, da capo aria, and a long list of popular and jazz variations.
Ternary form has a few common variants: A A B A' means the A section is repeated, followed by a contrasting middle section (B) and, finally, the first section returns with variations (A'). The term, coda, means a ending section has been added.
Ternary form has a few common variants: A A B A' means the A section is repeated, followed by a contrasting middle section (B) and, finally, the first section returns with variations (A'). The term, coda, means a ending section has been added.
Pipeline is a textbook example of ternary form:
| A | A | B | A |
In typical fashion, the A section is heard twice in the first section of the piece. The B section (1:09) introduces a new theme and builds tension with forte dynamics. After the solos by Kealoha, Deither and Colsen, the A section returns (3:03).
Musical Texture
Horizontal
Vertical
Monophonic
Polyphonic
Homophonic
Musical Form
Repetition
Variation 
Contrast
Ternary Form
