unit 2 listening

• 60s pop features instruments including drum kit, lead and backing vocals, bass guitar etc. The Beatles, the Rolling Stones and the beach boys are all pop acts from 1960s
• heavy, driving beat. Usually features electric guitar, bass guitar and drum kit but can have various others.
• Punk music is loud, aggressive and energetic and usually carries a political message.
• Disco usually features a “four to the floor” beat. Often includes synthesisers.
• Acoustic guitar being mic’d up


  • placing a small diaphragm (cardioid pattern) condensor microphone, facing the guitar pointing directly at where the neck meets the body/positioned close to the strings
• what is it called when you place a microphone as close to an amplifier as possible


  close mic’ing
• Major 


  Music sounds happy
• Minor 


  Music sounds sad
• Atonal 


  Music has no feeling of key, and didn’t sound major or minor
• Chorus 


  An effect whereby short delays and modifications are added to a signal to make it sound as if there is more than one player. Can be very effective on the electric guitar. Used a lot in the 1980s. sounds wobbly/out of tone/underwater
• Wah-wah


  Sounds quacky/funny
• Reverb 


  can give the impression of being in a hall
• Gated reverb 


  A reverb that only lasts a few seconds. makes the drum kit parts sound bigger/more explosive without the lasting effect of normal reverb. Used in the 1980s A LOT
• EQ


  frequencies are either cut or boosted
• Distortion


  Makes an instrument sound fuzzy and electronic
• Compression

  Sounds squashed/fuller/rounder
• 3/4 time 


  you should be able to count 3 beats in a bar as you listen. Waltz is always in this time
• 4/4 time 


  You should be able to count 4 beats in a bar as you listen. Most common
• 6/8 time 


  you should be able to count 1-2-3-4-5-6 (or: straw-be-rry. straw-be-rry.
• Syncopation 


  Music that had a mixture of notes on/off the beat. Most music contains syncopation but most commonly disco and similar style. (can sound funky)
• Walking bass 


  busy sounding bass line most commonly used in jazz music but also other styles. Steady short notes constantly changing, liking walking up and down a set of stairs.