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Teacher_TextureTimbre

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Timbre definition:
the characteristic quality of a sound independent of pitch and dynamics; tone colour.

Texture definition: simultaneous layering of sounds (e.g., multi-part music making)

 

Timbre can be:

  • Bright to dark, soft to hard, warm to cold, etc.

 

Texture can be:

  • Dense to sparse, thick to thin, active to still
  • Layered (may be made up of a combination of melody, harmony, rhythm)

 

Discussion points:

  • The choice of instrument timbre can be used to convey the attributes of a character, emotion, place or mood.
  • Many instruments have more than one timbre they can produce
  • Changing the number of instruments changes the density of the texture, more instruments = thicker, and less instruments = thinner.

 

Texture Example:

 Boléro M. 81, London Symphony Orchestra

 

Timbre Activity:

  • Instrument Colour Worksheet: assigning colours to each instrument as heard
  • BeepBox: Rate the waveforms in terms of darkest and lightest

 

Texture Activity:

  • Worksheet: vocab to texture (ie. How to convey isolation, thick or thin)

 

Resources:

 

Career Pathway Videos

 

Shannon Mason
Composer & Sound Designer
Vancouver, BC

 

Caitlin Yu
Head of Quality Assurance
Phoenix Labs
Burnaby, BC

 

Adrian Talens
Freelance Composer
Vancouver, BC