The_Complete_Idiot%27s_Guide_To_Music_Theory

84
Part 2: Rhythms
Definition
A long piece of
music (especially in the
orchestral environment) is
often called a score. More
precisely, the score is the
piece of music the conductor
uses, which contains all
the parts for all the instruments
and voices. The music
for each individual instrument
is not technically a
score, although sometimes
people refer to it as such.
Note
Learn more about the various
sections of a song in
Chapter 11.
When you’re playing a long piece of music, various parts of the song might be
indicated by numbers or by letters. For example, you might see the letter A at
the beginning of the first verse, and the letter B at the beginning of the second
verse, and the letter C at the start of the chorus. This way other musicians can
tell you to start at a specific point in the song by saying, “Start at letter B.”
Alternatively, the measures of a song might be numbered. If this is the case,
you can say “Start at measure 16”; everyone will know what you mean.
In any case, you need some way to determine just where you are in a piece of
music; otherwise you’ll always have to start at the beginning—even if all you
need to practice is the very end!
Repeating Sections
There are various shorthand methods you can use when writing or arranging a
piece of music. Especially useful are various ways to indicate repeating sections,
which saves you the trouble of writing out the exact same music two (or more)
times.
When you have a section of music that should be repeated, you border that
section by a pair of repeat marks. One repeat mark indicates the start of the section
to be repeated; the other one indicates the end of that section. Unless
noted otherwise, you repeat a section only once (that is, you play it twice), and
then you move on to the next section.
Use repeat marks to indicate a range of measures to play twice.
Sometimes you’ll need to repeat a section but play a slightly different ending
the second time through. When you see this in the score—called a first ending
and a second ending—you play the first ending the first time through, and then
when you repeat the section you skip the first ending and play the second ending.
Use first and second endings to end a repeated section two different ways.
You also can repeat a section of a song by returning to a section designated with
a sign (called a Segno sign). For example, when you see the notation “D.S. al
Fine,” you jump back to the Segno sign and play through to the end of the
song.