The Seven Basic Elements of Music

All music can be considered in terms of all of these elements. Style is determined by the ways in which these elements are used. All of the elements are always present to some degree, although they might receive little to no attention within a particular style. The seven elements are:

Rhythm (the “lifeblood” of music): Rhythm includes tempo, meter (or time signature), duration, division (i.e., of the beat) and other aspects.
Pitch: Includes melody and harmony. Melody is the horizontal (successive) aspect and harmony is the vertical (simultaneous) aspect.
Timbre: Tone color. Usually, timbre refers to sound of one instrument vs. another, but also could mean the contrasting colors of a single instrument.
Dynamics: Relative loudness at any given moment. Accent is an aspect both of rhythm and dynamics.
Texture: There are four kinds. A single melody with no other parts present is monophonic. A melody that is supported by a harmony is homophonic. Two or more simultaneous, independent melodies is polyphony, and one melody that sounds simultaneously with other versions of the same melody is heterophony.
Form: All music has form., which is its overall shape in time. Phrases, sections, repeated material, new materials, changes of keys, instrumentation, texture a d meter all are ways of delineating form.
Space: All sound exists in space. Sometimes the position in space (i.e., front and back) or changes in positions (i.e., moving from one side to the other) are a deliberate aspect of the composition, performance or recording.

There is one element even more fundamental than all of these: change. Something is always changing. What is changing is one or more of the elements listed above.

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