A music

Music

Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...

al figure is the shortest idea in music, a short succession of note

Note

In music, the term note has two primary meanings:#A sign used in musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a sound;#A pitched sound itself....

s, often recurring. It may have melodic pitch

Pitch (music)

Pitch is an auditory perceptual property that allows the ordering of sounds on a frequency-related scale.Pitches are compared as "higher" and "lower" in the sense associated with musical melodies,...

, harmonic progression

Chord progression

A chord progression is a series of musical chords, or chord changes that "aims for a definite goal" of establishing a tonality founded on a key, root or tonic chord. In other words, the succession of root relationships...

 and rhythm

Rhythm

Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...

ic (duration). The 1964 Grove's Dictionary defines the figure as "the exact counterpart of the German 'motiv' and the French 'motif

Motif (music)

In music, a motif or motive is a short musical idea, a salient recurring figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a composition....

'": it produces a "single complete and distinct impression". To Scruton (1997: 61), however, "A figure is distinguished from a motif

Motif (music)

In music, a motif or motive is a short musical idea, a salient recurring figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a composition....

 in that a figure is background while a motif is foreground: "A figure resembles a moulding

Molding (decorative)

Molding or moulding is a strip of material with various profiles used to cover transitions between surfaces or for decoration. It is traditionally made from solid milled wood or plaster but may be made from plastic or reformed wood...

 in architecture: it is 'open at both ends', so as to be endlessly repeatable

Repetition (music)

Repetition is important in music, where sounds or sequences are often repeated. One often stated idea is that repetition should be in balance with the initial statements and variations in a piece. It may be called restatement, such as the restatement of a theme...

. In hearing a phrase

Phrase (music)

In music and music theory, phrase and phrasing are concepts and practices related to grouping consecutive melodic notes, both in their composition and performance...

 as a figure, rather than a motif, we are at the same time placing it in the background, even if it is...strong and melodious."

A phrase originally presented or heard as a motif may become a figure which accompanies another melody

Melody

A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...

, such as in the second movement of Claude Debussy

Claude Debussy

Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...

's String Quartet

String Quartet (Debussy)

Claude Debussy wrote his sole String Quartet in G minor, Op. 10 in 1893.-Background:The previous year Debussy had abandoned the opera Rodrigue et Chimène...

. Perhaps it is best to view a figure as a motif when it has special importance in a piece.

Minimalist and developmental music may be constructed entirely from figures. Roger Scruton (1997: 63) describes music by Philip Glass

Philip Glass

Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...

 such as Akhnaten

Akhnaten (opera)

Akhnaten is an opera in three acts based on the life and religious convictions of the pharaoh Akhenaten , written by the American minimalist composer Philip Glass in 1983. Akhnaten had its world premiere on March 24, 1984 at the Stuttgart State Opera, under the German title Echnaton...

as "nothing but figures...endless daisy-chains". A basic figure is known as a riff

RIFF

The Resource Interchange File Format is a generic file container format for storing data in tagged chunks. It is primarily used to store multimedia such as sound and video, though it may also be used to store any arbitrary data....

 in American popular music.

Sources

• Scruton, Roger (1997). The Aesthetics of Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-816638-9.
• Nattiez, Jean-Jacques (1990). Music and Discourse: Toward a Semiology of Music (Musicologie générale et sémiologue, 1987). Translated by Carolyn Abbate (1990). ISBN 0-691-02714-5.
• (1964). Grove's Dictionary. cited in Scruton, Roger (1997).