Texture

11.0.Texture

Now we move onto texture. Texture is the way the chords, melody, rhythm and instruments come together and overall affects the quality of the piece.

Most types of textures can be summed up into a few different types. These are:

Monophonic

Homophonic

Contrapuntal/Polyphonic

Octave

Unison

Monophonic is literally having just one instrument playing and is usually done for introductions unless you have a solo throughout.

Homophonic is when there are chords and notes played regardless of rhythm. Most genres will end up landing in the homophonic section as they all the instruments will play a chord with a melody over this most of the time

Contrapuntal/Polyphonic texture is when all the instruments are playing different notes and these notes are interweaving. This is a more common feature in classical music and is very rare in most of the genres I will discuss. The key feature in this is that no one part shines from the other parts and usually everyone is playing at the same dynamic (loudness)

In octave is when all the instruments play the same note but some will play the note higher or lower, this is usually because some instruments won’t go as high as others

Unison is when everyone plays exactly the same notes, not in different octaves just exactly the same. Unison is very similar to monophonic as you cannot tell the parts apart very easily