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Solfege table in an Irish classroom

In music and sight singing solfege or solmization is a way of assigning syllables to degrees or steps of the diatonic scale. In order, they are: Do (or Ut), Re, Mi, Fa, So(l), La, Ti (or Si), and Do (for the octave). In India, the origin of solmization was to be found in Vedic texts like the Upanishads, which discuss a musical system of seven notes, realized ultimately in what is known as sargam. In Indian classical music, the notes in order are: Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, Ni, Sa. Much later in the West it was a pedagogical technique created by (or at least generally ascribed to) Guido of Arezzo; these names are still used for the notes in Latin countries, while in Germanic countries, the letter notation is used.

[edit] Etymology

"Solfege" came from French solfège in the 1910s. (In French, solfège refers to musical technical skills as a whole: sight reading, writing the score of the music one hears, singing in tune, etc.) The French word in turn came from the Italian solfeggio, which is a combination of sol and fa. Its equivalent since Early Modern English is sol-fa.

The syllable names come from a formerly well-known medieval hymn, entitled Ut queant laxis, in which each successive musical phrase, corresponding to a half line of the first verse, starts on the next higher scale degree in the major scale:

Ut queant laxis resonare fibris

Mira gestorum famuli tuorum,

Solve polluti labii reatum,

Sancte Ioannes.

The first syllable in each half line corresponds to the solfege syllable, with the exception of the first, "Ut", which was changed in the 17th century to the more singable "Do", most likely from the Latin Dominus (Lord). The original hymn did not start a phrase upon the seventh scale degree. To fill in this gap, at a later time the Si (or sometimes Ti) was added to the repertoire. The Si was derived from the final phrase of the hymn, Sancte Ioannes (Saint John).

In colloquial language, singers sometimes incorrectly use "solfege" and "sight reading" as synonyms; sight reading means reading the piece without benefit of previous study, or numerical sight-singing, where the solfege syllables are replaced by the numbers one through seven.

In English-speaking countries, solfege is most commonly used with singers. In countries where the fixed Do system is used (see below), solfege is commonly taught to all musicians.

[edit] Variations

There are two main types of solfege: moveable Do, in which each syllable corresponds with a scale degree, and fixed Do, in which the syllables correspond to fixed pitches. The advantage of moveable Do is that Do always corresponds to the tonic; the disadvantage is that the singer must do a harmonic analysis of the piece in order to sing the correct syllables. The shaped note system removes this disadvantage. In fixed Do, the pitches are set: the tonic, Do, is C, Re is D, and so on; Fa is easy to remember, since it is F.

The fact that two different systems use the same names (Do, Re, etc.) causes much confusion among musicians and music educators, since they serve two very different educational purposes: movable Do is a language of function, while fixed Do is a language of pitch. A student who is fluent in movable do will be trained to hear the relationships between the notes, the functions, and where the tonal center is. A student who is fluent in fixed do will be able to identify the exact pitches of notes and chords with precision. Both have merit for different purposes, although teachers of harmony and theory often argue which is 'better' in an absolute way.

There are also other syllables corresponding to notes outside of the major scale. All the solfege syllables are listed in the table below; the syllables in the major scale are shown in bold.

Some variations of the syllables are (e.g. the major scale): Do, Re, Mi, Fa, So, La, Si, Do, and Fa, Sol, La, Fa, Sol, La, Mi, Fa. The first variation was common in English-speaking countries until John Curwen changed Si to Ti so each syllable would start with a different letter. The second variation uses four syllables and repeats three of them. This system always has a half step before the syllable "fa". It was once common in England, and, via England, in early America. It has survived in American shape note books such as the Sacred Harp and Southern Harmony. The article Shape note discusses assigning shaped noteheads to correspond with the solfege symbols. John Curwen developed the English Tonic Sol-fa system (see below), in which visual aids such as shape notes removed the difficulty of singing the correct syllables in a moveable Do system.

[edit] Tonic Sol-fa

Tonic Sol-fa is a system of musical notation based on relationships between tones in a key. The usual staff notation is replaced with solmization syllables (e.g. do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti, do) or their abbreviations (d,r,m,f,s,l,t,d). "Do" is chosen to be the tonic of whatever key is being used (thus the terminology moveable Do). This is the name of one of the most popular among letter systems which was developed by John Curwen of England.

Some of the roots of tonic sol-fa may be found in items such as

• the use of syllables in the 11th century by the monk Guido de Arezzo
• the cipher notation proposed by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in France in 1746,
• its further development by Pierre Galin and popularization by Aimé Paris and Emile Chevé, and
• the Norwich sol-fa of Sarah Ann Glover of England. Reverend John Curwen (1816-1880) was instrumental in the development of tonic sol-fa in England, and was chiefly responsible for its popularity.
  

  

  Depiction of Curwen's Solfege hand signs. This version includes the tonal tendencies and interesting titles for each tone.

When John Windet printed the 1594 edition of the Sternhold and Hopkins Psalter, he added the initials of the six syllables of Guido (U, R, M, F, S, L) underneath the note. Windet explained, "...I have caused a new print of note to be made with letter to be joined to every note: whereby thou mayest know how to call every note by his right name, so that with a very little diligence thou mayest more easilie by the viewing of these letters, come to the knowledge of perfect solfeying..." Rousseau, Curwen and others would have been aware of this popular psalter.

B. C. Unseld and Theodore F. Seward, with Biglow and Main publishers, imported Curwen's tonic sol-fa to the United States, though the method was never widely received. Prior to this, the 9th edition of the Bay Psalm Book (Boston, USA) had appeared with the initials of four-note syllables (fa, sol, la, me) underneath the staff. Reverend John Tufts, in his An Introduction to the Singing of Psalm Tunes in a Plaine & Easy Method, moved the initials of the four-note syllables onto the staff in place of "regular notes", and indicated rhythm by punctuation marks to the right of the letters. These may be considered American forerunners of Curwen's system, though he may not have been aware of them. Tufts' Introduction was popular, going through several editions. Nevertheless, his work probably did more to pave the way for shape notes. When Unseld and Steward introduced tonic sol-fa in the late 1800s, it was considered "something new".

Zoltán Kodály (1882-1967) of Hungary championed the system in more modern times, building on Curwen's work. He introduced a set of hand signals which correspond to each solfege syllable.

In 1972 Roberto Goitre printed one of the most important modern metod il Cantar Leggendo with the moveable Do.

Solmization that represents the functions of pitches (such as tonic sol-fa) is called "functional" solmization. All musicians that use functional solmization use "do" to represent the tonic (also known as the "keynote") in the major mode. However, approaches to the minor mode fall into two camps. Some musicians use "do" to represent the tonic in minor (a parallel approach), whereas others prefer to label the tonic in minor as "la" (a relative approach) Both systems have their advantages: The former system more directly represents the scale-degree functions of the pitches in a key; the latter more directly represents the intervals between pitches in any given key signature.

[edit] Common scales

Some common scales are given below in solfeggio for reference.

In atonal music, integer notation is often sung rather than solfege.

[edit] Solfege in popular culture

• Do-Re-Mi is a song featured in the musical The Sound of Music. Within the story, it is used by Maria to teach the notes of the major musical scale to the Von Trapp children. The song is notable in that each syllable of the diatonic scale appears as solfege in its lyrics, sung on the pitch it names.
• The Music Man also used solfege in its music, especially in Shipoopi.
• A Japanese animated series with a musical theme is known as Ojamajo Doremi, with the English language version known as Magical DoReMi. In the Japanese series it is about a girl named Doremi and two of her friends, but the dub changed their names to Dorie, Reanne, and Mirabelle. In the original, Doremi's name was to reflect solfege, but in the English version, the first syllables of all their names together make solfege. In the episode "Dustin' the Old Rusty Broom", when they make over the Rusty Broom, they call it the DoReMi Magic Shop. The fairies in said show are known as Dodo, Rae Rae (Rere in the Japanese version), and Mimi, all given to reflect solfege as well.
• Hawkwind named their 1972 album Doremi Fasol Latido.
• The Kodály hand signals are used in the climactic scene of the film Close Encounters of the Third Kind when François Truffaut's character communicates with the alien.
• Solfeggio was the name of a song used in a comedy sketch featuring The Nairobi Trio on Ernie Kovacs's television show. The lyrics of the song featured the solfege tones and was played while three cast members dressed in trench coats, gorilla masks and bowler hats engaged in silly situations on-screen.

[edit] See also

• Shape note
• Musical note
• Sargam
• GNU Solfege
• Solresol, a constructed language that had the solfege notes as syllables and could be sung or played as well as spoken.
• The Nairobi Trio, a comedy skit, to the tune "Solfeggio" (written by Robert Maxwell and sung by the Ray Charles Singers)
• The Kokiri, a fictional elf-like race from the Legend of Zelda game series who are largely named after blends of Solfege tones.
• Iroha, an ancient poem sometimes used as solfege in Japan.
• Canntaireachd, a means of communicating bagpipe music vocally.

[edit] External links

• The song "Do-Re-Mi" from The Sound of Music
• History of Notation by Neil V. Hawes
• John Curwen & the tonic sol-fa method
• Tonic Sol-fa by Neil V. Hawes

[edit] Tonic Sol-fa examples

• Professor Warren Steel's web site

[edit] References

• The Teacher's Manual of the Tonic Sol-fa Method: Dealing with the Art of Teaching and the Teaching of Music, by John Curwen ISBN 0-86314-118-8