Diminution Totally Explained

Everything about Diminished totally explained

Diminution, from Italian diminuimento, is a musical term used to mean different things in the context of melodies and intervals or chords.
   A melody or series of notes is diminished if the lengths of the notes are shortened (this is opposed to augmentation, where the notes are lengthened). A melody originally consisting of four crotchets (quarter-notes) for example, is diminished if it later appears with four quavers (eighth-notes) instead. This technique is often used in contrapuntal music. It gives rise to the "canon in diminution", in which the notes in the following voice are shorter than those in the leading.
   An interval is diminished if a minor or perfect interval is narrowed by a chromatic semitone; a diminished chord is constructed of stacked minor third intervals. Thus a diminished fifth, for example, is a chromatic semitone narrower than the perfect fifth, and a diminished triad consists of root, minor third, and diminished fifth.
   In Schenkerian analysis a diminution is a division, rather than a diminishing is a prolongation or expansion, "the process by which an interval formed by notes of longer value is expressed in notes of smaller value," see nonchord tone.
   An example of a diminished scale would be A Dim - A B C D D# F F# G# A Diminished Scales are very easy to construct, you simply start at your required root note, and from there just move up a tone and then a Semitone, continue this until you've your scale.
    Root/ Tone/ Semi/ Tone/ Semi/ Tone/ Semi/ Tone/ Semi A B C D D# F F# G# A
   From there you can form a diminished chord by using the A, C, and D# (root, minor third, diminished fifth). In a diminished chord you've 4 notes which are each a successive minor third apart, leading to minimal transposition. So there are actually only 3 different diminished chords (e.g Cdim contains the notes C, Eb, F#, A, as does the diminished chords with the roots of Eb, F#, and A)

Further Information

Get more info on 'Diminished'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://diminution.totallyexplained.com">Diminution Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.