Rock Vs Classical Music

Difference between Rock and Classical

  “Even if you are not an established musician, you can easily distinguish rock music from what is termed as classical music. There are several large differences between rock and classical.

One of the most obvious differences between the two genres is the instruments used. Instrument makers before the discovery of electricity had to make instruments audible without the aid of electricity; they relied on sound boards (or lung power (wind instruments)) to amplify the sound. In our modern times, we have a large array of electric instruments. Many electric instruments rely mainly on electricity to make there sound perceptible. One may also include the difference in the way the two music forms are arranged. rock is typically (though there are many exceptions) played with the classic format of singer, electric guitar, drums and bass guitar, while classical makes heavy use of the instruments of the violin family and the piano family.

Classical music across time, which includes the medieval periods, renaissance (rebirth of Greek culture), baroque, classical, romantic then modern-contemporary periods all exhibit musical similarities. In classical, it is usual for there to be multiple harmonies going on at once. Classical also uses a wide variety of chords, however many classical composers have restricted themselves to using only chords of that particular key. In classical music, it was considered wrong to use any chords that were not found in the same key at once. In the early 1900s, a composer by the name Igor Stravinsky decided that he did not want to follow the theory exactly, he wanted more music freedom. In fact, he was disliked by many people of the time for his radical chord changes and heavy use of dissonance. Rock music on the other hand, is not constrained to any set of guidelines or forms. There are many examples and instances (particularly in songs by The Beach Boys) when the harmonic changes are completely wrong according to classical music theory, yet the song still maintains it charm doesn’t sound wrong or bad to the listener. Basic rock/blues uses a very simple chord progression, I,IV,V, the chords are, in order, the tonic, subdominant and the dominate chords of the scale. They are called chord degrees; the name refers to the chronological order of the notes in a scale. In a typical C major scale, you have the notes, C, D, E, F, G, A, B, in order to build the 3 note chords, or triads, you add a note that is 3 notes away from the first note and 2 notes away from the second note, so the tonic chord (the chord built off of the first note, the tonic) in this case is C, E, G, the subdominant chord, F, B, C and the dominate chord is , G, B, D. Now in better and more advanced rock music such as The Beatles, The Beach Boys and Jimmi Hendrix, they will use chords of other scale degrees and they will even add extensions to the chords which makes for additional harmonic intricacy. And it makes the song much more interesting.

Classical music, as the name implies, is the older music compared to rock. Its earliest forms have sprouted as early as the 9th century and continued to take shape until today. Rock is a relatively newer music genre. It only emerged in popularity in the 1960s although its origin can be traced back as early as the 1940s.

Both forms of music will likely endure for centuries to come. Although rock still has only been around since the 1950s its impact on culture has been unlike any other musical genre. The world has never has been the same since Elvis Presley first came out. Classical music on the other hand has already been around for several hundred years. Unfortunately many younger people disregard classical as old people music and do not appreciate. I find that the culprit for this is that they associate the music with snobby rich people who find that classical is more ‘sophisticated’ than any other form of music. If we didn’t force kids to listen to classical than they may eventually learn to at least respect it, they don’t need to like it, it’s a matter of taste, you should never force your own beliefs/likes on another person, only expose them to it in a natural sort of way.

Summary:

1.Most classical music adheres to a strict set of rules whereas rock is much freer musically

2.Classical music generally is more complicated than rock music (although not always true).

3. Rock is a much younger form of music than classical

4. Both forms of music will withstand time equally as well

5. Finally, both are different branches of the same art form. It is comparable to painters and sculptors, both are forms of visual art yet are different sub form, you cannot say ‘this one’s better’, they’re two separate branches. It comes down to a matter of taste, you either like one or you like them both like me. There are great artists in both rock and classical, you shouldn’t close your world up to one genre only.”