What is "Voicing" In Music and at the Piano?
Introduction
The words “voice” and “voicing” are used in many different ways in music. Here are some examples.
A Voice in music can refer to an independent melody or melodic line in a musical texture.
Voicing is a term sometimes used by pianists to describe the dynamics (the different volume levels) of different voices in a musical texture.
A Chord Voicing is the way that the notes of a chord are arranged or spelled.
Voicing can also refer to the process by which a piano tuner or piano technician works on the piano’s hammers.
In saxophone playing, Voicing can refer to the way that the player shapes the sound of each individual note.
Each of these examples is discussed in further detail in the sections below.
A Voice as an Independent Melody
The term Voice is often used to describe an individual melody when one or more additional melodies are present in the musical texture. Think of a choral group with a few singers, each using their own voice to sing an individual melody. Such textures are referred to as Contrapuntal or involving the use of Counterpoint. As Walter Piston wrote in his book on the subject, “[t]he art of Counterpoint is the art of combining melodic lines.” [n.1]
Thus, music can be written in Two-Voice Counterpoint, Three-Voice Counterpoint, etc., depending on how many independent melodies are involved. Sometimes, this type of structure is called Two-Part Counterpoint, or Three-Part Counterpoint, etc. Similarly, Four-Part Harmony has four voices or melodic parts. These voices are called, from high to low, Soprano, Alto, Tenor, and Bass. Even outside of strict four-part harmony, the lowest melody in many kinds of music is often referred to as “the bass” or “in the bass,” which is a sort of shorthand for talking about the Bass voice. Interestingly, in one of the most important historical books on the subject of Counterpoint, J. J. Fux wrote, “in earlier times, instead of our modern notes, dots or points were used. Thus one used to call a composition in which point was set against or counter to point, counterpoint; this usage is still followed today, even though the form of the notes has changed.” [n.2]
Voicing as Working with Different Dynamic Levels
When pianists talk about Chord Voicing, Voicing Chords, or Voicing a Melody, they are talking about working with the dynamics or volume of individual notes or melodies in a musical texture. When someone says, for example, to “voice the melody,” they mean to play it louder, so that it stands out relative to the other aspects of the musical texture. When someone says to “voice the chords,” they mean to play one or more notes in the chords louder than the others for some musical purpose, such as accentuating a melodic line present somewhere in the chords.
Learning to “voice” when you are playing the piano is a real art. It takes a lot of practice to get it right, but it’s worth the effort. It also requires a good instrument, and in the case of an acoustic piano, one that’s well maintained. Being able to control the relative volumes of different parts of a musical texture at the piano is one of the skills you will need to bring music to life and make it sound really beautiful and artistic.
The basic mechanics of controlling the volume of a note are relatively straightforward. If you depress piano keys quickly, the hammers will be propelled to the strings quickly and produce loud sounds. If you depress piano keys slowly, the hammers will be propelled to the strings slowly and produce quiet sounds.
The more difficult part is learning how to use your body, arms, hands, and fingers to produce just the right volume at the right time and in the right voice in the musical texture. This is something that comes with a lot of practice!
Chord Voicing in Piano and Jazz
When Voicing is used as a noun, such as in A Voicing or A Chord Voicing, it has another meaning. In this case, it refers to the way that the notes of a chord are arranged or spelled. In other words, a C major chord can be voiced as C on the bottom, E in the middle, and G on top. Or, it could be voiced as E on the bottom, G in the middle, and C on top. Both of these different voicings give you a c major chord, but they each have a different structure and sound a bit different.
Voicing Your Piano: Adjusting Your Piano Hammers
The term Voicing is also used to refer to the process of working with Piano Hammers. Piano Hammers are part of the piano’s Action.
The Action is the mechanism inside the piano that operates to produce a sound when a key is depressed. When a key is depressed with sufficient speed and force, the hammer for that key is propelled to strike the relevant piano strings. The hammer has a head and stem (called a shank). The head is covered in felt, so as to produce a beautiful tone when the string is struck.
A skilled piano tuner or technician can use tools such as Voicing Needles to soften and shape each individual hammer to adjust the sound produced when the piano hammers hit the piano strings. The way an individual note sounds is called the Timbre or Tone Color of that note. For example, a trumpet and a violin playing the same note will sound very different. They will have very different Timbres. Similarly, different pianos or guitars playing the same note or notes can also sound different from each other, although the difference will be less pronounced than with different kinds of instruments.
Voicing in Saxophone Playing
By altering the shape and position of their tongue, mouth, and throat, a saxophone player can also shape the Tone Color or Timbre produced by their instrument. As with voicing the relative volumes of notes played at the same time on the piano, voicing the Tone Color of each individual note on the saxophone is a real art that takes a lot of time and practice to learn.
Reflections
To me, it seems likely that we use the words Voice and Voicing so readily in music because it’s something that we are all very familiar with as human beings. We learn to use our voice very early in life when we first cry as a baby and later learn to speak and perhaps even sing. Similarly, it seems likely to me that one of the earliest forms of music was singing, as the instrument is already present in us, and doesn’t require any technology or tools to build, like a guitar or a piano.
If you’d like to learn more about music theory, how to voice chords, or piano lessons in Westchester, NY, please get in touch at your earliest convenience. I’d be happy to work with you.
Footnotes
[1] Counterpoint, by Walter Piston, Norton 1947, p. 9.
[2] The Study of Counterpoint, from Johan Joseph Fux’s Gradus Ad Parnassum, Norton 1965, pp. 22-23.