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The Purpose of Solfege #1: Melodic Mnemonics
“What precisely is the purpose of solfege?” Solfege has an important role in music education, allowing vocalists to develop sight singing skills. A solfege syllable acts as a mnemonic device to help you sight read sheet music. Read more to learn why they invented solfege and how the syllables work.
This post uses musical terms. For definitions, see the Glossary at the end of the article.
The Purpose of Solfege #2: How the Syllables Work
“What precisely is the purpose of solfege?” It’s all about sight singing:
- The Benedictine monk Guido d’Arezzo invented solfege in the 11th-century to help his monks sing chants they’d never heard before.
- He wrote a hymn, Ut Queant Laxis, to help his singers remember the sound of the notes in the scale.
- Then, he used a four-line, graph-like staff to help them track the notes.
Each phrase of the hymn starts on the next higher note of the scale.
- The first phrase starts on the note C and has the Latin word Ut.
- The syllable Re from the word Resonare has the note D.
- Mi from Mira has E.
- Fa from Famuli has F.
- Sol from Solve has G.
- La from Labii has A.
- Later Do replaced Ut and Ti was added.
This gives us: Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Ti (or Si), Do.
Basically, if you want to sight sing, you do it with solfege.
- You memorize a song (such as Do, Re, Mi) as a sound model to help you imagine what the scale notes should sound like.
- As the notes go from line to space up or down the staff, you’ll switch from one solfege syllable to the next.
- However, it gets tricky when you’re figuring out what key you’re in, or when you need to sing sharp/flat notes. Why? Because this impacts what syllables you’ll sing.
For a practical example of singing with solfege using shape notes:
For information on sight singing standard notation:
Mobile users: for best results reading the music in the video, tilt your screen 90o to the right.
Video: Ut Queant Laxis the Source of Solfege
The Purpose of Solfege #3: Summary
Here’s some final thoughts on What Precisely Is the Purpose of Solfege?
- Solfege is a system that’ll help you turn notation into music.
- That’s its primary purpose, but that’s not all it can do.
- It can also help train your ear to hear melodic intervals.
Have fun singing!
Related Posts
- Is There a Better Way to Learn Sight Singing?
- Can I Learn Sight-Singing if I Haven’t Learned an Instrument?
- Is Singing Solfege Helpful for Learning to Hear Intervals by Ear?
© 2023 Geoffrey Keith
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