The song is one of the common genres of vocal music, it combines a poetic text with a melody that is easy to remember. Songs can be performed by one performer, as well as a group or choir, with instrumental accompaniment and a cappella.
What is a song?
The most popular genre of vocal music is song. The main genres of songs: folk and composer. Their main difference is that the composer has at least one author, and the folk author does not have it, its creator is the people.
Folk songs are transmitted from the older generation to the younger. They spread throughout the country thanks to roving musicians who replenished their repertoire and moved from city to city, bringing them to different listeners. Ordinary people were not taught to read and write, did not know how to write music and lyrics, so the songs were memorized. Naturally, in different cities they could sing the same work with different words or a melody. In addition, each artist could change the text or motive as he wanted, so in our time you can meet several different options for one song. At first, people sang at weddings, funerals, on the occasion of the birth of a child, during ceremonies. Then people began to sing when they worked, and rested when they were sad, or joyful.
Composer songs appeared around the 16-17th centuries, with the development of secular culture. These are compositions that have at least one specific author and which should be performed as intended by the creator. The songwriting of composers reaches the listener in its original form, even if several centuries have passed since its inception.
Types of Songs
The following song genres exist:
- copyright (or bard);
- Neapolitan;
- hymns;
- folk;
- historical;
- rock ballads;
- variety;
- country;
- romances;
- chanson;
- ditties;
- lullabies;
- children’s;
- combatant.
Both long-established and contemporary genres of songs are listed here. Examples of some of them: “It's great that we all gathered here today” O. Mityaeva (bard); “Oh, frost, frost” (folk); “I remember a wonderful moment” by M. Glinka to the words of A. Pushkin (romance); “Return to Sorrento” by E. de Curtis and J. de Curtis (Neapolitan); “Soldiers, brave children” (combatant) and so on.
Russian folk songs
Folk songs are divided into ritual and non-ritual. Rituals accompany any ritual: wedding, funeral, birth of a child, harvesting, etc. Non-ceremonial - are performed not on a specific occasion, but on gatherings, during conversations and evenings, they are sung for mood, express emotions and experiences of people. The themes of folk songs can be any: love, heavy peasant or recruiting share, historical events or real historical figures ...
Genres of Russian songs:
- Wedding
- recruiting;
- lullabies;
- nursery rhymes;
- petals;
- calendar rituals;
- crying
- yamshchitsky;
- ditties;
- funerary;
- robbers;
- burlatsky;
- lyrical;
- round dance;
- dance;
- chimes.
Ditties, by the way, are not a very ancient genre; they appeared a little over a hundred years ago and sang about love in them. Initially, they were performed only by guys.
The lyric genre of folk songs includes works that express the feelings and moods of those who sing them. Such songs are divided into family and love. They can be different in character, even reckless and rampantly funny. But for the most part, Russian folk lyrics express sadness and longing. Often in lyrics, a person’s mood is compared with natural phenomena.
Folk songs can be performed by a soloist, a group or a choir, accompanied by instruments and a cappella.
Romances
There are such genres of songs, where no less than words and melody, accompaniment is important. This is the kind of romance. This genre originated in Spain in the Middle Ages. The word "romance" called works performed in the Spanish style. Later, all secular songs began to be called. Russian composers wrote romances to verses by Alexander Pushkin, Athos Fet, Mikhail Lermontov and other poets. In our country, this genre was at the peak of popularity in the 19th century. Many
great composers composed romances, the most famous works of this type of song creation belong to M.I. Glinka, P.I. Tchaikovsky, N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov, S.S. Prokofiev, S.V. Rachmaninov,
A. Alyabyev.Bard song
The genres of songs that appeared in the 20th century are pop, chanson, bard song and others. In our country, this type of musical creativity arose in the second half of the 20th century. The bard song is distinguished by the fact that, most often, the author of the text, the composer and performer are one and the same person. That is, the author himself, under his own guitar accompaniment, performs his work. The dominant role in this genre belongs to the text. Initially, these songs were divided into student and tourist, later the theme expanded. Bright representatives of this genre: V. Vysotsky, Yu. Vizbor, B. Okudzhava, S. Nikitin, O. Mityaev, V. Dolina. The performers of such songs were often called "singing poets." In the 50-60s of the 20th century, this genre was called "amateur song", as often bards are not professional composers, poets and singers.