In music, a drone is a harmonic or monophonic effect or accompaniment where a note or chord is continuously sounded throughout much or all of a piece, sustained or repeated, and most often establishing a tonality upon which the rest of the piece is built. In Western music, harmony is the use of different pitches simultaneously and chords actual or implied in Music. In Music, monophony is the simplest of textures, consisting of Melody without accompanying Harmony. In Music, accompaniment is the art of playing along with a soloist or ensemble, often known as the Lead, in a Supporting manner In Music, the term note has two primary meanings 1 a sign used in Musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a Sound; This article describes musical chords in traditional Western styles Sustain is a Parameter of Musical Sound in Time. As its name may imply it denotes the period of time during which the sound is sustained before Tonality is a system of Music in which specific hierarchical pitch relationships are based on a key "center" or tonic. The systematic (not occasional) use of drones originated in Ancient Southwest Asia and spread north and west to Europe, east to India, and south to Africa (van der Merwe 1989, p. The Ancient Near East refers to early Civilizations within a region roughly corresponding to the modern Middle East: Mesopotamia (modern Iraq 11). It is used in Indian music and is played by the tambura. The tambura ( Hindi: तानपूरा is a type of Stringed instrument found in different versions in different places around the world most are plucked

Musical instruments

Highland bagpipes, with drone pipes over the pipers' left shoulders

Similarly, a drone is the name of the part of a musical instrument intended to produce such a sustained pitch, generally without the ongoing attention of the player. A musical instrument is a device constructed or modified for the purpose of making Music. Pitch represents the perceived Fundamental frequency of a sound A sitar features three or four resonating drone strings and Indian sargam is practiced to a drone. The sitar ( Hindi: सितार Urdu: ستار Persian: سی تار) is a Plucked stringed instrument. for the town in Nepal see Swara Nepal The notes or swaras, of Indian music are shadja rishabh gandhar madhyam pancham dhaivat and nishad Bagpipes (like the Great Highland Bagpipe and the Uilleann pipes) feature a number of drone pipes, giving the instruments their characteristic sounds. The Great Highland Bagpipe ( Gaelic: A' Phìob Mhòr) is probably the best-known variety of Bagpipe. A hurdy-gurdy has one or more drone strings. A hurdy gurdy (also known as a wheel fiddle) is a stringed Musical instrument in which the strings are sounded by means of a Rosined wheel which the strings The fifth string on a five-string banjo is a drone string with a separate tuning peg that places the end of the string five frets down the neck of the instrument; this string is usually tuned to the same note as that which the first string produces when played at the fifth fret, and the drone string is seldom fretted. The banjo is a Stringed instrument developed by enslaved Africans in the United States, adapted from several African instruments The bass strings of the Slovenian drone zither also freely resonate as a drone. Slovenia, officially the Republic of Slovenia (Republika Slovenija) is a Country in southern Central Europe bordering Italy to the west Drone zither (in Slovenian bordunske citre, pl is a Slovenian type of Zither.

Musical compositions

Composers of classical music occasionally used a drone (especially one on open fifths) to evoke a rustic or archaic atmosphere, perhaps echoing that of Scottish or other early or folk music. Classical music is a broad term that usually refers to mainstream music produced in or rooted in the traditions of Western liturgical and Secular music Early music is commonly defined as European classical music from the Middle Ages, the Renaissance and the Baroque. Folk music can have a number of different meanings including Traditional music: The original meaning of the term "folk music" was synonymous Examples include:

• Haydn, Symphony No. 104, "London", opening of finale, accompanying a folk melody
• Beethoven, Symphony No. 6, "Pastoral", opening and trio section of scherzo
• Berlioz, Harold in Italy, accompanying oboes as they imitate the pifferi of Italian peasants
• Bartók, in his adaptations for piano of Hungarian and other folk music

However, drones are less often used in common practice classical music because the longer and more central a drone the less functional it is and because equal temperament causes slight mistunings which become more apparent over a drone, especially when also sustained. The Symphony No 104 in D major (Hoboken 1/104 is Joseph Haydn 's final symphony Ludwig van Beethoven ( English ˈlʊdvɪg væn ˈbeɪtoʊvən, 16 December 1770 &ndash 26 March 1827 was a German Composer and Pianist. Harold en Italie (English Harold in Italy Symphony with Viola obbligato) Op Béla Viktor János Bartók (March 25 1881&ndashSeptember 26 1945 was a Hungarian Composer and Pianist, considered to be one of the greatest The common practice period, in the history of European Art music (broadly called Classical music) spanning the Baroque, Classical, and A diatonic function, in tonal Music theory, is the specific recognized Roles of Notes or chords in relation to the key. Equal temperament is a Musical temperament, or a system of tuning in which every pair of adjacent notes has an identical Frequency ratio. In Music, there are two common meanings for tuning: Tuning practice, the act of tuning an instrument or voice On the other hand, drones may be purposely dissonant, as often found in the music of Phill Niblock. Phill Niblock (born 2 October 1933, in Anderson Indiana) is a Composer, Filmmaker, Videographer The best known drone piece in the concert repertory is the Prelude to Wagner's Rheingold (1854) wherein the bass instruments sustain an Eb throughout the entire movement (Erickson 1975, p. Das Rheingold ("The Rhine Gold" is the first of the four operas that comprise Der Ring des Nibelungen ( The Ring of the Nibelung) by Richard Wagner 94). Later drone pieces include Loren Rush's Hard Music (1970), Folke Rabe's Was?? (1968), and Robert Erickson's Down at Piraeus. Loren Rush (born August 23 1935) is a US Composer. His works include the drone piece Hard Music (1970 for three amplified Year 1970 ( MCMLXX) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link shows full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Folke Rabe (born 28 October 1935 in Stockholm Sweden) is a Swedish Composer. Year 1968 ( MCMLXVIII) was a Leap year starting on Monday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Robert Erickson ( March 7, 1917 in Marquette Michigan &ndash April 24, 1997 in San Diego California) was an American composer

Contemporary classical musicians who make prominent use of drones, often with just or other non-equal tempered tunings, include La Monte Young and many of his students, David First, the band Coil, Pauline Oliveros and Stuart Dempster, Alvin Lucier (Music On A Long Thin Wire), Ellen Fullman, and Arnold Dreyblatt. La Monte Thornton Young (born October 14 1935) is an American Composer and musician David First (born August 20, 1953) is an American Composer. His music most often deals with drones and interference beats the latter aligning Pauline Oliveros (born May 30, 1932 in Houston Texas) is an Accordionist and Composer who currently resides in Kingston New Stuart Dempster (born July 7, 1936 in Berkeley California) is a Trombonist, Didjeridu player improvisor Composer, author Alvin Lucier (born May 14, 1931) is an American Composer of Experimental music and Sound installations that explore acoustic phenomena Music On A Long Thin Wire is a musical piece by Alvin Lucier conceived in 1977 Ellen Fullman (b Memphis, Tennessee, 1957 is a Composer. Known principally for music she has written for an instrument she invented the Long string Arnold Dreyblatt (b New York City, 1953 is an American Composer and visual artist The music of Italian composer Giacinto Scelsi is essentially drone-based. Italy (Italia officially the Italian Republic, (Repubblica Italiana is located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe, and on the two largest Giacinto Scelsi (ʤaˈʧinto ˈʃelsi Count of Ayala Valva ( La Spezia, January 8, 1905 – Rome, August 9, Shorter drones or the general concept of a continuous element are often used by many other composers.

A drone differs from a pedal tone or point in degree or quality. In tonal music, a pedal point (also pedal tone pedal note organ point or pedal is a Sustained tone typically in the bass, during which at least one A pedal point may be a form of nonchord tone and thus required to resolve unlike a drone, or a pedal point may simply be considered a shorter drone, a drone being a longer pedal point. A nonchord tone, nonharmonic tone, or non-harmony note is a note in a piece of Music which is not a part of the chord that is formed Resolution in western tonal Music theory is the "need" for a sounded Note and/or chord to move from a dissonance (an unstable sound

See also

• Drone music or "dronology" or "drone": a post-classical popular music genre with heavy emphasis on the drone harmonic effect. Drone music, also known as drone-based music, drone ambient or ambient drone, dronescape or dronology, and sometimes simply A music genre is a categorical and typological construct that identifies musical sounds as belonging to a particular category and type of music that can be distinguished from other
• Drone doom is a form of heavy metal music with basic song structures focusing almost entirely on droning, heavily downtuned electric guitar and bass guitar, often lacking vocals or drums. An electric guitar is a type of Guitar that uses pickups to convert the vibration of its steel-cored strings into an electrical current which is made louder The electric bass guitar (also called electric bass, or simply bass; ˈbeɪs as in "base" is a Stringed instrument played primarily with the Songs often reach or greatly exceed ten minutes in length.

Source

• Erickson, Robert (1975). Sound Structure in Music. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-02376-5.
• van der Merwe, Peter (1989). Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-316121-4.