musical adjectives projectThank you Gail Fischler for the wonderful music adjectives project link. Most Interesting & Useful. (Ennio A. Paola, Composer / Artistic Director at Significant Music)

A new and highly imaginative way of considering music! I encourage my students to think of descriptive words for the music they are studying. I was inspired to do this largely by the delightful and ever-expanding Musical Adjectives Project. Many students were quite inventive, proving that they had spent some time actually thinking about their music… (The Cross Eyed Pianist, Fran Wilson)

The Musical Adjectives Project was founded in 2010 by Dr. Gail Fischler of Piano Addict together with her students and hosted on Wikispaces. Today, this project continues to be a collaborative effort between musicians from many countries. We collect and categorize descriptive words, characters, and other resources to aid musicians in understanding and depicting the emotions and character within repertoire.

The Musical Adjectives Project is also a wonderful tool for integrating the arts and vocabulary in lesson, classroom, and homeschool settings. The original inspiration was a wonderful reference handout (now dog-eared and very, very faded) by Maurice Hinson which consisted of an entire page full of adjectives. 

How can these descriptives be used?

One way to start out is to simply write words that describe sections or phrases of a piece directly on the score. Start with large sections and then gradually move into finding the character in smaller sections. As each person matures, they will be increasingly able to describe subtle differences between phrases, motives, and repetitions.

I’ve posted before about Gail Fischler’s wonderful Musical Adjectives Project but wanted to highlight it again as I had such a lovely response from a pupil this week. I’d asked Ben to choose adjectives that he felt characterised his exam piece “Ready to Go” by Ben Crosland. What he chose was a real surprise to me! …a great way to talk about how to actually communicate these words in his playing and hear this rather shy pupil express himself. I also realised that I shouldn’t assume my pupils hear things the way I do! (Alison Mathews)

Musicology Duck’s Listen Wider Challenge is a great way to incorporate musical adjectives into the lives of you and your students. How many challenges can you complete? How many challenges can you add?

Here’s a favorite activity from my studio. Each student chooses words to illustrate a mood in which another student must play a scale, arpeggio, progression, short improvisation etc. Warning: imaginative descriptions such as, Playful but never giddy with a mere hint of brooding, may happen. Of course, this activity is loads of fun. On the serious side, not only do students really have to know their musical elements, they must also simultaneously conceive of the sound they want and listen out into the room. 

Enjoy! Check out the ways others are thinking about and using musical adjectives on the Tips & Ideas: Hacking Adjectives & Words page and please share the ways you use the adjectives here at The Musical Adjectives Project. (BTW, a few adverbs, phrases, and other descriptives have come along for the ride but we are not prejudiced and do not discriminate against them) Scroll to the bottom of this page to find out how to contribute words, resources, images, and ideas. 

Have you seen Musical Words, the popular board game based on the descriptives found here at The Musical Adjectives Project?

It’s a fun way to get your students started describing and connecting to musical emotion and character!
• Individual or team play
• Add your own words 

• Great for all instruments, levels & group sizes

• Secret word challenges

• Obstacle & reward cards 

• Play improv style or use recordings

• Perfect for all styles of music
• Laminated for years of fun
• Downloadble format available

Find Out More or Purchase Musical Words Game

How to contribute to The Musical Adjectives Project

We are always glad to hear how pianists and teachers use these descriptives. If you have words, tips, resources, or advice you want to share please click on the Contact tab on Piano Addict . Remember, the images must pertain to a specific work of music. Please submit only one image per piece or movement. Images should be in jpg format with good resolution (width 1500), and no larger than 2.0 MB.

Check out Tips & Ideas: Hacking Adjectives & Words for more super creative ways to use Musical Adjectives and Musical Words: the Board Game in both one-on-one and group settings.

Founded in 2010 by Gail Fischler

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