While rhetoric can take many forms in music, it is most commonly seen as a method of selecting melodies, rhythms, and lyrics that are pleasing to the ear. Composers who use rhetoric in music aim to align speech rhetorical principles with the techniques used to create good-sounding music in general. Rhetoric is primarily defined as the art of orchestrating persuasion through speech. Music, like speech, is an auditory experience with a chronological timeline, which has prompted many composers to experiment with the application of spoken art in music employing similar rhetoric.
The arrangement of words in lyrics, as well as how they are said or sung, all contribute to the vocal style of a song. The use of speech rhetoric in lyrics has obvious applications, as it can be used to create the song’s words and phrases. Some singing styles, such as Gregorian chant, have specific rhetorical rules that help define the genre’s vocal style.
Counterpoint is a system for composing baroque music that uses note relationships to determine which notes would fit well into the sequence. Composing with counterpoint can be done in a variety of ways. This composition technique, like speech rhetoric in music, assigns a method to achieving a convincing end result.
In composition and improvisational jazz, rhetorical modes like paraprosdokian, which is an unexpected way of ending a musical or spoken phrase, and tautology, which is an idea that is repeated in a new sentence, can be useful. In addition to composition, music rhetoric can aid in the analysis of a piece. Comparing the melodic line arrangements in an improvisational solo can help you figure out what makes a solo enjoyable to listen to. Though rhetoric is commonly thought of as an overly dramatic, manipulative use of language to make a point, it is actually the study of written and spoken composition techniques that can lead a writer to a more effective, interesting, and convincing composition.
Famous philosophers and speakers like Aristotle have theorized that rhetorical principles can be used to compose a convincing speech since the dawn of human society. Many people consider rhetoric to be an art form, because the modes of rhetoric can still result in unreadable writing and must only be used in ways that improve the composition. Though there is little evidence that applying rhetorical principles to music results in a good composition, selective application of rhetoric to music can be an effective creative or brainstorming exercise with pleasing results.