A musical question tends to feel unfinished. A musical answer responds and usually sounds more settled.
Each section below is labeled with the target it teaches. The questions and your Noteflight task practice every target.
Communicator · Thinker — Thinking: shape musical ideas that create tension and resolution, like a conversation in sound.
Use what you're learning to complete the Noteflight task below, then check your own work before moving on.
Inquiry: What has to change between a musical question and its answer for the answer to sound resolved?
Reflect: What did “Question & Answer” teach you about your own composing choices?
In Lesson 1 you heard phrases end open or closed. In Lesson 2 you heard one idea answer another. A question and answer combines the two: a phrase that ends unfinished, followed by a phrase that responds and settles. The question leaves tension; the answer brings resolution. The core skill is comparing two endings side by side and deciding which sounds more unfinished and which more settled, then saying why.
You analyzed these phrases one at a time in Lesson 1. Heard back to back, they work as a question and its answer. The question pauses on G, a held note away from home, and the listener waits. The answer uses exactly the same rhythm but steps down F–E–D–C and holds the home tone, which settles what the question left open. With rhythm identical, the comparison comes down to where each phrase ends and how it gets there.
An answer has to sound like a reply to this question, not a new melody that happens to end on C. The most common way to do that: the answer begins by reusing the question’s opening, so the listener recognizes it, then changes its second half to steer toward home. How much to reuse is a decision. Beethoven reuses three of the four measures in “Ode to Joy” (see the worked analysis below); your task in this lesson reuses the first half and changes the second half. The four original examples below show one question and three possible replies.
Four measures that rise to an apex on high C in m. 2, come back down to D, and then climb D–E–F–G to a held G. The ending is away from home and arrives by rising, so the phrase sounds unfinished.
Measures 1–2 repeat the question exactly. Measures 3–4 (orange) are new: they descend by step from A all the way to C and hold it. The listener hears the same opening, recognizes the reply, and then hears it settle.
Copying the whole question produces the same open ending on G a second time. The listener hears the question asked twice, and the tension is still there. An answer must change something, and the ending is what matters most.
This phrase ends on a held C, so it sounds resolved on its own. But it shares nothing with the question: different opening, different contour. It sounds like the start of another tune rather than a reply.
Once the answer changes its ending, three tools decide how resolved it sounds. You have met all three before; here they work together. In each example below, measure 1 shows a weaker ending and measure 2 shows a stronger one. The strongest answers use all three tools at once.
Ending on the home tone is the strongest single tool. Both endings here have the same rhythm and shape; only the final pitch differs. E sounds like a pause; C sounds like arrival.
Reaching C is not enough if the melody does not stay there. In measure 1, C is a quarter note like every other note, so it passes by. In measure 2, C is held for two beats, the longest note, and the phrase lands.
Rising into an ending tends to sound lifted and open; falling into it, especially stepping down to home, sounds like settling. This is a tendency, not a rule: the question in “Ode to Joy” falls to D and still sounds open, because D is not home.
In Unit 1 you compared these two endings. Now hear the two phrases as a complete question and answer. Orange marks the only measure that changes.
| Feature | Question (mm. 1–4) | Answer (mm. 5–8) |
|---|---|---|
| Opening | E–E–F–G, up to the apex and back | Mm. 5–7 reuse mm. 1–3 exactly |
| Home tone | Ends on D, one step above home | Ends on C, the home tone |
| Note length | Dotted rhythm into a half note | Same rhythm, same half note |
| Direction | E–D: steps down, but stops short of home | D–C: steps down into home |
| Effect | Unfinished: leaves tension | Settled: resolution |
Model description: Beethoven’s answer reuses the first three measures of the question exactly, so the listener hears it as a reply to the same idea. Only the last measure changes. The question’s dotted rhythm stops on D, one step above home, which leaves tension. The answer keeps the same rhythm and note lengths but moves the last two notes down a step, so the melody falls D–C into the home tone and holds it. Because the rhythm is identical, the home tone and the downward step alone create the resolution.
Notice what the description does: it names what the answer reuses, what it changes, and which tools (home tone, note length, direction) make it sound resolved. Your task asks you to change two measures instead of one, which gives you more room to steer toward home.
Pick an answer for each question. You will see right away whether you are correct and why.
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1Play both endings. Which sounds more settled?
2Listen only. Is this phrase a question or an answer?
3Here is a question. Play both phrases. Which is an answer that reuses part of the question but changes its ending?
4This answer touches C but does not settle there. Which single change would make it sound most resolved?
5A question ends by rising E–F–G to a held G. Which answer ending uses all three resolution tools?
6Listen, then choose which phrase you heard.
Write a question, copy it, and rebuild its second half into an answer. Keeping the first half identical makes the answer sound related; changing the second half makes it resolve.
Write a 4-measure question. Copy it, then change the second half so the new phrase sounds like an answer.
End away from C (G or D work well) on a held note, so the phrase sounds unfinished.
Copy the first two measures of your question exactly.
Change the second half: head toward C, step down into it, and hold it.
Play the question, then the answer, without looking. Which ending sounds more settled? If you can’t tell, the answer’s ending needs to change more.
Check the three tools in mm. 7–8: ends on C, the final note is the longest, and it is approached by a downward step.
Write 2 sentences, modeled on the “Ode to Joy” description, naming what your answer reuses and what it changes.
To copy your question, select mm. 1–4 and copy (⌘ C on a Mac, Ctrl C on Windows or a Chromebook). Click m. 5 and paste (⌘ V / Ctrl V). Then rewrite mm. 7–8.
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Finish the Noteflight work above, then mark this lesson done when you finish.