Home › Glossary › Letter S

Song cycle

Form
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A group of individually complete songs designed to be performed in sequence, often unified by a common theme or story

Detailed Definition
A song cycle is a thematically unified series of poems or lyrics intended to be performed as a cohesive musical and narrative whole, often tracing emotional or biographical arcs; exemplified by Schubert’s settings of Müller, it merges poetic sequence with musical development.
Example
Example in poetry:
Schubert’s Winterreise; Schumann’s Dichterliebe; Britten’s Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings; Joni Mitchell’s Blue album as a modern song cycle
Additional Notes
Song cycle: A group of songs or poems intended to be performed or read as a unified sequence, often telling a story or exploring a theme; musical counterpart to verse sequence (10097).
Also Known As
Liederkreis Thematic song sequence Narrative vocal suite Musical poetic cycle Lyric sequence
Skip to main content