serialism means music, especially from the 20th century, in which themes are based on a definite order of notes of an equal-tempered scale. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 90 out of 100.
Why this word is great
SERIALISM — [Noun] A method of musical composition that structures a piece around a fixed, ordered series of fundamental musical elements. From serial (relating to a series) + -ism (denoting a practice or system). Calque of the German Reihenmusik ("row music"). Unlike "atonality," which broadly describes the absence of a tonal center, or the "twelve-tone technique," which specifically orders pitches, serialism is a generative, ascetic logic, extending its organizing principle to rhythm, dynamics, and timbre. It is the sound of intellect imposing its own severe order: the cold, glassy inversion of a tone row, the brutalist architecture of a preordained rhythmic sequence, the grid-like parsing of time into pure duration. This is the ultimate, melancholic faith in system over intuition, a universe where every possible chaos has been methodically foreclosed.
noun
- Music, especially from the 20th century, in which themes are based on a definite order of notes of an equal-tempered scale.