Whatever the length or style of a composition, it will show the principles of repetition and contrast, and unity and variation. One formal practice linked to repetition that is found throughout the world is call and response, or responsorial music. This style is based on a social structure that recognizes a singing leader who is imitated by a chorus of followers. This is commonly found in non-Western music such as African, Native American and African-American. The Gregorian chant is an example from early Western church music.
Another widely used structural procedure linked to repetition is ostinato. This is a short pattern, melodic, rhythmic, or harmonic that is repeated throughout a work or a major section of a composition.
A movement is a complete, comparatively independent division of a large-scale work of music. Just as a novel binds together the individual words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs, chapters, and parts, a work of music binds together the individual tones within a phrase, the phrases within a section, the sections within a movement, and the movements within the work as a whole.
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