First of all, what the heck is solfege. Its definitely not a common word. Solfege is a series of sounds we use to give names to sound qualities or scale degrees. These names are "Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Ti." Many people know these from the Sound of Music, but they are commonly used to learn music.
One common issue with these sounds is that people just memorize them and sing whatever while saying these random syllables. The intention of these is to associate a certain personality of tone with each note. We don't use "1 2 3 4 5 6 7" because 7 has two syllables and because if the 3 is flatted there isn't a sound to say. In solfege we can say "Do Re Me Fa Sol La Ti" instead (note the Me instead of Mi). Before I go on here is one important note, Europe uses several different syllables and you'd see "Do Re Mi Fa So La Si" instead.
So what does it mean for notes to have "personality?" Well, Do has a distinct homey feeling. It feels like the center of the key. If you sing a song and end on Do it will feel concluded or at home, but if you end on Mi it will seem inconclusive. This is why keys are named after the Do of that key (eg. C major or A minor).
Moral of the story is, when practicing solfege/singing scales be sure to note the personality of each note in the scale and learn how it interacts with the other notes. Don't just sing the solfege at random as there would be no purpose to the syllables in that case. Also, make sure to sing along with a piano or something similar so that you can learn the personalities in tune and not mistakenly learn the wrong personality.
I can go into the exact personalities and the names of these (Do is called the Tonic for example) in a future post as well as the history of solfege, but if you need help figuring these out I would be glad to assist in a private lesson. Sign up here for lessons with me! Otherwise, subscribe to my blog and you'll get notified when the next part of this series comes out!
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