motivic

American  

[moh-tiv-ik] / moʊˈtɪv ɪk /

adjective

Music.

1. of or relating to a motif.

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Example Sentences

But before long, Wollschleger’s piece works a gorgeous changeup by allowing its more striated tones to flower into full motivic passages, beautiful on their own terms even as the overall harmonic world remains somber.

From New York Times • Mar. 12, 2023

Rogister’s steering of the music’s violent weather had me loosening my tie, and his finely attuned management of its mess of motivic gestures and granular details was superb.

From Washington Post • Oct. 30, 2022

It's minimalism, but Bärtsch has always stretched the method beyond the minutiae of rhythmic and motivic changes to a more robust approach, informed by funk and soul.

From The Guardian • Dec. 16, 2010

In Voevodsky’s motivic homotopy theory, familiar classical geometry was replaced by homotopy theory — a branch of topology in which a line may shrink all the way down to a point.

From Nature

Glass generally is lumped with Composers Steve Reich and Terry Riley in the minimalist camp because of his simple melodies and his dependence on repetition instead of traditional motivic development.

From Time Magazine Archive