CHROMATIC (Gr. xpcoµaruc6s, coloured, from xpwµa,

See also:

• COLOUR (Lat. color, connected with celare, to hide, the root meaning, therefore, being that of a covering)

colour)  , a term meaning " coloured," chiefly used in science, particularly in the expression " chromatic aberration " or " dispersion " (see ABERRATION) . In Greek music Xpa.waru o) µovoaai was one of three divisions—diatonic, chromatic and enharmonic—of the tetrachord . Like the Latin color, Xp6 a was often used of ornaments and embellishments, and particularly of the modification of the three genera of the tetrachord . The chromatic, being subject to three such modifications, was regarded as particularly " coloured." To the Greeks chromatic music was sweet and plaintive . From a supposed resemblance to the notes of the chromatic tetrachord, the term is applied to a succession of notes outside the diatonic scale, and marked by accidentals . A " chromatic scale " is thus a series of semi-tones, and is commonly written with sharps in ascending and flats descending . The most correct method is to write such accidentals as do not involve a change of key .