She cried out "O my!" And more stars did she spy Than are seen in the star-spangled banner. -Nonsense Rhymes. The fun in this, too, is in the incongruity of employing for a rhyme-ending what, in a properly written line, would be merely a cæsura-pause: Whene'er with haggard eyes I view This dungeon that I'm rotting in, niversity of Gottingen, niversity of Gottingen. -The University of Gottingen: Geo. Canning. CHAPTER VI. ART-METHODS AS DEVELOPING RHYTHM IN MUSIC. Rhythm an End aside, from its Connection with Words-Music as Developed from Song-Point of Separation between Speech and Song: Poetry and Music-Musical Measures more Complicated than PoeticWays of indicating Musical Notes and Rests-Measures-Longer Divisions Corresponding to Poetic Lines-Developed as in Poetry from the Art-Methods, Parallelism, etc.-The Motive-Its Expressional Import- 75 ance-The Phrase, Section, and Period-Changes in the Period-Unity of Effect as Developed from these Rhythmic Arrangements-Why Higher Works Find Few to Appreciate them-Musical Measures, Like Poetic, Double and Triple-Accent in Musical Measures-Why Poetic Measures Need to be Distinguished in Other Ways than as Double and Triple-Three or Six Notes as used in the Time usually Allotted to Two or Four-Changes of the Places of Accent in the Measures-Possibility of Representing Different Effects of Movement-Typical Forms of Rhythm-General Effect of Musical Rhythm Depends on that of Whole Phrases, Sections, and Periods-Effects of Rhythm very Different from those of Harmony-But the Development of the One has Accompanied that of the Other. VERY slight consideration of rhythm, even as used by the poets, will cause us to recognize that it possesses a charm wholly aside from that of the intelligible words arranged in accordance with its requirements. What else than the effects of the rhythm of mere sound could cause the senseless phrases of so many of "Mother Goose's Melodies" to be so popular with the children? What else than the rhythm of mere sound-the recurrence of like beats at like intervals of time-could cause the satis faction which those of different nations seem to derive from the noises of gongs, drums, castanets, and cymbals? What but this makes the negroes of the South and the settlers of the far West clap their hands and feet in unison, and seem to enjoy doing this, in order to provide what takes the place of music for their dancers? In the very rudest beginnings of this art therefore, even before it has passed into a form in which it can properly be termed music, it is characterized by rhythm. In order to recognize how natural it is that the same should continue to characterize the art after it has been fully developed, let us begin by recalling a few of its fundamental conditions. In Chapters II. and VI. of "Art and Theory," attention was directed to the fact that it is through the use of their own voices and hands that men begin to gain personal experience in that initial act of all the arts, which consists in putting together the sights or sounds of nature. Probably no one disputes this fact as applied to music. "We are justified in assuming," says Helmholtz, in his exhaustive work on "The Sensations of Tone as a Physiological Basis for the Theory of Music," "that historically all music was developed from song. Afterwards the power of producing similar melodic effects was attained by means of other instruments which had a quality of tone compounded in a manner resembling that of the human voice." As music starts with song, it starts with the elements of natural speech. This, as we have found, is composed of syllables differing from one another in duration, force, quality, and pitch. The moment these possible differences begin to be made for their own sakes without reference, or primary reference, to the meanings which they have in words, we are in the realm of music, which art, as it deals with sounds rather than with their linguistic significance, tends to a far more elaborate development of them than is found in poetry. In the latter art, measures have been shown to be a result of grouping about certain syllables, in pronouncing which there is a physiological necessity of using an accent, certain other syllables that need not be accented. As a result of this fact, as also of the fact that each syllable of speech has a definite meaning, and, therefore, must be uttered with sufficient slowness to be definitely heard not only but interpreted to understanding, poetic measures never contain more than two, three, or four separate sounds. But musical notes, even if in song, are produced by a sustained action of the larynx, which does not necessitate anything even resembling the alternating accented and unaccented utterances of speech; and, of course, the absence of the same alternation is still more marked in sounds produced upon musical instruments. Besides this, the meanings of musical sounds are not dependent, as words are, upon their individual formation, but upon their order of sequence, and, therefore, they can be produced with any amount of rapidity consistent with giving a general impression of the fact that they are present. For all the reasons just given, very many more separate sounds can be used in a musical measure than in a poetic; and the manner, too, of using and arranging them can be correspondingly more complicated. Poetic rhythm, in fact, is only a very elementary form of the elaborate developments of it which, when sounds are freed from the limitations of accent and etymology, we find in music. As, however, the underlying principles in both arts are the same, it is not necessary here to trace again the sources of rhythm to the artistic tendencies toward unity, order, comparison, and principality, as modified by variety, confusion, contrast, and subordination, and manifested in the other methods of composition connected with these as arranged in the chart on page 3. As musical rhythm is a development of poetic, it will be sufficient for our purpose, with only an occasional reference to particular methods, to confine our attention to observing the differences in the factors of the two arts which determine the differences in their rhythmical manifestations. In order to accomplish our end, let us begin by recalling-of course in the interest of those only who are ignorant of music-a few familiar facts with reference to musical notation. It may be as well to say too, in passing, that a study of the methods underlying musical rhythm is important in its bearings upon the subject of proportion, as well as in itself. But with reference to music: Its single sounds are called notes. In writing it, these are represented by characters that indicate the length of time in which they are to be sounded. The notes used at present, beginning with the longest, are the whole note sounded, as a rule, in the same time as two half notes as four quarter notes, as eight eight notes, as sixteen sixteenth notes and as thirty-two thirty-second notes. A dot placed after a note lengthens it by just one half. For instance, a whole note dotted () is sounded for the same time as three half notes (PPP). Corresponding to these notes in the length of time given to them, are characters called rests, indicating that the sound should cease where they are placed. These, beginning with the longest, are the whole rest indicating, as a rule, a pause of the same length as two half restsas four quarter rests 2, as eight eight rests, as sixteen sixteenth rests, and as thirty-two thirty-second rests |