Critical and Historical Essays - Edward MacDowell (most important books to read txt) 📗

would mean nothing to us in comparison with the expression that accompanied them.

Take away the harmonic structure upon which Wagner built his operas and it would be difficult to form a conception of the marvellous potency of his music. Melody, therefore, may be classed as the gift of folk song to music; and harmony is its shadow language. When these two powers, melody and harmony, supplement each other, when one completes the thought of the other, then, provided the thought be a noble one, the effect will be overwhelmingly convincing, and we have great music. The contrary results when one contradicts the other, and that is only too often the case; for we hear the mildest waltzes dressed up in tragic and dramatic chords, which, like Bottom, "roar as gently as any sucking dove."

In discussing the origin of speech, mention was made of those shadow languages which accompany all our spoken words, namely, the languages of expression and gesture. These were surely the very first auxiliaries of uttered speech, and in the same way we find that they constitute the first sign of advance in primitive melody. Savages utter the same thought over and over again, evidently groping after that semblance of Nirvana (or perhaps it may be better described as "hypnotic exaltation") which the incessant repetition of that one thought, accompanied by its vibrating shadow, sound, would naturally occasion.

It was also stated that the relative antiquity or primitivity of a melody is invariably to be discovered by its degree of relationship to the original type, one note, one rhythm, the emotional, the savage howl, or, in other words, the high note followed by a gradual descent. To confirm this theory of the origin of folk song, we need only look at the aboriginal chants of widely separated peoples to find that the oldest songs all resemble one another, despite the fact that they originated in widely separated localities.

Now the difference between this primitive music and that which we call folk song is that the latter is characterized by a feeling for design, in the broadest sense of the word, entirely lacking in the former. For we find that although folk song is composed of the same material as savage music, the material is arranged coherently into sentences instead of remaining the mere exclamation of passion or a nerve exciting reiteration of unchanging rhythms and vibrations, as is the case in the music of the savage.

Before proceeding further, I wish to draw the line which separates savage from folk music very plainly.

We know that the first stage in savage music is that of one note. Gradually a tone above the original is added on account of the savage being unable to intone correctly; through stress of emotion the fifth and octave come into the chant; the sixth, being the note above the fifth, is added later, as is the third, the note above the second. Thus is formed the pentatonic scale as it is found all over the world, and it is clear, therefore, that the development of the scale is due to emotional influences.

The development of rhythm may be traced to the words sung or declaimed, and the development of design or form to the dance. In the following, from Brazil, we find a savage chant in almost its primitive state:

[Figure 15] etc.

The next example, also from Brazil, is somewhat better, but still formless and unemotional.

[Figure 16] etc.

Let this be danced to, however, and the change is very marked, for immediately form, regularity, and design are noticeable:

[Figure 17] etc.

On the other hand, the emotional element marks another very decided change, namely, by placing more sounds at the command of the singer, and also by introducing words, which necessarily invest the song with the rhythm of language.

Thus the emotional and declamatory elements heighten the powers of expression by the greater range given to the voice, and add the poignancy and rhythm of speech to song. On the other hand, the dance gives regularity to the rhythmic and emotional sequences.

In the following examples we can see more clearly the elements of folk song as they exist in savage music:

Three or four note (simple)

South America [Figure 18]
Nubia [Figure 19]

Emotional (simple)

Samoa [Figure 20]

Emotional and Composite

Hudson's Bay [Figure 21]
Soudan [Figure 22]

Howl and Emotion

[Figure 23]

Dance. Brazil
[Figure 24]
Simple [Figure 25] or
Dance [Figure 26]

The fact that so many nations have the pentatonic or five-note scale (the Chinese, Basque, Scotch, Hindu, etc.), would seem to point to a necessary similarity of their music. This, however, is not the case. In tracing the differences we shall find that true folk song has but few marked national traits, it is something which comes from the heart; whereas nationalism in music is an outward garment which is a result of certain habits of thought, a mannerism of language so to speak. If we look at the music of different nations we find certain characteristics; divest the music of these same characteristics and we find that the figure upon which this garment of nationalism has been placed is much the same the world over, and that its relationship to the universal language of savage music is very marked. Carmen's song, divested of the mixture of triplets and dual rhythms (Spanish or Moorish) is akin to the "howl."

Nationalism may be divided into six different classes:

First we have what may be broadly termed "orientalism," which includes the Hindu, Moorish, Siamese, and Gypsy, the latter embracing most of southeastern European (Roumania, etc.) types. Liszt's "Second Rhapsody," opening section, divested of orientalism or gypsy characteristics, is merely of the savage three-note type.

Our second division may be termed the style of reiteration, and is to be found in Russia and northern Europe.

The third consists of the mannerism known as the "Scotch snap," and is a rhythmic device which probably originated in that trick of jumping from one register of the voice to another, which has always had a fascination for people of simple natures. The Swiss jodel is the best illustration of this in a very exaggerated form.

The fourth consists of a seemingly capricious intermixture of dual and triple rhythm, and is especially noticeable in Spanish and Portuguese music as well as in that of their South American descendants. This distinction, however, may be traced directly back to the Moors. For in their wonderful designs we continually see the curved line woven in with the straight, the circle with the square, the tempus perfectum with the spondee. This would bring this characteristic directly under the head of orientalism or ornamental development. Yet the peculiarity is so marked that it seems to call for separate consideration.

The fifth type, like the fourth, is open to the objection that it is merely a phase of the oriental type. It consists of the incessant use of the augmented second and diminished third, a distinctively Arabian characteristic, and is to be found in Egypt, also, strange to say, occasionally among our own North American Indians. This, however, is not to be wondered at, considering that we know nothing of their ancestry. Only now and then on that broad sea of mystery do we see a half submerged rock, which gives rise to all sorts of conjectures; for example, the custom of the Jutes to wear green robes and use fans in certain dances, the finding in the heart of America of such an Arab tune as this:

[Figure 27]

or such a Russian tune as this:

[Figure 28]

The last type of nationalism in folk song is almost a negative quality, its distinguishing mark being mere simplicity, a simplicity which is affected, or possibly assimilated, by the writer of such a song; for German folk song proper is a made thing, springing not from the people, but from the many composers, both ancient and modern, who have tried their hands in that direction.

While this of course takes nationalism out of the composition of German folk song so-called, the latter has undoubtedly gained immensely by it; for by thus divesting music of all its national mannerisms, it has left the thought itself untroubled by quirks and turns and a restricted musical scale; it has allowed this thought to shine out in all its own essential beauty, and thus, in this so-called German folk song, the greatest effects of poignancy are often reached through absolute simplicity and directness.

Now let us take six folk songs and trace first their national characteristics, and after that their scheme of design, for it is by the latter that the vital principle, so to speak, of a melody is to be recognized, all else being merely external, costumes of the different countries in which they were born. And we shall see that a melody or thought born among one people will change its costume when it migrates to another country.

Arab Song

[Figure 29]

Scheme [Figure 29a]

Russia-Reiteration

[Figure 30]

[Figure 31]

Red Sarafan

[Figure 32]

Scotch

[Figure 33]

[Figure 34]

Irish-Emotional in character, with greater perfection in design

[Figure 35]

Spanish

[Figure 36]

Egyptian

[Figure 37] (Note augmented intervals)

The characteristics of German and English folk songs may be observed in the familiar airs of these nations.

The epitome of folk song, divested of nationalism, is shown in the following:

[Figure 38]


[12] The antiquity of any melody (or its primitiveness) may
be established according to its rhythmic and melodic
or human attributes.


XII

THE TROUBADOURS, MINNESINGERS AND MASTERSINGERS


Although wandering minstrels or bards have existed since the world began, and although the poetry they have left is often suggestive, the music to which the words were sung is but little known.

About 700-800 A.D., when all Europe was in a state of dense ignorance and mental degradation, the Arabs were the embodiment of culture and science, and the Arab empire extended at that time over India, Persia, Arabia, Egypt (including Algeria and Barbary), Portugal, and the Spanish caliphates, Andalusia, Granada, etc. The descriptions of the splendour at the courts of the Eastern caliphs at Bagdad seem almost incredible.

For instance, the Caliph Mahdi is said to have expended six millions of dinars of gold in a single pilgrimage to Mecca. His grandson, Almamon, gave in alms, on one single occasion, two and a half millions of gold pieces, and the rooms in his palace at Bagdad were hung with thirty-eight thousand pieces of tapestry, over twelve thousand of which were of silk embroidered with gold. The floor carpets were more than twenty thousand in number, and the Greek ambassador was shown a hundred lions, each with his keeper, as a sign of the king's royalty, as well