Lessons in Music Form | Page 8

and bass voices. In a duet, unaccompanied, there are two melodic lines; if accompanied, other melodic lines are added to these. Thus we recognize the same system of associated lines in music as in architecture or drawing. Very rarely indeed does one single unbroken line portray a complete image.
But in music, as in drawing, the lines differ in their degrees of importance and prominence; and, very commonly, one line over-shadows all, or nearly all the rest. This strongest tone-line is therefore apt to be designated, somewhat unfairly, the melody (the "tune" or "air" is more just). But, at all events, this predominating melodic line is the most important factor of the form, the one upon which the definition and recognition of the "form" depend; and it is therefore necessary that the student learn to distinguish it, to acquire the habit of centring his attention upon it,--in reading, listening to, or analyzing music; and, in playing, to give it the emphasis it requires.
The importance of a tone-line depends solely upon its conspicuousness. The principal melody--the Melody--is the one which is most salient, which most attracts the hearer's attention. For this reason the composer is induced to place his chief melody above the rest of the tone-lines, because the uppermost tone strikes the ear more acutely than the lower ones, and therefore the succession of highest tones constitutes a conspicuous line that attracts and impresses the sense most keenly.
Here then, at the top of the harmonic tone-complex, we look for the chief melody; and here it will be found,--excepting when arbitrary emphasis (by accentuation) is imparted to some lower tone-line, so that it, for the time being, assumes a prominence equal, or superior, to that of the uppermost line. (This divided prominence is seen in the 18th Song Without Words--the duet.)
LESSON 2.--Write careful and complete answers to the following questions:--
1. What is Time, as applied to music?
2. What is tempo?
3. Give a full definition of the beat.
4. By what time-value is it most commonly indicated?
5. Give a full definition of the measure.
6. Why do measures differ in size?
7. What is a simple measure?
8. What is a compound measure?
9. Define duple and triple rhythms. (See also Chap. I.)
10. What does the term rhythm signify?
11. How is it applied in music?
12. When is the rhythm regular?
13. When is the rhythm irregular?
14. Define the difference between melody and harmony.
15. Give a full definition of melody.
16. What are the conditions of a good melody?
17. In what respect does music resemble architecture or drawing?
18. Are the tone-lines in a composition of equal importance?
19. What significance is to be attached to the principal tone-line?
20. Upon what does the importance of a tone-line depend?
21. Where is the chief melody usually placed?
CHAPTER III.
FIGURE AND MOTIVE.
THE MELODIC FIGURE.--The smallest unit in musical composition is the single tone. The smallest cluster of successive tones (from two to four or five in number) that will convey a definite musical impression, as miniature musical idea, is called a Figure. Assuming the single tone to represent the same unit of expression as a letter of the alphabet, the melodic figure would be defined as the equivalent of a complete (small) word;--pursuing the comparison further, a series of figures constitutes the melodic Motive, equivalent to the smallest group of words (a subject with its article and adjective, for example); and two or three motives make a Phrase, equivalent to the complete, though comparatively brief, sentence (subject, predicate, and object). This definition, amply illustrated in the following examples, serves also to point out the significant resemblance between the structure of language and of music. The principal melody is, as it were, the voice of the speaker, whose message is framed wholly out of the primary tones, or letters of the musical alphabet. The association of primary tone-units, in successive order, results first in the figure, then in the motive, then the phrase, period, and so forth, in the manner of natural growth, till the narrative is ended. The following example, though extending beyond our present point of observation, is given as an illustration of this accumulative process (up to the so-called Period):--
[Illustration: Example 6. Fragment of Beethoven.]
[Illustration: Example 6 continued.]
The tones bracketed a are the Figures; two (in the last measures, three) of these are seen to form Motives; two of these motives make the Phrase; and the whole sentence, of two phrases, is a Period. See also Ex. 1 and Ex. 2, in which the formation of figures is very distinct.
The pregnancy and significance of each of these tiny musical "words" (or figures, as we are to call them),--small and apparently imperfect as they are,--can best be tested by concentrating the attention upon each as if it stood alone upon the page; it is such vitality of the separate particles that invests a musical masterwork with