The Rhythmic Conception Of Music

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U N IT Y

formative principle of art brings de fi ni t e nes s out of the indefinite T h is is e ff ected b y division of space and divi sion o f time S pace becomes intelligible to us by its division and time can equally be grasped only by its divisions T h e form is perceived through the senses D ivision o f space is the forma tive principle in the arts o f painting sculpture and arc h itecture and is per c e i v e d through t h e eye D ivision of time is t h e formative principle in the I A

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C art of music and is perceived throug h the I n the case of both space and time c ar the nature o f the division is rhythmic Rhythm may be defined as t he p eriodic .

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The arts O f space division do not in themselves exhibit movement but being formed by a rhythmic movement in con s c i o u s ne s s their mani festation in space is of a rhythmic nature I n the arts o f time division the actual rhythmic movemen t is evident to the senses Rhythm introduces a common char acter into all things and there fore makes fo r unity The formative principle may thus be styled the principle o f Rhythmic U nity which underlies and is common to all the -

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RH YT H M I C U N IT Y arts Each art has a rhythmic origin and con forms to the rhythmic principle by consisting O f a W hole made up of variously related parts The formative principle cannot in itself make an art There must be something that is f ormed else the form is not per to the senses I n the arts of c e t i ble p painting and sculpture the material con sists o f natural forms t e created in the mind O f the artist and expressed by means o f colour or varied sur face I n archi tecture the rough material is simply the building m a terial I n music the rough material is tone A tone is a sound of definite duration pitch intensity and quality and can vary in these four respects When a tone varies in duration it is longer or shorter ; in pitch it is higher or lower ; in intensity it is louder or so fter ; its quality is that .

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distinguishes one kind o f voice or instrument from another As it is impossible for a tone to vary in any but one of these four ways it is clear that D uration P itch I ntensity and ! uality f are the factors of musical e fl e c t and that every detail o f a musical W ork must be re ferable to one of these heads I n attempting a classification o f this nature one is met at once by the di ffi culty that no accurate definition is pos sible within the present limits o f musical nomenclature The necessary words do not exist The terms duration pitch intensity and quality can apply only to single notes or detached chords and these however attractive in themselves are not music There is no music with out successive tones nor will any succes sion o f tones be music other than a rhythmic succession I t i s the rhythmic ,

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R HYTH M IC UNITY movement the formative principle that leading to tone relati ons makes tone b e come music I n the first place a word is needed that will bring t h e true nature general development into Clear O f this relief since an unnamed idea dwells in the region of s h adows The word ” “ rh t h m i t o nal suggests itself as an y appropriate one for this purpose and i t may also assist in defining t h e nature of the musical imagination I n the second place terms are required to express the four main branch es of rh yt h m i t o nal de ,

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Turning to the words i n present use ” “ we find that the two words rhyt h m ” “ and time h ave to cover the whole of D uration and that every one defines them variously as seems to him best The variation o f P itch on the other hand has received an undue sh are of attention ,

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R H YT H M I C C O N C E P T I O N O F M U S I C being called mel ody harmony counter point polyphony thorough bass part writing and so forth but there is still lacking here the one word necessary to expr ess the sum o f all these the broad classification that will distinguish P itc h from the other tone variations and not merely a division in pitch itself ! uality has of late years been called orchestra tion but as the name implies it relates only to the orchestra and outside the orchestra ! uality does not exist t e c h ni cally while I ntensity remains altogether in th e limbo o f the nameless What is wanted is a term that will suggest form a rhythmic movement in each variation ” “ The word outline has something o f this significance and is easily used in ” “ combination as follows : time outline ” “ “ pitch outline and force outline “ colour outline These terms will in ,

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RHYTHM I C C ONCEPTI ON OF MUSI C with rhythm ; the second is t h at out of all four outlines that o f pitch is the most important The first assumption may be said to involve the second I t seems likely that no body of men can be more conservative than musicians for these ideas apart from their superficial appearance o f truth are rooted far back in musical history and yet continue to thrive to this day untouched by the flail O f time Their historical cause W ill be considered later on for the present it is su ffi cient to show that they exist in opposition to the facts o f ethnology of experience of the unity O f art and of the musical consciousness The study of ethnology shows that it is impossible to form any accurate con c e t i o n of primitive music W ithout taking p into consideration its connection with the art o f dancing Rhythm here attains a .

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RHYTH MI C U N I TY double expression appealing to both eye and ear and this accounts fo r dancing being admittedly th e most r h ythmic art in existence I t has never been without an accompaniment of noise reduced to time and among tribes o f very low intellectual development the feeling for time outline is found exhibited in absolute perfection “ I t is scarcely possible to speak o f the beginning o f music W ithout at the same time thinking o f the dances with w hi ch it was intimately connected This is moreover no accidental connection t ha t can under certain circumstances be omitted as in the case o f poetry and music ; it is more than a mere connec tion it is a unified organism which led to an independent musical branch so unified that it is neither possible to treat O f the subj ect of primitive dance ,

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEP TI O N O F M US I C without primitive music nor to make it even probable by means O f e t hnological ” examples that they were ever separated “ A general View O f primitive music Shows us that in the most primitive State the main constituent of music has always been rhythm while melody has remained an accessory The most primitive music is in many cases no modulation o f tone but mere l y a rhythmical move ” ment in one tone (D r W allas c h e k P rimitive Music The two characteristic features of “ primitive music are the decided pro m i ne nc e of the rhythmic as opposed to ” “ the melodic element and the monotony which results from the fact that most of the primitive so ngs are contained within ” “ a very narrow compass The sense o f time seems to have been highly developed in man long be fore he had the faintest ,

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conception of what w e call me l ody M rs Brown M usical ( “ I n the very rudest beginnings o f t h is art even before it has passed into a form in which it can properly be termed music ” i t is characterised by rhythm G L ( Raymond Rhythm and H armony An examination of ancie n t folk mus i c which is o f course a later stage o f primitive music shows how high a development it had reached in early times N early all the rhythmic pheno men a O f modern music can be traced to their origin in folk song and from t h e examples that have come down to us it is evident that folk song o f all nations is founded essentially upon rhythmic pulsation “ The deep impressio n w hich t h e r h ythmic property o f music made on the human mind is clearly shown by .

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RH YTH M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M U S I C the fact that fo r several centuries in the history of modern European music all the most popular dance tunes were the tunes o f songs and all the most favourite songs were turned into dance ” “ tunes (S ir S tainer M usic in its Relation to th e I ntellect and the Emo ” tions p I n discussing the w ell known English ” “ round S ummer is a c u m e n i n Mr R o c k s t ro remarks We find the melody pervaded by a freedom o f rhythm a merry graceful swing immeasurably in advance of any kind o f polyphonic music of earlier date than the Falas peculiar to t h e later decade o f the sixteenth century — to which decade no critic has ever yet had the hardihood to refer t h e Rota B ut this flowing rhythm is not at all in advance o f many a folk song O f quite u n fathomable antiquity The merry grace ,

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RHYT H M IC U N ITY a popular melody is no proof of its late ” origin (Groves D ictionary Of M usic p v o l iv Th us it appears that in early music no doubt can exist as to which outline of music is the predominating one But the position of this form o f rhythm as a main factor of everyday musical experience is a matter that may have escaped notice When a certain rhyt h mic succession of musical tones has become familiar to th e memory the mind images to itse l f t h is familiar arrangement without needing to hear its actual physical sound This is done by exertion of the auditory imagi nation which is the p ower o f evoking mental sound images by a spontaneous act o f memory This power is called into existence by rhythmic feeling H ence forward rhythmic feeling and the auditory imagination unite to form one O

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C action o f the mind which may be named ” the rh yt h m i t o nal imagination Since it forms an exact parallel of musical develop ment I ts function at first is purely re creative reproducing what h as been heard I n time variations appear two arrange ments being unconsciously mixed together until the stage o f creation is reached i n volving an arrangement o f tones character i s t i c o f individual feeling O n the other hand persons are frequently to be met with w h o have su ffi cient perception o f tone to enj o y music but at the same time are unable to si ng any tune they can recognise by ear or even to imitate correctly the pitch o f any a ngle given tone The cause o f this de fect is a lack of rh yt h m i t o nal imagination I n order to sing a tone it must first be formed mentally that is imagined and if the motive power that develops the imagina ,

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repetitions O f t h e original idea S B M athews P rimer o f M usical This is to say t h at the pitch outline may be varied at will and these variations will appear simply as a developmen t of th e original form o f the subj ect But alter radically the time outline and a new subject is at once introduced T h is could not be unless time outline were the dominating factor We may there fore conclude that besides appearing as the primary factor in early music the outline o f Time is clearly the essential one in the imagination memory and perception o f music I ts predominance over the other factors o f music goes far to prove the theory o f rh yt hm i t o nal develop ment that it is rhythm that leads to tone relations and not tone relations to rhythm B ut i f rhythm be the origin of all tone relations it is clear that these cannot be .

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R HYT H M I C U N I TY rig h tly understood except in their relations to rhythm and t h is leads to t h e considera tion O f the unity o f art I t may be taken fo r granted that a perfect w ork of art must have unity unity both o f matter and of manner I t is also Obvious that such unity does not signi fy monotony but relation — th a t is the relation o f all the parts to the whole as in a living organism S trange as it m ay seem this rhythmic principle has never yet been applied theoretically to the art o f music I n the Middle Ages the happy hunting ground of the musical theorist was counterpoint and a cumbrous machinery o f time notation long Since discarded ; later on he trans ferred his a ffections to harmony but never in his ,

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prin c i p l e of u ni t y was s ta te d by H au ptm ann b u t wa s o nl y p art i ll y a pp li e d by h i m S in c e I n te n s i t y a nd ! ua li t y a e n ot c o n s id e re d in h i s t h eor y 1

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C wildest dreams did the theorist imagine that either harmony or counterpoint could be made t o account fo r time order N ever apparently did he even perceive the necessity for any general principle that would relate all the factors o f music to one another Time outline but seldom appealed to him and still less did he stoop to consider force and colour or perhaps the windings o f counterpoint proved a maze in which once entangled n o possibility existed o f extrication there from The fact at least remains that all theories o f pitch outline though they may rival in ingenuity the definitions are relative to pitch only o f rhythm and it is therefore clear that the central principle o f unity must be sought fo r elsewhere And it may well be asked where shall this central principle be And granting found i f not in rhythm ! -

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R H Y TH M I C U N ITY that it may exist in rhythm Of what use are elaborate treatises that ignore the relation o f harmony as a part to the whole presenting it as a whole in itself ! Further since no pitch outline can exist without some form o f time outline why should attention be concentrated upon the former practically ignoring the underlying conditions which render its very existence a possibility ! I n a word w hy does unity exist in the creative work of an artist and disappear from the account given by others of that work ! The answer to this question involves recognition o f a pro found fact o f the artistic consciousness which in its re lation to the art o f music has not yet received the attention that it deserves P eople are dimly aware that there is something apparen tly abnormal or at any ,

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R HYTH M I C C O N CEP TI O N O F M U SI C rate unusual about the mental condition of a man of genius ; he has at least the power of accomplishing what other men are unable to do but as to how he does it or wherein his consciousness di ffers from that o f others as much is known perhaps as of the consciousness o f primi tive man And since this creative action is invariably synthetic and not analytic it does not make fo r self consciousness and therefore the genius himsel f can as a rule C xplain very little about it N or would description convey knowledge to the average mind since w e cannot know that o f which we have had no experience But the fact that needs to be appreciated is that this mind action is non intellectual i c not o f reasoned origin ; no one by taking thought can produce a true art work ; the springs O f music are deep in the emot ional conscio u sness and do not ,

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RHYTH M I C U N ITY touc h the intellect I n this region the intellect is an interloper and a destroyer The general condition o f t h is mind action is involuntary and intuitive ; it may fo r want of a better word be named I ntuition I t is essentially o f a dramatic nature and has there fore dramatic unity of expres sion I t con ceives the whole and the parts spring there from as by a natural consequence This is the state o f con moves s c i o u s ne ss wherein rhythm lives and has its being Taking this fundamental fact into consideration we are in a position to perceive the cause of the failure of theorists to render a true account of the nature o f music I t is not that such is impossible but that the theorist m ust o f necessity begin at the opposite end of things and he has never yet succeeded in reaching the point from which the .

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R H YT H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C composer started This starting point is the conception o f the whole an intui t ive conception realised in the art work The form th us produced is intuitive by n ature and origin but all such form can be apprehended by the intellect I t is capable of translation into the terms O f reasoned thought Th e func t i on O f the intellect is analytic and it can only reach the conception o f the whole through understanding the rela tions o f the parts I t must begin by apprehending the parts We may take it that all theories o f musi c are honest attempts at apprehension of the parts but wherein they mislead is in their lack of any sense of the rhythmic relations of these parts to the whole They are thus not only incomplete but miss the conception o f that for which theoretical study must exist if it is to be of any -

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R HYTHMI C C O N CEPTI ON OF M USIC obliged to teac h upon establis h ed lines fo r want O f any adequate alternat i ve system I t is the obj ect of the present volume to indicate the broad lines of a ne w theory of music based upon the principle of Rhythmic U nity to be followed by an educational text book containing a complete analysis of rh yt h m i t o nal form which will weld all the various parts of musical education into one consistent and logical wh ole .

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C H A P TE R I I T H E EV ID E N C E

O F H IS T O R Y

ev i dences O f the general principle of art formation o f early music and o f e xperience are all alike in favour of the theory o f Rhythmic U nity ; yet the his tory o f the art o f music at first Sigh t appears to prove t h e contrary If it be assumed as is commonly done t h at modern music is t h e lineal descendant O f the c h urch music O f t h e M iddle Ages then it must follow that the art has originated in tone and not rhythm Since as is well known rhythm in early church music was a negligible factor This is a time honoured assumption which probably has never before been

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questioned the credentials of which now require to be examined The applica tion o f the evolutionary test must either confirm or destroy it as a theory o f musical development and this may be briefly stated as follows : between the earlier and later stages there Should exist some a ffi nity since the di fference will be one o f degree and not o f kind We do not gather grapes of thorns The remarks o f S ir H ubert P arry on early church music are necessarily of that value which attaches to critical expert opinion H e writes as follows : The w hole aspect and texture of this old music is SO di fferent from the modern style that it seems almost inconceivable to most people when they first come into contact with it that it could have had any musical e ff ect at all much less that it could be the direct source o f the elaborate ,

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modern fabric The most familiar rule that t he t e in the study of harmony learns to his cost is to avoid consecutive fifths and octaves ; but t h e rule of the m e di a v al musician was distinctly and u n questionably to write more o f them than of anything else As has been pointed out before the b asis and substructure O f many compositions was a series o f such fifths and octaves disguised by ornamental notes and passing notes I n other particulars also the di fference from modern views is very marked ; such as fo r instance in t h e use O f discords These early musicians used many dis cords and very harsh ones too but hardly ever in any way like modern composers T h ey were always purely accidental dis cords and were in no sense either used as means O f contrast nor to propel the music on from point to point as is their .

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in modern times The melodic outline of one part j ostled against that of another voice part and as it were disregarded w h at its neighbour w as doing for a Short while till it landed upon some note which brought it again into con sonance with its surroundin gs The musical ideas themselves were singularly vague and indefinite Even the tunes which they (the church composers) bor rowed were put into such enormously long notes that whatever individuality there was in them commonly disappeared I t is quite impossible to recognise a tune when single notes are prolonged to an exten t equivalent to half a dozen bars in slow time And this extension w as merci lessly practised by t h e best m e di ze v al musicians in order to lengthen their movements and give more time for th e Spinning o ut of their Strange kinds of .

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counterp oint S pontaneity w as of course out o f the question T h e store of known technical resources w as too limited and every musical work w as the product o f arduous and laborious concentration or o f peculiar ingenuity “ The average quality O f their works of every kind is marvellously crude harsh and incoherent Almost every elementary rule o f art which a modern musician holds inviolable is broken i n cessantly and there are hardly any pieces by the most learned o r the o f music most intelligent musician up to the four t e e nt h century which are not too rough and uncouth to be listened to by even the most liberal — minded and intelligent musician without such bewilderment as ” Often ends in irrepressible l aughter ” “ Art of Music chap iv pp 10 1 1 ( 9 7 .

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RH Y T H M I C C O N CEP TI O N O F M U SI C I n the face of suc h an authority the ,

idea may be at once dismissed that any likeness exists between early church music and modern music There fore the evolutionary test at once breaks down the accepted tradition I t is clear that this weird counterpoint is not music at all as we understand it since though composed o f tones it is almost entirely lacking in rhythmic relations and has not proceeded out of rhythm This is the cause o f its uncouth and hideous construction With it the musical con s c i o u s ness the intuitive rhythmic feeling has n othing to do I t is the outcome o f the laboured conscious process o f the intellect and therefore lacks grace beauty and coherence those outward tokens of the indwelling spirit The intellect set to make an art proves itsel f but a clumsy machine For a thousand years it .

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R H YTH M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M USI C chords which purports to be copied from one o f the year 1 1 0 0 and to give ” the music o f the Welsh composed at that time and which by Welsh scholars is from the internal evidence regarded as an authentic and dependable document H ence it is evident that the church had no need to invent harmony but th at regarding the popular music as worldly and frivolous which it doubtless often was the monks set to work to devise an art which should bear no resemblance whatever to the fasci nating but unh oly strains that beguiled the outer world And in this attempt they may be said to have succeeded As already noticed M r R o c k s t ro finds it necessary to warn his readers against mistaking anc rent folk melodies for modern ones on account o f their free rhythmic grace but we are in ” S D i c t i o n ry vo l i v p 44 G rove s ,

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no such danger with regard to medi aeval churc h music T h e di ffi culty is here to perceive music O f any kind ancient or modern for music implies rhythmic fe el ing and not merely an assortment of tones At the same time it is natural t ha t r h ythmic development should Sp ring from the free outdoor li fe o f the peop l e rat h er than from the confinement and routine of mon a stic discipline The rhythmic feeling is common to all men but an indoor sedent a ry life i s fatal to its deve l opment since there i s no call for its translation into rhythmic action The impulse thus suppressed practically ce a ses to exist Therefore the churc h o f the Middle Ages desiring a music o f her own was confronted by the problem o f form ing an art whose natural foundations had long v a nished from her horizon H ow th i s problem was solved i s well k n own -

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPTI ON O F M USI C S tarting from an arbitrary system a mis ,

apprehension O f Greek scales tones were laboriously arranged to Sound together according to well defi ne d rules and this note against w as called counterpoint or ” note W hen it reached the period of its final development in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries which is the only part o f it that can reasonably be called an art certain elements of rhythmic form had partially leavened its construction and this was in all probability due to the slow but sure filtering through O f the rhyt h mic growth which w as pressing upon it from outside B ut since persistent labour is certain in the long run to yield some valuable result to mankind so these monkish musicians besides developing an art which posterity might have done without at the same time slowly invented a system wherein to record it a notation ,

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THE

E V I D EN C E O F H I S T O RY

which h a s been indispensable to musical art The fact that the church system the Gregorian which held the field com l from the fourth century to the e t el p y close of the sixteenth has descended to posterity by m eans of its notation and the popular system o f folk song with the exception of a few examples noted down by C hurch musicians has come do w n t o us through oral tradition only completely accounts for the overlooking O f the latter and the enormous bulking of the former in musical history I t also accounts fo r the fact that the traditions o f ancient church m usic survive unchanged in modern thought I n this music the use of force and colour was almost accidental and formed no part of its science and rhythm had little to do with its harmony P itch outline w as all important The prevalence o f t h ese very ide a s amongst .

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R H YTHM I C C O N CEPTI O N

MUSIC

OF

modern musicians h as al ready bee n remarked I t is also probable that the invention of notation e x ercised upon medi ae val com position an influence that we are unac customed to ascribe to it The eye must have played a far more important part t h an the ear at this period and in all pro b ab i li t y the sound of the music was the result Of t h e notation instead of being its originating cause which may in some degree account for its extraordinary e ff ect I n course o f time a fixed note duration appeared out o f the necessity fo r keeping singers together rather than from any i n ward impulse ; this was called Mensural music and was from the first a science The feeling fo r rhyt h m never became It i s p i ll y re c or d e d of ! o s q in D e s pr es ( 44 5 ) .

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t ha t h e w a in t h e hab i t o f a ss em b lin g s in g er s at h i s h o u s e w h o s an g to h i m from h i s MS S t h at h e m ig h t h ea r h o w t h e y s o nde d s

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EV I D EN C E O F H I S T ORY

strong enoug h to establis h a definite key system nor to lead to any melodic deve l opment T h e very vagueness of t h e tone re l ations constitutes per h aps to modern ears t h e chief c h arm o f th i s ecclesiast i cal art W i thout the peculiar condit i ons t h en prevailing of complete severance of monastic from popular li fe and wit h out the amazing perseverance O f church -musicians who toiled for centuries at a supremely di ffi cu l t task it is qu i te certain t h at t h e art of P alestrina could never h ave been bui l t up into the per fe c t i o n to whic h it ultimately attained I t is possible for a genius to create a living art out of the dry bones of pedantic formula and this is the achieve ment of P alestrina B ut this p h ase of the art of music remains a thing apart I t has been handed down to us in written records as an extinct tradition for j ust at -

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R H Y T H M I C C O N CEP T I O N O F M U S I C the moment o f attaining to full maturity i t was swept ruthlessly away The ela borate contrapuntal system vanished before the i nflo w i ng tide of popular rhyt hm i t o nal art which had been gradually l eavening the secular side O f music with its intui tive charm and its dual scale system SO fundamentally opposed to the multi form method o f the church The folk system became at the close of the sixteenth cen tury the essential foundation o f cultivated music and hence arose the mistaken idea that it w as an artistic invention belonging to that period fo r this was its first ap e arance in notation O bviously it was p an attempt to put new wine into O ld bottles and accordingly a considerable time elapsed be fore the O ld record could be made to fit the new tone movement and the changes that it underwen t were so fundamental that all notation prior to ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N CEP T I O N O F M USI C between N ature and T radition and i n such a conflict N ature is certain to win at last being the stronger though i t be centuries before s h e comes to her own The first res u lt of t h e victory of folk music at t h e close of the sixteent h century was to provide its a dversary wit h material for a new lease of life The P rotestant ch u rch musicians gradually absorbed t h e popular key — system and began to build up an art of counter point upon that basis At the same time i n s ecular music t h at curious combination of dance form and counterpoint called ” “ the S uite m a de i ts appearance T h is new developmen t continued all throug h t h e seventeent h century and up to the middle of the eighteenth century when it culminated in the genius o f B ach I n his work so great and massive is the con t rap u nt al handling t h at the straitness of ,

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T HE

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OF

H I ST O RY

the time - outline passes unnoticed A strong foundation of formal construct i on was indeed essent i al to t h e rearing of the contrapuntal edifice I t is an art full o f t h e sound of many voices a marvel lo u sly wrought w e b o f the strands of pitc h yet resting upon a time out l ine whic h can for t h e most p a rt be com pared only to a monotone Even and regular as cl ock work a study in equa l duration its u n i form C ha racter presents t h e most h omogeneous a nd inarticu l ate form of pulsat i ve rhythm t ha t h as ever existed in music Y et suc h a degenerate t i me outline is a necessity of contrapuntal art which consists i n the predominance of pitch outline because the special tendency ofthe latter is towards regular time division I ts most prominent tones are necessarily those that occur on the natural regular divisions O f the bar and i f p l aced between .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C these divisions t h e most striking pitch e ffect will become at once a m ere passing detail or else suggest a mistake unless there be a strong free time outline to emphasise its existence The general effect of a melody can be preserved by these naturally prominent tones when all the intervening ones are omitted or altered such alteration producing the e ffect o f variation o f the original melody as fo r example in the varied melody o f Beethoven s C minor sym phony It is therefore absolutely ne c e s sary that all important pitch e ffects (such as cadences suspensions and any pro no u nc e d discord or C hange of chord or key) should occur at these regular inter vals and the natural tendency o f pitch outline is thus inevitably towards monotony O f time division a typical instance of which is the modern hymn tune The ,

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H I STORY

OF

contrapuntal method throwing a veil over the sharp outline produced by Simple harmony counteracts to a great extent the monotony of the regular c h ord change by its many voiced movement But though an interesting form of art may thus for a time exist these are not the normal conditions o f musical e v o lu tion I n a truly rh yt h m i t o nal art time outline must dominate because it is naturally the most essentially rhythmical and therefore the primary outline T h e predominance o f pitch thus produces loss o f the natural evol utionary balance and such a predominance was t h e most striking characteristic of both the early and later C ontrapuntal epochs The developing power of these epochs was therefore o f necessity limited to a pitch development which require d the subor di nat i o n o f all the other factors o f music and was doomed to extinction so soon as ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C t h e material o f var i ety in pitc h outline was exhausted Each C ontrapuntal era h owever interesting in itself forms from t h e po i nt of View of rh yt h m i t o nal evo lu tion a c u l— de ra c O nce this point is reached t h e natural r h ythmic princ i ple reasserts itsel f and music reverts to the normal conditions of its development Wit h the death of Bach this change took place ; pitch outline ceased to develop contrapuntally and made way for a new rhyt h mic growth The reason for this was not t h at the utmost development o f pitc h outl i ne had been realised but t h at owing to t h e prevalence of the mean tone system o f tuning and the state of orchestral instruments only h alf the possibilities of t h e key— system were in general use and that this material h ad been exhausted -

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t e fi r s t c ompo s er to ad opt Eq ua l Tempera me n t b t a c e n t u ry p ss e d b efore his examp l e was g e n er ll y fo ll o w e d in E ng l an d 1

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T HE

E V I D EN CE O F H I ST O RY

Even as late as in t h e Beet h oven orc h estr a the confined range of horns and trumpets exercised a very limiting e ffect upon modulation I n the Slow movement of the C minor symphony t h e appearance o f the subj ect fo r the brass each time in the same key was doubtless due t o t he impossibility of getting it played on t h ose particul a r instruments in any key bes i des C maj or The development of S on a ta form w a s the triumph of R h yt h m over C ounter point but it is a r h yt h m still s h o w of half its natura l freedom Th e first at tempt at developing a large m u sical form upon rh yt hm i t o nal lines proceeds in a tentative manner much hampered by contr apuntal tradition This constraint sti ffens the r h ythm and produces that form a l e ffect c ha racteristic of t h e l a tter hal f of t h e eighteent h century I t w as ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M U S I C only t h e greatest composers B eethoven and S chubert wh o possessed the rhythmic genius able to master these conditions and fully to develop itself in spite of them The fixed design to them became automatic and instead o f dominating their music as it had done that o f their predecessors it was rendered entirely subordinate to expression and so paved the w ay for the emancipation o f the later nineteenth century The further history of music is that gradual escape from traditional o f the form a history embodied largely in the work o f one great composer The art was necessarily conditioned o f Wagner by the drama and stands apart from the development o f purely instrumental music Essentially a union o f arts it cannot be fully considered in a volume that deals with but one At the same time so ,

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R HYTH M I C CO N C EPT I O N O F M U S I C presenting the same fundamental con di t i o ns as those of t h e C ontrapuntal eras M odern polyphony di ff ers as much from the organ counterpoint of Bach as that di ffered from the vocal counterpoint o f P alestrina but the underlying principle is identical — the predominance o f pitch outline over time outline I n our day there is added a v a st development of colo u r— outlin e w h ich is also predominant over time outline H istory repeats itsel f and t h is p a rticular pitch development will end like its pre de ra c de c e s so rs in th e cu l— .

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C H A P TE R T H E R H YT H MIT O NA L

III F O U ND A T IO N

c h aracter of rhyt h m in nat u re is that of irregular recurrence consisting of a series of undul a tions which are never at ex a ctly equal distances or of c i rcles which are incomplete M an h as evolved the feeling for pre reg u lar time divisions out of the ci sel y necessity for concerted action — that is h e has learned to keep strict time This rhythmic perceptive feeling is essenti a l to the art o f music and this aff ords an e xplanation of why there is no music in nature but the incoherent fragments of bird song Regular pulsative rhythm may be called the logic of music T HE

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C Without exact time division it is i m possible to grasp rhythmic combinations At the same time the history of art reveals the fact that exact symmetry is but a stage in its evolution For example in Assyrian and Egyptian sculpture o f n atural forms exact symmetry prevails regardless o f existing variability o f form in nature but in Greek sculpture this rigidity has entirely disappeared All art passes from the S trict to the Free (which is equivalent to passage from the homogeneous to the h e t e ro ge ne o u s) retaining only so much o f the strict basis as is necessary to its i nt e lli il i and to its actual Structure t i b g y For the understanding o f the art o f music it is necessary to realise the rhythmic principle involved in S trict Form and in Free both separately and with regard to mutual relations and also -

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FO UNDATI O N

T H E R H Y T H M IT O NA L

to distinguish each kind o f form in musical phenomena T h is is less di ffi cult t h an it appears w h en once the fundamental prin f f These a ord c i le s have been grasped p the clue to a maze that would otherwise rival in complexity the labyrinth o f C rete V iewed from the rhythmic standpoint the apparently inextricable tangle o f musical detail resolves itself into an exquisitely ordered design marvellous alike in its simplicity o f foundation and complexity o f structure T his design has been the growt h of ages the work o f no one race nation or individual but a form gradually coming to per fe c t i o n no man knowing how or whence any more than he who sails his ski ff down an unexplored river can tell whither the current may bear him The form is our inheri tance and musically speak ing it is as essential t o us as the air w e .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C breathe Without it we were musically dumb N o utterance could take place no art o f music could exist I n our natural admiration of the marvels of i n dividual genius we are apt to overlook the still greater marvel o f the e x istence o f the common form no conscious imita tion o f nature on the part of man but an o ff spring o f man and nature having in one parent that which is to be found in man only in the other that which is common to both The first is the principle o f exact relation which pro duces S trict Form the second that o f inexact relation which finds vent in Free Form The first principle makes for coherence because the exact relation is readily perceived and it is the intuitive perception o f relations that makes music intelligible to us and therefore coherent I n the mind o f a b e are r or per former .

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FOUNDATIO N

T H E R H Y T H M IT O N A L

of music t hi s intuitive perception of relations awakes emotions of satisfaction and repose appealing to h i s sense of beauty B ut once let the relations become obvious that is be too easily perceived and these emotions are super s e de d by a feel i ng of monotony which speedily invo l ves boredom if the same relat i ons continue to be presented In this sense of monoton y lies the necessity fo r Free Form the necessity for a varia tion upon S trict Form which can only be made by the presentation of an inexact relation Therefore the Free principle makes for variety and contrast and its function is here to oppose and vary the exactness of S trict Form A considerable degree of variety and opposi tion will produce a rest l ess and agitating e ffect upon the mind This is of course admissible i n places w h ere such an e ffect ,

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RHYTHMIC

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is needed What 18 I nadmissible is such an extreme degree of inexactness as will destroy the grasp of the exact relation A S t h e inexact relation is intuitively measured by the mind against t h e exact relation by which means the amount it is clear o f its variation is perceived that if the feeling fo r the exact relation be partially lost music will appear i n coherent o r insu fficiently related w h ile i f it be entirely lost the m i nd will be brought to a standstill in its grasp of rhythmic relations and will therefore be unable to perceive music at all but only chaotic tones H ence Free Form when used with S trict is of a relative nature ; first we must grasp the S trict and then the Free through t h e S trict This fact forms the essential basis o f music and gives rise to the fundamental law o f rhyt h m i t o nal evolution .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C us to know I t w i ll surprise many people to hear that t h e whole essential basis of modern music w h ic h is missing from m e di mv al art is to be found not on l y i n folk song but in the music o f t h ose pr i mitive peoples whic h is decl ared by em i nent et h nologists to be w h o l ly inde pendent o f European influence and w h ose gener a l culture is that of the S tone Age B ut t h e n in order to find t h at basis one m u st know wh at to look for And it is the r h yt h mic concept i on of music that en ables us to distinguis h root from br a n c h I t has been alre a dy s a id th a t all art passes from S trict Form to Free There fore t h e S trict Form is evidently the primal thing and the Free is th e later development B u t in order to apply t h is pr i nciple to music w e must assign to S trict Form t h e musical p h enomena that .

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T H E R H Y T H M IT O NA L

FOUNDATI ON

belong to i t w hi ch w i ll g i ve pract i cal s h ape and form to an abstract co n ception A ll rhyt hm i t o nal development 18 e i t h er of an abso l ute or relative nature T h ere are absolute Free Forms o f all the outlines which are independent O f S trict Form ex h ib i ting the irreg u l ar undulating r h yt h m of nature and t h ese have no e ffect upon t h e U nion of S trict a nd Free Form need i ng therefore i n this place only a passing reference Re l ative Free Form is t h at w h ich re l ates to S tr i ct Form and the la tter forms a ser i es of fi x ed standards w h ic h represent exact rel a t i on and are th e essentia l basis of music The st andards of D uration ex h i b i t regular pulsative r h ythm ; those of P itch a regular circ l ing rhyt h m or in other words a complete Circle in the ,

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term bs o l te s t nd ar d u n re l ate d to 1

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R H YTHM I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M USI C sense o f return to the point st a rted from There are no standards o f I ntensity or ! uality Force outline and colour outline are either fixed as when one instrument or combination o f instruments continues uniformly and without force variation or else if variation takes place as it usually does it is dependent upon the number and nature o f the instruments and voices employed— a matter fo r the composer s free choice S trict Form is there fore virtually limited to D uration and P itch and their respective out li nes ” Much is taught about time in musi c but until very recently one might seek in vain in any elementary primer for re ference to t h e Time beat the out come o f that intuitive perception of time division that can be assisted by counting but is not necessarily dependent upon any extraneous aid S ince strict pulsative .

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FOUNDATI ON

T H E R H Y T H M IT O N A L

rhythm is equal time division it is easy to see that we have h ere in t he time beat the standard of time outline The division is expressed in primitive music by means o f alternate sound and Silence each beat being distinct from the one be fore and the one following it and in modern music when not heard it is always understood A S no sound w h ether musi cal o r otherwise can exist without some degree of intensity accent an inter mittent degree of force — outline is used to emphasise S trict Form by ind i cation o f the time beat and when it becomes accent force outline ceases to be an absolute movement and is relative to the standard of time outline Thus is formed a further composite standard a grouping o f time beats by means o f one accented time beat placed at regu lar intervals B esides the alternation -

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPTI O N O F M US I C sound and silence there is no w the alternation of one louder and one softer sound or of one louder and several softer ” “ T h is may be called strict accent and this larger grouping i s commonly sup posed to be represented in notation by the bar and it would be well if suc h were really t h e case but what frequently happens is that the bar goes one way and t h e strict accent goes anot h er at the good pleasure of the performer or conductor or it does not go at all a matter which may be commended to the consideration of composers T h e standard of D uration consists of the rel a t i ve duration of tones indicated in the notes of music S ince t i me outline relates to this standard as well as to the time beat and pitch outline again relates to its own standards it is clear that the words S trict and Free of

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T HE

FOUNDA TION

R H Y T H M IT O NA L

will not w i t h out creating confusion cover the whole ground and that other words must b e found to take t h eir place which S h all bear the more limited significance o f being S trict or Free o f a particular standard Many o f these words already exist Equal and U n equal explain themselves i n time out l ine which must o f necessity consist of tones o f either equal or unequal relative duration and while U nequ a l time outline may be eit h er S trict o r Free o f the time— beat standard it is impossible for Equal time -outline to be anything but S trict Since i t em bodies the time beat principle of equal time division The standards o f P itch represent e x act relation b y physical a ffi nity A ffi nity o f synchronous pitc h relations is expressed by the word C onsonance and the standard ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C syn chronous relative pitch is the common chord or triad maj or and minor C onsonant and D issonant in this relation also explain themselves and pitch outline in these conditions becomes synchronous as it consists of the simul t ane o u s combination o f several parts S uch a combination is not necessarily harmony except in Western music which does not admit o f a synchronous pitch outline without the C onsonant standard The importance o f this standard to Western ears is perceived in the fact that w e are practically u m able to conceive o f music without it A synchronous pitch outline must be harmony or it is not music Y et in some Eastern music notably in that of ava a highly developed synchronous j time outline is found the several parts of which are distinguished by vary o

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C the rhythmic conception of music th a t can define tonal ity I n this connec tion it is seen at once to be the t e lat i o ns of all tones to a given C onsonant centre the exhibition of a complete circling rhythm The primary stand a rd is the Tonic chord used melodically or harmonic a lly and the composite standard is the Ke y The melodic key consists o f t h e dia tonic scale maj or or minor and the harmonic key consists of a ll known chords w ed in rela tion to one t onic That we are only j ust beginning to re a lise intellectually the functions of the Tonic and the Ke y in music is S h own in the fact that no adj ectives exist to express them N othing would seem more natural than that tonality Should ” “ suggest tonalitive but the word has not hitherto appeared And with the .

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FOUNDATION

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e x ception of diat onic t h ere are no words to indicate t h e S trict and Free Forms o f pitc h outline in respect of the to n alitive standards The gap may be ” ” “ “ filled by S yntonic and Atonic to e xpress severally tonic relations and non tonic relations and by U ni t o ni c and ” Modulative to define relations t h at belong to the harmonic key - standard and those that pertain to subordin a te M usic that contains relations of Io ni c s “ this nature may be described as key ” centred T h e only word in present use that suggests this larger set of relations is modulati on which is the act of pass ing from key to key This word therefore strictly speaking indicates the actual c h o rds forming the transit whic h t h ough necessary to key relation is not key relation in itse lf The importance of h av i ng words that “

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RH YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N OF M US I C will ind i cate S tr i ct and Free Form in all these various relations lies mainly in the fact that they all follow the L aw o f the U nion of S trict and Free Form which requires the predominance of S trict Form over Free in order to main tain unity and there fore coherence With regard to time outline this principle is obvious enough I f we lose our grasp of the time beat and the equal note division we lose our intui tive perception o f the music But in pitch outline this is less evident fo r in a circling rhythm S trict and Free cannot coexist I t possesses no parallel to that sense o f contradiction which is p ro du ce d in time outline for example by syncopation where the Free outline is necessarily in immediate conflict with the S trict The time beat is always there fo r it is possible to grasp a ,

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FOUNDATI ON

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S trict and a Free outline simu l taneously

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but the tonic is only there when it is sounding Since it is not possible to grasp mentally a S yntonic and an Atonic outline at the same moment on account of the nature o f pitch rel a tions The only partial exceptions that occur are in the case of a tonic or dominant pedal ; and rare instances of a mixture dominant harmonies In o f tonic and both these c a ses the S yntonic impression is the stronger though incompletely heard S yntonic and Atonic outlines therefore as a general rule exist only in alternation The same is true o f U ni t o ni c and M odulative outlines and yet it is necessary that in both cases the standard should predominate else loss o f balance will result O ut o f this ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M U S I C necessity arises the fundamental rhyt h mic princip le o f tonalitive movement This consists in a departure from and a return to the tonic ; an eccentric followed by a concentric movement ; the former S yn tonic Atonic the latter Atonic— S yntonic This movement may extend over many bars and it finally merges into the l arger movement o f U ni t o ni c a nd M odu l ative out l ine w hich is the expression of precisely the same principle upon a larger scale This latter h as been one of the most important factors in tonal When the key is i t i ve development changed involving a new tonic it is obvious that all ch ord relations must undergo readj ustment This radical change would in instr u mental music ‘ unassisted by word outline destroy ( ) .

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ere w or d s a e u s e d or a d eve l op in g ac t i o n i s c o n c ern e d t h e k e y c e n tre m ay b e c ome s u perfl u o u s in vo l v in g a n in c omp l ete r h y t h m 1

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tonal i tive un i ty but for the emergence of the origin al c h ord centre as key centre By this means all other keys are made relat i ve invo l ving recognition of a nd u l timate return to the key centre t h us completing the c i rcle I t is even possible to establis h subordinat e key centres during the course of modul a tion without destroying t h e sway o f the orig i nal tonic but clearly the greate r the complexity o f t h e tone relations the greater is t h e di ffi culty of preserv i ng t h e standard N othing however is more remarkable than the rapid growth of t h e harmonic key during the past century and as t h e key concept i on widens there is a corresponding extension o f the rhyt h mic c i rcle o f modulat i on w i t h o u t loss of key centred e ffect This brief sketc h of t h e rhyt hm i t o nal basis is s uffi cient to S h ow t h at S trict ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C Form is limited to the fo llowing ele ments ( 1 ) The Time beat ; (2 ) the N otes ; ( 3) the S cale ; the Triad ; the Tonic the these 6 K e ; ; (5 ) ( ) y are the S tandards of music I t remains to Show by quotations from D r Walla s ch e k s book that these standards exist in prim i tive music “ They always keep time well I ( ) which here as among all primitive people is the chief point D rumming with sticks or on stretched deer— skins or the clapping o f hands and stamping o f feet w as evidently regarded as the Simplest ” means t o mark the rhythm 2 P rimitive music can be com ( ) m i t t e d to n otes in duple as well as in triple time I n many instances the change between these two divisions is so sudden and frequent that we h ave to ” note down the fi v e four time °

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occur among primitive races it does not seem to be more di ffi cult to sing in the minor key than in the maj or N either harmony nor the germs of co u nterpoint are entirely unknown to p rimitive nations and it would seem from all t h e examples I was able to collect that the principle o f tonality i s ” in most cases unmistakable P rim i tive Music As h as been already n oticed pr i m i tive music is far more strongly developed i n pulsative rhythm t h an in tonality yet both show the essential basis of S tric t Form The di ff erence between t h em is due to t h e natural order in which t h e factors o f evolution develop Time out l ine precedes pitch outline because it is the easiest to grasp T h ere fore it shows in many cases a freedom that contr asts curiously w i t h the mono .

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tony in pitc h outline Monotony i t appears to us but to the savage mind doubtless represents no less than a satisfy ing coherence N othing i s more certa i n than that t h e bal ance t h at shall avoid monotony on the one h and and i nc o h e re nc e on the ot h er swings unceas i ng l y t h rough t h e ages a nd e a c h age even each generation must make its own ad j ustment As S trict Form becomes estab li sh e d i t is presently ousted by Free Form till at length only the i rreducib l e m i nimum of S trict Form remains and even t h en t h e relative portion of space allotted to it wil l grow less and less T o real i se this one has but to think of the incessant reiteration of that well worn tonal itive idiom the full cadence in the music of li ttle more than a century ago and to note its gradual disappear a nce from m odern mus i c as t h e perception -

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N OF M U S I C of tonality strengthened its hold Aga i n the modern growth o f discords is the natural correlative o f the growt h o f the rh t h m i t o nal imagination that can now y perceive pitch relations through a mass of discords that would have completely obscured them a century ago All special rules for t h e employment of discords are n ecessarily o f a temporary character and t he sole arbiter is the L aw o f S trict and Free Form interpreted by each genera tion and to some extent by each indi vidual for himself From this it may be perceived that monotony and incoherence are in them selves only relative terms It is evident that to a mind undeveloped in rhythmi tonal perception form relations may be obscure that to the cul tured mind are perfectly clear H ence the unrhythmical mind will delight in that music which .

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by its obviousness is into l erable to the rhythmical mind while the latter will find the h eig h t of h appiness i n l i stening to music which to t h e unrhyt h mical mind is as a foreign tongue This sug gests an explanation of t h e wide diversity of opinion upon musical works I t is inevitable that opinions shou l d di ffer as minds di ffer and t h e mental di ff erences thus indicated p oint to varying stages in rh t h m i t o nal development as much as to y underlying variations of temperament S ince the practice of m u src 18 no longer essent i al to the maintenance of life in general as was the case in the primit i ve art a wide amount of inequality of rhythmic perception appears amongst i n di v i du als D egeneration set in long ago and the maj ority fall far below the rhythmic capacity o f the primitive savage ” S P r i m i t i ve M s i c p 7 6 R W ll h k ,

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T h us apart from those w h o follow music as a profession society in ge n eral divides i t self into the musica l and the unmusic al and these again are merely relative terms T h ere are but few peop l e in any class of soc i ety w h o ca n not enj oy some kind of music provided its rhythmic re l ations are su ffi cient l y obv i ous to be i ntell i gible to t h eir rhythmic capacity W h at is of co u rse meant is that t h ey cannot appreciate wh at are general ly regarded to be the great works of music A ft er passing the general folk song per i od music ceased to be th e art of the people and became the serious study of a small minority From this cause it has bot h l ost and gained as an art but the point at present to be noticed is t h is t h at s i nce the maj ority has lost the h abit and there fore to a great extent the capacity o f rhyt h m i c percept i on i t is quite unable ,

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to j udge of w h at is actuall y m onoton y and what is incoherence i n t h e present Stage of musical development I ndeed it is undeniable t h at the music u pon which its a ffections are set bears u n mistakable Signs of degeneracy rather than o f that Simplicity w h ich character i se s t h e developing period of national a rt I t is then only t h e minor i ty who are in a position to j udge of music al e ffect and t h oug h i t must be confessed that even within the profession itself the diversity o f opinion is su ffi ciently bewildering yet the j udgment o f t h is minority as a whole does represent a consensus of Opinion upon w h at are to be regarded as the great works of music of former time and if the e x ercise of t h e rhythmic perception were adm i tted to be essential a n d m u src al education were re organised upon t h ese lines t h ere is no .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C reason t h at t hi s m i nority or even a maj ority Should no t be able to j udge also o f the music o f its own times which from all points of View might appear to be even more desirable Too much indeed has been lost already by leavin g contemporary genius to starve an d encouraging the pro duction o f mediocrity or by absorption in the music of the past to the exclusion of the present This has a twofold cause Firstly a backward and lethargic con dition of rhythmic intuition which I s thus unable to grasp anything new in rh t h m i t o nal combinations secondly ; y the complete absence o f accurate intel lectual knowledge o f the structure o f music U ndeniably the first cause is the most vital but nothing can here be done beyond pointing i t out and em h as i s i n its importance The intuitive g p consciousness o f music is not to be ,

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEP T I O N O F M U S I C it is bo und t o do so lo n g as t h e m ind remains a live growt h and does not partake of t h e n ature o f an a ir— tight compartment O nce we h ave firm hold of the essential strict foundation by the h earing of the ear it wil l cease to hamper us a s its perception w i l l become an automatic process leaving t h e im a i n a t i o n free to ro a m a s it w i l l and t h us g gradu ally to br i ng abo u t the right ad justment I f the present obstructions i n t h e p a t h of music were removed slowly but i ne vi t ably the r h ythmic consciousness would “ assert itse lf and lead the way to fresh ” woods and p ast u res new .

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S T R IC T Form br i ngs us the expected

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Free Form the unexpected The one is the world of t h e known from whic h we start the other t h e re alm of t h e u n known to which we go I n the music the unexpected o f a composer of genius is always appropriate and generally i n evitable B ut w i th the imit a tive com poser this is not so H is mind lacks su fficient rh ythmic i nitiative to enable it to strike out its own path ; he moves naturally and securely in the ways of his predecessors or else struggles pre out of them This is always c ari o u sl y manifest and the unexpected is here .

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seldom appropriate and never inevitable I t is due to th e lack of relation Free Form is inexact relation and it is the inexactness that opens the door to the unexpected but Still there must always be relation I t is this finer sense of artistic relation which is unity exhibited throughout the whole of a composition determining the form and the due emphasis o f every detail that raises the work o f t he great artists above their contemporaries I t is the c o nc e p ti on of the rhythmic form image the fruit o f the rh t h m i t o nal imagination assisted y by an experienced critical knowledge o f the fundamental conditions o f art I t should be the aim o f education to encourage the imagination and to lay t h e righ t foundation o f critica l knowledge ; beyond this every man must build fo r himself That so few comparatively .

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h ave any notion of how to bu il d for themselves is because imagin a tion has

been discouraged and the right fo u nda tion h as not been laid I f w e made a healthy child to go on crutches instead of teac h ing it to walk it would surely lose the natural use of its l i mbs and be a cripple for li fe But w e force the mental crutches of a fixed mode o f composition upon our young composers paralysing their natural p owers under the impression that they cannot learn to write wit h out such assistance and have not perceived that we are thus producing a crippled art The national lack o f genius is obvious and w e ignorantly lay the blame on N ature having first destroyed h er free gi ft I t will never be known how much music and interest has thus been o f charm lost to the wor l d Though t h e creative .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C enius i s less common t h an the re g creative it is impossible to suppose t ha t all imitative composers have mistaken their vocation and ought to be per formin g other men s works instead o f writing t h eir own The re creative i n s t i nc t asserts itsel f early being the w ay o f least resistance and the margin of individual freedom permissible to per But the fo rm anc e satisfies its desires desire fo r creation is the desire for a greater freedom than this a freedom that can only be attained by the finding own path from the beginning o f its And t h ere is no art that can so com satisfy this desire as music l e t el b e y p c a use thoug h its l aw is stricter than that of any other art its freedom is a greater freedom When therefore we find the bulk of modern music exhibit ing no freedom at all or e l se an i n ,

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art i st i c freedom devoid of balance it is cle a r that its composers have missed what they set out to find And t h is cou l d not h ave happened unless their cre a tive imagin a tion had been stifled j ust at the moment when t h ere w as the possibility either of stifling or of nursing it into strength To bring t h e i magination under the ru l e of the i n t e lle c t is inevitably to kill its creative power I t thus becomes t h e i ns t ru ment of t h e intellect instead of being the instrument of t h e emotio n s and ceas i ng to h ave any r h ythmic i nitiative is unable to conceive r h ythm i c form I t imitates instead of orig i nating M usic composed by means of reasoned action is invariably imitative and unemotional lacking t h e form image however Skil fully it m ay be devised I t is not art but t h e imitat i on of art O nly the ,

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M U S I C imagination springing out o f rhythmic feeling can create music Thus it is that absence o f teaching is much less dangerous than wrong teaching I n View of the prevalence of modern theories that can see only S trict Form in music that enforce delibera te imitation o f models from whi ch rigid laws of form are de du c e d that approach works o f art with t h e foot rule and explain away all discrepancies in measurement by i n ” “ contrivances of elision and e ni o u s g prolongation the existence of Free Form cannot be too strongly e m p h a s ise d If in order to support a theory it is necessary to assume the existence in a work o f art of w ha t i: not there or to apologise for what is there that theory stands self condemned The i m “ a i nar bars of elision have never g y hyt h m i t o nal

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R H Y T H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M U S I C of the early Stage o f rhyt h m i t o nal develop ment I n this early stage the relations of S trict and Free Form were necessarily so di ff erent from t h ose they now assume as to give to such a mistake some appearance of truth S trict Form being more easily perceived than Free Form the rhyt h mic feeling in its perceptional capacity i n s t i nc t i v e l seeks t h e S trict until it has y fully grasped its relations and only when these are become familiar and therefore wearisome does it go farther afield to find free relations As already stated by t h e law of evolution all art must pass from S trict Form to Free But an art that remains S trict is one of arrested development and in t h e case of music natural development w as long arrested by the growth o f C ontrapuntal form w h ich divorced the imagination from its n atural association wit h rhythmic feeling .

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a nd bro u g h t it under t h e sway o f the intellect U nder these co n d i tions free deve l opment was an impossibility since t h e C ontrapuntal style dem a nds a strict .

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time outline and it w as not until men grew weary of counterpoint t h at a The e a rl y R hyt h m i t o nal art could arise composers of t h e symp h ony and sonata forms were forming a new art with not h ing but r h ythmic feeling to guide t h em with no underst a nding of wh a t they were doing and with an inheritance of co n trapuntal a nd therefore strict hab i t w hi c h could not fail to be a stumb l ing b l ock in their path T h e on l y practical possibil i ty was a form i n w hi c h t h e strict relat i ons Shou l d large l y predomin a te over t h e free and for t h is reason we find S trict Form t h en occupy i ng t h e position now accorded to it by t h eorists but fro m which the time spirit h as long s i nce -

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driven it D irectly S trict Form becomes obvious it disappears And in the works o f H aydn the folk m u sIC Ian w e find constant attempts at a greater freedom in the details of composition B ased as the art must be upon S trict Form t h rough necessities of concerted action and o f coherence its imaginative development is ever seeking to establi s h finer freer relations B ut at this stage the rhythmi tonal imagination was unable to form free outlines of any magnitude and there fore fell back by necessity upon the sca ffolding of a consciously worked out design This sca ffolding so obvious to us in the works of H aydn and M ozart is adopted by Beethoven but by him is gradually absorbed until it becomes an integral though unobtrusive part of his architecture What he migh t have done without i t is a matter of pure specu l ation .

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R H YT H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M U S I C of predominating interest and relative accessory ones This results from t h e essential di fference in t h e natures of duration a nd pitc h The synchronous combinations of pitch at any given point have in consonance and dissonance a natura l afli ni t y and a l so a contrast that is lacking to duration and t h e c ar h as therefore t h e assistance of a well de fi ne d sync h ronous combination as well as a successive one to enable it to grasp the tone— movement Time — outlines on the contrary can only be grasped indi vidually first a s a succession then realised a s a w h o l e a nd finally p u t together T h is is impossible e x cept under t h e cond i tions above indicated T ime out lines o f strong individuality tend to de stroy one anot h er I t is not impossible to combine two le a ding outli nes but un l e ss they v a ry gre a tly from one another ,

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i n t h e forms of p i tc h and co l our a l so t h e sync h rono u s o u tl ines w ill b e co m e confused to t h e e a r or one wi ll i nevitably predom i n a te a nd the other be red u ced to an accessory T h is fact besides account i ng for t h e slowness of t h e de of sy n c h ronous time out l ine v e lo m e nt p has profound a nd far re a c h ing Co nse The natural predomin a nce u e nc e s of q one time — outline means t h e p re do m in ance of the rhyt hm i t o nal I dea A rhythmic force clot hi n g itse l f spon a changing g a rment of t ane o u sly in pitch force and colour t h is is in its h ig h est form a direct revel a tion of t h e ,

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personality of the composer that can determine the form i mage of a w h ole tone movement Though in the bar it is not of the bar for its origin and deve l opment are free I t i s t h e crown ing glory of Fre e Form the hal l mark -

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C of genius Wit h the e x ception o f pure l y C ontrapuntal art no music that is not imaged out o f original ideas has ever lived much beyond i ts own generation I t is the life of the simplest folk song and equally of the most elaborate works of the great composers The only dif ference between the folk tune and the great art work is one o f development The potentialities o f the folk song are undeveloped in the art work they are realised I t i i s not one action o f the mind that creates and another that de v e lo s but the rh t h m i t o nal imagination p y that creates is also the formative power when allowed its free action unhampered by the intellect I t is evident that de v e lo m e nt as taug h t in the schools that p proceeds out o f no creative germ and is at the best an imitation o f the develop ment proper to another man s idea is .

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con fusion e x ists in the subj ect o f the relations o f the rhyt h I t is some m i t o nal I dea with thought times said to express thoug h t C onfusion is frequently c a used by the use of one word to convey two things and e specially is this the case when these a re abstract ideas since there is then no means of distinguishing between t he two This is what has happened with the word ” “ thought I t used indiscriminately t o convey the synthetic intuitive action of the imagination and also the analytic reasoned processes of the intellect Those who apply t h e term to music are right if C ONSID ERA BL E

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they mean t h e action of t h e imagination but they are wrong if t h ey m ean t h at of t h e intellect I n order to avo i d con fusion it will be necessary to con fine the term to one me a ning only and it seems to be claimed by the intell ectu a l process Since thought does undoubtedly imply an intellectual con tent and not necessarily an imaginative orig i n Th e confusion has apparently arisen out of the a rt of l iterature wh i c h t h oug h the simplest of arts in its rhythmic rela tions is from t h e point of Vie w of psycho l ogy the most complicated of them all This is due to t h e nature of language which is its roug h material L anguage has been Slowly formed by thinking beings in order firstly to dis objects by name secondly to t i ngu i s h e xpress t h oug h t I t is a system of ,

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M US I C symbols for by no ot h er means than by signs and symbols can obj ects be named or thought be expressed Each word is a sound symbolic of some obj ect or thought gradually evolved to denote that particular Obj ect or thought and so understood by the community B ut language does not become an art until it serves as rough material for the creation o f the imaginative idea and its development Then we have an ima action working upon symbolic n at i v e i g material which is itself the result o f an intellectual process and thus the literary art combines imagination with the sym bols of intellect Those wh o would make music also symbolic forget that no such process has evolved tones N O tone o r rhythmic order of tones has ever conveyed a new thought because there is no analytic relation between tone ,

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thought and also of thoug h t but “ the word idea can on l y be used in the first or specialised sense The need for so m e such general term in music is shown by t h e frequent use of suc h words ” “ as language and expression both o f which are apt to be misleading as sug the intellectual process Tho u ght est in g g is expressed by means of words but t h e idea is not expressed by means of tones ; it is act u ally present i n the tones and can by no manner o f means be dissociated there from T he tones are not symbolic but that particular selection and arrange ment o f tones is the idea I t would grea tly aid the common understanding o f music if the terms language and ex pression could be struck out of its voca utter a nce b u lary and the simple word substituted for them M usic has a voice and taken as a whole it is essential ly a ,

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huma n imaginat i ve utterance and t h ere i s no art to w h ic h t h e same word can be SO fi tt i ngly applied I t meets the case of those w h o would protest aga i nst t h e degradation of music into a mere tone pattern equally w i th t h ose w h o would c l ear away t h e con fusion between m usic and the l i terary art since an utterance cannot be merely a decoration a nd yet it does not involve necessarily the use of words U tterance in music t h erefore consists o f t h e I dea a n d its deve l op ment i maged out of t h e emotional consciousness T h e I dea presents a new combination in a degree t h at is possible to no other art I t is as thoug h a poet s h ould speak in words of h is own creation Words SO formed could not be under stood but a new rhyt hm i t o nal combina tion is referred intu i tively to the fa miliar ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C of variability far outweigh ing those of similarity O nce a genius has passed the period of adolescence it is a rare thing to find anything suggestive of anot h er individual in his ideas Th ey are not all o f equal importance ; some arise from the depths of his personali ty others float upon the surface From the former comes the music of pro found emotion fro m the latter that which i s exquisitely pleasurable Each has its function in human life and upon both but especially upon the deeper utterance l ies the distinctive stamp of style In order to unfold the many small tec h nica l peculiarities the particular way in whic h a little thing is done the reiteration of which is what constitutes a distinctive style it would be necessary to examine a composer s work in its totality Even then the style would be found to consist .

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10 4

T HE

R H Y T H M IT O N A L

I D EA

i n an ever-varying comb i nat i on o f h ab i tual methods t h at relate to the m i nutest detail each detai l be i ng of sli g ht importance e x cept in its relation to the sum of t h e whole S tyle l ike the I dea from w hi c h ,

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it springs is a unity but it is a free an ever changing un i ty that wil l va ry w i th eac h individua l H owever i nteresting a comp l ete tec h n i cal analysis of t he style of any one composer might prove i t is the work of t h e specialist in music for it is fruitless as a ff ording material out of w h i c h general princ i p l es may be de “ du ce d We cannot say this is rig h t bec a use it is done in t h is particular ” “ nor t h is is wrong because it is w ay ” done di fferently The first way is rig h t for one composer because it is in h armony with his style the second w ay for the s a me reason i s righ t for another and both may be wrong for a third I n ,

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10

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R H YTH MIC C ONCEPTI ON OF M USI C music it is the individual w h o counts and always the individual N othing in the way of a rule or a principle can rightly be l aid down to restrict or direct natural development excep t those that relate to the L aw of t h e U nion of S trict and Free Form The utterance must preserve su ffi cient o f the Equal and S trict time outline to make the standards o f duration clear ; it must have tonality ; if it be in synchronous p i t ch o u t li ne it must p reserve the C onsonant standard which means that the movement of each outline must relate to all the rest and a su ffi cient relation between all the syn as a whole must be c h ro no u s outlines readily perceptible I n other words the harmony must be correct I t is s i gni fi c ant that though no one ever th i nks o f teaching time outline or tonality as such the greater part of the energies ,

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R H Y T H M IC C O N C E P T I O N O F M U S I C question of righ t or wrong is simply that of preserving the needful standards and is there fore referable to t h e L aw of the U nion o f S trict and Free Form The fact that endless rules have been fo rm u lated w i t h out reference to this law merely shows that rh yth m it o nal relat i ons were not understood as a who l e and that therefore rules were made for eac h particu l ar case The di ff erence in work ing between these rules and t h e general law is that the former required on l y an e ffort of memory w h ile the latter demands an exertion of the rhyt h m i t o nal imagina tion and also of the crit i cal faculty to detect whether or n o t h e conditions o f t h e l a w h ave been fu lfilled T h e one is the mechanical method of routine t h e ot h er aims at awakening the intelligence and putting the student in possession of knowledge w h ich wi ll enable h im to ,

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8

THE R HYT

H M IT O N A L

I D EA

j udge for hi mself B ut h ere as e l sewhere practice must go before precept Th e principle that h as been followed u n intentionally with regard to tonality o f allowing it to soak gr a du a lly into th e mind with every bar of music th a t is heard or sung from baby h ood until it becomes impossible for the mind to think of music without tonal ity this principle requires to be fol l owed i n t e nt i o nally with reg a rd to t h e less easily detected C onsonant standard The h ear ing a nd singing of good p a rt songs s h ou l d bring this about and if t h e ear is e n art movem e nt notice the p c o u ra e d to g i t will soon begin to dete ct right and wrong for itself irrespective of the reason By the time the mind has reached w hy the point of originating an I dea t he standards will have become so essentially a second nature that it w i l l be quite .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M US I C unable to imagine music without them Therefore the I dea and all th a t develops out of it will of ne cessity bear the stamp o f these standards and thus b e come generally intelligible When how ever the composer reaches the point of perceiving new rh yt h m i t o nal relations that to his contemporaries appear t o involve chaos because o f t h eir inabi l ity to perceive them it does not mean that he has lost sight o f the standards but that he has extended the possibilities o f Free Form in its re l ations to S trict Form I n course o f time this is perceived and a new generation accepts with delight what its fathers had rejected with violence and scorn This fact proves t he all importance to music o f the S tandards o f S trict Form as the main factor o f its intelligibility as an utterance of its i n t e lli gi b i li t that is to the emotions and y .

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1 10

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPTI O N

o r

MUSIC

standards T h is is all a m a tter of i n tuitive perception and is a means to an end D irectly it is m ade an end and the mind is consci ously fixed upon it as an end music becomes for th a t hearer a mere tone pattern T he play of tone absorbs the mind to the exclusion of all else H o w ever great the emo tion al utterance it will fall upon deaf e a rs H ence i t may happen that to the u n educated i n music wi l l be revealed a n utterance that is hidden from the pro fe s si o nal musician w h o throug h h is ab sorption in the me ans has forgotten the end To enter by sympathy into the inspiration of the composer is the end in the hearing of m u sic .

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1 12

C H A P TE R V I A S S O C IA T IO N

OF

ID EA S

the palmy days of sonata form w h en the form had become the common pro perty of all composers suc h a thing as ori ginal development of a whole work had not begun to dawn upon the general musical consciousness The form pre “ scribed the number o f the ideas sub ” e ct s as they were called t h e exact j manner and order of their presentment and the keys in which they were to appear ; it divided the whole into well de fi ne d sections and the only chance fo r individual utterance lay in the develop ” ment section of the middle Wit h imitative development presented as the H 1 13 IN

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M US I C normal condition and original develop ment as the mere variation upon it there was no great likelihood o f the average composer making much o f his c h ance Trained to imitate and to regard the liberties taken w i th the form by B eethoven as the eccentricities of genius his de ” section di f f ered little from v e lo m e nt p that o f other people And the deadly monotony thus produced spread even further I t a ffected the texture of the ideas themselves These too became all alike I ndividual utterance vanished and instrumental music w as merely decorative and a dull decoration at the best The influence that lifted music out of this depressing rut of the commonplace w as already at work in the vocal side o f the art Gradually song form or forms analogous crept into instrumental music but it was reserved fo r Wagner to shoulder ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C again went astray out of the path But his imagination could not lead him astray and it invariably governed his artistic action H ence the thing that took place was not the dramatic development o f music by the relinquishing of its own natural form image and its subordination to the requirements of dramatic art but the complete triumphing o f the art of music over poetry drama theories and all other considerations S uch a con summation could only have been achieved by the highest order o f musical genius working upon the lines o f natura l develop ment The exp l anation of the part played by poetry in the combination is a very simple one Association of id e as can exist between all the arts but as music and poetry are both arts o f sound exhibiting rhyt h mic movement the correspondence is here far .

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1 16

A S S O C I A T I O N O F I D EA S closer Wh i le poetry knows nothing of th e str i ct pulsative rhythm o f music it had deve l oped its own Simple free r h ythm i c relations w h ile the complex form of music was still in a very early stage T he explanation of t h e sudden and amazing deve l opment o f music under the influence of poetry above and beyond the Stimulus of associated ideas is that a great genius h ad intu i tively dis covered the form t h at underlies and is common to bot h arts The ser vice done by poetry to mus i c was t h e breaking o f the cha i ns of t h e Strict forms that bound her and t h e sett i ng of music free to accompli s h h er own destiny True im a ginat i ve utterance of w h atever kind is essentially dramatic by nature (in the broadest sense of the word ) and there fo re the dramatic nature of m usic afli li at e s closely to the dramatic n a ture of poetry .

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1 17

R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C B ut in a combination of two di ffering arts it is impossible that the i r development can exactly coin cide and though there will be a certain amount o f give and take the weaker will go to t h e wall There fore in this combination poetry has commonly suffered for the utterance o f music requiring a much longer space of time for its full development than that of poetry has demanded much senseless word repetit i on and it becomes no longer p ossible to preserve entirely the natural rhythm and pauses of lan guage The utter callousness of the earlier composers w i th regard to the claims o f poetry in vocal music finds some j ustification in the fact that so long as music was governed by S trict Form it was imp ossible to give poetry any rights without spoi l ing the musical development and these composers stood ,

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1 18

R H Y T H M I C C O N CEP T I O N O F M U S I C po etic imagination t o s atis fy that called out fo r the drama and was at the same time so inextricably woven in with his musical imagination that h e himself underrated the strength of the latter the trend of all hi s theories forbidding an independent musical art o f the future S econdly I n view of his tremendous imaginative out p ut during the period of his greatest creati ve activity it w as pract i ca lly i m p o s sible even for h im in advancing years to have abandoned all his previous habits of composition N evertheless Wagner s musical imaginat i on did all a nd even more than could h a ve been e xpected of i t M any of his preludes are perfect ab s o l ute music and though they sprang in his mind from the association with a poetic idea no such idea can add to the greatness o f t h e if musical utterance The immediate influence of Wagner ,

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12 0

A S S O C I A T I O N O F I DEA S however upon h is own generation and the next has been destruct i ve of the growth of absolute music by reason of h is insistence upon poetry as a necessary ac c o m p ani ment of music Broadly speaking the resu l t has been that all absolute music fell into the category of a tone pattern and only rel ative music (music in i m mediate association with poetry ) was al l owed the rig h ts of emotional utterance ” Thus poetic and emotional came to be regarded as convertible terms when applied to music T h e great music o f Beethoven be i ng obviously emot i onal had to be acc ounted for by the supposi tion that a kind of poetic drama was going on in B eethoven s mind when he composed this music I n support o f t h is fancifu l suggestion not a particle o f his t o ri c al evidence can be adduced Beet hoven was fond o f the poetry of Goethe ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C E PT I O N O F M U S I C and the dramas of Sh akespeare but there is nothing to Show that h e ever in his li fe wrote a line o f original poetry H ad the poetry been in his head it was bound to have come down on to paper He ” “ himself writes to a friend o f the dead ” “ letter (o f the alphabet ) and th e living note w h ich is in itself strongly s igni The one appealed to the living fi c ant imagination the other did not S uch poetic imagination as he possessed w as in no sense creative and never rose above a very ordinary not to say commonplace level upon the few occasions w h en it spoke in the mig h ty presence of his musical imagination To call the music ” “ programme music is to o f Beethoven destroy th e meaning o f t h at word We h ave hit h erto agreed in confining t h e use of the term programme to something that is planned beforehand I f a hearer ,

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12 2

R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N

o r

MUSIC

influence that they not only find accept ance but are even sti ll being retailed as a novelty They ignore the existence o f t h e musical imagination excep t as a h and maid to poetry or to poetic ideas and are based upon a misunderstanding of the fundamental rhyt h mic nature o f musical inspiration At t h e same time in e s t i m at ing the value o f what Wagner has done for music i t must not be overlooked t h at by me ans of this close assoc ia tion of mus i cal with poetic ideas w h at m a y be ” “ termed the aud i ence music h as of been enormously enlarged For one per son who possesses musical i magination i n any strength there are probably ninety nine or more w h ose poetic imagination is uppermost and w h ose r h ythmic feeling can best be stimulated through t h e poetic faculty by images from the outside world or t h e real m of fancy That is ,

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12 4

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A S S O C I A T I O N O F I D EA S to say th a t being a ble to a pprec i ate t h e emotional utter a nce of music directly t h roug h its obvious and natural channel the percep t ive rhyt h mic feeling by reason of insu ffi cient deve l opment of that percep tion they reac h the emotional utterance b y the indirect met h od of associ a tion of poetic ideas with the mus i cal ones As already observed no rhyt h m i t o nal imagi nation but only rhythmic perception and memory are required of the b e are r o f music When these are fully developed the whole weig h t of the musical utter ance enters h is mind th roug h t h is c h annel to the exclusion of all other mind action I f however it be insu ffi ciently developed the m usic cannot enter fu lly at its natural door the mind is thus not entirely o cc u pied and through the natur al stimulus of association poetic ideas are called up If the composer himself indicate the course ,

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5

R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C !

f

the associat i on the indirect method being thus emphasised may supersede in many minds the direct method until the latter Shrink to the dimensions of a purely sensuous c h annel which yet appears to represent absolute music That this is what has happened to many people is abundantly evident in the writings o f to day to whose authors the relations of absolute and poetic music have assumed precisely these proportions For these persons Wagner s theory contains a truth since it meets the facts of their o w n case and it is probably impossible for them to conceive o f the existence o f the musical imagination as an independent force in the creation of t h e music they have themselves reached through poetry Their numerical superiority accounts fo r the extraordinary popularity of music drama and also of the symphonic poem

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12

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R H Y T H M I C C O N CEP T I O N O F M U S I C art i stic in itse lf— t h e form i s a log i ca l possibility and the d iffi culty of its appe al is a purely practical one w hi ch further experience may overcome The case against programme music rests not in its nature but in t h e position which it claims to occupy as the so l e possessor and dispenser of the emotions of instrumental music This claim if allowed entirely disposes of absolute music as an a ffair of any vital importance i n the future O f what conseque n ce to the r a ce is a sound pattern when it is looking for an utter a nce ! T h at the public should in the present condition of things acquiesce in t h is cl a im is not surprising since the majority does not possess the absol u te musical imagination which in itself gives the lie to the state ment but that the bulk o f com p osers Should ex h ibit the same deficiency ,

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A S S O C I A T I O N O F I D EA S creates a very serious situation for t h e future of music W h atever charm ing and beaut i ful results may be achieved by the relative musica l imagination that which works under the bidding o f poetic or pictorial ideas its product must always remain from the point of view of origi nal creation a thing upon a lower plane th an absolute m usic and this applies to modern vocal m u sic as well as to pro gramme music The only possib l e e x ception occurs w h en the poetic ideas are themselves a n original creation as in the work o f Wagner I n that case the music also rises to the creative level and can only be distinguished from absolute music by the partial subordination o f its form to the necessities of poetry and dramatic action A symphonic poem based upon an original poetic conception wort h i l y e x pressed in the programme .

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R HYT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M U SI C might a l so rise to the highest creative level in its music But at present no such work exists and the sole ambition of the programme composer is to render into music the account of some one else s poetry i f he can resist the temptation o f dispensing with poetry altogether and substituting prosaic personal exper i ences T h e relative imagination belongs to a type of mind standing ha lf way between the creative and the t e creative ; it t e creates but with a di fference and in another art form This is commonly mistaken for creation but it is not so The poetic translator also re creates (or should do so) with a di fference in the s ame art form o f language The fact of another art form being emplo yed does not constitute creation o f a single idea ; in this case the ideas are produced not by creative power but by sensitiveness .

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I 30

V II

C H A P TER E MO T I O N

F O RM

A ND “

has been well sai d I maginative form ” has value only when it images a trut h I t is pertinent to inquire what kind o f truth ! C learly n ot the trut h of external fact w h ich is the truth of intellect We do not go to music or poetry to learn science There is an inner truth o f the soul which by n o means contradicts external truth since it is entirely apart from it and yet has an independen t existence in no wise relying upon the intellect This is the truth of feeling which finds voice in imaginative art The supreme test of ” “ R y mo nd R h y t h m nd H rmo n y p 8 IT

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1 32

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EMOTION

A ND

F ORM

the value of art t h en is its sincerity T h e artist must above all th i ngs be sincere The underlying trut h of emo tion informs and d i rects h is imagination so long as he remains true to himself B ut if he simu l ate feeling whic h is not his o w n and desire to appear somet h ing other than he is if he come to regard his art form as an end in itsel f instead o f a means o f utterance t h en t h e inner voice dies down into silence and his art ceases to live I t has l ost its function and can no longer image truth It cumbers the ground Art i s i n this sense the mirror of nature not of nature as it appears in the external world but the mirror of h uman nature of that mysterious blend o f emotions w h ich con a di ffering personality in each stit u tes man thoug h the emotions themselves are common to all B ut these emotions ,

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1 33

RHYT HM IC C ONCEPT I ON OF M USIC cannot form art Every great imagina tive art h as to pass throug h t h e Slow stages of t h e growt h of its material and o f the format i ve action of the imagi nation upon t h at material ; sensuous collective feeling must have its day b e fore the Stage of p rofounder personal utterance can begin These three stages all overlap and blend with one another so that no distinct line can be drawn b e tween t h em At the same time it shows that there is a c h ildhood stage of art both in the race and in the individual in wh i ch the accumulation o f material and the imaginative work ing of that material entirely absorb the en e rgies of the growing m i nd The art is imaginative but as yet reveals nothing distinctive o f a personality ; its emotions are of the vaguest and ligh test ; its form is too new a t hi ng to be ot h erwise than .

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1 34

R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C interest as proving how much or how little o f the man existed in the child H ere the personality seizing hold o f t h e rhythmic art form gradually trans forms it into its own image until the imagination is whol l y inspired and ceases to be influenced by any outward form whatever or even by any kind of i m mediate external suggestion B ut this can only take plac e in its entirety in the great personalities The study of the emotional element in music possesses exceptional interest from the fact that t h at element has actually assisted to develop a consider able part of musical technique and t h erefore is clearly demonstrable in the form of the art W h ile the creative action of t h e imagination in the forma tion of the I dea belongs to relative Free Form — that is form directly relat .

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1 36

EM OT I ON

FORM

A ND

ing to t h e standards o f S trict Form it being impossible to conceive o f a definite musical I dea without such relation— t h e action of the emotions upon the i m a i nat i o n h as created t h e movement of g absolute Free Form I n actual e ffect th e se two forms are never separated t h ey con s t ant l mingle but for purposes of analysis y it is desirable to regard their united utter ance as t w o distinct forms in order to S h ow wherein one d i ffers from t h e ot h er T h ere is peculiar to absolute Free Form a gradual wavelike movement I t is not the r h ythm t h at ticks but the r h yt h m t h at surges I t is t h e counter part o f the rhythmic rise and fall o f feeling The natural conditions o f feel ing are those o f a state o f flux elation and depression animation and repose increase or decrease of intensity The power of music over the emot i onal ,

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1 37

R H YT H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M USI C nature lies in the fact that the art by means of its undulating rhythm is able to adapt itself to t h e natural suc cession of the emotions o f the mind and is therefore fe l t to be t h e direct appeal of t h e emotional nature This adaptation takes place most obviously in the three forms which may be named ”“ ” position tempo and force outline t h e absolute movements of P itc h D uration and I ntensity Th e complete wave movement w h en t h ese three for m s are united consists o f a rise and fall of pitch of a quickening and slackening o f duration and of an increase and decrease of intens i ty I t will be seen that w e have here the material for t h at most important of modern musical e ffects C limax The e ffects o f climax and o f antithesis are necessary to all the arts and are founded ,

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1 38

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C lowest the contrast o f direction of movement and also the contrast of pos i tion between high and low Th is applies to all the three forms mentioned and as t h ey may be very variously com b i ne d it is evident t h at the contrasts possible to music a fford quite as wide a field as the climaxes I ndeed climax itself is perhaps t h e greatest e ff ect o f contrast that can be imagined The statement of t h is physiologica l necessity is only another w ay of putting what h as already been said that t h e natural con di t i o ns of feeling are t h ose of flux and that t h e possibility of utterance o f that feeling in a continuous art form depends upon the flexibility of the form M usic composed in a fixed position tempo and force outline will depend fo r emotional utterance entirely upon the freedom of the I dea assisted by colo u r outline and ,

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EMOTION

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i f t h at be a l so m i ssing there can be no emotional u tterance w h atever T h e form of P osition by natur e an ever Shift i ng movement h as been trans formed by art into a s u ccession o f fixed ,

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steps These are accepted by the ear in place o f the natural movement and thus an emotional signific a nce attac h es not only to t h e rise and fall of t h e c h ro matic scale but also to that of t h e diatonic scales and t h e larger intervals With the latter it is Simply the genera l of rise and fall that is in i n c i le p p question the relation o f intervals being a matter of relative pitc h Besides this general principle position has the complications arising from the syn possibilities o f pitch Tone c h ro no u s movement cannot be fast and slow or loud and soft at the same time but owing to octave repetition it can easily .

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R H YT H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M US I C be high and low simultaneously With the orc h estra any position can be com b i ne d w i t h any ot h er or a chord can be made to extend over t h e w h ole sca l e at once The fixing of position wit h in a small compass is a comparatively ex c e t i o nal occurrence in modern music p its normal condition being that of per e t u al movement S uc h cannot be said p tempo fo r here we find the con of T empo is di t i o ns exactly reversed usually fixed its movement (accel and ritard ) being regarded as the exception H ow far this may be due to incomplete development o f tec h nique or how much of it is owing to underlying emotional conditions it is impossible in the present State of the art to hazard an opinion A fixed tempo has not the physical mon otony o f a fixed position in any thing approaching the same degree yet .

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14 2

RH YTH M I C C ON CEPTI O N OF M USI C a nd sta rt t h e slower o n e as abrupt l y This reminds one a little of t h e u n ” ” “ “ related loud and soft volunt a ries o f the old fash i oned organist T h e old .

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fashioned organ did not lend itse lf kindly to cre s cendo or diminuendo e ffects there fore a movement containing the extremes o f forte and piano possib l e to the i ns t ru ment w as obviously inart i stic from t h e sudden nature of t h e contrasts in i n tensity w h ich the player eit h er co ul d not or would not prevent H ow far the analogy may hold good with temp o time will Show but it is probable that the absence of gradation except as an occasional e ffect m a y sti l l be due to the inherent di ffi culties of performance of a constantly moving tempo and that the possibilities thus opened up have not yet struck t h e composer s imagination A fixed tempo as a Stand a rd savours ,

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I 44

E MOTIO N

F ORM

A ND

rather too much o f S trict Form to belong naturally to Free Form With regard to both tempo and force out line i t is remarkable how recent is the full development o f the wave form and yet that B eethoven s use o f it w as far ahead o f his own times and possibly with reg a rd to tempo o f our time also Beet h oven is said to have i n vented the crescendo at any rate as a normal means o f e ffect and t h ough in his scores the tempo wave form is but exceptionally indicated S chindler tells us that in h is own piano playing and in the superintendence of performances of h is own chamber mus i c the composer used an almost continual temp o ru ha to That the s a me principle was n ot carried out in his symphonies w as because he had no orc h estra under his o w n personal direction I n S chindler s opinion had .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C Beethoven retained h is h earing and been given th e necessary scope he would have founded an entirely new era o f music upon t h e freedom of tempo It w as a development t h at only began to appear in his playing at t h e beginning o f his third period But tempo had not then attained the recognised position even of a normal speed variation in orchestral music for it is only the e v o lu tion of the conductor th at has rendered the present amount o f variation feasible N othing however is more striking than th e rapid growth o f force outline during the last century and the c o nse quent gain to the art in emotional utterance I t is here again very evident that the means and the method of employing those means must both be mastered be fore the end can be ac complished I t is not the nature o f ,

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MUSIC

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gre at est amount o f variety and the most overpowering emotional results upon a large scale We have only to call in mind the toylike e ffect o f the feeble twang and tinkle th e occasional sweet n ess but utter powerlessness o f that which our forefathers called a band some th ree hundred years ago to realise how impossible it is for any great emo t i o nal utterance to take place in music without adequate resonance and gra dua tion of tone And fo r this which the modern orchestra gives us instrumental music has waited long I t is evident that the complete de of free outl i nes must play v e lO m e nt p havoc with those forms which having grown up in an earlier stage o f the art ignored i ts possibilities Fugue form neglected antit h esis but w as capable o f a massive i f formal climax S onata .

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EMOTION

FORM

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form

included a formal use o f ant i thesis since this e ffect i n the develop ment of ideas was to some extent understood but it made no provision fo r climax The more interesting class of movement was placed at t h e b e ginn i ng o f t h e symp h ony or sonata and the form commonly tailed o ff to com f arat iv e frivolity at the end Be ore p Beethoven no symphony composer had ever thought o f introducing the greatest climax last I t w as not in t h e original conception o f the form and but fo r Beethoven and S chubert would never have come there Beethoven s relation to the music o f his time may be summed up by saying that he re modelled the symp h ony to the requirements of Free Form as he perce i ved them The com promise perfect l y answered his purpose for the t i me had not t h en come for ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C Free Form to claim t h e whole of its own These conditions are now long past and the compromise is no longer possible H ad not Wagner s natural bias led him to the theatre w h o knows with what wonderful new forms he migh t have enriched symphonic art T ruly i n his case t h e gain of oper a has be e n the loss of instrumental music T hus it is that w e stand at t h e part ing of t h e ways with a past t hat can aid us litt l e in a present t h at can aid us less looking to a future that presents an impenetrable blank to the intellect B ut it is exactly this condition of intel lectual darkness that o ffers the imagina tion its opportunity Whatever may be the abso l ute music of the future i t will be based not upon intellectual design but upon imaginat i ve form t h at will image truth .

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RHYTH M I C CONCEPTI O N O F M USIC causes an e ffect o f absurdity through the contrast between the e ffect produced by the words and that produced by the music I n a bsolute music no reversal o f the normal conditions is possible Each of necessity produces its own e ffect w h ic h is obvious and unalterable And the emoti ons t h us aroused are vague and collect i ve common to t h e race and easy of utterance to any com poser Equ ally vague are the emotions evoked by the general h armonic forms T h e S trict Forms m ake for repose Free Forms fo r unrest a p re po n derance of h arsh di scords produces a feeling of distress more or less acute We also associate the minor standard wit h grief t h e maj or with rej oicing but it is evident t h at t h ese forms depend for t h eir emotional e ff ect largely upon tempo and upon the general proportion .

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I D EA

and Free as it is possible t o reverse t h e conditions and to make a minor movement quite cheerful and a maj or one overpoweringly depressing This is because bo th are S trict Forms the only di fference be i ng that the minor standard is the weaker and less consonant of the two and therefore is more easily associated with depression of feeling O n the side o f duration an Equal outline is restful especially i f combined with scale form an U ne qual outline is more animated and a Free outline is restless and agitating I t will be seen t h at the general principle of emotional utterance in music depends in t h e S trict and Free Forms on t h eir relative pro portions and in t h e absolute forms on t h e contrasts provided by their general scale o f outline w h ich correspond to con o

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C o n the emotional states and also g wave movement associated with emotional rise and fall I n the case of the abso l ute form of colour outline which has ye t to be con the general principle does not s i de re d seem to apply The material o f colour outline consists of an agglomeration o f units a collection rather than a scale whose general relations do not admit of any one method of arrangement being preferred above another and therefore not a scale at all as it exists in the other free outlines For this reason colour has no wave form of its own I ts parti c i at i o n in the general principle is limited p to assisting or modifying t h e other Free outlines I t has here no i ndependent utterance S ome will look for the ra iroa d etre of colour in its sensuous beauty I t is true that this is incomparable and

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R H YT H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M U S I C B ut if t h e sensuous beauty of colour be its most obvious attribute it does not follow t h at t h is was t h e determ i ning factor in its evolution Thoug h it is di ffi cult for us to j udge of w h at decided t h e pre ference o f t h e primitive savage for one kind of tone rat h er than anothe r t h ere seems no doubt t h at noise pleased him far more than abstract beauty We can readi l y perceive the same p h enomenon in the children of to day That is to say that t h e utterance of collective rhythmic feeling is t h e essential thing and t h e artistic value o f the S h ape taken by t h at uttera n ce is t h e inessential There is n o reason for supposing t h at t h ese are not the fun da m ental conditions of musical evo l uti on For t h e art to be perfect it must h ave decorat i ve beauty but that does not i nvolve any essential change in the relations o f utterance a nd form The ,

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EMOTIO N

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I D EA

need for a form of u tterance comes first ; the need fo r beauty o f th at form comes second Why then should the conditions h ave been reversed in the development o f colour outline ! An d when the art reached t h e stage of individual utterance when force had to make way for colour is it unreasonable to suppose that man made instruments in his own image rather than in the image of abstract beauty ! I f mere beauty was all he wanted his own voice might well have satisfied him and instruments need never have advanced beyond their primitive function o f defining the tone path o f the voice But j ust because the voice considered a s mere tone is insu ffi cient fo r the utterance o f all the varied characteristics of individual emotion in music so by the slow and gradual path of experience and by t he .

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M U SI C promptings of emotional I ntu i t i on were instruments cal l ed i nto existence — The function of colour outline then is not merely to make music beautiful ; it is to render possible the utterance o f the individual in music by means o f the natural association o f voice and feeling Each instrument represents a cert ain quality of tone emphasised by its dis sociation with other qualities and further development upon its own lines but its capacity for emotional utterance lies in the fact that emotional utterance originated in the voice and was thence trans ferred to instrumental tone I t is probable that the speaking as well as the singing voice has been a factor in the evolution o f i n I t thus appears that the voice s t ru m e nt s is the early homogeneous stage the natural standard out of which orchestral comp l exity has developed as emotional .

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R HYTH M I C C ON CEPT I O N O F M USI C extension of their respective scales above and below th e limits o f voc a l utterance in colour outline the evolution has been so pronounced as to appe a r already a di ff erence o f form I nstrumental types are so far removed from the parent voice stock that vocal utterance in colour is one thing instrumental utterance is quite another And as colour outline becomes more and more developed it is probable that the anachronism involved in t h e combination of voice and orchestra will become increasingly perceptible so th at vocal art will go one way admitting i n s t ru m e nt s merely as a background while the development of instrumental art will eventually exclude voices altogether Emotional utterance in colou r outline will have become SO well defined that the vague vocal tone will be meaningless by the side o f instrumental tone But ,

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EMOTIO N

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this will not be achieved by the multi plication of instruments The most direct and characteristic utterance o f emotion in music is that which is associated with the I dea I t is solely in its association with the I dea that colour outline can form the instrument o f definite and personal emo t i o nal utterance as distinguished from the indefinite impersonal utterance o f ab so lute form in general The I dea when fully developed clothes itself in the precise form of colour outline that b e longs to it and t h us gains a quality o f personal utterance in a degree not other wise obtainable The evolution o f emo music is from th e t i o nal utterance in indefinite to the definite o f which the form development from S trict to Free is the outward Sign The c h arac t e ri s a tion o f the I dea in colour is suggested by H aydn and M ozart forms a strong .

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R H YT H M I C CO N CEPTI O N O F M U S I C factor in the symphon i es of B eethoven and S chubert and makes immense strides of advance in the works of B erlioz and Wagner A t this point the association with the poetic idea has confused the issue and w h at is actually inherent in the nat u re o f music itself h a s been as c ri b e d to its associ a tion with poetry But seeing that music is surely adv anc ing upon h er own natural and inevitab l e path of development it is impossible that the association of another art can be the essential cause o f this evolution V ocal music owes much to poetry and natur ally i f any one should w ish to tell a Story or to associate any particular personage or event with a musical utterance the literary art must be called in to do its own work Beyond its Special form of I dea the rh yt h m i t o nal form music has no utterance o f ideas but only o f emo ,

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RH YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F MUS I C to the fee l ing I n the same w ay the tone the colour outline of music and especially of the orchestra identifies the emotion A S the dramatist throug h i ntuition and experience o f human character resolves his own personality into the separate units of his dramatic personalities so the composer throug h intuition and experience o f the character and scope o f orchestral instruments resolves his personality into th e multisonant personality of the o r speaks with a di fferent voice in c h es t ra each instrument and unlike the drama is able to create new characters t ist by the blending o f instruments and to unite their varied utterances into one massive whole But this is the ideal composer Many there are who force their own utterance upon the orchestra ; it is only the few who give the orchestra ,

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leave to be itself The maj ority o f com posers ignore its h uman element and regard it as a mere collection o f i ns t ru ments corresponding to a score forgetful of the mind behind each instrument If an orchestral player become a machine it is the composer w h o makes him so through neglect o f the individuality o f his instrument which is to the true artist a second self There remains to be noticed only the general aspect o f the relation o f the I dea to emotion This is the relation o f a picture to nature and not o f a photo graph Music idealises all emotion ; it selects intuitively the essential freeing it from the accidents o f the inessent i al But like all art it has its limits Many writers have observed its inability to embody the mean the contemptible the sordid The reverse o f the noble in .

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C music is merely the insignificant O nly th at which is great can be emphasised H ence the greatness of the art depends upon greatness of Character and an i n significant o r contemptible personality will sooner or later render all artistic facility abortive Greatness of mind re veals itself in the form of the I dea in the proportion in which Free Form enters into it and in the breadth o f the rise or fall of position to be found in it Tempo and force Outline in a lesser degree may have the i r e ffect but an I dea that h as no breadth of absolute pitc h outline that runs uncertainly to and fro cannot be other than insignificant The most complete and perfect form of I dea seems to be that which consists of a single broad rise and fall like some of ” the motives o f P arsifal I n all the varie d utterance of music .

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C H A P TER I! A ND

I N T EL L EC T

IN

T U IT IO N

is a fact that with one notable ex c e t i o n all the writers upon the origin p of music h ave striven to account for it without so much as a passing reference to Rhythm as a fac t o r o f importance in its evolution H ad musicians possessed any scientific knowledge o f the s t ru c ture of their art the amateurishness of S pencer s theory of its origin must have been at once apparent ; indeed such a theory could never have been advanced I t is obvious that the essential basis of music in the S tandards o f S trict Form is a thing peculiar to music itself and that no such bas i s or even the most IT

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I N T E LL E C T

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rudimentary signs of it are to be found in language T h e essential basis o f lan guage th at w h ich renders it intelligible is logical co h erence o f thought expressed in grammatical forms N othing could well be more dissimi l ar in origin and in method to that which renders tone relations perceptible —V i z the standards of duration and pitch The method t h at o f language is a reasoned met h od o f music is intuitive While most o f the writers on the sub “ of a admit the existence musical e ct j ” ” i faculty u ne oni ec mu rica le they p g nore the discovery made by D r Walla S c h e k during his et h nological studies o f the origin o f music in rhythmic pulsation As long ago as 1 8 9 3 he stated his belief in the existence o f what he termed the ” “ “ rhythmical impulse or the time ” sense in man in w h ich the origin o f ,

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R HYT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M US I C music must be sought H e perceived it as an independent force leading to the formation of tone order This state ment appears to have fallen upon u n h eeding ears and therefore it i s only j ust to recall it to mind Apart from the question of the origin of mus i c S pencer s famous essay has a value of i ts ow n I t records the inde pendent observation of a t h inker w h o had perce i ved a trut h whic h was h idden from the more tec h nically profic i ent in “ music The statement that variations of Voice are the physio l ogical results o f ” variations o f fee l ings is in itself w i th out any re ference to language a State ment of t h e origin of absolute Free Form in m u sic T h e analysis o f t h e “ variations o f voice into loudness quality ” pitch intervals and rate of var i ation is an entirely accurate analysis of that .

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S pencer himsel f reached what he took

to be t h e essential foundation of music throug h language and mistaking a part fo r t h e w h ole h e exa l ted his personal experien ce into a theory of origin obli v i o u s of the existence of the other even more essent i al h alf of the musical foun dation This is not surprising since musicians themselves were equally obli vi i ntellectually N o stronger proof coul exist of the purely intuitive origin and nc t i o n of the S tandards of S trict For m t h an t h e fact that during the w h ole course of t h i s controversy extend ing i n termittently over fifty years it never once occurred to t h e intellects of those w h o h ad known these standards intuitively from C h ildhood that they were actually overlooking the natural and com e t e refutation of the t h eory t h ey desired l p to disprove H av i ng had no hand in the ,

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I N T E LL E C T

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I NTUITI ON

making of rhythm the intellect knew it not and intellectually it was not recognised beyond its obvious form of time outline The musical intellect w as so engrossed in the vain attempt to make music on its o w n account that it completely neglected its true function o f examination an d scientific explanation of the intuitive method T h is intuitive method o f music the rhythmic form image existing only in the brain of a musician has remained until no w a sealed book to men of science N evertheless that S pencer appre h ended the existence o f suc h a method in litera ture is proved by the following extract “ from his essay on The P hilosophy of S tyle “ The species of composition which the law w e have traced out indicates as the perfect one is the one which genius tends natur ally to produce As w e found ,

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RHYT H M I C C O N CEPTI O N O F M US I C that the kinds of sentence which are theoretically best are t h ose commonly employed by superior minds and by inferior minds when temporarily exalted so we Shall find that the ideal form fo r a poem essay or fiction is that which the ideal writer would evolve spon t ane o u s l O ne in whom the powers of y le xp re ss i o n fully responded to the state o f feeling would unconsc i ously use that variety in t h e mode o f presenting his t h oughts which Art demands H is mode o f expression naturally responding to his thought and emotion there will flow from his pen a composition changing as the aspects of his subj ect c h ange H e will thus without e ff ort conform to what w e h a ve seen to be the laws o f e ffect And while his work presents to the reader that variety need ful to prevent continuous exertion o f the same facul ties ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C EP T I O N O F M U S I C has no place in creative art and when it is found them is simply the fungus on the tree trunk which Shows that the life is out Y et the truth cries out to be heard S o long as su ffi cient energy o f rhythmic feeling exists to fully carry out the intuitive method there is no room for any ot h er method M oreover reason is the complete contradict i on o f t h e intuitive method in action The two cannot coexist O n this point science speaks wit h n o uncertain voice Many cases o f aphasia prove that an expression cannot be emotional and intellectual at the same time the one kind O f expression arising in and Spreading throug h di ff erent parts o f the brain and nervous system ” from those occupied by the ot h er (D r ” P rimitive M usic p W allasc h e k I n the minds o f the greatest composers the intuitive action o f the emotions in ,

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composition was so continuous as to actually prevent the intellectual develop ment on other lines o f which the mind was potentially capabl e H ence the absence of general intellectual power in such a brain a circumstance which has o ften been remarked When the musical genius turns to literature as a means o f expression in addition to music then some of his intellectual potentialities begin to be realised since literary and poetic C xpression cannot take place without some intellectual development O f this comparatively new type Wagner is the greatest example And it is n ote worthy that Wagner himsel f has written “ of a Beethoven symphony This sym i n all its change fulness reveals phony an ordering principle so free and bold that w e can deem it more forcible than any logic yet without the laws o f logic .

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N O F M U S I C entering into it in the slightest ; nay rat h er the reasoning march of thoughts with its track o f causes and e ffects here finds n o sort o f foothold S o that this symphony must positively appear to us a ” revelation from another world Even so the intuitive action o f the emotions always has appeared and always will appear to the intellect which can only reason Y et at the same time it “ can apprehend that this ordering prin ” “ ciple i n which the reasoning march o f ” thoughts finds no sort o f foothold is the great principle of Rhythmic U nity which out of the most insignificant beginnings has developed this marvellously complex art o f mus ic with its equally marvellous simplicity o f utterance I t is not perhaps generally known that B eethoven is re ported to have said Tha t mind alone whose every th o ught is rhythm can ,

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEP T I O N O F M U S I C and e x ists fo r the sake of perfecting the intuitive product The o ffi ce of the intellect is to apprehend and criticise if need be the intuitive art work There never w as yet a genius so great that his intuition was invariably in fallible S chubert w as unable to criticise his own music and hence both its greatness and its inequality I t is characteristic o f the intuitive method that it is rarely able to correct I t is purely synthetic and not reflective I t states once for all But since it may err in details only the intellect can perceive exactly what is wrong with its work and out of reasoned knowledge suggest the method of putting it right The all importance o f this critical function cannot but be recog ni s e d and in this lies th e need for a thorough and practical scheme of i n in music a need t e lle c t u al education .

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I NTUITION

whic h can on l y be fu l ly supplied by a detailed analysis At the same time the synthetic function must not be over looked All the sound p h enomena o f music must become familiar to the mind a : rou nd else t h e analysis o f them will mean nothing The development of the i nt u i t i v e fu nc t i o n consists i n its exercise I t can be developed firstly by rhythm i c physical exerc i se including dancing ac companied by Simple rhythmic music ; secondly by r h ythmic musical exercise such as the singing of fo l k songs and dance tunes and at a later stage by the playing of instruments especially in orc h estral and concerted music Th e value o f intu i tion in musical performance is only second to its importance in com position It is unfortunately easi l y de stroyed by means of mechanical repetition and wrong practice induced by wrong .

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R H YT H M I C C O N C EPT I O N O F M U S I C theory I ts place is largely taken amongst those w ho are trained fo r music by a li feless superficial facility the result o f perpetual mechanical repetition which from the artistic standpoint is absolutely barren I t me ans the substitution o f technique for utterance The problem of an executant s education is to acquire technique and develop intuition at the same time The greater t h e natural intuitive power the more rapidly will technique be mastered I t may be assisted by the frequent hearing of good R hyt h m i t o nal music well performed by singing and playing from memory and especially by pauses of rest in the study of technique I t is evident that this most important syn thetic part of rhythmic instruction cannot be taught from any book and must precede instruction in the intellectual anal ysis of rhythm I n .

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R H YT H M I C C O N CEPT I O N OF M U S I C no permanent art of music could ex i st This consists in the written record T h e invention o f notation though it must conform to the requirements o f intuitive action is of purely intellectual origin N o intuitive action would ever of itse lf lead to the invention of written signs H ence the inability o f fo lk music to record itself and its lack o f advance beyond the small form of a melody which could easily be remem bered T h e debt owed by music to t h e monks of t h e M iddle Ages is in this respect incalculable I f counter point kept back r h ythmic development the latter would never have taken place at all without a system o f record And if as is probable notation at first di ctated tone movement there is no question now but that tone movement dictates notation The act o f notation .

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INTUITION

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is an act of the intellect that is an act of analysis The stream of imaginative sound whic h forms one whole in the mind must be resolved into its com ponent parts O u tlines must be detached chords must be analysed Especially is this the case with an orchestral score The di ffi culty o f musical composition lies less in the mental composition than in forming an accurate record in m ak ing the Sign exactly fit t h e sound The perversity o f our presen t musical educa tion or rather its transmission intact from the Middle Ages is Shown i n the fact that too often i t teaches the sign regardless of the sound and encourages students to work harmony exercises a fter the manner in which they would think out problems in C hess O f late years there has been a movement in favour of what is called ear training the re ,

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R H Y T H M I C C O N C E P T I O N O F M U S IC cognition o f the name of the note by ” “ its sound and ear tests are now beginning to enter into the practical Side o f examinations But un fortunately this has as yet brought little m o difi c a ” “ tion into t h e theoretical scheme the written part o f examinations I t is evident that what is wanted is a change and the introduction o f a o f method graduated system fo r teaching notation which should be the writing o f music from the give n sound beginning with Simple melodies and chor d movement through concerted music up to the orchestral score All children and b e ginners should be taught elementary notation in this manner as it will greatly assist the power o f reading from sight upon an instrument a n d its i m portance fo r students of composition need scarcely be pointed out Between -

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RH YTH MI C C ONCEPTI O N O F M USI C makes him resort to the assistance of the intellect Y et it is surely better to be original in a small form t h an common place i n a large one The day will perhaps at last arrive fo r mus i c that has already arrived fo r literature w h en each writer will naturally discover the kind and the size o f the form best suited to him and will not be expected to con form to a fe w fixed types ; w h en instead of inqu i ring what the form is people will ask what t h e utterance is and w h et h er it is realised by the form I n t h at day the form will be j udged as a means of utterance and not as an end in itself But this c h ange m ust come from wit h in and not from without I f we want true imaginative form in music w e must encourage t h e act i on o f intuition and discourage the action of intellect in actual com .

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position except i n its o ffi ce of recorder and critic The man o f genius is not merely one w h o possesses imagination but he w h o allows his imagination to possess him T h is is a mental state unknown to talent which identifies itse lf with reasoned action H ence the distinction which is perceived to exist between genius and talent I magination is not denied to talent but here it becomes the serv a nt instead of the master M ake it the master give it the natural free dom of intuitive action and you a t once transform talent into genius There is no reason in the nature of things th a t t h e di fference between a sm a ll imagina tion and a great one should be more than a di fference in degree The smal l imagination will naturally pr o duce the small work the great imagination the .

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R HYTH M I C C O N CEPTI O N OF M USI C greater work and each has its value as an utterance o f personal ity There is room in music for imaginative form o f any Size from the folk song upwards and the small works have a charm that is all their o w n But that so few exist o f any real value is because of the craze for imitation o f the great works so that the small imagination falls a prey to the domination o f the intellect which o ffers an easy ready made w ay o f doing the thing on a big scale At once personal utterance vanishes and genius s h rinks into talent The natural di ff er ence in degree has become a di fference in kind as regards the artistic product The li fe is gone and is replaced by imitation o f li fe I nstead of a real flower one is o ffered an artificial one The cause o f all this is apparent I t is a lack o f t he faith that m oves ,

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other t h an intellectual is the formative principle of unity th at as R h ythm in music has called the art of music into existence ; that hitherto it has been recognised only in its most developed form and so named genius but now appears as the author equally o f the l owest and the highest forms o f living art And to the further developments action in the future w ho o f intuitive Shall set a limit ! ,

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