Music Notation and Terminology Part 26

_Primitive Minor (descending)_

Same pitches in reverse order.

_Harmonic Minor (ascending)_

The minor scale form having minor sixth and major seventh above tonic to be called Harmonic Minor.

Ill.u.s.trative examples. A minor: a, b, c, d, e, f, g sharp, a; C minor: c, d, e flat, f, g, a flat, b, c.

_Harmonic Minor (descending_)

Same pitches in reverse order.

_Melodic Minor (ascending)_

The minor scale form having major sixth and major seventh above tonic to be called Melodic Minor.

Ill.u.s.trative examples. A minor: a, b, c, d, e, f sharp, g sharp, a; C minor: c, d, e flat, f, g, a, b, c.

_Melodic Minor (descending)_

Same as the Primitive.

ADOPTIONS OF THE 1912 MEETING AT CHICAGO

_Pulse and Beat_

The Committee finds that the words: Pulse and Beat are in general use as synonymous terms, meaning one of the succession of throbs or impulses of which we are conscious when listening to music. Each of these pulses or beats has an exact point of beginning, a duration, and an exact point of ending, the latter coincident with the beginning of the next pulse or beat. When thus used, both words are terms of ear.

_Beat_

One of these words, Beat, is also in universal use, meaning one of a series of physical motions by means of which a conductor holds his group of performers to a uniform movement.

When thus used it becomes a term of eye.

The conductor's baton, if it is to be authoritative, cannot wander about through the whole duration of the pulse but must move quickly to a point of comparative repose, remaining until just before the arrival of the next pulse when it again makes a rapid swing, finis.h.i.+ng coincidently with the initial tone (or silence) of the new pulse.

Thus it is practically the end of the conductor's beat that marks the beginning of the pulse.

The Committee is of opinion that Beat might preferably be used as indicating the outward sign.

_Beat-Note_

This term "beat-note" is already in use in another important connection (see Terminology Report, 1911) and the Committee recommends that those using the above terms shall say: "This note is an on-the-beat note; this one is an after-the-beat note; this one a before-the-beat note."

DEFINITIONS

_Matters of Ear_

Pulse: The unit of movement in music, one of a series of regularly recurring throbs or impulses.

Measure: A group of pulses.

Pulse-Group: Two or more tones grouped within the pulse.

_Matters of Eye_

Beat: One of a series of conventional movements made by the conductor. This might include any unconventional motion which served to mark the movement of the music, whether made by conductor, performer or auditor.

Beat-Note: A note of the denomination indicated by the measure-sign as the unit of note-value in a given measure.

_Example_

Given the following measure-signs: 2-4, 2-2, 2-8, quarter, half, or eighth notes, respectively, are beat-notes.

Beat-Group: A group of notes or notes and rests, of smaller denomination than the beat-note which represents a full beat from beginning to end and is equal in value to the beat-note.

(A beat-group may begin with a rest.)

On-the-Beat Note (or rest): Any note (or rest) ranging in value from a full beat down, which calls for musical action (or inaction) synchronously with the conductor's beat.

After-the-Beat Note: Any note in a beat-group which indicates that a tone is to be sounded after the beginning, and before or at the middle of the pulse.

Before-the-Beat Note: Any note in a beat-group which indicates that a tone is to be sounded after the middle of the pulse.

To ill.u.s.trate terminology and to differentiate between Pulse and Beat as terms, respectively of ear and eye, the following is submitted:

Whenever a brief tone involves the musical idea of syncopation, it may be regarded as an after-the-pulse tone and the note that calls for it as an after-the-beat note; when it involves the idea of antic.i.p.ation or preparation it may be regarded as a before-the-pulse tone, and the note that calls for it, as a before-the-beat note.

_Measure and Meter_

"What is the measure-sign?"

"What is the meter-signature?"

These two words are used synonymously, and one of them is unnecessary. The Committee recommends that Measure be retained and used. Meter has its use in connection with hymns.

The author does not find it possible at present to agree with all the recommendations made in the above report, but the summary is printed in full for the sake of completeness.

The Music Teacher's National a.s.sociation has also interested itself mildly in the subject of terminology reform, and at its meeting in Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C., in 1908, Professor Waldo S. Pratt gave his address as president of the a.s.sociation on the subject "System and Precision in Musical Speech." This address interested the members of the a.s.sociation to such an extent that Professor Pratt was asked to act as a committee whose purpose it should be to look into the matter of reforms necessary in music terminology and report at a later session. In 1910 Professor Pratt read a report in which he advocated the idea of making some changes in music nomenclature, but took the ground that the subject is too comprehensive to be mastered in the short time that can be given to it by a committee, and that it is therefore impossible to recommend specific changes. He also took occasion to remark that one difficulty in the whole matter of terminology is that many terms and expressions are used _colloquially_ and that such use although usually not scientific, is often not distinctly harmful and is not of sufficient importance to cause undue excitement on the part of reformers. Quoting from the report at this point:--"A great deal of confusion is more apparent than real between _note_ and _tone_, between _step_ and _degree_, between _key_ and _tonality_. No practical harm is done by speaking of the _first note_ of a piece when really _first tone_ would be more accurate. To say that a piece is written _in the key of B[flat]_ is more convenient than to say that it is written in the _tonality of which B[flat] is the tonic_. The truth is that some of the niceties of expression upon which insistence is occasionally laid are merely fussy, not because they have not some sort of reason, but because they fail to take into account the practical difference between colloquial or off-hand speech and the diction of a scientific treatise. This is said without forgetting that colloquialism always needs watching and that some people form the habit of being careless or positively uncouth as if it were a mark of high artistic genius."

Professor Pratt's report is thus seen to be philosophic rather than constructive, and terminology reform will undoubtedly make more immediate progress through the efforts of the N.E.A. Committee with its specific recommendations (even though these are sometimes admittedly _fussy_) than through the policy of the M.T.N.A. of waiting for some one to get time to take up the subject in a scholarly way. Nevertheless the philosophic view is sometimes badly needed, especially when the spirit of reform becomes too rabid and attaches too great importance to trifles. A judicious intermingling of the two committees in a series of joint meetings would undoubtedly result in mutual helpfulness, and possibly also in a more tangible and convincing statement of principles than has yet been formulated by either.