Duple Meter Research Articles

The relationship between meter recognition, rhythmic notation, and information processing competence

Abstract This paper reports a descriptive study examining the relationship between the information processing dimensions of simultaneous and sequential synthesis and children's ability to recognise and notate meter. One hundred and sixty–one Grade 3, 5, and 6 students who were enrolled in two primary schools comprised the sample. The students' ability to distinguish between duple and triple meter was studied using a Meter Recognition Test which enabled the separate examination of three musical elements. namely pitch, rhythm, and dynamics. The results of analyses showed significant correlations between both simultaneous and sequential processing competencies and notational ability, between meter recognition and both simultaneous and sequential processing scores, and between meter recognition and notational ability. Additionally, children with high simultaneous processing ability were advantaged on simple rhythm items, while those with high sequential competence outperformed their peers on more complex rhyt...

Discrimination and Interference in the Recall of Melodic Stimuli

Two studies were designed to investigate the nature of forgetting in regard to melodic stimuli; specifically, the degree to which 400 college-age subjects were able to discriminate identical melodies when extremely similar melodies were interpolated between test and recall melodies. Additionally, an attempt was made to investigate differences that might be attributed to either modal (major-minor) or meter (simple-compound) presentations. In each experiment, nonmusic majors were given a 16 trial stimulus presentation consisting of nine 10-sec. melodies per trial. In each trial, the initial test melody was presented followed by 8 additional melodies. After each of the melody presentations, subjects indicated whether that particular melody was identical to or different from, the first test melody. All 144 melodies for the 16 trials were extremely similar in that they represented 4 alterations of 4 similar original melodies. The original melodies were based on a descending diatonic scale with modal and meter alterations. The first experiment attempted to isolate simple-compound alterations; the second experiment, major-minor alterations. Results indicated that subjects were able to discriminate effectively throughout the stimulus presentations with extremely high accuracy for those specific melodies that were identical to the test melody. In addition, when melodies were identical except for slight modifications, melodies presented in duple meter appeared less susceptible to interference than melodies in triple meter or than melodies having modal changes. As would be expected, accuracy declined across time and across interpolated melodies; however, even after 8 interpolated melodies, subjects recalled the test melody with at least 43% accuracy.

Thai Songs in 7/4 Meter

t became apparent during a period of research in Thailand in 1965-67 that there existed a unique group of songs, based on a rhythmic cycle of seven beats, which were practically unknown outside of musical circles. These songs, which are used in conjunction with the theater, are of particular significance because their metrical organization is entirely unlike the standard rhythmic structures of most traditional music. Ever since Simon de la Loubere, Envoy of Louis XIV to Siam, wrote in 1688, Je n'y ai pas remarque un seul air, dont la mesure fit a trois temps (1700:207), it has been generally assumed by Westerners that all traditional music with firmly fixed tempo must belong to the duple meter category. This concept was perpetuated by Phra Chen Duriyanga, who stated emphatically, Thai musical compositions are all in... simple duple time. Compound time is never met in them (1948:5). Why was no mention made of this repertoire of songs in additive meter, some of which date back to the Ayudhia period (1350-1767)? Perhaps the answer is provided by Duriyanga, a citizen of German and parentage, when he indicates that his training had been exclusively in Western music. Montri Tramote, a prominent authority on music, made a brief allusion to what he described as a meter (1961:14), an appellation which I have adopted here. However, his remarks were never translated into English. The ching (small cymbals) provide the only accompaniment in the 7/4 songs; the drums and all other colotomic elements are entirely absent, even in the instrumental interludes. The ching pattern is illustrated in Example 1.

The Harmony of Berg's "Reigen"

IT Is quite possible that the Mahlerian symphony inspired by Balzac's Seraphita that Berg pondered in the years 1912-13 would have centered on D minor. The works that developed from this project, the final interlude of Wozzeck and the Three Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 6, are strongly dominated by this key. Possibly the first movement of Mahler's Ninth Symphonywhich Berg fondly studied and which seems to be a major influence on the Praeludium of Op. 6-haunted Berg's imagination during this period. The key of D minor may have been to him a symbol of farewell to traditional tonality. In Op. 6 old and new harmonic principles participate in a fascinating balance and D minor is the prime representative of the old. At least once in each of the three pieces there is a strong resolution to the note D or to a chord whose most prominent tones form a D minor triad. The use of D minor in this work leads us to ponder the function of the many tonal references that occur here. Do they serve in a way similar to the structural function of traditional tonality? Are they a part of or are they separate from the more prevailing contextual harmonic elements? The present article will attempt to present the harmonic structure of Reigen, the second piece of Op. 6,1 and discuss certain questions that this harmonic structure provokes. Reigen is a dance movement of a predominantly waltz or Ldndler rhythm. Melody is its most prominent aspect but its texture shows extraordinary variety. Its shape is a kind of sonata form with an introduction and coda in a contrasting duple meter. While contrasts in meter, melodic material, and texture help to articulate the shape it is the harmony or pitch structure of the piece that is most bound up with the question of form. Smoothing over all subdivisions is the growing, evolving quality of the music.

Negro Folk Elements in Classic Ragtime

Ragtime was similar in many ways to the marches and dances popular in the 1890's, for like them it consisted of short melodic sections repeated according to a formal pattern, with accompanying harmonies that relied heavily on tonic-dominant progressions. Unlike its contemporary musical fashions, however, emphasized a highly developed rhythmic syncopation, and melodies and harmonies which contained a full and subtle use of Negro folk elements. Present-day students of early Negro music have tended to ignore the melodic and harmonic resources, but these aspects of the music deserve comment, for in the classic pieces, the early Negro composers developed the possibilities of their folk idiom to a remarkable extent. Ragtime was first heard as part of the musical entertainment in the wine rooms and sporting houses in the mid-Western United States. It was played by Negro and a few white itinerant pianists, many of them highly gifted and all of them close to the sources of folk music. They drifted from one town to the next, following the fairs, the races, and the excursions, and when their evening job was finished, they would meet at a piano in some back-room to play on into the morning. Ideas were exchanged freely and rags were patched together from the bits of melody and scraps of harmony that all contributed. During these formative years, each pianist desired only the making of music and the achievement of a personal playing style, but by 1897, with the first publication of a piece, a distinct kind of composition known as ragtime had developed (Blesh, 1958:17). Many of the ideas of these traveling musicians had begun to enter the stream of popular music when a white band leader, W. H. Krell, published his Mississippi Rag in 1897. More pieces followed by both white and Negro composers, and in 1899, Maple Leaf Rag, by the Negro Scott Joplin, was published in Sedalia, Missouri by John Stark. It had such an unprecedented success that finally came to the attention of a nationwide audience. Thousands of people responded to the lilting melodies and exciting syncopation, and bought copies of the sheet music to play on their parlor pianos. The lively melodies and rhythms shocked conservative listeners, but for the first time in American history, Negro composers were impressing their ideas onto the country's popular instrumental music. If the content of the music was unfamiliar, its form was not. The pieces were organized into highly formalized patterns (not unlike nineteenth century lancers dance patterns, cake walks, and marches) which controlled the exuberance of the syncopation and shaped the music so that it was at least structurally familiar to the parlor pianists. A rag was characteristically written in duple meter, although there were a few waltzes and tangos. The compositions were divided into three, four, or five sections or of 16 measures each, usually with a separate melodic development in each strain. The sections were often repeated according to simple patterns like A A B B A C C D D, with the later strains C and D in a key a fourth higher than the key of strains A and B. 174