5o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



IMPERFECTIONS OF MODERN HARMONY. 



By S. AUSTEN PEAECE, Mus. D., Oxok. 



THE works of Helmholtz, and those of his English translator Ellis, 

 have drawn attention to the fact that piano-fortes and instruments 

 with similar key-boards are out of tune. .The recent contribution to 

 musical literature by Professor Pole having referred to the subject of 

 intonation, it becomes a duty to the public to point out the miscon- 

 ceptions of these theorists, and to state that musical problems are far 

 more complex than they believe. 



Although professing to work scientifically, they allow their senses to 

 deceive them. Professor Helmholtz in his elaborate work " On the 

 Sensations of Tone as a Physiological Basis for the Theory of Music," 

 says, for instance, " We often hear four musical amateurs, who have 

 practiced much together, singing quartets in perfectly just intonation." 

 He is deceived in this. It is a popular error that music for stringed 

 instruments or for voices is or can be rendered in tune ; and scientists 

 writing upon the subject invariably cling to this fallacy. 



An unaccompanied quartet of singers returning at the close to the 

 exact pitch at which they began would thus most certainly prove that 

 they had sung out of tune. This is a startling fact — stranger than the 

 current fiction — and demands complete demonstration. The subject is 

 abstruse, and difficult to present clearly to persons not practically ac- 

 quainted with the points at issue, but for the benefit of all thoughtful 

 readers the attempt is made. 



All the great Oriental nations of antiquity were familiar with the 

 difficidties to be overcome in establishing a tonal system. The results 

 of their experiments are known to the musical historian. It is suf- 

 ficient to say that the necessity of accurate definition was universally 

 desired in the earliest ages of which we have any record by j^eoples 

 who did not employ harmony. But our own use of chords makes ques- 

 tions of intonation much more intricate. We not only require a song 

 or melody, but several songs or melodies to be given simultaneously, 

 as in the ordinary church quartet or fugal chorus, where each singer 

 demands the right to be provided with some important subject-matter, 

 worthy the delivery of a feeling, acting, willing spirit — some " part " 

 which fully occupies him. He will not be content with a mere accom- 

 paniment to some leading part. The harmonizing of these several 

 melodies, that they may at every instant make recognized and well- 

 proportioned combinations called chords, constitutes the modern science 

 of harmony. This science is based upon the comparatively recent dis- 

 coveries that Nature herself supplies a full chord, or cortege of har- 

 monic sounds, to attend every single note, and others also to attend a 

 union of two notes, and so on. The ancient Greeks, not being acquaint- 



