MUSIC OF PRIMITIVE PEOPLES PASTOR. 685 



material is used for the strings, and, in short, indifi'orence is shown 

 toward all those ele^nents wdiich the melodic music perception at one 

 tune built up with the most painful exactness. But there is one part 

 of the stringed instruments in which we see not a retrogression but a 

 clear development. That is the sounding board. All wa^ll-developed 

 music culture regards this as a mere sound strengthener. Every form 

 of resonator represents an unlimitetl number of musical experiments. 

 Only the work and the traditions t)f many generations could deter- 

 mine the form to be finally accepted, which is so important in the 

 matter of tone color. But this form once settled upon the player 

 need no longer trouble himself about it. 



It is otherwise with primitive peoples. In handling the borrowed 

 instruments they were convinced that the sounding board produced 

 a sound like that of the strings. This sound they thought could be 

 made better by a transposition of the soundmg parts. Hence, they 

 almost always reconstructed the sounding body so that it formed a 

 drum. In })laying, this drum is just as industriously used as the 

 strmgs (which explains also the quite radically different way of holdmg 

 the instrument), so that the melody ahvays reverts agam to pure 

 rhythm. In a word, from a well-thought-out instrument of melody 

 has been evolved a somewhat more complicated percussion mstrument. 



This also goes to show how yet undeveloped are the musical ideas 

 of ])rimitive peoples under the ban of an idea which always loses 

 itself m the subtleties of the pure rudiments of sound. What the 

 consideration of rhythmics and of instruments teaches us will be cor- 

 roborated by the harmonics and melodies of ijrimitive peo])les. 



Of course our chords were unknown to these peoples. Their nmsic 

 except m a very few })articular mstances, is altogether in unison. 

 And this unison naturally does not arise from the fact that the women 

 and children accom])any the men an octave higher in the roundelays. 

 Octaves can be made a very expressive means of harmony, as is 

 shown in the works of Chr. Siiuling and also Puccini. But among 

 prhnitive })eoples the octave is nothing more than a strengthened 

 single tone. 



The two followmg phenomcnux are not quite so sim])le a matter as 

 the parallel octaves. The Berliji Phonogrammarchiv, which is con- 

 ducted by Dr. Abraham and von Hornbostel, contains unequivocal 

 ('xamj)les of songs of j)rimitive ])eoplcs which w(>re sung in strict fifth 

 intervals, und one can not disreganl the fact that Leoi)old ^lozart once 

 heard street singers m Italy sing their little ditties in perfect fifths. 

 Such musical talent was not a bit liner than— indeed it was cjuite 

 similar to — what we observe in our village musicians when they sing 

 in fifths, though, "unfortunately," says Wallaschek very justly, 

 "without kncnviu^ that they had done it or wishing to do it." Thus, 

 we may conceive of the ])arallel fifths as well as the i)arallel octaves of 



