Songs of the Copper Eskimos • 23 



are also, for the music in a rhythmic respect corresponds almost absolutely with 

 that of the words, as we should expect in more or less primitive singing. It is 

 the words that are intoned, not formal musical structure to which words have 

 been fitted. There are a few exceptions, such as a glide of two notes over one 

 syllable, but these are comparatively rare, and so dependent is the rhythm of 

 the music upon that of the words that it is subordinated to them in countless 

 instances. No two verses or refrains are exactly alike, usually, in a song, and 

 the differences are even more rhythmic than melodic. Time and again we note 

 that a change of word to one with one more syllable will cause an extra half 

 bea,t or beat in a measure that would otherwise be an exact repetition of one 

 which occurred in an exactly similar situation only the verse before. With such 

 a condition, formal rhythmic structure is, if not out of the question, at least 

 very unlikely to exist, although there are a few instances of it here and there in 

 both dance tunes and chants, but they do not persist long enough to be dis- 

 tinguishing features except in cases where words are repeated and even then 

 not through the song. These rhythmic effects seem to be enjoyed, if one can 

 judge from the way in which they are sung, but such a play is so unusual as to 

 be worthy of comment, rather than customary. Instances of the kind will be 

 noted in their places. 



In the different songs of one type, such as the pisik or aton, I have not been 

 able to find any particular rhythmic combination that predominates. If one 

 song seems to possess such, here and there, the next has nonle, or one that is 

 totally different. And in the course of a single song there are not many suc- 

 cessions that are alike, so that it could hardly be said that a certain rhythmic 

 unit or pattern characterizes the song in question. One can hardly imagine a 

 dancing of fixed, form accompanying this sort of music, for what would happen 

 at odd beats it would be difficult to conjecture. Their presence is frequently 

 most disconcerting to whatever rhythm may have appeared to be forming. 



With none of the. usual features to assist in the identification of the different 

 types of dance songs, it becomes necessary to resort to questions of composition 

 which deal with the general plan of the tune and the words, to the proportion 

 of parts, their recurrence and repetition in relation to themselves and other 

 parts. Therefore the division of the pisiks into those without and those with 

 preludes seems comparatively important. As has already been stated the pisik 

 is a rather long song consisting of verses and refrains. The verses are poetically, 

 if not musically, usually subdivided into two or more parts which are separated 

 by refrains. These latter may be all the same or each verse part may have its 

 own refrain. There is a large group in which the beginning of the song is made 

 at once with the verse, and as these are simpler in construction from several 

 different points of view, they will be discussed first. 



Sub-Group 1. Without Prelude 



Song number 1 is the most simple in structure of all the pisiks which were 

 collected. There are merely undivided verses which are separated one from the 

 other by a refrain which is the same throughout. After the refrain there is a 

 short connective, which is neither part of it nor of the succeeding verse, but 

 rather a transitional measure, which usually in all dance songs introduces the 

 verse. The connective is a characteristic feature of these songs, and varies in 

 length generally from one to two measures. There are always burden syllables, 

 frequently i ya, i ya, which constitute the connectives. A study of this inter- 

 esting device in the examples themselves will serve better than a description. 



There are several songs in which the verses are divided into two parts, 

 both alike, each followed by the refrain which remains the same throughout the 

 song. These are numbers 2 to 8 inclusive. There is one exception in this group, 

 for toward the end of the song the refrain in No. 4 changes. In fact, it is very 

 hard to generalize about any group, for exceptions of one sort or another are 



