RHYTHM. 



Such were the metres appropriated to the dialogue of the 

 ancient tragedy, and fuch mull have been the rhythms or 

 times of the mufic to which they were fet. 



We (hall clofe thefe obfervations with one example 

 more, taken from the choral part of the drama, that 

 part which was more particularly mufical, and the circle 

 marked out for the mnlician, where all the magic of 

 his art, with all the wonders of rhythm, were to be dif- 

 played. Of the metre of this part, we (hall only ob- 

 ierve, in general, that it fecms to have admitted of fuch 

 an unbounded variety in the mixture and arrangement of 

 feet, and to have been fettered by fo few rellraints, that, to 

 a modern ear, it is frequently not to be dillinguilhed from a 

 fmooth and elegant prole. We can therefore be certain of 

 nothing, concerning the mufic applied to the ancient chorus, 

 except the relative lengths of the notes as thev are deter- 

 mined by trie profodv : in what manner the ancients divided 

 them by beats, we do not even prefume to guefs ; and we 

 believe it may be propofed to the mufical reader as a problem, 

 worthy, for its difficulty at lealt, if not for its importance, 

 to exercife his fagacity, how the following fpecimen fhould 

 be barred, in order to render it as little tormenting to the 

 ear as poffible. 



;^~— jaczpzpzEZg 



P^£ 



Z*"a; E - Wt - fta^ti' 



^S! 



szzfzip 



4—4- 



Ti : * yotgy tT s ' a, - vr,^ rcXi - cv 



i 



POP f~w~p~w~u 



Ice; tvooci - fxo - vt - oc: <^t fit. 



gi-r f c r re r 



}I TO - T«T0» (I - GOV OOX!l» 



ife 



p.#_g. peg 



Kai do|a»T' a - stok M - »ai ; 



The mod finking circumftancc in all thefe examples, is the 

 perpetual change of time, occafioned by the mixture of 

 unequal feet. To the eye, indeed, the recitative of the old 

 French opera prcfents a fimilar appearance ; but where no 

 Uriel time is obferved, the changes are lefs perceptible to 

 the ear. No circumltance relative to ancient mufic has been 

 more frequently and triumphantly oppofed to the modem, 

 in proof of fuperiority, than its inviolable adherence to the 

 fixed quantity of fyllablcs. It is, perhaps, equally difficult 

 to dilprove this, and to conceive how fuch a mufic could be 

 rigoroufly executed, without throwing both the hearers and 

 performers into convulfions. If, however, this was the cafe, 



we have here attempted to give of the rhythmical refources 

 of ancient mufic, may be lufficient to warrant lomething 



we need no longer wonder at the notfy expedients, to whici. 

 the ancients had recourfe in beating time ; for we believe the 

 bed modern band would find it difficult, if not impoffible, to 

 keep exactly together in the execution of a Greek chorus, 

 though affiled by all the clatter of an ancient coryphaeus. 



( T pon the whole, perhaps, even the imperfect view which 

 ;d to give of the rJ 

 y be lufficient to 

 more than a doubt, whether, after all tliat Ifaac Voilius, and 

 many others, have laid, a Jixed proiody, and the rigorous, 

 unaccommodating length of fyllables, be any recom- 

 mendation of a language for mufic ; that is, whether a 

 mufic formed and moulded cloiely upon fuch a language, 

 mult not neceliarily be cramped and poor, in companion 

 of that free, unfhackled variety ; that independent range of 

 rhythmical phrale, which constitutes fo coniiderable a part 

 of the riches of modern mufic. Let the molt inventive com- 

 pofertry to fet halt a dozen Hexameters, pure Iambics, or 

 any other verfes that will tall into regular common or triole 

 tune, and he will loon find that no refources of melody are 

 fuffictent to dilguife or palliate the infipid and tirefome uni- 

 formity of the meafure ; and as for any thing like expreffion, 

 we may as well expect to be affected by the mechanical llrut 

 of a loldier upon the parade. In other metres, fuch as 

 thofe already given in the preceding examples, where feet 

 of different times are intermixed, fome variety is indeed ac- 

 quired ; but it is a mifplaced variety, which, without ob- 

 viating the tirefome effect of a confinement to no more thai: 

 two lengths of notes, adds to it that of an aukward and 

 uncouth arrangement ; the ear i; Hill fatigued with uni- 

 formity where it requires change, and diftracted by change 

 where it requires uniformity. 



Modern mufic, on the contrary, by its divifion into equal 

 bars, and its unequal fubdivifion of thefe bars by notes of 

 various lengths, unites to the pleafure which the ear is by 

 nature formed to receive from a regular and even meafure, all 

 the variety and expreffion which the ancients feem to have 

 aimed at by fudden and convullive changes of time, and a 

 continual conflict of jarring and irreconcifeable rhythms. 



Nothing feems more cffential to mulical pleafure, than 

 the divifion of melody into equal portions of time, or bars. 

 Quintihau attributed to this natural menfuration of the ear, 

 the firll production of poetry : " Poema — aurium menfura, 

 et iunihter decurrentium fpatiorum obfervatione effe gene- 

 ratum." Hexameters and Iambics appear to have been 

 the moll ancient Greek metres ; and the latter, if we may 

 credit Horace, Art. Poet. 253, were at firlt pure and un- 

 compounded. The mixture of unequal feet, and the Dithy- 

 rambic licence of lyric poetry, were later refinements. The 

 progrefs of mufical rhythm was, of courfe, the fame. 

 Plutarch exprefsly fays, in the dialogue de Mufica, that the 

 compofitions of Terpander, and other old malters, were fet 

 to Hexameter:-., chiefly of Homer; that is, they were in re- 

 gular common time. The change and intermixture of 

 rhythms is lpokcn of as the innovation of modern artifU. 

 Plato rejects thefe complicated meafures from the mufic of 

 his repuhhe ; and even Haac Voilius, the great champion of 

 ancient rhythm, who aliens that " no man can be a good 

 mnlician, that is not a good drummer,'' owns, p. II, that 

 " vitiolum et ineonipolituni imprimis, liet carmen, li duorum, 

 trium, quatuor, pluriumve temporum pedes, veluti Pyrri- 

 chii, Iambi, Dactyli, Pxoncs, Ionici, limul copulentur ;" 



though this is done continually, not only in the lyric part, 



but even in the dialogue oi the ancient drama. 



It is evident, from the proofs already given, that the 

 Greeks and Romans had but two different degrees of long 

 and fhort notes; and even the old lozenge and Iquare cha- 

 Cc 1 ra*' 



