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Author: Claireinet
Date: 2009-01-07 04:24
I know this is going to sound silly- but how many of you actively apply metric accents or hypermeter to your playing?
Though metric accent is simple, and many times applied without so much as a thought - I, more frequently than I would like, find myself listening to recordings of practice sessions feeling something is off, and realizing I can't tell from the recording what meter I'm in. This, of course, irks me to no end – given what an elementary skill it is.
So, I have been trying to keep better track of applying metric accents in order to present the music in a more organized and aesthetic way, and was wondering if anyone else has had problems with this or actively takes it into consideration when performing.
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2009-01-08 05:22
Marches and dances for example are more metric in nature than other types of music. For music that is more lyrical dwelling on making the meter very obvious will take away from the larger units(phrases). Furthermore the meter can change without being indicated on the written page.
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2009-01-08 13:13
This is a very subtle question and requires a subtle answer -- unfortunately it's a bit difficult to do in this medium.
Certainly the term 'hypermeter' isn't well-known amongst players, and in fact I've never seen it used before you used it; but looking at the literature, I see that that features quite prominently in the academic field.
Understanding that showing metre (sorry, I'm English) is something that you can do to a greater or lesser extent is in my view a very important part of playing classical music well. It goes along with the realisation that 'beginning-oriented' phrase-structure admits of degrees; and of course that means that the two structures 'compete' in some sense: see 'Phrasing in Contention':
http://www.woodwind.org/clarinet/Study/Phrasing.html
A good example of hypermetre discussed in that article occurs at the beginning of the Mozart clarinet quintet. Supported by the phrasing, the first two bars are a unit, the third and fourth units in themselves, the fifth falls into two and the sixth (arguably) into four. At the double bar, the process is reversed, starting with the four quarter-notes in the violins and moving back to the C major recapitulation.
It's often worthwhile in classical music to ask yourself, is this bar 'in' one, two or four? In the absence of phrasing indications, that question essentially amounts to asking, how much does the metre want to be represented here? The answer you get often illuminates the music.
A couple of months ago I led a workshop with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment in which we investigated the results of applying ONLY metrical and phrase modulation to the G minor symphony and the clarinet concerto. It's amazing how much you can get out of these pieces using just those structures, and in my view the exercise goes some way towards explaining how it is that Mozart's scores seem so unadorned to us. See:
http://test.woodwind.org/Databases/Klarinet/2008/10/000102.txt
Tony
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Author: mrn
Date: 2009-01-08 15:59
Tony wrote:
<<The answer you get often illuminates the music.>>
I have a favorite (20th century) example of just how true this is--the first two bars of the first of Stravinsky's Three Pieces. The first time I heard someone play it, I didn't notice this, but when I finally got the sheet music in front of me and saw the where the barlines were drawn, the light bulb went off and I realized this was not just a bunch of rambling notes, but a quote from familiar tune everyone knows, no less--the Song of the Volga Boatmen!
No wonder Stravinsky left strict instructions about accents, metronome marks, and breaths. If you try to play in some kind of mushy romantic style, you miss the whole point of the music!
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Author: vjoet
Date: 2009-01-08 16:45
Years ago I was an avid chess fanatic, and in my many books on chess was one called "Better Chess for Average Players". It really was excellent, giving general principles to be applied.
I've thought for some months now that with the combined wisdom of so many fine players and teachers who frequent this board a thread on "Better Clarinetistry for Average Players" would be beneficial.
Most clarinetists you encounter in high school and community bands play like a dish of mashed potatoes. The point you make on metric accents and hypermeters gets to a major cause of mashed potatoe syndrome.
I don't know why the articulation and clarity of the musical line is generally so much better among amateur brass players than it is among amateur clarinetists. But bringing out the accents, both metric and phrase based, does indeed go a long way toward appropriate musical expression. Plus the clarinetist must remember that the accents need to be a bit more emphatic than what he himself would like: else it will not communicate to the audience. When you play back your practice session, you will be able to judge whether you have achieved the correct degree of accent.
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2009-01-09 02:00
I took this question as a very basic one. Can you be more specific? Give an example of a piece you are looking at and trying to employ these techniques.
I don't see that adding metric stresses is a good policy in general. If hypermeter is another name for recurring phrase lengths that are the same I don't see music as being structured so regularly. If it isn't structured so uniformly you certainly can't easily restructure it by adding extra accents. The melody wouldn't work.
Freelance woodwind performer
Post Edited (2009-01-09 03:12)
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Author: mrn
Date: 2009-01-09 17:11
Arnoldstang wrote:
> I don't see that adding metric stresses is a good policy in
> general. If hypermeter is another name for recurring phrase
> lengths that are the same I don't see music as being structured
> so regularly. If it isn't structured so uniformly you
> certainly can't easily restructure it by adding extra accents.
> The melody wouldn't work.
I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing. I don't think anybody's suggesting that one *restructure* music by *adding* accents that weren't there to begin with (or at least implied). I think what we're talking about is more along the lines of how much you make the existing structure of the music apparent to the listener--sometimes you want to do this more than others.
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2009-01-09 20:51
What is the existing structure? We are talking about meter here. That is both meter and hypermeter. I assume that meter is more than just the indicated time signature but maybe it isn't as Claireinet hasn't responded. I am assuming a hypermeter is larger than just meter. I would also assume it is somewhat constant just as meter is. If is not somewhat constant then it shouldn't be described as a type of meter. I still don't see the structure of music being so uniform as Claireinet suggests. This topic is still very unclear to me as indicated by my metrically challenged brain which is shortcircuiting presently.
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: FDF
Date: 2009-01-09 23:00
arnoldstang, not only a great board name, but metrically challenged as well. ![[cool]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/cool.gif)
Believe me, I "don't know nothin." The question, as I understand it, is the meter is going along well as indicated in a work, then there are changes, we will call "hypermeters, " or meters outside of the work as marked. Are these meters errors or some sort of embellishment? Against this is a musical phrase. How does the phrase play out with both meter and hypermeter?
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Author: Claireinet
Date: 2009-01-09 23:48
Attachment: hypermeter.pdf (39k)
Hello again – thank you all for the responses. They have been very helpful. It is as Tony said, a “subtle question”.
Arnoldstang- I think, as mrn, that we may be on separate pages. I am not talking about restructuring or adding things, and am not even asking the question in regards to a specific passage or piece. It is a very general (and perhaps vague) inquiry into the presentation of meter to the audience. In some ways the question is, as you put it, “a very basic one”.
Every meter has strong and weak beats. As musicians we are all at least unconsciously aware of this. However, I think sometimes we forget it or fail to convey the meter to the audience. As an instrumentalist we are never going to be able to accurately hear what the audience hears when we play. We will hear things they can't and think that we are doing things with the music that we are not (in the sense that the idea is not, in the end, communicated to the audience) – such as the natural accents that go with meters. Without the natural stressed and unstressed beats inherent to meters music can become nonsensical mumble. Vjoet's comment that sometimes we need to make things more emphatic than we ourselves would like to hear really helped me – It's so basic but I did not think of it myself! I was only thinking in terms of “Argh! I know this, don't I?... A fifth grader could do it why cant I??... etc...”
A good trick I like to play on students (and I have it written out somewhere...) is to take a simple tune that everybody knows, such as 'Mary had a little lamb', and write it out in various meters. Each example has exactly the same relative note durations as the original – the only thing that changes is how it is notated – in which meter. The fun part is that almost invariably students will play through the song in meter after meter and not recognize it at all. What happens when they get to the correct meter? The light bulb goes off and they can't believe they didn't see it sooner! The reason, of course, is that changing the meter changes the music. If the only reason for the meter was to help the musician keep track of note values it wouldn't mater what meters things were in.
As for hypermeter it can only be applied in certain circumstances. The basic idea is that if music contains equally sized measure groups (2&2&2&2... for example) and also displays a pattern of strong and weak alternation the same principles applied to beats in measures can be applied to meters or other higher level structures of the music.
As I occasionally have a knack for confusing people – and I myself like to be able to see examples - I will try to demonstrate pictorially. (If this is more confusing please ignore it ...)
***[I was unable to make the chart display correctly so I converted it to a .pdf that hopefully everyone can read]***
As you move up farther structurally in the music strong beats in one level become beats in the next level. Notice in the example we had 8 measures and 8 strong beats. When we apply metric accents to measures instead of beats (hypermeter) we have 4 strong beats and essentially 4 “big measures”, 2 bar groupings will lead to 2 strong beats(2 “big measures”) and 4 bar groupings lead to 1 strong beat (1 “big measure"). It's all based on a concept called “metric hierarchy”.
Again, hypermeater does not apply in all circumstances.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2009-01-10 17:49
Claire wrote:
>> As for hypermeter it can only be applied in certain circumstances. The basic idea is that if music contains equally sized measure groups (2&2&2&2... for example) and also displays a pattern of strong and weak alternation the same principles applied to beats in measures can be applied to meters or other higher level structures of the music.>>
Yes, thanks for that, and for providing an illustration that means we can now take the basic concept for granted.
I mentioned the Mozart G minor symphony, which is one of the most prolonged examples of Mozart's use of hypermetre. If you look at how the first 19 bars are organised with hypermetre in mind, you see the possibility that the first 8 may be organised as two 4/1 bars (as though each bar is one beat of those two 'big' bars); bar 9 is a 1/1 bar; bars 10 and 11, bars 12 and 13 and bars 14 and 15 are three 2/1 bars; bars 16, 17 and 18 are 6 2/4 bars, and bar 19 is 4 1/4 bars!
I'm being quite radical in interpreting bars 16 to 19; but if I'd chosen to say that bar 16 was a 2/2 bar rather than two 2/4 bars, the hierarchy would have the wind chord LESS than the string downbeat in bar 17. But at that point, the orchestra is in two opposing camps, wind and strings, fighting for control of the principal beat. They have to be equal.
Notice how ALL the structures in this opening are strong+weak, from an individual pair of eighths in the violas (lowest level); then BETWEEN pairs of eighths in the violas (next level up); then between groups of four eighths (half-bar level); then between bars (shown by the 'cellos and doublebasses); then between pairs of bars (underlined by dissonant appoggiatura structures in the violins in the first pair, and non-dissonant passing note structures in the second pair). The whole mammoth structure of that shifts at bar 10, setting up the conflict that the winds begin in bar 16.
Nearer to home, the first bars of the solo line of the clarinet concerto use hypermetre. Both bar 1 +bar 2 and bar 3 + bar 4 go strong+weak; bar 5 + bar 6 is tilted in the opposite direction by the harmony, tessitura and phrasing; and bar 7 + bar 8 returns to strong+weak.
Having a hypermetre 'tilted' by other musical structures is quite common in classical music, and the fact that the degree of tilt is a performance CHOICE is what makes different interpretations both possible and necessary. That you can learn how to do this subtly -- and differently each time -- is what makes the style such a delight to work in.
A little wrinkle that I always enjoy is the fact that bar 2 of the clarinet part (a decoration of bar 1) can be made to 'sparkle' by playing the written A appoggiatura brilliantly for a moment. That doesn't alter that the second bar is lighter than the first, because the effect is so short-lived.
Tony
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Author: clarnibass
Date: 2009-01-10 18:52
>> how many of you actively apply metric accents or hypermeter to your playing?
Many players do this in many types of music. It is common for example in Indian music in an improvised part, where the soloist plays a repeating phrase in a different meter where in the end it "meets" the beginning again (I forgot the Indian name for that, sorry). It also happen pretty often in other improvised music (or music with improvisations) like jazz, etc. and especially when a soloist does it and spontanously whoever that is "keeping" the meter imedaitely goes along with it. And it happens in a lot of other types of music too (like classical Tony mentioned).
Here is an example (which someone just posted here a few days ago) where it takes a moment to figure out the time signature because of how the melody in the second "pattern" (third bar) doesn't begin on the beat, and the accents in that bar create a different meter for a moment: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h8PoUyL-hk
So I guess the actual answer is yes, some of us do, some of the time 
Post Edited (2009-01-11 04:06)
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2009-01-10 21:28
clarnibass -
You are a very sneaky person. The amazing video by Slobodan Trkulja is in an irregular Bulgarian meter -- one of the comments says 17/8 -- that Bulgarians grow up playing and have no trouble with. The rest of us have no idea.
The melody always begins on the beat. It's just that the beats aren't where non-Bulgarians expect them to be.
A more familiar example comes in the third movement of the Bartok Contrasts.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2009-01-12 02:44
Hi Claireinet, your attachment makes things clearer...but if we take your first example in 2/4 time the first beat is strong and the fifth is strong. This will confuse the audience...it is so close to 4/4 time.
Mary Had A Little Lamb won't work this way. Mary (strong) had a little lamb, Little(strong)lamb,little lamb Mary(strong) had a little lamb etc. Obviously this song isn't a good choice for hypermeter? What would be? In any case you cannot clarify meter to an audience by employing hypermeter so your original question which entailed making the meter more obvious to the audience is confusing to me. respectfully Arn listen to a big Mozart
Freelance woodwind performer
Post Edited (2009-01-12 03:27)
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Author: Claireinet
Date: 2009-01-12 06:13
Arnoldstang,
Yes, 2/4 and 4/4 are quite similar and can be difficult to distinguish between as a listener. You could even make the argument that sometimes the choice to compose in either 2/4 or 4/4 is an arbitrary decision. There is however a subtle difference between the two. In 2/4 we have 1 as strong and 2 as weak. In 4/4 1 is strong ; 2 weak ; 4 strong (but less than beat 1); and 4 is weak. 2/4 contains only one strong and weak beat. Whereas 4/4 contains 2 strong beats ; a primary (1) and a secondary (3).
For clarity's sake (so you know what is going through my mind when I talk about metric accents) here is a simple map out of some common meters' strong weak beat relationships:
**in 2/4 1=strong 2= weak ( _ u )
**in 4/4 1=primary strong 2=weak 3=secondary strong (remember this is not as strong as the primary) 4= weak ( _ u - u )
**in 3/4 1=strong 2= weak 3= weak ( _ u u )
**in 6/8 1=primary strong 2=weak 3=weak 4=secondary strong 5=weak 6=weak ( _ u u - u u)
or if thinking of 6/8 in 2 1=strong 2=weak ( _ u)
Also when talking about metric accent the strong beats are not actually accents (>), but pulses.
As for “Mary Had a Little Lamb” I was using it in the context of being a simple tune everyone knows that can be made unrecognizable by writing/performing it in a meter unrelated to its original – and thus demonstrating that meter plays a more important role than just aiding musicians in keeping track of note durations. Changing meter will change the feel of a piece.
I think instead of trying to map out possible hypermeter in “Mary Had a Little Lamb” or some other piece (it gets difficult to make coherent pictures out of numbers and words and dashes and whatnot...) that these these articles might be of some help in making the concept of hypermeter a bit clearer (there are even audio clips to demonstrate some of the examples):
http://www.keyboardcompanion.com/summer2008/rhythm/rhythm1.html
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2009-01-12 16:13
Hi, before I even look to your suggested reading I have found "Tales From the Vienna Woods" is perhaps an example of hypermeter. (two bar units) Again as I initially stated it is a dance form. As far as the difference between pulse and accent I don't understand. Pulse to me is just the rate or speed of the quarter note etc. The pulse will have accents (stronger pulses) at set intervals which groups notes into metric units. I will now look at your reference. Thanks Arn Well after a peek at your reference there is much material for to digest. Thanks
Freelance woodwind performer
Post Edited (2009-01-12 16:35)
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2009-01-12 16:33
Claire wrote:
>> ...these articles might be of some help in making the concept of hypermeter a bit clearer.>>
I think they're excellent.
Looked at from this point of view, of course, hypermetre applied to two 2/4 bars gives precisely your canonically organised 4/4 bar; so the idea of hypermetre is already built into classical music.
My experience of clarinet pedagogy, such as it is, leads me to suppose that not very many teachers engage with these ideas. Obviously you do; but I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has had, say, the last movement of the Mozart concerto described to them in this way.
Much more commonly, I suspect, students are encouraged to identify a plausible point of arrival, and then 'go' towards it. So, in the case of the Mozart, bar 1 'goes' to bar 2; bar 3 to bar 4; bar 5 to bar 6, and bar 7 to bar 8. That is, they're taught to anticipate the crescendo that Mozart reserves for the orchestral tutti, thereby weakening its effect.
Whereas, using my invented term 'tilt', you can see that the accompanying violins in bar 1 tilt the perception of that bar towards it being 'in one' -- the pattern 'eighth (rest) eighth eighth eighth eighth' suppresses the middle of the bar. (This wouldn't have been the case had Mozart written 'eighth (rest) (rest) eighth eighth eighth', of course.) Bar 2 is also in one (it's the phrasemark that kills off the middle of the bar in this case); bar 3 is clearly in 2 (perhaps even possibly amounting to 2 equal 3/8 bars without hypermetre:-); bar 4 either in 1 or canonical 2.
Then the same sequence applies to bars 5 to 8.
The 'hypermetre wrinkle' lies in the relationship between (the relationship between bars 1 and 2) and (the relationship between bars 5 and 6.)
The first is, I suggest, the canonical strong/weak. But the second is tilted by both tessitura and harmony towards equality -- and even beyond that into weak/strong, if you want.
All that is really complicated to say, but really simple to experience, once you get the hang of it.
And, what's more, the DEGREE to which you do these things is subject to variation -- the upshot being that this little tune, that comes back so many times, can always sound fresh.
I have to say, I wish someone had explained this sort of thing to me when I was young. It took me far too long to work it out for myself.
Tony
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2009-01-12 18:12
Yes this is a great article. I do think your original question mislead me. I would rather it have been about "hypermeter" exclusively. I couldn't get my head around trying to make the meter obvious to the audience. Dealing with making the "hypermeter" more obvious to the audience is more about music making in my opinion.
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2009-01-12 18:35
Going back to your original post, you wrote:
>> Though metric accent is simple, and many times applied without so much as a thought - I, more frequently than I would like, find myself listening to recordings of practice sessions feeling something is off, and realizing I can't tell from the recording what meter I'm in. This, of course, irks me to no end – given what an elementary skill it is.>>
There's something to say about this that's nontrivial, I think: which is that one very often practises pieces that have other instruments involved when they are 'complete'.
Suppose you're playing the second Trio of the Mozart clarinet quintet. Then, you're practising something that in the end will be played with an UM-cha-cha accompaniment in the strings. What's written in the clarinet part -- slur over the barline, defeating the downbeat in our part -- will go very well IN THE END with the string quartet; but may well sound strange in isolation.
Consider: if you SING this tune to someone, you have to do a strong downbeat accent because that's what the music 'sounds like'. But if you do that in performance, you destroy an important and quirky character of the music.
So, sometimes, we have to practise something that sounds strange -- unless we imagine the rest of the music.
Tony
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