Which came first, Pitch or Rhythm?
Pitches = the notes you play or sing, in the correct order.
Rhythm = the duration of each of those notes, i.e. how long they last.
Musicians measure pitch with letters of the alphabet: A, B, C, D, E, F and G. Sometimes sharps or flats are added, but never without one of those seven letters of the alphabet. The seven letters repeat almost endlessly: A B C D E F G A B C D E F G A B C D E F G A B C D etc! Each series of seven letters, plus the first one of the next series, is an octave. Pitch also takes into account which particular A, B, C, D etc you are playing or singing. Pitch can be defined as sound wave frequency.
Musicians measure rhythm and duration with beats and sub-divisions of beats. We don’t count how many seconds a note lasts, but how many beats. And then we give emphasis, or extra importance, to some of those beats. The march of the beats is known as the pulse of the music, and the way they are emphasised, or accented, is known as the meter. Rhythm can be defined as temporal change.
Together, pitches + rhythm = melody (or tune).
You recognise tunes you know.
It doesn’t matter if someone is singing it, or playing it on a ukulele, or if it’s a symphony orchestra giving it the full works. If it’s a tune you know, you’ll recognise it at once. How? The pitches and the rhythm work together, and they stick in your mind.
But which is the main driver of recognition?
Listen to these two recordings (but not the third one! Not yet, anyway!):
Did you recognise the tune of either of them?
Perhaps you knew both songs?
How about this third one:
I imagine you recognised this third song!
I wonder if you realised that Recording 1 had the same rhythm as Recording 3, but different pitches. Not only that, but Recording 2 had the same pitches as Recording 3, but a different rhythm!
In my view, it’s much harder to recognise a song if the rhythm has been changed, than one where the rhythm is intact, but different notes have been used.
Listen to Recordings 1 and 2 again, and see of you can superimpose the song you know from Recording 3 over either of them. Try singing it. You’ll certainly find it easier with Recording 1, because the rhythm is correct!
In fact, it’s almost impossible to sing the song over the top of Recording 2, unless you put your hands over your ears!
Because of this, I make the suggestion that it’s rhythm which came first. Clapping, stamping, drumming with hands, sticks or rocks on the ground, almost certainly came, in prehistoric times, before melody. And even when melody did come along, it would have made no sense without rhythm!
Some commercial music recordings, such as those of plainchant, or some very modern compositions, talk of “free” rhythm, where there may be no meter and either no or very little pulse. If this is truly the case, how do performers keep together? How do they work in a synchronised way?
All right, maybe there’s only one performer, and that person is truly “free” to hold notes for as long or as short as they like? Even then, time still passes. Suppose someone coughs? Or some other, external, sound is heard? This will break up the sound the performer is making and insert at the very least a feel of rhythm into the music.
John Cage tried to eliminate all traditional musical control, including rhythm.
Drone music is pulse-less, meter-less and almost rhythm-less, with its sustained, uninterrupted sound. No beats, no meter. But is this music? Once you remove meter, pulse and rhythm, you’re no longer composing music, you’re tracking time itself.
As for the chicken and the egg…. I still have no answer to that!
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Humoresque = a whimsical or fanciful piece of music. Be whimsical, be fanciful, but play in time!
This is Humoresque Number 29