From Drusca Sent Mon, Aug 23rd 1999, 06:00
From Drusca Sent Mon, Aug 23rd 1999, 06:00
ChairCrusher wrote: > That view of melody (or more generally harmonic progression) is the > cornerstone of western music. It took Africa (and African Americans) to > bring rhythm and drums up to where they are co-equal with harmony > in Western Music. I think rhythm & melody were on a equal level in Western music before the introduction of African (or Asian) rhythms. There was a lot of rhythmic intricacy in medieval music (check out Machaut & the whole Ars Nova period) and then of course much later Stravinsky did some amazing stuff. Schoenberg and Webern were also very rhythmically sophisticated though in more subtle ways. Even listen to Beethoven's 5th, I definitely think the rhythmic development in that piece is just as important as the melodic development. Even Brahms is famous for doing a lot of 3 against 2 stuff. I think what Africa did is introduce the west to different rhythmic patterns and "feels" and the emphasis of different beats (2 & 4 vs. 1 & 3). Andrei