Dust: 2024

Monday 21 October 2024

Languages about music

This section builds on the earlier introductions to the Hebrew letters and the music of the accents. It introduces a variety of terms that can be used to speak about music.

The opening phrases of the Lamentations of Jeremiah

1 Ah in such solitude sits the city. Abundant with people she is as a widow. Abundant from the nations, noble among the provinces, she is into forced service.
א איכ֣ה ישב֣ה בד֗ד העיר֙ רב֣תי ע֔ם הית֖ה כאלמנ֑ה רב֣תי‪ ‬בגוי֗ם שר֙תי֙ במדינ֔ות הית֖ה למֽס ס	18 17		a aich iwbh bdd hyir rbti ym hiith calmnh rbti bgoiim wrti bmdinot hiith lms s

As we have already seen, a compact musical notation is embedded syllable by syllable under and over the text of the Hebrew Bible. The French organist and composer, Suzanne Haïk-Vantoura (1912-2000) approached the mystery of these signs, analyzing how they are placed and used, and proposed a deciphering key that has given us a new way of hearing the Hebrew Bible in song. The melodies of proclamation, appeal, lament, joy, story of the Scripture are now available to us to hear, sing, arrange, and learn from. The music reveals structure, form and stanza, hymns, arias, and connections between verses and chapters that would not otherwise be heard.

Still we can use some mundane terms to help describe what the music is. Trained musicians read a score and simultaneously hear it. They have various ways of describing the notes, intervals, and rhythms of the score. Here is one such description of the first few bars of the music above:

the recitation in this example begins on the note e and immediately rises a fifth to the note B and continues on that note for 12 syllables.
In that second long bar of the score, three ornaments are encountered on the fifth, seventh, and eleventh syllables of the bar. The middle one on the seventh syllable invites a brief pause in agreement with the grammar of the text.
The recitation continues after the brief pause to the remaining five syllables and descends to g#, where after an additional four syllables, it comes to rest on A.

Of course this is mundane and it leaves out nearly all of the expressivity in the music. If we were to hear also the underlying tonality,

we would identify the tonic, home base, as e. The low e is comfortable for most voices. It is the default starting point if none other is specified.
We would also hear the rest point, A, on the 4th degree of the scale, the sub-dominant.
The majority of this particular recitation is on the dominant, B, the 5th degree of the scale, a natural harmonic for a wind instrument such as the shofar. This tone gives the whole recitation a sense of proclamation.

Hebrew names for the accents can also be used to describe the music. These are the names including the additional two notes not used in this verse, for the remaining degrees of the scale below the tonic e:

darga (c), galgal (d), silluq (e), merkha (f), tifha (g), atnah (A), munah (B), mahpakh (C).

All these accents are written below the text. They determine the pitch of the recitation until a new sign is encountered.

Using these terms I could describe the first phrase, bars 1 to 4 of the music, like this:

the recitation begins on silluq and on the second syllable rises a fifth to munah, continuing on that note for twelve syllables.
Three accents above the text are encountered above the text, revia on the fifth syllable, pashta on the seventh, and and zaqef-qatan on the eleventh. The pashta invites a brief pause in agreement with the grammar of the text.
The recitation continues on the remaining five syllables until it descends to tifha, and after four syllables comes to rest on atnah.

When Hebrew students begin to learn cantillation they use what is called a zarqa table to help them hear and memorize the shape and pitch of each accent. A zarqa table is a mapping of the names to notes and shape. We can use such a table. Some modification in thought process is required to apply this concept to the Haïk-Vantoura deciphering key. Accents above the text have melodic shape, but not a fixed pitch. Their pitch is relative to the current recitation pitch.

For the music of the verse we are considering, here is the zarqa table.

Zarqa table for Lamentations 1:1

Would an ancient Hebrew singer be able to read and hear the music and sing from the text itself? Yes, it is easy for a musician trained in this representation of music to sing the hand-signals and words in their written sequence. Each sign corresponds without ambiguity to a note (defined by the sign below the text) or an ornament (defined by a sign above the text) relative to the current reciting note.

Given this deciphering method, we too, thousands or more years later, can hear the ancient recitation. In our musical terminology, we hear it as a recitative where by convention the note values (quarter note, eighth note, etc.) vary in duration according to speech rhythm in prose, or syllable rhythm in poetry. The performer will determine the tempo and syllable duration according to the sense of the text. In this example, the single main reciting note, the dominant, with minimal ornamentation suits the announcement of the story that is beginning. We can hear a slow-paced recitative as the opening of this acrostic poem, with a slight lift on the word the city (hyir). The second phrase moves to the atnah, the sub-dominant, creating a point of repose on the last syllable of the word, as a widow, (calmnh) where the cantor pauses and the hearers reflect. The final phrase moves from the rest on the subdominant and continues the proclamation on the dominant, finally moving to the third degree of the scale on its way to the tonic and the final word, forced service (lms).

It is true also to note that, as for traditional solfege, do, re, mi, the Hebrew accents have corresponding hand-signals. I consider hand-signals as beyond scope for my efforts at describing this music. I want us to hear and sing. It is not my task to justify the music historically, but to let the music sing for itself as a good solution to the design of the accents inferred from their actual usage, and as a gift to us all, the millions of people who are and will be influenced by the Hebrew Scriptures.

You will hear in your inner ear that this verse has a tenor of B (munah). The tenor is the reciting pitch used most frequently for a phrase or section of a book, or even a whole book.

I made an arrangement of the first four verses of the Lamentations of Jeremiah as an example of how the music can be used beyond its recitation form.

Reading the Music in the Hebrew Bible

It’s almost impossible to describe music. But we have ways of writing down the music that can be described. During my lifetime as a chorister, I learned slowly over many years to read notes from a staff. There are five lines and you can put notes on the lines and in the spaces and even on ledger lines written in above or below the lines of the staff. The staff is governed by a clef. The clef determines the notes that are represented by the lines and spaces on the staff. I use the treble or g-clef. The clef is placed such that the curl in the middle surrounds the first line from the bottom and defines the place of the note we name g.

Perhaps you remember the words that we boys memorized to fix the note names of the lines in our minds: every good boy deserves fudge. Pretty silly and gender biased, but that's where we came from. And the spaces spell f-a-c-e! We were all learning to sight read whether by voice or on an instrument. I wonder why I never used this sort of technique to learn to sight read other clefs.

The default starting pitch for the music embedded in the Bible is the note /e/ to be sung at whatever octave is comfortable for the singer. If the singer has a lower voice, the pitch can be lowered.

Below is a score containing the opening verses of Psalm 80. I have used a key signature of 4 sharps. It looks like E major but the high C will be consistently flattened. Note values are indeterminate. The pulse is taken from the word rhythm in prose, and the syllable rhythm in poetry. Ornaments highlight words in a musical phrase, sometimes inviting a breath from the singer, and sometimes not.

Psalm 80 verse 1

I have used dotted bar lines to show that the rhythm is irregular and subject to the singer. In this first verse, there are 6 bars, the first containing two notes, the second five, and so on. In the third bar, the // signifies a pause of indeterminate length. The symbol in the last bar after the last note is a rest. This allows the eye to see the end of a verse more clearly. Yes the notes are quarter notes, crotchets in the British terminology, and the rest is a quarter note rest, but there is no specific time value to any of them in this music.

Read individual words in the text right to left. Words themselves are left to right and placed over the note they apply to. Everything else is left to right. Occasionally in a score, I will underlay an English lyric below the Hebrew. Many different musical possibilities open up to translations as lyrics. For example, the short five-verse text of Isaiah 12 lends itself to a 6/4 rhythm in English. Many other examples will be found by those who research the musical possibilities.

Psalm 80 verse 2

Compare these two verses with the original hand written work by Suzanne Haïk-Vantoura. She uses a custom notation. The white notes with tails show the syllable holding the accent. Her notation is also one where no specific duration values are intended. Both standard and custom notations imply a recitative in speech rhythm for prose. Strong syllabic rhythms will be heard in most psalms.

The non-standard notation of Suzanne Haïk-Vantoura

She also uses a different mode. There’s nothing in the Hebrew that tells us what the key signature or the mode should be. At least, there’s nothing we’ve found so far.

Here is the text and the score!

1 For the leader. On lilies. A testimony of Asaph, a psalm.
א למנצ֥ח אל־ששנ֑ים עד֖ות לאס֣ף מזמֽור	8 7	a lmnxk al-wownim ydut lasf mzmor
2 ♪~ Shepherd of Israel give ear, driving Joseph like a flock, sitting on the cherubim, shine.
ב ר֘ע֤ה ישרא֨ל האז֗ינה נה֣ג כצ֣אן יוס֑ף יש֖ב הכרוב֣ים הופֽיעה	15 8	b royh iwral hazinh nohg cxan iosf iowb hcrubim hopiyh

The Hebrew in square text above is the actual score as it is written in the Hebrew cantillation signs of the Westminster Leningrad Codex. I have eliminated the vowels so the cantillation signs stand out. You can trace exactly the impact of each sign on the score. There are no ornaments in the setting of the inscription (verse 1), so the role of the signs under the text is very evident. The music can be read directly from the Hebrew once the singer can associate the reciting notes and ornaments with each of the signs. Here is a blow by blow description -- almost as simple as Do Re Mi. Where is Julie Andrews when I need her!

למנצ֥ח lmnxk – start on e, move to f on the syllable xk.

אל־ששנ֑ים al-wownim – continue on f, move to the resting note A on nim.

עד֖ות ydut – continue on A, move to g on dut.

לאס֣ף lasf – continue on g, move to B on sf.

מזמֽור mzmor – continue on B, close on the tonic e on the syllable mor.

Verse 2 continues with the reciting note on the tonic, but the opening note starting on a note below the tonic connects the verse to something that has preceded it. I did not make this idea up from thin air. It is simply an observation based on hundreds of examples I have seen. We will see many examples of this kind of connection. They are on every page of the music of the Bible. In this case it may be the inscription, particularly the word wownim (lilies) that was on the resting point in verse 1.

ר֘ע֤ה royh – ornament the first syllable (take your time and remember you are singing on lilies). On the second syllable, move to C.

ישרא֨ל iwral – continue on C and ornament the last syllable al.

האז֗ינה hazinh – continue on C and ornament the second syllable zi.

נה֣ג nohg – continue on C, move to B on hg.

כצ֣אן cxan – continue on B, the word accent is on the second syllable - no change in recitation pitch but the accent shows accentuation also when needed.

יוס֑ף iosf – continue on B, and move to A, the rest note on sf.

יש֖ב iowb – continue on A, move to g on wb.

הכרוב֣ים hcrubim – continue on g, move to B on bim.

הופֽיעה hopiyh – continue on B, close on the tonic e for the last two syllables piyh.

You may have noticed that there are differences between the text that Haïk-Vantoura is using and the older Leningrad codex. She has a mark on al-wownim that returns her to the tonic. And a similar mark in verse 2 drags the melody to the tonic on hazinh. These are errors in the 19^th century text that she was using. But it’s clearly the same song. We will see this technical problem and others as we proceed.

The above description raises a question about automated transcription. It might be easier to use a recitative format and not resolve every syllable in the Hebrew. This would make easier sight reading for some audiences. Arabic hymn books make use of a right to left music staff. This technique could make for a complete right to left Hebrew rendition.

I have chosen the detailed syllabic approach for the Hebrew lyrics with additional text lines for translation below and original Hebrew above right to left by letter, and left to right by word.

I have not used every mark in the Hebrew manuscripts. In particular, Haïk-Vantoura does not consider the pesiq to be relevant to the music. It may be useful to emphasize word separation, but it has no other purpose. I keep my eye on them just in case, but many of them are additions to the MS over the last 10 centuries and I have seen none so far that have any serious impact. (More detail on the pesiq here if you want to do the research.)

Sunday 20 October 2024

Introducing the Hebrew letters

There are many things to the Hebrew language that are very foreign to an English reader. Most people start with the letters. That’s fine. Some of them make a sound and some sometimes don’t. So it is in English – remember the silent ‘e’. When we began to learn writing, we also started with the alphabet, but we knew our own language long before we were taught to connect the sounds to the letters. I remember my first real attempts to learn Hebrew. It was not many years ago. I would pick up a page of text and struggle to see its orientation, often seeing it as upside down.

There are 22 letters in the Hebrew alef-bet. All 22 letters are consonants. Eleven of them also have a grammatical function. There are letters in English that have a grammatical function: like ‘s’ for plurals and ‘ing’ for a verbal form, and ‘re’ for a prefix, and ‘ness’ and ‘ion’, suffixes for creating nouns from verbs. But we don’t think of many individual letters as having grammatical usage. The Hebrew language makes extensive use of prefixes and suffixes, so whenever I found myself looking for a word in a lexicon, I often couldn’t find it because I did not know how to separate the prefixes from the root. The first letters of a word are often grammatical and therefore not part of the root word that would be listed in the lexicon.

This lesson is brought to you by the letter vav, the sixth letter of the Hebrew alef-bet. It is itself the word for a hook. Vav is also a letter that is extensively used in several grammatical roles. It is a very frequent part of the Hebrew soundscape. One of its main roles is to connect Hebrew words within a sentence and between sentences. For instance, it is the first letter of 51,001 words in the Hebrew Bible. That is about 1 in 6 of all the words of the canon (by my count). Yet there is only one Hebrew root word or stem that begins with vav and that is vav itself. All other words in the lexicon beginning with v are foreign to Hebrew. They are proper names or borrowed from other languages.

There! If you have started from nothing, you now know one Biblical Hebrew root word: vav is a hook. It frequently occurs as the first letter of a lexical word, because like our conjunctions ‘and’ and ‘or’ its role in Hebrew is to hook words together, just like the hooks connected the curtain of the temple onto the pillars. Vav even looks like a hook (ו), but in some fonts the hook disappears and it is simply a full line height vertical bar.

Vav, unsurprisingly, sounds like v. So as a child, you might well have heard the sound frequently, and you would eventually know that it made sentences, even before you knew what a sentence was. Here is one of the 13 places – all in Exodus, where the word vav is used. See if you can find it.

Exodus 26:32

The other thing I remember about learning to manage Hebrew is that every English or French or German book I looked at had a different scheme for transliteration. It was very frustrating. It is also unavoidable. For the lyrics of the music, the singer needs some help, so I have used anglicized vowels and digraphs as needed. It’s an imperfect scheme, but at least, the program that produces the score is consistent.

Let’s take apart a word or two from this verse of Exodus 26 on the building of the tabernacle. It is almost a ‘given’ that you would have heard the first word from your mother many times. If I use a transliteration that is reversible, that first word is vntt.

This transcription into SimHebrew accurately simulates the Hebrew square text in its full spelling. Sometimes SimHebrew expressly includes vowels, but not in this case. The hearer is just supposed to know the vowels. It’s as if one adds a sound between two consecutive consonants to make the language heard. You might notice that over half the syllables in this verse carry an ‘a’ vowel. They are all short and may almost be so short as to be a schwa, like the second ‘o’ in octopus.

The first word vntt is from the root ntn, usually rendered as give. It is one of the most difficult roots to find in a lexicon from the word because the n (nun) is a weak letter. Both the first and last letter of this root disappear in some word forms. In this verse I rendered it as position. Here is the text with the Hebrew score (the accents over and under the text). The middle column between the two Hebrew versions is a syllable count.

32 And you will position it onto the four pillars of acacia overlaid with gold, their hooks gold, on four sockets of silver.
לב ונתת֣ה את֗ה על־ארבעה֙ עמוד֣י שט֔ים מצפ֣ים זה֔ב וויה֖ם זה֑ב על־ארבע֖ה אדני־כֽסף	25 7		lb vntt aoth yl-arbyh ymudi wiTim mxupim zhb vvihm zhb yl-arbyh adni-csf

Did you find the hook (vav) in the music and in the lyrics? Look at the SimHebrew for the whole verse. Do you see two consecutive v’s in the text?

You can learn to read SimHebrew. It helps you to see and hear the structure and wordplay of the Hebrew, but it has no musical marks in it. SimHebrew is a left to right notation. Square Hebrew is right to left. So if you are tracing the mapping of letters in a word, draw arrows from each SimHebrew letter to its corresponding letter in the square Hebrew if that helps you see. There is a full list of the letters here for reference.

Most of us struggling Hebrew students eventually learn to puzzle out the vowel markers in the square text that the tradition invented in the first millennium of the Common Era to preserve the sounds that would otherwise have been lost. These various dots and dashes appear above and below the consonants. In the case of the two words we examined above, the first has repetitive short ‘a’ vowels, venatatah, and the second has three different vowels, vaveihem. The suffix ihem signifies the plural of hooks and the pronoun ‘their’.

But my work is about the musical score embedded in the text. No one knows when that was invented. It appears fully formed for the first time in the Aleppo Codex. These signs are music, a system of hand-signals, and they allow interpretation for the ear of things that writing for the eye cannot achieve.

Saturday 19 October 2024

The Hebrew Bible as a musical and textual puzzle

This post is a restart to my presentation of the Psalms and other stray verses that creep into my blogger's thoughts.

There are so many ways to approach a puzzle. I have had in front of me for many years a massive historical, musical, liturgical, linguistic, literary, holy puzzle. This puzzle is used in a hit or miss fashion by more than half the world. Some have it but have not seen it. Some pass through without hearing it. Some worship it. Some ignore it. Some are deeply touched and cannot explain why?

It has over 300,000 pieces in the traditional canon. Its coding elements are not so numerous to count:

22 or so consonants in its alphabet,
17 vowel signs over, within, and under the syllables of the text, and
12 musical signs located under the letters, 19 musical signs located over the letters.

About 70 signs in all. This is a slightly uncomfortable number.

When I approach a puzzle, I try to find and lay out the edge pieces so I can see the overall shape. Hebrew tradition divides it into 24 books in 3 sections, Law, Prophets, and Writings. I spell this as Tanach. The 24 may also be separated into 21 prose books + 3 poetry books. Some pieces are shorter than others, 1 to 4 chapters, rather than 40 to 60 chapters. Christian traditions count 39 books and more, and arrange them in different sequences. For instance, Daniel is included in the prophets by the Christians, but in the writings in the Hebrew Bible. Ruth is included in the history near the Judges in Christian Bibles, and in the Writings as part of a group called the five scrolls in the Hebrew Bible.

I think I more or less backed into this puzzle without a careful plan of approach. I ignored the music in my first pass. This was a serious mistake, but the language around these signs has been thoroughly confused over the last 1000 years. And I could make no sense of it.

People ask, Where should one start? I would start with a few short sections. I would now start with the music. And I will restart with the Psalms. No one can be definitive but:

definitely memorize the first verse of the first chapter of Genesis.
definitely read its form as mimicked by the stage play, Job, near the beginning of the third section.
And when you haven't time to sing, remember that you could be missing the tone of voice and failing to use your ears.

So you might ask, How will I find the music when I want it? Good question. I hope to analyse all the music eventually and perhaps have a 1000 posts on it, a chapter at a time. That will be a revision of all my earlier work. But until then, the music as generated directly from the text is in these links to pdfs.

Torah (torh) is in 5 books in 5 pdfs: Genesis (brawit), Exodus (wmot), Leviticus (viqra), Numbers (bmdbr), and Deuteronomy (dbrim).

The Prophets nbiaim rawonim in 4 books in 4 pdfs: Joshua (ihowy), Judges (wop'tim), Samuel (wmual a & b), and Kings (mlcim a & b), nbiaim akronim in 4 books in 4 pdfs: Isaiah (iwyihu), Jeremiah (irmihu), Ezekiel (ikzqal), and The Twelve (tri ywr: howy, ioal, ymos, yobdih, ionh, mich, nkum, kbquq, xpnih, kgi, zcrih, mlaci).

The Writings (ctubim) 11 books in 8 pdfs: Psalms (thlim), Proverbs (miwli), Job (aiob). The Five Scrolls (wir hwirim, rut, aich, qhlt, astr), Daniel (dnial), Ezra-Nehemiah (yzra-nkmih) and Chronicles (dibri himim a & b) (3).

I hope to approach the first part of this project by presenting the Psalms. And where thereafter depends on too many factors to predict.

But I will begin with some introductory posts: first to the Hebrew letters and the musical signs, then to the music, then again to text and music together. There is an earlier introductory post here.

Tuesday 15 October 2024

Psalm 1 and its cadences

Some scholars think that in the three books of poetry, the cadence on the atnah is weaker than the cadence on the ole-veyored. I don't think this is the case.

Many scholars and traditions have a number of different pause values associated with different accents. I admit I have not thought much about them except for the atnah and the ole-veyored. In the Haïk-Vantoura schema, the deciphering is relatively clear and I don't get too tangled in language. All the terms are 'reconciled' in part in the accents document here.

I do have my own biases - they are accidental to my history as a singer and cantor. We always used to count to 2 at the midpoint of a psalm, to allow consideration of the text. This is a bias. First the midpoints chosen in Anglican chant or plainsong are not necessarily those of the Hebrew Bible. Secondly, they are not midpoints as if they divide the text equally. They are chosen by the poet and are sometimes very lopsided in their placement. Thirdly, the verses aren't always the same in liturgical editions and the Bible itself. So -- discount those biases. But pauses for breathing, for dramatic effect, for consideration are all legitimate in performance.

The base data is clear:

the atnah occurs only once per verse if it is present.
Similarly, the old-veyored occurs only once per verse if it appears.
If both appear, the ole-veyored always precedes the atnah.
The harmonic order is then tonic, to a cadence on the supertonic, the second degree of the scale, then to a cadence on the subdominant, the 4th degree of the scale, then a return to the tonic.
The mid verse cadences are each optional, but they occur frequently. Only 147 of 2,527 verses have neither inner verse cadence in the Psalms.

The relative strength of the cadence is dependent on its tonality.

The subdominant can often feel like you are at home, at rest in the middle of the verse.
The supertonic is less a point of stability. It feels like something should follow, even if you are pausing.
The tonic, being the beginning and ending feels like something has concluded.
The Haïk-Vantoura deciphering is the only one I am aware of that uses these three cadence points.
My additional thought: a verse beginning on a note other than the tonic feels like it is attached to something that preceded it.

Perhaps you will judge my judgments as subjective - I am sure they are -- but it's how I consider the music as a layer of the sense of the psalms. I really must write that second book - Hearing the Psalms. But I know it will take years.

Here is the text of Psalm 1 and its music -- atnah are colour-coded as green, ole-veyored as red and revia-mugrash as blue. Here's a question: does the revia-mugrash have any impact on the length of the pause for the atnah? We have verses with a combination of accents:

a tricolon, ole-veyored, atnah, revia-mugrash
a bicolon, ole-veyored, no revia-mugrash
a tricolon, ole-veyored, atnah, no revia-mugrash
a bicolon, atnah, revia-mugrash
a bicolon, atnah, revia-mugrash
a bicolon, atnah, no revia-mugrash

I see the revia-mugrash purely as a melodic fragment, an ornament. I would not expect it to have any effect on some other part of the musical cadence structure.

Psalm 1 showing selected ornaments and pauses

Psalm 13

Psalms - called in the plural since that's the name of the book. The Hebrew name is plural thilm, the 14th book of the Bible, the first of the third division of the Hebrew Bible, Writings or ctubim.

A short psalm for analysis.

I am using my usual presentation scheme, four ways of reading the Hebrew, Word by word left to right above the score, but read each word right to left, a rough transcription readable by a singer who does not know Hebrew, then below my translation, the square text without vowels but showing the musical hand signals, the cantilation or trope, then the SimHebrew a one for one reversible code for the plene (malé) text. The SimHebrew is an automated transcription of the haser text above the music to plene text. But what about the psalm? How should we hear it?

1 For the leader. A psalm of David.
א למנצ֗ח מזמ֥ור לדוֽד	9	a lmnxk mzmor ldvid
2 How long please Yahweh will you forget me? perpetually? How long please will you hide your face from me?
ב עד־א֣נה י֭הוה תשכח֣ני נ֑צח עד־א֓נה תסת֖יר את־פנ֣יך ממֽני	11 12	b yd-anh ihvh twckni nxk yd-anh tstir at-pniç mmni
3 How long please must I impose advice on myself, sadness in my heart by day? How long please will my enemy be exalted over me?
ג עד־א֨נה אש֪ית עצ֡ות בנפש֗י יג֣ון בלבב֣י יומ֑ם עד־א֓נה יר֖ום איב֣י עלֽי	17 9	g yd-anh awit yxot bnpwi igon blbbi iomm yd-anh irum aoibi ylii
4 Take note - answer me Yahweh my God. Light my eyes, lest I be dead asleep,
ד הב֣יטֽה ע֭נני יהו֣ה אלה֑י הא֥ירה ע֝ינ֗י פן־איש֥ן המֽות	11 11	d hbiTh ynni ihvh alohii hairh yinii pn-aiwn hmvvt
5 lest my enemy say, I have overpowered him. My foes will rejoice, for I will be moved.
ה פן־יאמ֣ר איב֣י יכלת֑יו צר֥י י֝ג֗ילו כ֣י אמֽוט	8 8	h pn-iamr aoibi icoltiv xrii igilu ci amoT
6 But I, in your kindness I have trusted. My heart will rejoice in your salvation. I will sing to Yahweh, for he has matured me.
ו ואנ֤י בחסדך֣ בטחתי֮ י֤ג֥ל לב֗י בֽישוע֫ת֥ך אש֥ירה ליהו֑ה כ֖י גמ֣ל עלֽי	19 5 5	v vani bksdç bTkti igl libi biwuytç awirh lihvh ci gml ylii

Does the original music derived from the accents above and below the text itself reveal something more than the text by itself? Can we hear the emotion, the tone of voice through the music?

This psalm has a tenor of B (munah). I am surprised. It seems on the surface of the words to be an appeal, but it is largely sung on the shofar proclamation tone of B. I conclude that the tone of the psalm is confidence in God throughout as is explicitly expressed in the words of verse 6.

Two of the long phrases, the 17 syllables of 3a may be divided at the revia (appoggiatura) on bnpwi (on myself) and, the 19 syllables of 6a on the tsinnor in bTkti (I have trusted). I have shown the phrasing in the English underlay below. My program counts syllables only between the main cadences, ole veyored (6a is the only instance here of this cadence on the supertonic), the atnah (on A, the subdominant), and the silluq (the tonic) at each verse ending.

I have not done an arrangement for a long time, but I feel I must again since I received a note from a group of scholars intending to have people sing the psalms in translation. And of course we do this and have done so for hundreds of years. James McGrath in his book on the Bible and Music (available without charge at the link) has documented many examples. But should we ignore the music that is in the Bible itself? I think the music embedded in the text is integral to the presentation of the psalm - its real tone of voice, its confidence, its expression of the poet's mind. None of these things can be fully described.

There are many possible arrangements of the musical motifs of the raw data of the Bible, for instance, call and response, or a hymn, or a solo song and so on. I could imagine a threatening chorus at the end of each question: I have overpowered him. Then a rejoicing chorus repeating the last verse to conclude. But we can also sing what is there in our own language without elaboration.

Psalm 13 with English underlay to the melody as determined by the accents over and under the text

Notice the movement of recurring words. The most obvious are the four questions: How long please. The final focus of recurring words is rejoice: the imagined rejoice of the enemies, and the rejoice of the poet's heart.

Recurring words in Psalm 13

Many things change when the music is underlaid with lyrics that do not share the Hebrew pulse.

You will find a live performance in Hebrew here. There are differences in the sung notes from the score above for reasons noted before: cantillation changes to the text over 900 years, and the increased number of meteg's causing spurious returns to the tonic. Fortunately in this case they are of short duration.

Sunday 13 October 2024

Chronicles

Note that every book in its own pdf is available from this post.

Chapter	Syllables	Max Recit	c	d	e	f	g#	A	B	C
1 Chronicles
1	992	13	1.61	2.62	18.35	20.06	23.99	9.27	18.04	6.05	Adam Seth Enosh.
2	1221	15	1.8	3.28	18.43	16.95	20.15	9.42	22.11	7.86	These are the children of Israel, Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah, Issachar and Zebulun,
3	543	22	4.05	4.79	21.73	14.92	20.81	9.94	18.97	4.79	And these are the children of David that were born to him in Hebron, the firstborn, Amnon of Axinoam the Jezreelite, second, Daniel of Abigail the Carmelite,
4	1135	21	1.76	2.73	19.65	12.33	19.21	9.87	24.85	9.60	The children of Judah, Perez, Hetsron, and Carmi, and Hur, and Shobal.
5	816	30	1.59	2.94	23.28	14.71	14.71	12.75	21.69	8.33	And the children of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel, (for he was the firstborn, but he profaned the bunk of his father). His birthright was given to the children of Joseph, child of Israel, and not through the genealogy of the firstborn.
6	1519	20	.99	3.29	30.48	12.44	23.17	9.61	14.88	5.13	The children of Levi, Gershom, Kohath, and Merari.
7	1099	28	2.73	3.09	18.38	13.28	17.74	9.65	25.02	10.10	And to the children of Issachar, Tola and Puah, Yeshuv and Shimron, four. S
8	753	19	2.92	3.85	23.90	18.86	23.24	8.37	16.73	2.12	And Benjamin had Bela his firstborn, Ashbel the second, and Axarax the third,
9	1201	17	2.75	3.83	24.48	13.57	19.90	11.57	20.57	3.33	And all Israel was enrolled by genealogy. And behold, it is written in the record of the kings of Israel, and Judah, who were exiled to Babel in their trespass. S
10	488	19	1.23	3.69	17.62	8.20	15.78	12.50	25.82	15.16	And the Philistines fought against Israel, and the man of Israel withdrew from the presence of Philistines, and the profaned fell on mount Gilboa.
11	1248	16	2	3.85	24.28	10.74	18.11	8.33	20.03	12.66	And all Israel collected themselves to David toward Hebron, saying, Behold, your bone and your flesh we are.
12	1260	32	2.46	3.02	23.25	11.03	15.40	9.21	24.84	10.79	And these are they who came to David, to Tsiqlag, while he contained himself from the face of Saul, child of Kish. And they were among the valiant, helpers in the battle.
13	504	43	2.98	5.56	15.48	10.91	17.46	10.71	25.60	11.31	And David consulted with the chiefs of thousands and of hundreds for every herald.
14	489	14	1.64	2.25	22.29	13.70	18.00	9.20	17.59	15.34	And Hiram the king of Tyre sent messengers to David and cedar trees and artificers of sidewall and artificers of timber, to build for him a house.
15	956	32	.63	2.93	25.31	9.62	16.53	12.34	26.78	5.86	And he made for himself houses in the city of David, and prepared a place for the ark of God, and stretched out for it a tent.
16	1018	27	1.18	1.77	22.69	12.87	18.17	7.96	16.99	18.37	And they brought the ark of God and exhibited it in the midst of the tent that David had stretched out for it. And they came near with burnt offerings and peace offerings in the presence of God.
17	954	20	.84	3.67	22.01	11.84	15.62	11.84	20.86	13.31	And it happened that as David sat in his house, that David said to Nathan the prophet, Behold I myself sit in a house of cedar, but the ark of the covenant of Yahweh is under curtains.
18	576	18	.69	3.99	20.49	11.28	15.28	8.85	18.23	21.18	And it was after such that David struck the Philistines and subdued them, and he took Gath and her built-up areas from the hand of the Philistines.
19	786	27	2.42	2.93	18.45	7.12	13.87	12.09	28.88	14.25	And it was after such that Nachas, king of the children of Ammon, died, and his son reigned in his stead.
20	327	22	1.83	4.89	25.69	8.87	14.07	7.03	32.42	5.20	And it was the time of the turning of the year, at the time the kings go forth, and Joab led the force of the host and destroyed the land of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah, and David sat in Jerusalem. And Joab struck Rabbah and overthrew it.
21	1121	19	2.14	3.48	20.61	11.06	14.09	9.37	24.09	15.17	And an accuser stood up over Israel, and he incited David to fathom Israel.
22	730	29	1.92	3.97	14.93	12.33	13.29	9.73	31.51	12.33	And David said, This is itself the house of Yahweh God, and this, the altar for a burnt offering for Israel. P
23	859	30	2.33	4.77	19.21	13.15	17.35	9.31	24.10	9.78	And David was old and sated with days, and Solomon his son reigned over Israel.
24	755	22	.79	1.06	28.74	9.93	17.88	7.81	25.30	8.48	And for the children of Aaron, their divisions, the children of Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.
25	761	27	.79	2.23	21.29	19.19	11.96	5.39	22.34	16.82	And David and the chiefs of the host differentiated for the service of the children of Asaph and Heyman and Jeduthun, to prophesy with harps, with lutes and with cymbals, and the counts of the men of trade for their service were:
26	968	15	2.79	2.69	22.11	11.78	15.70	10.12	22.52	12.29	Of the divisions of the gatekeepers, of the Korahites, Meshelemiah, child of Qore, from the children of Asaph.
27	1090	45	.83	1.47	17.98	12.94	16.51	17.16	23.94	9.17	And the children of Israel, for their count, the heads of the ancestors, and the chiefs of thousands and of hundreds, and their overseers, ministered to the king for all matters of the divisions that came in and went out month by month for every month of the year. One division, twenty four thousand. P
28	954	31	2.73	4.82	18.55	10.59	12.89	7.55	30.40	12.47	And David convened all the chiefs of Israel, the chiefs of the bands, and the chiefs of the divisions ministering to the king, and the chiefs of thousands, and the chiefs of hundreds, and the chiefs of all the property and acquisitions for the king and for his children, with the eunuchs and the valiant, and for all of valour and ability, to Jerusalem.
29	1227	36	2.12	3.42	17.11	8.72	13.45	7.91	30.64	16.63	And David the king said to all the congregation, Solomon my son, the one whom God has chosen, is a youth and is tender, and the line of work is great, because not for a human are the temple precincts, but for Yahweh God.
2 Chronicles
1	690	23	2.32	4.06	17.54	8.84	13.33	7.97	29.13	16.81	And Solomon child of David was resolved concerning his kingdom, and Yahweh his God was with him and made him to be greatly ascendant.
2	813	35	.86	3.08	21.28	9.72	11.32	6.64	34.44	12.67	And Solomon counted seventy thousand men to bear burdens, and eighty thousand men to hew in the hill, and the leaders over them were three thousand six hundred. P
3	603	15	1.49	2.16	19.57	12.11	13.76	10.78	25.37	14.76	And Solomon started building the house of Yahweh in Jerusalem on the hill Moriah, that of the appearance to David his father, which David had prepared in the place at the threshing-floor of I Shout With Joy the Jebusite.
4	802	35	4.36	4.86	15.71	12.59	12.59	8.60	32.42	8.85	And he made the altar of brass, twenty cubits its length and twenty cubits its breadth, and ten cubits its height. S
5	603	34	4.15	4.31	18.41	12.11	11.11	9.12	30.68	10.12	And all the lines of work were whole which Solomon had constructed for the house of Yahweh. And Solomon brought the holy things of David his father, and the silver and the gold and all the vessels, he gave into the treasuries of the house of God. P
6	1808	28	1	2.05	18.03	10.90	13.61	9.35	31.58	13.50	Then Solomon said, Yahweh is said to dwell in dark turbulence.
7	960	34	1.35	2.19	14.90	8.54	13.33	10.63	35.31	13.75	And as Solomon finished praying, the fire descended from the heavens and it devoured the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of Yahweh filled the house.
8	699	27	3	3.43	24.75	13.02	11.73	5.01	26.90	12.16	And it happened at the end of twenty years that Solomon had built the house of Yahweh and his house.
9	1213	21	1.98	5.03	16.08	10.14	14.51	10.31	29.76	12.20	And the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon, and she went to prove Solomon with riddles in Jerusalem, with excessively glorious wealth, and camels bearing spices, and gold abundant, and precious stone. And she went to Solomon and spoke with him all that was with her heart.
10	755	27	1.19	2.38	24.50	9.01	13.64	10.99	25.56	12.72	And Rehoboam went to Shechem, for to Shechem all Israel had come to make him king.
11	714	25	2.94	4.06	24.51	12.18	17.93	9.52	23.81	5.04	And Rehoboam entered Jerusalem and convened the house of Judah and Benjamin, a hundred and eighty thousand chosen, to make war to fight with Israel to restore the kingdom to Rehoboam. P
12	617	25	2.43	5.02	18.31	9.24	14.91	10.05	24.47	15.56	And it happened when Rehoboam had established the kingdom and had encouraged himself, he forsook the instruction of Yahweh, and all Israel with him. P
13	939	16	.85	3.30	19.38	10.76	14.06	10.22	29.61	11.82	In year of the eighteenth of king Jeroboam, and Abijah reigned over Judah.
14	540	34	0	1.48	19.26	9.63	15.37	10.56	32.41	11.30	And Asa did what is good and what is upright in the eyes of Yahweh his God.
15	626	21	1.28	3.04	23.96	12.62	17.57	8.95	22.20	10.38	And Azariah child of Oded, the spirit of God was upon him.
16	607	16	.99	1.98	16.47	8.40	14.00	9.39	36.90	11.86	In the thirty sixth year of the reign of Asa, Baasha king of Israel came up to Judah and built Ramah, so as to prevent going out or coming in to Asa king of Judah.
17	630	21	2.7	5.87	21.43	13.97	18.89	9.84	19.68	7.62	And Jehoshaphat his son reigned in his stead, and was resolute concerning Israel.
18	1307	22	1.45	3.44	24.41	10.48	13.62	10.71	25.02	10.86	And there were for Jehoshaphat riches and glory in abundance, and he made an alliance with Ahab.
19	462	32	1.95	2.60	19.91	10.82	12.12	5.41	37.66	9.52	And Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, returned to his house in peace to Jerusalem. S
20	1458	28	2.74	3.98	23.80	10.36	14.20	10.29	27.23	7.41	And it was after this the children of Moab came, and the children of Ammon, and with them from the Ammonites, against Jehoshaphat to war.
21	766	19	.91	3.92	18.54	11.62	14.10	9.27	28.59	13.05	And Jehoshaphat was laid out with his ancestors and was entombed with his ancestors in the city of David, and Jehoram his son reigned in his stead.
22	593	25	2.53	5.40	19.39	9.61	11.47	10.12	33.39	8.09	And the inhabitants of Jerusalem made Achaziah, his youngest son, king in his stead, for all those first in line, the raiding party that came with the Arabians to the camp, had slain. And Achaziah reigned, child of Jehoram king of Judah. P
23	966	46	.52	2.48	22.05	10.46	10.46	9.01	33.23	11.80	And in the seventh year Jehoiada was encouraged, and he took the chiefs of hundreds, of Azariah child of Jeroham, of Yishmaeil child of Yehoxanan, and of Azariah child of Obed, and Maaseyah child of Adiyah, and Elishaphat child of Zikri, with him into covenant.
24	1135	32	2.03	4.58	19.12	9.07	12.78	8.55	34.89	8.99	A child of seven years, Joash began to reign, and forty years he reigned in Jerusalem, and the name of his mother was Zibiah from Beer-Sheva.
25	1231	35	.24	2.11	17.22	9.75	12.51	8.29	30.63	19.25	A child of twenty five years, Amaziah reigned, and twenty nine years he reigned in Jerusalem. And the name of his mother was Jehoaddan from Jerusalem.
26	932	21	2.68	2.15	20.39	7.62	14.59	6.97	29.94	15.67	And all the people of Judah took Uzziah, and he was a child of sixteen years, and made king him instead of his father Amaziah.
27	301	18	1	2.99	18.60	7.64	16.61	8.31	33.55	11.30	A child of twenty five years was Jotham when he began to reign, and sixteen years he reigned in Jerusalem. And the name of his mother was Yerushah, the daughter of Zadok.
28	1116	28	1.7	3.23	24.46	8.87	14.25	7.62	28.41	11.47	A child of twenty years Ahaz was when he began to reign, and sixteen years he reigned in Jerusalem, and he did not do what is upright in the eyes of Yahweh like David his father.
29	1412	32	1.84	2.90	18.20	9.42	15.30	9.49	29.04	13.81	Hezekiah began to reign as a child of twenty five years, and twenty nine years, he reigned in Jerusalem, and the name of his mother was Abijah, the daughter of Zachariah.
30	1124	20	1.96	3.38	21.44	8.81	13.26	8.10	31.49	11.57	And Hezekiah sent over all Israel and Judah, and also wrote letters to Ephraim and Manasseh, to come to the house of Yahweh in Jerusalem, to do the Passover of Yahweh, the God of Israel.
31	955	35	3.35	3.35	17.17	8.80	14.55	9.42	33.09	10.26	And as all this was finished, all Israel that were found came forth to the cities of Judah, and they shattered the monuments, and they chopped down the fetishes, and they broke down the high places, and the altars from all Judah and Benjamin, and in Ephraim and Manasseh, until they finished. And all the children of Israel returned, each to its holding, to their own cities. P
32	1398	27	.86	2.72	24.54	8.51	13.38	8.51	31.19	10.30	After these truthful matters, Senacherib king of Ashur came. And he entered Judah, and encamped against the enclosed cities, and said he would split them for himself.
33	955	24	1.05	3.35	18.85	11.20	14.14	7.96	31.31	12.15	A child of twelve years was Manasseh when he began to reign, and fifty five years he reigned in Jerusalem. S
34	1529	32	1.57	2.88	18.97	8.11	13.02	10.20	36.95	8.31	A child of eight years Josiah was when he began to reign, and thirty one years he reigned in Jerusalem.
35	1180	24	1.19	3.64	22.12	9.66	13.64	11.02	27.46	11.27	And Josiah did in Jerusalem the Passover of Yahweh, and they butchered the Passover on the fourteenth of the first month.
36	920	18	1.74	3.04	20.54	9.24	14.24	10.22	29.02	11.96	And the people of the land took Jehoahaz, child of Josiah, and made him king instead of his father in Jerusalem.

Saturday 12 October 2024

Daniel