The Song-form Or The Part-form
Almost every musical composition of
average (brief) dimensions, if designed with the serious purpose of
imparting a clear formal impression, will admit of division into either
two or three fairly distinct sections, or Parts, of approximately equal
length. The distinctness with which the points of separation are
marked, and the degree of independence of each of these two or three
larger sections, are determined almost
ntirely by the length of the
whole. And whether there be two or three such divisions depends to
some extent also upon the length of the piece, though chiefly upon the
specific structural idea to be embodied.
A composition that contains two such sections is called a Two-Part (or
bipartite, or binary) form; and one that contains three, a Three-part
(tripartite, or ternary) form.
Such rare exceptions to these structural arrangements as may be
encountered in musical literature, are limited to sentences that, on
one hand, are so brief as to require no radical division; and, on the
other, to compositions of very elaborate dimensions, extending beyond
this structural distinction; and, furthermore, to fantastic pieces in
which the intentional absence of classified formal disposition is
characteristic and essential.
The terms employed to denote this species (Song-form or Part-form)
do not signify that the music is necessarily to be a vocal composition
of that variety known as the Song; or that it is to consist of
several voices (for which the appellation parts is commonly used).
They indicate simply a certain grade,--not a specific variety,--of
form; an intermediate grade between the smallest class (like brief
hymn-tunes, for example), and the largest class (like complete
sonata-movements). An excellent {84} type of this grade of Form is
found in the Songs Without Words of Mendelssohn, the Mazurkas of
Chopin, and works of similar extent.
The word Part (written always with a capital in these lessons) denotes,
then, one of these larger sections. The design of the Part-forms was
so characteristic of the early German lied, and is so common in the
song of all eras, that the term Song-form seems a peculiarly
appropriate designation, irrespective of the vocal or instrumental
character of the composition.
The student will perceive that it is the smallest class of forms--the
Phrase-forms,--embracing the phrase, period and double-period, to which
the preceding chapters have been devoted. These are the designs which,
as a general rule, contain only one decisive perfect cadence, and
that at the end; and which, therefore, though interrupted by
semicadences, are continuous and coherent, because the semicadence
merely interrupts, and does not sever, the continuity of the sentence.
(This grade of forms might be called One-Part forms).