14 Feb
2013
14 Feb
'13
4:15 p.m.
Paul Davis <paul@...> writes:
even i have read that (even) bach rarely departs from
a fairly monotonous
grid, even on those odd occasions when things are not in 4.
I'm about to turn in for the night after a few glasses of Malbec (vacation is
wonderful and necessary, no?) so I'm not up for a full treatise. But I do want
to point out that vast amounts of Bach's output derive from the rhythms of
Baroque court dances (same for most late Baroque composers, actually), and a
good many of those dances are not in 4.
Triple divisions of the beat and triple meters are not "odd occasions" in Bach,
by any means.
It is true that syncopation appears in baroque music in ways that are less
flexible than 20th-century classical music, or jazz, not to mention the great
breakbeat wizards from d'n'b and its offshoots.
hjh