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Show 72 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [ BULL. 75 No. 17. Pinal Song of Bear Dance ( b) ( Catalogue No. 693) Recorded by SINGEB NO. 4 VOICB J - 144 MORACHB J - 144 Rhythm of morache similar to No. 2 msmiir r r- fiarir r r u r r ^ ^ mj- i finr r J ^ r r riif r J ^ s Analysis.- This, like the song next preceding, is major in tonality, harmonic in structure, has a compass of six tones, and progresses only by intervals of the fourth and the major third. The present melody contains 15 progressions, 53 per cent of which are downward, and the preceding melody contains 67 progressions, 51 per cent of which are downward. With these melodic similarities it is interesting to not? the difference between the rhythmic character of the two songs. Only one rhythmic unit occurs in the song under analysis, its four repetitions comprising the entire melody. The preceding song contains three short rhythmic units with many intervening measures. The present song contains eight changes of measure lengths, while the preceding song is in 2- 4 time throughout. PLOTS OF BEAR DANCE SONGS 17 In the plots of a large majority of the Bear dance songs we note a resemblance to the plots of Sioux songs concerning animals. ( See Bull. 61, p. 204.) This resemblance consists in the touching of a low M A form of graphic representation, or " plotting," of melodies has been devised by the writer for the purpose of making the trend of melodies more apparent. The general method employed is similar to that used in showing graphically the course of a moving object. The loci of the object at given periods of time are determined and recorded, the several positions being connected by straight lines. In any use of this method the interest centers in the several points € k which the object is located, it being understood that the lines connecting these points are used merely as an aid to observation. In the present adaptation of this method the pitch of the accented tones in a melody is indicated by dots placed at the intersection of coordinate lines, the horizontal coordinates representing scale degrees and the vertical coordinates representing measure lengths. These dots are connected by straight lines, though the progress of the melody between the accented tones would, in many instances, vary widely from these lines if it were accurately plotted. The use of accented tones exclusively in analyzing these songs has already been employed, the structure of the melodies being determined by the pitch of contiguous accented tones. One of the reasons which seem to justify this usage is the observation that, when differences appear in the several renditions of an Indian song, these differences usually are found to be in unimportant progressions between unaccented tones. Since the sole purpose of these plots is to show the trend of the- melodies, it seems permissible to omit from the representation, not only the unaccented tones occurring in the melody, but also a distinction between whole tones and semitones in progressions, and a distinction between double and triple time in measure lengths. It is obviously desirable that the graphic representation be as simple as possible, the more detailed observation of the melodies being contained in the tabulated and descriptive analyses. |