H
The letter H is used in German to denote
the English
note B, while B in German signifies the English B flat. In the
use of the
letters of a word to form a musical motif, the presence of H
allows a complete
musical version of the name BACH (B flat - A - C - B = German:
B - A -
C - H), used by various composers, including Liszt. The
Russian composer
Dmitry Shostakovich uses a musical cryptogram derived from the
first letters
of his name in German, DSCH, which becomes D - Es (= E flat) -
C - H. This
occurs in a number of his works as a kind of musical
signature.
Habanera (= Havanaise)
The Habanera is a Cuban dance from Havana,
later
introduced to Spain. One of the most famous examples is found
in Bizet’s
Spanish opera Carmen, where Carmen herself sings a seductive
Habanera.
Ravel includes a Habanera in his Rapsodie espagnole and also
wrote a Vocalise
en forme de habanera, while Debussy makes use of the
characteristic rhythm
of the dance.
Harmonic Rhythm
The rhythm of the changes of harmony in
time in a
musical work. Strong harmonic rhythm is marked by: 1)
strong root
motions, especially in root position; 2) by coincidence
of harmonic
changes with regular metrical dividing points, especially the
downbeat
of the measure; 3) by deemphasis of contrapuntal
activity of the
bass line; 4) and by relatively longer duration of the
harmony.
Weak harmonic rhythm is marked
by: 1) weak
root progressions; 2) deemphasis of root
position; 3) the strength
of contrapuntal motions added to the harmony; 4) weak
rhythmic placement
in the measure; 5) and relatively shorter duration.
Harmonic rhythm does not itself depend
on tempo
any more than melodic rhythm does, but the combination of
rapid tempo and
rapid harmonic rhythm generally produces an effect of
musical compression
or intensity, whereas slow harmonic rhythm in slow tempo
suggests breadth
and freedom from tension.
Schenker
analysis characteristically emphasizes the relatively strong
harmonic rhythm,
over the larger time-span and considers the relatively
weaker harmonic
rhythm over the smaller tiem-span, a detail rather than a
foundation-post
of the overall harmonic structure.
Harmonic
Series
In acoustics, a series of frequencies, all
of which
are integral multiples of a single frequency termed the
fundamental.
The fundamental and its harmonics are numbered in order, the
fundamental
being the first harmonic. Harmonics above the
fundamental are sometimes
termed overtones, the second harmonic being the first
overtone, etc.
The pitches represented by these frequencies, and thus the
intervals formed
among these pitches, are said to be acoustically pure.
In some measure,
they correspond to the pitches and intervals employed in much
Western music.
Most such music, however, requires the use of a tuning system
in which
relatively few intervals (always the octave and sometimes only
the octave)
are acoustically pure.
Harmonica
The Western harmonica or mouth-organ is an
invention
of the early 19th century, inspired by the ancient Chinese
bamboo mouth-organ,
the sheng. The 20th century chromatic harmonica, of which
Larry Adler has
been a leading exponent, has inspired a number of composers,
including
Vaughan Williams, who wrote a Romance for harmonica and
orchestra.
Harmoniemusik
Harmoniemusik is music for wind band. In
its more
limited sense the term is used to signify music for wind bands
or wind
ensembles in the service of the nobility from the middle of
the 18th century
to the end of the third decade of the 19th century, and their
popular counterparts.
The Harmonie, the band itself, which varied in number from a
duo to the
often found sextet or octet or to a much larger number of
players, had
its counterpart in France and in England, as well as its
successors among
emigrants to the United States of America.
Harmonium
The harmonium, developed in the early 19th
century
from experiments in the last quarter of the century before, is
a keyboard
instrument that produces its sounds by means of air from
bellows passing
through free reeds, metal tongues that are made to vibrate.
The instrument
has a relatively small classical repertoire, its use either
domestic or
as a cheap substitute for the church organ. Dvor*ák wrote
Bagatelles
for two violins, cello and harmonium, and Schoenberg made some
use of the
harmonium in chamber arrangements of works of his own and in
versions of
two waltzes by Johann Strauss.
Harmony
Harmony describes the simultaneous
sounding of two
or more notes and the technique governing the construction of
such chords
and their arrangement in a succession of chords. Following the
convention
of writing music from left to right on a horizontal set of
lines (staff
or stave), harmony may be regarded as vertical, as opposed to
counterpoint,
which is horizontal. In other words harmony deals with chords,
simultaneous
sounds, and counterpoint with melody set against melody.
Harp
The harp is an instrument of great
antiquity, represented
from as early as 3000 B.C. in Sumeria. The form of the
instrument has varied,
but the modern double-action harp, a development of the early
19th century,
is in general orchestral use. The strings are tuned in
flats,starting from
a bottom C flat, with seven pedals, each of which can change a
given set
of strings to a natural or a sharp. The C pedal, therefore, in
its three
positions, can make all the Cs on the instrument flat, natural
or sharp.
Other forms of harp survive. The Aeolian harp, with strings of
the same
length and pitch but of different thicknesses, was to be
placed by an open
window, its sounds produced by the wind blowing through the
strings. Various
forms of Celtic harp are still in use.
Harpsichord
The harpsichord is a keyboard instrument
with strings
running from front to back of its wing-shaped horizontal box
and soundboard.
Unlike the piano and the earlier clavichord with its hammers
that strike
the strings, the harpsichord has a mechanism by which the
strings are plucked.
The instrument seems to have existed in a simple form in the
14th century
and assumed considerable importance from the early 16th until
the fuller
development of the pianoforte towards the end of the 18th
century. Variations
of dynamics on the harpsichord are possible through the use of
stops that
activate different lengths of string and by the use of a
muting buff stop
and of the two manuals often found on the instrument. In
addition to its
ubiquitous use in the music of the baroque period, the
harpsichord has
also been used by modern composers, since its revival at the
end of the
19th century.
Heldentenor
The heroic tenor or Heldentenor is a tenor
with a
quality of voice suited to the heroic rôles of 19th century
French
Grand Opera and of the music-dramas of Wagner, as in the part
of Tannhäuser
in Wagner’s opera of that name.
Hemiola
1) a rhythm which , in its simplest form,
contrasts
a group of two equal note values against a group of three
equal values
occupying the same total time. The contrast may be
either simultaneous
or successive. The individual values of the contrasting
groups stand
in the proportion of 3:2. In actual practice any
specific value of
either group may be replaced by two or more smaller values;
or, two values
of the group of three may be replaced by one larger
value. The term
is used especially with reference to music of the 14th and
16th centuries.
In Baroque music, hemiola rhythms often occur in Courantes.
They are also to be found in works of such later composers as
Beethoven,
Brahms,
Schumann,
and Chopin.
2) In an earlier sense, now obsolete,
the term
denoted a pair of notes whose vibration frequencies were
related in the
proportion of 3:2; such a ratio produces the interval of a
perfect fifth.
Heterophony
The simultaneous performance of variant
forms of
one basic melody; the variants may involve added or omitted
notes and rhythmic
changes. Heterophony is to be observed in some music of
the Far East
and may have been employed in ancient Greek and medieval
Western music.
Hexachord
A collection of six pitches. Hexachords
figure prominently
in the history of solemnization and in twelve-tone
theory.
In polyphony of the 13th and 14th
centuries, a stylistic
device or a self-contained composition characterized by the
distribution
of a melodic line between two voices in such a way that as one
sounds the
other is silent. As a device, it is first used in "conductus"
and motets and later
in Mass
movements and certain of the vernacular, forms, above all the
"caccia"
and the "chace."
As a genre,
the hocket is intimately related to the discant "clausula,"
its plainchant tenor arranged in modal
patterns and ornamented by freely composed voices.
What distinguishes
it is the overlapping of these voices so that, to quote
Johannes de Grocheo,
"they continually cut each other off."
Music in which melodic interest is
concentrated in
one voice or part that is provided with a subordinate
accompaniment, as
distinct from polyphony, in which melodic interest is
distributed among
all parts of the musical texture. The term may refer to
a variety
of melody-plus-accompaniment textures as well as to texture,
termed homorhythmic,
in which all parts move with the same or similar rhythm.
Horn
The horn takes its name from the horn of
an animal,
the original form of this wind instrument in ancient times.
The instrument
was long associated with hunting and as a means of military
signalling.
The instrument now generally known as the French horn
developed in France
in its familiar helical form, but in one form or another the
horn had come
to be a frequent instrument in music for the church, the
theatre and the
chamber by the early 18th century. The natural horn was able
to play the
notes of the harmonic series, modified by the use of the right
hand in
the bell of the instrument, and in different keys by the use
of different
crooks that changed the length of the tube and hence the
length of the
air column. The valve horn was developed in the first quarter
of the 19th
century, its two and later three valves making variations
possible in the
length of tube and hence in the pitch of the fundamental and
harmonic series
stemming from it, but the natural horn continued in use at the
same time.
The double horn was developed in the late 19th century and is
now in common
use. Concertos for the French horn include the four concertos
by Mozart.
In the classical orchestra the two horns played a largely
sustaining part.
The modern orchestra normally has four French horns. The
hunting associations
of the horn led to its evocative use in Romantic music, as in
Weber’s opera
Der Freischütz, and in the same composer’s opera Oberon, in
which
the horn has a magic rôle to play.
Hornpipe
The hornpipe is a rapid British dance that
exists
in various metres, triple, duple and quadruple. In its earlier
English
form it is found in the keyboard suites and stage music of the
English
composer Henry Purcell, and in keyboard and orchestral
movements by Handel.
It later came to be popularly associated particularly with
sailors in the
so-called Sailors’ Hornpipe derived from a fiddle-tune.
Humoresque
Schumann was the first composer to use the
title
Humoreske for a relatively long work for piano, the humour of
the title
used rather in the sense of a mood of one sort or another. The
word later
came to indicate very much shorter pieces, such as the well
known G flat
Humoresque by Dvor*ák, one of a set of eight.
A hymn is a song of praise, whether to a
god, saint
or hero. The plainchant hymn has a place in the Divine Office.
In Protestant
Christian worship, where the hymn assumed considerable
importance, after
the chorales of Martin Luther and his followers, the metrical
homophonic
form dominated.