On the Role of the ‘Passionate’ Rhythms of French Poetry of the 17th and Early 18th Centuries in the Genres of the chanson à danser and the danse chantée

Larisa D. Pylaeva

Abstract


The article is devoted to the rhythms of French Baroque poetry, which are considered as an important source of emotional expressiveness in the dances of that time period. One example chosen is the Sarabande, as presented in the genres of the chanson à danser and the danse chantée by French composers of the 17th and the early 18th centuries. Special attention is given to the so-called unbalanced phrasing of poems, which leads to the emergence of ‘passionate rhythms.’ Their expressiveness was stipulated by the three types of accents present in the French spoken language — the grammatical, the logical and the pathetic (oratorical), which, according to Jean-Jacques Rousseau, create an impact on musical intonation and are important for composers who write music in dance forms. The equivalents of the grammatical accents, which mark the open or the closed sounds, as well as the brevity vs. the length of the syllables, are presented by the downbeats and the offbeats of the measures. The logical accents indicate the connections and relationships of the expressed thoughts uttered in the sentences of speech. The pathetic, or oratorical accents express the feelings of the speaker and communicate them to the listeners.

Keywords: French baroque music, rhetoric of dance, chanson à danser, danse chantée, sarabande tendre, “passionate rhythms,” the grammatical, logical and pathetic accents of French speech

For citation: Pylaeva L. D. On the Role of the "Passionate" Rhythms of French Poetry of the 17th and Early 18th Centuries in the Genres of the chanson à danser and the danse chantée [Electronic source]. In: Sovremennye problemy muzykoznaniya / Contemporary Musicology, 2023, no. 3, pp. 9–25. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.56620/2587-9731-2023-3-009-025


References


Rosanoff, I. V. (2014). The Tempos of Danses chantées in Michel L’Affillard’s Treatise (Paris, 1705). Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. Arts, 4(2), 5–41. (In Russ.)

Danishevskaia, Y. A. (2020). Old French Suite: The Sarabande as Vocal & Instrumental Genre. Bulletin of the South Ural State University. Ser. Social Sciences and the Нumanities, 20(1), 72—78. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.14529/ssh200111

Danishevskaya, Y. A. (2020). Refraction of the Laws of Prosody of the French Airs in Ancient Dances for Clavier. Music. Art, Research, Practice, 29(1), 38–49. (In Russ.).

Zaуtseva, N. V. (2022). The Controversy Around the French Classicism of the 17th Century. Historiography of the Issue. Filosofiya i kul’tura / Philosophy and Culture, (2), 101–114. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.7256/2454-0757.2022.2.37321

Zaуtseva, N. V. (2022). Secular Etiquette and the ‘Art of Liking’ in French Moralistic Literature of the 17th — 18th Centuries. Genesis: Istoricheskie issledovaniya / Genesis: Historical Research, (2), 65–75. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.25136/2409-868X.2022.2.34998

Pylaeva, L. D. (2021). Terminological Relations of Musical, Poetic and Choreographic Syntax in Stage Dances of French Baroque. In Terms, Concepts and Categories in Musicology. Proceedings of Fourth International Congress of the Society for Theory of Music. Kazan, October 2–5, 2019, (pp. 431–440). Zhiganov Kazan State Conservatoire. (In Russ.)

Rasputina, M. V. (2009). Stanovlenie klavirnogo stilya v muzyke yuzhnonemeckogo barokko [The Rise of the Clavier Style in the Music of the South German Baroque]. Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory. (In Russ.).

Bezuglaya, G. A. (2021). Muzyka baleta v kontekste muzykal’noj deyatel’nosti horeografov (konec XVI — pervaya tret’ XX vv.) [Ballet Music in the Context of the Musical Activity of Choreographers (From the End of the 16th till the First Third of the 20th Century)]. [Unpublished doctoral dissertation (Dr. Sci., Art Studies)]. Saint Petersburg Rimsky-Korsakov State Conservatory. (In Russ.).

Pylaeva, L. D. (2012). Muzyka scenicheskih tancev francuzskih kompozitorov XVII — nachala XVIII vekov v kontekste ritoricheskoj epohi [Music of Stage Dances of French Composers of the 17th and Early 18th Centuries in the Context of the Rhetorical Era]. [Unpublished doctoral dissertation (Dr. Sci., Art Studies)]. Gnesin Russian Academy of Music. (In Russ.).

Pineau, J. (1979). Le mouvement rhytmique en français, principes et méthode d’analyse. Klincksieck.

Belavina, E. M. (2016). O ritme vo francuzskom yazyke: polemika literaturovedov i lingvistov [On Rhythm in the French Language: Polemics of Literary Scholars and Linguists]. Aktual’nye problemy gumanitarnyh i estestvennyh nauk [Current Issues of the Humanities and Sciences], (2–3), 124– 126. (In Russ.).

Bally, Ch. (1955). Obshchaya lingvistika i voprosy francuzskogo yazyka [Linguistique générale et linguistique française]. Inostrannaya literatura. (In Russ.).

Kruglova, E. V. (2022). On Ornamentation and Improvisation in Baroque Vocal Performance. Philharmomika. International Music Journal, (6), 13–23. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.7256/2453-613X.2022.6.39508

Cyr, M. (2020). Ariane Consolée par Bacchus and François Couperin’s Early Writing for the Viol. Early Music, 48(3), 291–306. https://doi.org/10.1093/em/caaa037

Pylaeva, L. D. “Passionate Rhythms” in French Danses Chantées (the Problem of Correlation of Words and Music). Problemy Muzykal’noj Nauki / Music Scholarship, 5(2), 132–134. (In Russ.)

Pylaeva, L. D. (2015). O ponyatii danse de caractère vo francuzskoj muzyke XVII — pervoj poloviny XVIII vekov [On the Concept of Danse de caractère in French Music of the 17th and first half of the 18th Centuries]. In Music in the System of Culture: Scientific Bulletin of the Ural Conservatory, 9. Muzykal’naya nauka v nachale XXI veka: dostizheniya, problemy, perspektivy [Musicology in the Early 21st Century: Achievements, Problems, Prospects]. Proceedings of the International Scientific Conference to the 80th Anniversary of the Urals Mussorgsky State Conservatoire and the 175th Anniversary of Modest Mussorgsky, (pp. 183–192). Urals Mussorgsky State Conservatoire. (In Russ.)

Harnoncourt, N. (2019). Muzyka barokko: put’ k novomu ponimaniyu [Musik Als Klangrede. Wege zu einen neuen Musikverstandnis. Essays und Vortrage], (A. Ashirmetova, Ed., transl. from German by O. Koval’). Palmira. (In Russ.).




DOI: https://doi.org/10.56620/2587-9731-2023-3-009-025

Copyright (c) 2023 Larisa D. Pylaeva

License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/