The European Folk Music Scale: A New Theory

(Hirts Hirtenhrner Hypothesis)

by

Aindrias Hirt
University of Otago, Ph.D. Candidate

An abbreviated version has been published online here:

http://ethnomusicologyreview.ucla.edu/content/origin-european-folk-music-scale-new-theory

Abstract: Research into the origin of the Western European Folk Music Scale has been inconsistent, varied, and mostly unsatisfying. Melodies using this scale have many characteristics that seem inexplicable to researchers. Some of these distinguishing traits are that the scale is gapped, tuned in a different manner than Pythagorean tuning or Equal Temperament, is somehow aligned with the ecclesiastical modes, is either tetratonic, pentatonic, or hexatonic, is missing half-steps when pentatonic, etc. The present paper suggests that the Natural or Overtone Scale is the foundation of the Western European Folk Music Scale and solves all of the above-mentioned anomalies. The most prevalent instrument that demonstrates the natural scale is the wooden shepherds tr umpet that, although vanishing in Western Europe, still exists in marginalized communities in Eastern Europe . The decline of shepherds trumpets seems linked to the decline of the practice of transhumance (seasonal livestock movement) in Europe. With this understanding , the dichotomy between art music and folk music begins to have an understandable relationship based on differences between intonation systems that has not been suggested to date. This duality of intonation suggests a spectrum of transcendence of one tuning system over another over time. At one end of the time spectrum, there is the present day with a musical culture of Western European art music based on the equally tempered diatonic scale and few elements of the natural scale remaining. On the other end, perhaps 1,500 years ago, there was a musical culture that was primarily based on the natural scale with a few elements of the diatonic scale.

Introduction:
Explanations as to the origin of the Western European folk music scale have been disappointing. This may be because the knowledge needed to understand this music is no longer contained within the boundaries of our modern society. Theories are often rooted in a researchers modern-day experiences and not in past conditions. Some observations that have been made concerning the European folk music scale is that it is: gapped; tuned in a different manner than Pythagor ean tuning or Equal Temperament; either tetratonic, pentatonic, or hexatonic; when tetratonic or pentatonic is also missing half-steps; uncomplicated; simple; etc. There have been several theories advanced to explain these observations such as that the music is composed of stacked tetrachords, is related through circular phrase sequences relating to the cycle of fifths, somehow aligned with the ecclesiastical modes, et al.1 Concerning using the ecclesiastical modes to describe folk music, Norman Cazden candidly states:
1

Some of the many researchers include Cecil Sharp, (Sharp, Cecil J. 1932 English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians, Maud Karpeles, 2 vols., London: Oxford University Press), Kennedy-Fraser (Kennedy-Fraser, Marjory 1909 Songs of the Hebrides, 3 vols., vol. 1, London: Boosey and Co.), Gilchrist (Gilchrist, Annie G. 1911 Note on the Modal System of Gaelic Tunes, Journal of the Folk -Song Society 4, no. 16, 150-53), William H. Grattan Flood (Grattan-Flood, William H. 1905 A History of Irish Music , Book, Dublin: Browne and Nolan Limited), Donald MacDonald (MacDonald, Donald c.1900 Irish Music and Irish Scales, London: Breitkopf and Hrtel), Bertrand H. Bronson (Bronson, Bertrand H. 1946 Folksong and the Modes, The Musical Quarterly 32, no. 1, 37-49) and (Bronson, Bertrand H. 1972 Are the Modes Outmoded?, Yearbook of the International Folk Music Council 4, 23-31), Francis Collinson (Collinson, Francis 1966 The Traditional and National Music of Scotland , London: Routledge and Kegan Paul), James Culwick (Culwick, J.C. 1897 Distintive Charictaristics of Ancient Irish Melody: The Scales, vol. 3 ), Bradley and Breathnach (Bradley, Seirse and Breathnach, Breandn 1980 Ireland , Stanley. Ed.

Today that mode scheme mystifies rather than clarifies both the technical data presented in traditional song and the cultural history which its study ought rather to document [...] That is why I judge that mode scheme to constitute today a dogmatic barrier that directly impedes the desired internal analysis of the musical forms which it purports to promote, and that diverts the student from the further relevancies and generalizations that such analysis might indicate, all the while encouraging lip -service as a substitute for thought[...] To make way for a more serviceable frame for study, it is time we recognize that the familiar mode classifications and categories are historically a travesty and systematically both inept and unproductive.2

The cause of this problem facing Ethnomusicologists when dealing with folk music organization is that they have all been formally trained. They have an unconscious predilection for the diatonic scale and features of art music. As Foss believes:
The documentation of music history is entirely that of formal music, i.e. secular art music or religious music. To apply the theories and methods meaningful to this body of documentation to traditional music and song is therefore attempting to apply the rules of formal music to the traditional music idiom. This is at best impractical and most frequently impossible. The most persistent efforts to place folksong study within the frame-work of formal music theory are found in the attempts at describing and classifying the scales found in folksong. This is most obvious in the widespread use of modal theory and terminology in the study of British and Anglo -American folksong.3

Although such predispositions have prevented the actualization of folk music classification in a lucid manner, the effort to do so resulted in the recording of musical observations; that is, people made the effort to transcribe the music, and a good number of tunes were notated on the diatonic musical staff. Some of these observations were made when there was quite a difference between art music and folk music. The distinction is much less sharp today; folk music has become so altered through the pervasive affects of mass media that traditional tunes performed today bear little semblance to recordings in archives. Therefore, earlier observations are valuable because they describe, albeit imperfectly, music that is, for the most part, no longer extant. Furthermore, as Bronson believes, the organisation imposed on folk music by using the imperfect ecclesiastical modal system is preferable than to have no system at all. 4 Although it is often valuable to pull away from an issue in order to understand it, using foreign cultural constructs to quantize local patterns is ultimately fruitless. Each system is unique and full unto itself. For a parallel example, there are deep underlying grammatical forms in the English language. Using foreign constructs, such as using the grammar of Latin to describe the English language, often results in profound confusion. The impossibility of there being a split infinitive in a Latin verb does not mean that it is inappropriate to have a split infinitive in English. So the popular television quotation, To boldly go (where no man has gone before) is perfectly correct, whereas such a statement is not possible in Latin. Schoolboys in English public schools were taught how to translate Latin into English; split infinitives do not occur in Latin. Writing/speaking split infinitives became forbidden although it is part of the deep

Sadie, The Groves Dictionary of Music and Musicians, London: MacMillan Publishers), Boyle ( Boyle, San 1977 The Irish Song Tradition , Toronto: MacMillan of Canada), Finlay Dauney (Dauney, W. and Dun, F. 1838 Ancient Scotish Melodies: From a Manuscript of the Reign of King James Vi: With an Introductory Enquiry Illustrative of the History of the Music of Scotland Edinburgh Printing and Pub. Co.), etc., etc. 2 Cazden, Norman 1971 A Simplified Mode Classification for Traditional Anglo-American Song Tunes, Yearbook of the International Folk Music Council 3, 45-78: 46-47. 3 Foss, George 1967 A Methodology for the Description and Classification of Anglo -American Traditional Tunes, Journal of the Folklore Institute 4, no. 1, 102-26: 103. 4 Bronson Are the Modes Outmoded?

structure of the English language. Therefore, imposing foreign constructs on the English language does not reveal that deep structure but rather hinders it. In a like manner, attempts to discern the structure of folk music have failed largely because folk music has been analysed through an understanding and mores of a foreign music. Analysis has been made more difficult since the instruments that create such music are now quite scarce. Additionally, the Christian Church marginalized these instruments and tonal properties in the past. These issues hinder analysis since it is firstly difficult to divorce oneself from learned proclivities and secondly to analyse pitch structures of instruments that have all but disappeared. There have been few attempts made to understand European folk music from within itself; however, there have been tentative positive steps made by researchers outside of the English-speaking world. For example, Eivind Groven suggested that Norwegian folk music was based on the series of pitches produced on the seljeflte (sallow/willow flute).5 More recent work in the field of Generative Tonal Theory developed by Lerdahl and Jackendoff infer that the natural overtone series may be the foundation of folk music around the world. A readily available reference to this postulate can be found in a series of lectures presented at Harvard University by Leonard Bernstein termed The Unanswered Question which he gave in 1973. These videos are currently on www.youtube.com. His comments during the segment entitled Musical Phonology were supportive of this present paper in that Bernstein suggests that the essence of a cultures music is based on where it tends to dwell in the overtone series. Unfortunately, he equated D4 with D5 and never thought to match overtones to actual pitches produced by actual instruments. In short, Bernstein thought in terms of theoretical octave equivalency instead of observing the notes produced by actual instruments that may have produced the overtone series (also called the harmonic series or the natural scale-the phrase preferred in this paper). My approach was not to theorize possible notes that may have been used in the distant past, but to identify instruments that were known to exist, analyse pitches that those instruments produced, and compare them to transcribed music and observations made by researchers. My investigation over the last ten years has led me to the conclusion that folk music is not, in fact, folk music at all; rather, it is pastoral music. It is the music created by pastoral societies on pastoral instruments; such societies and instruments have all but vanished. The world of the shepherd is not the world of the music researcher. The shepherd once had needs and concerns wholly different from those of the average modern person. Yet, it is possible to re-create the living conditions of a 5-10th century shepherd by putting ourselves in a shepherds mind-set without imposing our own personal understanding of our own world onto that situation; this is quite difficult. There is a strong tendency to rationalize our own behaviours or patterns and project them onto the shepherd. For example, if we are accustomed to shoes, we will try to suggest that shepherds had shoes. If we eat cereal every morning, we will try to suggest that shepherds ate a type of cereal. We tend to project our experiences and emotions on people of a bye-gone era and then use our intellect to justify those conditions. It is therefore reasonable to assume that we would tend to project that tendency when dealing with music from the past. What is familiar to us about music we would think would be familiar to people from the past. This is not true; we must be on guard against assuming and rationalizing this.

Living Situation in the Dark Ages

5

Groven, Eivind 1927 Naturskalaen; Tonale Lover I Norsk Folkemusikk Bundne Til Seljeflyta , Skien: Norsk folkekulturs forlag.

Let us look at the living conditions of a typical shepherd who existed in the 5-10th century A.D.: There were no grocery stores; you had to kill and butcher what you ate or youd starve. People did not work and play, they worked constantly but tried to make the work playful. There was no newspapers or tabloids, no radio, no iPods, no internet, no telephones, no electricity, no cable or TV. There were no books. You didnt know anyone who knew how to read or write or do arithmetic; there were no films; there were no sewing machines; there were no stores; there were no cars; there were no inns; There was a priest and a church fifty miles away that you attended twice a year, maybe, and there was little or no ecclesiastical music.6 We have all of those things today, so we subconsciously project those things onto the behaviour of people in the past. There was nothing but you, your family, your chattel, relatives, and a great amount of space that was mainly uninhabited and wild. There was the sound of the wind, of animals, your family talking and singing, and thats just about it. We intuitively have an inclination to fill up the mind of a Dark Age shepherd with our own modern-age experiences. I believe that this tendency has hindered the solution as to the genesis of the European folk music scale. It is difficult to remove from our intellect what we subconsciously feel as normal. Moreover, although mostly forgotten in the last few hundred years, humans in Europe had practiced a pattern of life that sustained them dependably for over six thousand years from the Neolithic Era.7 The yearly cycle of the sun caused the pattern of heat and cold, summer and winter. People had adapted to this cycle and had developed a pattern of plant and animal farming that molded with the seasons. With the agricultural advancements of the eighteenth century, these earlier traditional patterns slowly faded. Conjoined musical activities likewise waned. Even in cultures that pride themselves on their cultural momentum, collective modern memory is so short that most people today are unaware of these older cycles. Yet today, vestiges of older traditions may be seen on the internet through the invisible eye of the video camera and silent voice of the digital recorder. The intertwined pattern of livestock movement, agriculture, and food preservation for the famine of winter in Europe had a necessary partner in music. Other animals respond to music just as we do, and using this understanding gave us an advantage in exploiting livestock for our own security. In order to understand this, we need to understand a modicum of how people all over the world respond to the shifting seasons. Before the industrial age produced machines that provided a great mechanical advantage, agricultural work had to be done by hand. People did not collect and process fodder for animals on a large scale since it required an inordinate amount of work. Instead, a practice called transhumance was followed. With this system, livestock was taken from farms in the lowlands in the spring; they were moved (called droving) to where the snows had melted on the hillsides and grass was growing. Animals feed on the grass, were milked, this made into cheese; in the fall, livestock returned to the homestead in the low country. During the time when animals grazed in the mountains, those people remaining behind planted and harvested crops. With winter setting in, the returned animals scratched and scraped through the snow and ate the unmown grass hidden below. Meanwhile, men ate the winter stores of bread for carbohydrate and siphoned off the protein interest of the livestock (cheese/milk/blood) until

It is natural for us to rationalize that a shepherd in a pasture would hook up a horse and buggy and go to church and that there would be a professionally trained musician there playing on a keyboard instrument; we are accustomed to rapid transit. This is doubtful. The population of London in 1100 was 15,000. Shepherds generally worked where there were few people. Organs and organized (interesting pun) music only existed where there were a great many people in a small area who could pool their wealth and afford such a luxury as an organ. 7 Evidence survives of a transhumance economy in the Alp s dating at least to the 4th millennium BC.

the spring came; with the bloom of spring, people expanded their meager, temporary winter diet for fresh vegetables and game. Research in recent years is revealing the overwhelming commonality of this mostly forgotten migratory custom and associated musical tools. In particular, one type of instrument was of vital importance in this daily or seasonal movement. 8 Shepherds used wooden trumpets to gather a herd before traveling to and from a pasturage, controlling them when driving a flock over a great distance in a seasonal cycle,9 frightening away attacking predators (bears or wolves), communicating by specific calls to other communities or fellow shepherds separated by steep ravines or other geographic impediments, calming animals by playing to them when milking them, etc. Seasonal migration to high pastures is still practiced in Norway, Sweden, Finland, through the Baltic States, the Carpathians, and down through to the Balkans. To the west, it still exists in Bavaria, Austria, and the Swiss Alps. Although transhumance is still practiced in the Pyrenees, its collaboration with shepherds trumpets seems to have disappeared; however, photographs and postcards of shepherds trumpets from the Pyrenees from as late a s the 1960s and extant instruments preserved as family heirlooms may still be found. Transhumance is also practiced in Spain; a livestock migration through Madrid still occurs where, since at least 1273, shepherds have had the right to pass through the city for a small fee. One hindrance to understanding the musical past is that we might have a tendency to think that instruments were as plentiful a thousand years ago per capita as they are today. Due to industrialization and the rise of cities in Europe, there was an upsurge of instrument making in the 16th century (hence the expression, The Rise of Instrumental Music ). Before that time, making an instrument was laborious and difficult. However, a shepherd might need to do this wearisome work in order to create a necessary musical tool. Shepherds needed to gather their domestic animals to travel to or from the pasture in the morning and evening, call to other shepherds, and frighten away dangerous animals. 10 Every shepherd had a tool to do this. If you examine marginalized societies today where there are still shepherds working in relative isolation in the Carpathians (Russia/Ukraine), Poland, the Balkans, Estonia, Romania, Sweden, and Norway, etc., you will see them carrying this instrument. It was made by taking a branch or the trunk of a small tree, splitting it, hollowing it out, putting the two halves back together with sap at the edges as glue, and securing the halves with birch-bark or wooden osier (willow) rings steamed or boiled to make
8

I am reminded of a time when I was walking through Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany and in the center of town heard the lowing of cattle from within a house. It was actually a stone barn on the road attached to a house. The family would walk the cows through town every early morning to the town pasturage and then back again at night. 9 Movement of livestock was extremely important to those in Europe. Overgrazing local fields was a serious problem. Therefore, there was pattern of movement to move animals to higher areas in the summer where grass seldom grew in the early spring or late fall, and then moving them back down after those areas were grazed over. The usefulness of shepherds trumpets to control the her d cannot be overstated. In England, there was reverse transhumance. In Wales during the summer pasturage, people stayed at a hafod , in lowland Scotland a (bothy or shieling), in the Highlands (irigh ), in Ireland (buaile or booley). 10 Since writing this article, it has become staggeringly apparent that shepherds trumpets were of profound importance in the almost forgotten practice of transhumance. Seasonal transhumance took place before the agricultural revolution in the eighteenth century (in Britain at least). Before that time, animals were not fed stored fodder, but were expected to survive off the land during winter. So in the spring, animals were led away from the fertile lowlands and (normally) up to the highlands. Animals ate there; cheese was made. The animals were then led down to the farmers permanent residence in the fall to feed off the relatively rich and unha rvested pasturage. Although this seasonal migration was a vital practice for survival in Europe for perhaps 9,000 years, the vast majority of people today are completely ignorant of it (as I was).

pliable. In short, the instrument was a wooden, valve-less, finger-hole-less trumpet; simply stated, it was a wooden shepherds trumpet. These shepherds trumpets seem to fall into two groups. One group consists of 6 to 10 foot (2-3 meters) trumpets made long so as to facilitate playing upper notes in the harmonic series/natural scale. The other group is much shorter, but has a marked flare to the instrument; it swells roughly to 8 (.2 m.) over its 2-3 (1 m.) length and generally resembles a large animal horn. This shorter instrument is only capable of playing a few notes that reside rather low in the natural scale. Ancient practices such as transhumance can often be linked through language use as well. Linguists have discovered that if a similar word exists in severa l cultures languages, the words existence did not migrate from one culture to the next, but rather originated from a parent culture and was spread with migration from it. For example, the word for lyre (crowd in English) is also known as chorus (Latin), cithara (Greek), cruit (Scottish Gaelic), crwth (Welsh), crotte, rotte, etc. Since the words are all similar, they are assumed to have originated from a root language and associated culture, much like a parent with offspring. For most European languages this parent language is called the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) language and dates to before 4000 BCE. Therefore, if trumpet playing was important to transhumance, one would expect to see a PIE root word and variants in PIE daughter languages for the shepherd s trumpet. The words for pipe are srwtom or strudsm which may have originally referred to the trumpet. Modern words for shepherds trumpets include trembita (, t, ), trombita , trambita , trmbia , trambica , trmbi , trmbit , trnghit , tulnic, trimitis, taures, torvi, touhitorvi, etc. Such names are obvious cognates and are linked to a parent language and practice. It must be noted that instrument forms and names change over time. For example, the Gaelic word cruit described a lyre. Once the lyre started to be bowed during the 10th century, the word shifted to refer to the harp. Such linguistic malleability might also have occurred in trompeta (Spanish), tromba (Italian), trompette (French), trompete (German), the English word trumpet and the earlier trump. As a cognate with other PIE words, it is doubtful that the word trumpet simply sprang from the ether in order to refer to the metal trumpet manufactured in cities in the Middle Ages. The word probably existed in some form in English and referred to the shepherds trumpet when transhumance was practiced in English-speaking areas. Other words are used for the shepherds trumpet as well: bucium buinne, bchel, busine, buisine, buccina, buysine , buzine , busaun (which becomes posaune ) from which we have in English bugle , etc. In the Scandinavian countries, the terms nverlur, neverlur, raklur (straight lur), langlur (long lur) are used for wooden shepherds trumpets and are most often wrapped with birch bark. Additionally, k nu is PIE for an animal horn. One can see/hear the Latin cornu from this and the Celtic carnyx as well. The English pipehorn was originally a pipe or reed with an animal horn inserted in the end. Variations are alpenhorn, alphorn, vallehorn , midwinterhoorn , hlzenhorn , hirtenhorn , and karjapasun among many others. The reader should remember that, unlike today, horns are usually shorter than a trumpet; trumpet makers will often search out curved wood for their trumpets so as to shape them to look like animal horns. It should be noted that names for instruments often change over time; words such as cornu , korn , horn, bugle, bucina , buinne, trumpet, trupa , tromba , tuba , etc. could all be used to specify the very same instrument in different cultures during different periods of time. Laxness in naming conventions was and is common; e.g., a trumpeter today might ask another what kind of horn s/he plays. Here is an example of a few shepherds trumpets (below). These trumpets are all shaped from tree branches or the trunks of saplings (often resulting in a shape similar to the large Swiss alphorn with a thick, upturned bell; this large, curved bell often results from a branch or trunk curving up sharply from 6

the bank of a steep hill). I have found that trunks of trees do not produce a marked flare near the bell area, while branches do. This strongly influences the volume and intonation of the resulting pitches. Here is an example of four trombitas, Figure 1, below:

Figure 1: Various S hapes of the Trombita

The above figure is interesting for a number of reasons. Firstly, the osier rings are clearly present and are spaced along the length of the instrument. Secondly, note that one of the trombita s in the figure curves up at the end. This shape is very similar to the horn-pipe which was originally a hollow reed or pipe with an animal horn inserted at one end. This feature is also is reminiscent of the alphorn and Roman lituus. Although vanished in the west, shepherds and their use of the wooden trumpet is still in evidence in Eastern European nations (see below, Figure 2):

Figure 2: A Romanian S hepherd and his Trumpet, 1938 (Photograph: Kurt Hielscher)

The internet has many deleterious characteristics, but one positive one is that it has the ability to link formerly separated communities through the display of visual and audio examples of remote and

marginalized societies. The necessity of shepherds to play wooden trumpets to collect their flocks, send an alarm, and to communicate to other communities that are geographically separated still exists in many Eastern European communities. Photographs similar to the one displayed above in Figure 2 are everywhere. You just have to look for them. For example, a recent interview of a trombita maker and player (the episode Predchodcovia telefnov? Trombity: http://tv.sme.sk/v/23365/predchodcoviatelefonov-trombity.html, on the show Nehate ud mj). Here is an example of a photograph from that interview (Figure 3):

Figure 3: Trombita Players. Photograph: Martin Kleibl

sThe video of this interview shows how the trombita is made as well as showing examples of how the instrument is used melodically and in harmony with other trombita s.

Wooden Trumpets Linked to Metal Trumpets

There is a strong connection between wooden shepherds trumpets and metal natural trumpets of the 1418th centuries. This has not been explored in musical research to my knowledge, but the connections are rather clear. The osier rings shown in the above figures of wooden shepherds trumpets seem to match not only thousands of images in iconography from the Middle Ages, but also of extant instruments. For example, consider components shown on a 5 (1.61 m.) 14th century metal trumpet found at Billingsgate, London during an excavation in 1984. The Billingsgate trumpet is shown below in Figure 4:

Figure 4: Digitally Re-Touched Image of the Billingsgate Trumpet; 14 th Century. British Museum, London

In the figure above, I have circled two elements of the trumpet, termed bosses. For metal trumpets, some have believed that bosses were purely decorative and serve no apparent purpose. Others believe that they serve as a structural support when joining two sections of tubing.11 In any event, they are simply small cups soldered together and cut to fit on the bell section. It seems likely that they were added to make metal trumpet bosses resemble the wooden osiers used in wooden trumpet construction and perhaps add rigidity (which is also a construction feature of wooden trumpets). Could it be that at one time kings were not concerned as to what material trumpets were made? Could it be that the nobility simply found the best shepherd/trumpet players and recruited them to be at court? 12 This would seem a fertile area for research. Length constraints within the current paper prevent further discussion on this topic.

Diatonic Scale:
In order to understand the interplay between natural instruments and those tuned to the diatonic scale, it might be worthwhile to examine both scales. Let us begin with the diatonic scale. It is not known if the diatonic scale came about from the Pythagorean tuning method or if Pythagorean tuning was at one time simply considered the best of many diatonic tuning methods. However, I tend to believe that the diatonic scale came about by the method of tuning multi-stringed instruments to octaves and fifths generally known as Pythagorean tuning. This is how the method is roughly applied. Imagine plucking a string on a harp (say C4 ). Tune another string (to remove all beating between notes) to that plucked string a perfect fifth higher (G4 ). Now tune another string an octave higher to the first string (C5 ). Now tune another string an octave lower than the second string (G3 ). Continue this cyclical process (see Figure 47 and Figure 49, but centred around G, below) and the sequence (C4 , D4 , E4 , F4 , G4 , A4 , B4 , C5 , et al.) will be created. This scale might be familiar to most people today, but is actually extremely odd. We are not taught that this is so, but a little reflection might help to see how unusual the scale is. A perfect fifth is actually a ratio of 3:2 (two strings under the same tension with one string one-third shorter than the other). A major third is the ratio of two strings set at 5:4 (two strings under the same tension with one string one-fifth shorter than the other). The explanation can be a bit convoluted, but the end result is that you cant have both perfect fifths and major thirds all fitting within one octave because the ratios of 5:4 and 3:2 cannot fit within the same length. Its akin to finding the last decimal place of Pi. It is simply not possible. So with the Pythagorean tuning system of combining perfect fifths and octaves, the strings closest to being in the ratio of 5:4 (thirds) are brutally out of tune (22 cents sharp-about a quarter of an equally tempered half-step) when played in harmony with the root. Tempering this tuning, that is, making some thirds flat and some fifths a little out of tune (sharper), then has the effect of making triads (root, third, fifth) bearable. Most people are not aware that in the equal temperament system that we use today, all of the major triads are slightly out of tune; they are eight cents sharp. Its quite noticeable if you hear a chord played exactly in tune and then the same chord played in equal temperament.

11 12

Simon ODwyer, personal correspondence 01Mar2013. Im reminded of a friend who once told me that all professional sports teams come from the same general situation: some children in a neighborhood play a game. Theyre rivals to those on the next block. When the town plays the next town beside them, they put their rivalries aside and get the best players from all of the areas in the town for the towns team. They start paying them. In a like manner, trumpet players at court were possibly just the best shepherd-trumpet players in a chiefs domain who were asked to play at court. Over time, they may have simply formed themselves into brotherhoods (guilds) and passed along their knowledge to their children.

For me, whats important is that tuning to fifths and octaves produces the diatonic scale (C4 , D4 , E4 , F4 , G4 , A4 , B4 , C5 ) and that this diatonic scale has certain unusual features. The most important feature is that there are the same number of notes per octave. This might seem obvious to you, but it is not obvious to a shepherd or someone else from a different culture. The diatonic scale is exponential with respect to frequency (cycles per second, called Hertz and abbreviated as Hz. ). So if you have a string that vibrates at 100 cycles per second (Hz.), the next octave will vibrate at 200 Hz. (a span of 100 Hz.). There will then be six notes added between the octave notes. Now, here is where it becomes apparent that the scale is exponential: the next octave note is double the frequency of the last and is 400 Hz., not 300 Hz. You now need to fit six notes between 200 Hz. and 400 Hz. (a span of 200 Hz., not 100 Hz. as it was in the lower octave). To make matters more complicated, in Pythagorean tuning, the six whole and half steps between the octaves are not equally spaced as they are in equal temperament. So there are combinations of two steps that are almost equal (the half steps) and the remainders are approximately equal (the whole steps), but they are not exactly equal. So the distance between C4 -D4 and the distances between D4 -E4 , E4 -F4 , G4 A4 , and A4 -B4 are not the same. Each interval is different. In the chart below, I have placed the notes in order as integer values and plotted that against the frequency of the pitches beginning on C4 (C4 , D4 , E4 , F4 , G4 , A4 , etc.; see Figure 5, below):

Figure 5: The Diatonic Equally Tempered S cale, Notes Number vs. Frequency

Here the x-axis reflects the note value (1=C, 2=D, 3=E, etc.), and the corresponding frequency is placed on the y-axis. If I had placed the notes so that they would trace a smooth parabolic curve, you would then notice that the notes would not be equally spaced. The purpose of this diagram is to show that the notes are not equally spaced in relation to other notes and that the overall pattern of movement is parabolic. So originally, there were no whole steps or half steps. They were all slightly different. Some were closer to others, some farther away. Also notice that the line connecting the points is not a linear, straight line. We tend to think of the diatonic scale (piano keyboard) as equal and linear. It is not; it is going up very rapidly as you scan to the right of the figure. This is an increase in exponentiation of the frequency. So, if C4 = 100Hz, then C5 =200 Hz, C6 =400Hz., C7 =800 Hz., C8 =1600 Hz., etc.

Natural Scale (Harmonic Series):

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The scale produced by natural instruments (a wooden shepherds trumpet, an un-stopped willow flute) is very different than the diatonic scale. This melodic natural scale is often unconsciously obfuscated by musicologists who study the harmonic/overtone series for an understanding of how to create perfectly intune chords. The melodic possibilities are almost always ignored. When you vibrate your lips on the mouthpiece of a wooden trumpet, you create a standing wave. One whole wave can fit within the length of the tube (this is almost physically impossible to do for this lowpitched note). If you increase the airflow and couple this with increased lip vibrating speed, you can now fit two waves in the length of the tube. Then you can fit three, four, five, etc. waves within the length of the tube (these are called partials). This sequence is called the natural scale or the harmonic or overtone series. There are a different number of pitches per octave. Compared to the diatonic scale, there are more notes per octave in the upper range than the lower. Also, the relationship between the notes is uniform; that is, the distance from one note to the next is an increase in frequency equal to the principal frequency. So if the principal note, the first partial, has a frequency of 50 Hz., then the following pitches would be 50 (1st partial frequency) + 50 = 100Hz., then 100 + (1st partial frequency) = 150 Hz., then 150 + (1st partial frequency) = 200 Hz., 250 Hz., 300 Hz., 350 Hz., 400 Hz., etc.13 So, if available notes are plotted against those notes frequencies, the following res ults (see Figure 6, below):

Figure 6: Natural S cale: Notes Available vs. Frequency (Cycles per S econd)

The x-axis is the note value (here the partial number, but it is just the integer value of the notes available, in order) and the corresponding frequency value in Hertz placed on the y-axis. This musical scale is scalar and not exponential. Therefore, the diatonic scale and the natural scale are vastly different. Here is the natural scale written in diatonic music notation for a natural instrument approximately 8 (2.4 m.) long. This is familiar to diatonically-trained musicians as a D natural trumpet as used by Bach,

13

This is not exactly true. The shape of the lead-pipe and the shape of the bell pushes or pulls the lower o r upper end of the harmonic series a bit (see Benade, Schilke, et al.) Therefore, you might note that over time, the shape of trumpet bells between the 17th and 18th century became more exponential (more flared, less cone-shaped; see Smithers, Don 1973 The Music and History of the Baroque Trumpet before 1721 , Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press ) in order to more closely match equal temperament.

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Telleman, Torelli, Fasch, Zelenka, etc. in the Choral Key but with a C crook added.14 See Figure 7, below:

Figure 7: The Natural S cale as it is Often Presented

Some of the notes above have been made bold/solid. This is to indicate that they are a good deal different than the intonation of notes in the diatonic scale (equal temperament); some of these notes are the 7th , 11th , 13th , and 14th partials. The 7th partial is between A4 and B4 ,15 the 11th partial is halfway between F 5 and F 5 ,16 the 13th partial is between A 5 and A 5 ,17 and the 14th partial is between A 5 and B5 .18 Arrows point in the direction that the natural scale note sounds in comparison to equal temperament. If a transcriber listens to a tune played on a natural instrument playing the 7th partial and also hears the tune end in C, the transcriber does not consider the pitch of B 4 for this note since B4 is not in the key of C major. The choice is between A 4 and B4 . The 7th partial is closer to A4 and the transcriber will probably write A4 and not B4 . Also, the 11th partial is written as F5 ; it could also be written as F 5 since it is almost exactly halfway between the two notes. If the natural scale s representation on the diatonic staff is adjusted with these concerns in mind, the playable notes might be represented as seen in Figure 8, below:

Figure 8: The Natural S cale as Transcribers Have Used It

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The pitches of shepherds trumpets and their pitches at A=440 Hz. are: D=110cm (3.6ft/43.3in .), C=120cm B=134cm (4.4ft/52.83in.), A=142cm (4.67ft/55.9in), G=160cm (5.25ft/63.0in), F=180 cm

(3.9ft/47.23in.),

(5.9ft/70.9in.), E=202cm (6.6ft/79.5), D=214cm (7.0ft/84.3in.), C=242cm (7.9ft/95.3in.). B=272cm (8.9ft/107.1in.). 15 The 7th partial on a C natural trumpet is 69 cents sharper than an equally tempered A 4 and 31 cents flatter than an equally tempered B4 . There are 100 cents in an equally tempered half step interval. On a scale of 100 between A4 than B4 , the 7th partial would fall on 35; therefore, it is closer to A4 than B4 .
16 17 18

The 11th partial is 51 cents sharper than an equally tempered F 5 and 49 cents flatter than an F5 . The 13th partial is 59 cents flatter than an equally tempered A 5 . The 14th partial is 31 cents flatter than an equally tempered B5 .

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Juxtaposing the Two Scales

The music notation that we currently use was originally designed to list all notes of the heptatonic (seven notes per octave/diatonic) scale sequentially. So visually, the distance between half steps and whole steps appears to be the same when you look at the diatonic notational staff. When you try to put the natural scale on a page using a system that was designed for the diatonic scale, it looks awkward when in fact it is much more consistent; this is demonstrated in the graphs above. With an understanding of the two different systems, almost all of the confusion about the folk music scale can be eliminated. The gapped nature of the folk scale appears to be trumpets playing in a low-to-mid range. This apparently produces a tetratonic (four notes per octave) or pentatonic (five notes per octave) scale. The trained musician should be wary on this point: terms such as tetratonic, pentatonic, hexatonic, heptatonic, etc. refer to the number of notes per octave; natural instruments do not have octave equivalency (equal number of notes per octave). As a natural instrument ascends in pitch, more notes exist per octave compared to the diatonic scale. By using terms such as pentatonic, hexatonic, etc. to describe folk music, musicologists are immediately excluding the natural scale from consideration because natural instruments do not possess octave-equivalency. This is further compounded by researchers who describe pentatonic music as evolving due to some sort of circle of fifth relationship. This may not be incorrect, but they may possibly be doing the analysis (at least tacitly) since there is interest in pentatonic scales because folk music has been described as being pentatonic. While researchers conclusions about the formation of pentatonic scales may be correct, if the theory presented in this paper is correct, those investigations are meaningless. Those researchers are only trying to describe pentatonic music because they believe folk music to be pentatonic. If folk music is not pentatonic, their theories as to how a pentatonic scale is created has no value. In other words, if my theory is correct and folk music is based on the series of notes that a natural instrument can produce (a natural shepherds trumpet), and since the natural scale does not possess octave-equivalency, then all theories relating pentatonic scales to folk music are false. This is rather troubling. Those are hundreds of books, thousands of papers, and touch upon tens-of-thousands of current Ph.D. theses. Of the hundreds of folk tunes that I have analysed using this present theory, every one, without exception, has been found to be play-able on a natural instrument. Of the handful that apparently cannot be played on such an instrument, it was found that they were either modern compositions by modern composers attempting to imitate the sound of old folk songs, or deliberately composed on a diatonic instrument such as the harp or bagpipe. Every folk song (as opposed to instrumental piece) that I analysed fit the natural scale. The suitability of the natural scale to folk music is difficult to see at first. One of the tools that I have found to be useful is to re-create the process of transcription. That is, I transcribe the music being played by a natural instrument as though trained as an art musician. By doing this, the points of conflict between what overtone partial is being played and what error arises as the pitch is being transcribed can be clearly identified. What I found is the following. If a trained art musician hears a natural trumpet playing in the lower range (see Figure 8: G3 , C4 , E4 , G4 , A4 , C5 ), that musician will classify the tune as tetratonic (four notes per octave; that is, four notes ascending including and starting on C4 , and then the octave, C5 ). If the tune happens to rise to D5 , the diatonically trained musician will then assume that D4 is in existence (a note an

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octave lower)19 and declare that the tune is pentatonic (missing F4 and B4 , but having five notes per octave; that is, five notes starting at C4 and then the octave, C5 ); this implies that the pitches present are G3 , C4 , D4 , E4 , G4 , A4 , C5 , D5 , when in fact D4 does not appear in the tune at all. A similar erroneous assumption may occur again on a different note (F5 ) as a shepherds trumpet ascends in pitch. A tune that would be classified as pentatonic (missing all Fs and Bs), is declared to be hexatonic once F5 is found; this is because the trained art musician will assume that the lower octave F4 is in existence. To explain this last point in more detail, examine a tune which scholars have classified as pentatonic (having C4 , (D4 ), E4 , G4 , A4 , C5 , D5 , E5 ) until the tune ascends to an existing F5 /F 5 . Once the tune includes F5 /F 5 , scholars will assume that the lower octave F4 exists, and the tune is then declared to be hexatonic (missing B4 , but not F4 ), resulting in a scale of: C4 , (D4 ), E4 , (F4 ), G4 , A4 , C5 , D5 , E5 , F5 , etc. This classification occurs even though both D4 and F4 do not exist. Simply put, because diatonically trained musicians think in terms of seven notes per octave and octave equivalency, it has never occurred to them that they were dealing with a system that was not octavebased. If you look at old folk melodies, particularly tunes in the song tradition, you will see that many tunes have been classified as pentatonic or hexatonic when in fact the notes D4 and F4 simply do not occur while their octave-equivalents do. The condition of an existing F5 but not an F4 occurred to me when I reset the first piece of The Celtic Lyre .20 It happened repeatedly afterward. Since folk/pastoral music has been something of an anathema, trained art musicians have often defined the music by theorizing that it is a type of music that they know is in existence, but is a type of music with which they have actually never heard. For example, if a trained art musician notices that folk/pastoral music has a different intonation than the music with which they are accustomed, say equal temperament, they will suggest that folk music is tuned in the Pythagorean method, even though that trained art musician has never heard an instrument tuned by the Pythagorean method. 21 If a trained art musician hears music that has a different ending pattern or structure than what the musician is used to, the musician might declare the music to be based on the ecclesiastical modes, even though the musician has never heard music based on the ecclesiastical modes. Hence the problem with folk/pastoral music classification: very few trained art musicians in the last few hundred years have researched the properties of natural instruments, and even if they have read of the natural scale and perhaps done theoretical work with it, they have never actual heard it. Therefore, they speculate that folk music is based on the ecclesiastic modes when in fact the tunes are all ending on specific pitches which correlate to the natural scale. Those pitches may very well be of the natural scale, not exclusively the diatonic scale. I believe that this confusion occurred because of the rise of cities/civilization and the diminution of pastoral society. If you were to imagine a pictogram of the presence of the two scales and their importance over the centuries, you might see something as displayed in Figure 9, below:

19

As mentioned above, Bernstein did this during a Harvard University lecture series termed The Unanswered Question which he presented in 1973. 20 Whyte, Henry 1885 The Celtic Lyre , Ed. Truman Matheson & Musical Ed. Aindrias Hirt, 2012 ed., St. Andrews, Canada: Sol Cultural Enterprises. 21 Dauney and Dun Ancient Scotish Melodies: From a Manuscript of the Reign of King James Vi: With an Introductory Enquiry Illustrative of the History of the Music of Scotland .

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Figure 9: Relative Importance of the Diatonic S cale and the Natural S cale

Most folk music research has been done to the far right of the time-line displayed above, when the natural scale was scarce and of little concern to trained art musicians. In large cities, natural trumpets began to be superseded by slide, keyed, and valved trumpets by the late 18th century. This was hastened by the decline of the courts and the subsequent dearth of paid positions for natural trumpet players and supporters of their guild by the nobility. Most folk music research had not begun in earnest by this time. Therefore, most folk researchers and folk music enthusiasts had probably never heard natural trumpets and their intonation.

Extrapolation of Increased Shepherd Trumpet Prevalence in the Past

If you observe the above figure (Figure 9), you might see at least three possible time-points of interest. To the far left of the above figure is my speculation that the natural scale was more prevalent quite a while ago with only some sporadic traces of the diatonic scale. The middle area of the above figure where the two lines intersect indicates a time when both scales were on an equal footing. The area to the far right is the present day where the diatonic scale is the only scale heard for the most part in the mass media in Europe and North America. The first point of interest is in the area to the far right, our present day. Music that we hear played on the radio is mainly diatonic with trace elements of the natural scale. Those vestiges include triadic harmony and equal temperament. These elements came about due to the ability of natural instruments to play major thirds in tune while Pythagorean-tuned instruments could not. Fortunately, unlike the distant past, we have records of this middle period that have survived. Therefore, if we bring our speculation of the distant past into our analysis of this middle area, we should be able to see a greater prevalence of natural instruments that has been largely overlooked. As an example of this, consider the following: I found a web site that stated that researchers had re-created the forgotten instrument called the lituus. They had done this work because J. S. Bach had written a cantata O Jesu Christ, mein's Lebens Licht, BWV 118, and wrote two parts for two litui in B. The pitches matched the natural scale , but the length of the instrument needed to be about 9 long to produce the pitches as written. The researchers used a computer application to model how this instrument was possibly constructed. They basically made a trembita . The modellers were initially contacted by Mike Diprose of Scola Cantorum, Basil, who was simply looking to make a trembita -like instrument using a new software

15

application to prevent simple mistakes from occurring which could waste an inordinate amount of time to correct. It never occurred to anyone that the instrument was probably a German alphorn and that the Swiss equivalent of this instrument could be readily purchased. A lituus is an instrument with a confused past. Most scholarship indicates that it was originally a religious instrument that evolved into a signalling instrument used by the Roman cavalry. There are two main shapes. One is a hollow tube of about the same diameter for the length of the instrument. It curls back on itself and is in the shape of the letter <J>. It is three feet long. The other shape appears to be a development of a horn-pipe (a pipe with an animal horn inserted at one end with the other end having a cupped mouthpiece). In this case, the bell expands rather quickly and points upward. Here is an example of the latter (Figure 10):

Figure 10: A Lituus

It is about 1 m. long. Neither one of these two instruments is the required 9 needed to produce the overtone series that Bach required. Yet, the bell in the figure above curls upwards like an alphorn and is a natural trumpet (no tone-hole/finger-hole openings). Bach knew how to utilize instruments in order to produce a desired emotional response in a congregation. For example, when he orchestrated his cantatas for St. Michaels day (a war betwe en St. Michael and the serpent/devil), he used trumpets, knowing that the men in the congregation who had fought in combat would remember the sound of the trumpet from the battlefield and empathize with St. Michaels and his predicament. In the case with BWV 118, Bach probably had read some poetry and decided to set it to music. There were fourteen verses in the original poem, but he could only include a few of them in the cantata he was creating. The poetry engendered a pastoral feeling and seemed much like the 23rd psalm. The 14th verse is, How joyful then I shall be/I shall sing with the angels/and with your chosen flock/forever behold your face clearly. Unfortunately, Bach didnt have room for this verse in the cantata, but perhaps wanted to somehow engender the feeling of the pasture into the minds of the congregation. He probably chose an instrument of the shepherd and orchestrated BWV 118 for two German alphorns. This would create a sympathetic response in the congregation, as people there had probably heard alphorns being played before (hence my point, that pastoral society was becoming more marginal, but still present in Germany at the time). 22 Pastoral instruments were forbidden in the church, so Bach probably gave the instrument a new name in order to have his own way. This was not the first time he would have done this. There were no trumpeters where he was located in Leipzig. Only members of
22

I am reminded of a time when I was walking through Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany and in the center of town heard the lowing of cattle from within a house. It was actually a stone barn on the road attached to a house. The family would walk the cows through town every early morning to the town pasturage and then back again at night.

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the Kammerdshaft (Brotherhood/Trumpeters Guild) were allowed to play the trumpet, and they could only ply their trade at a court. So Bach used (among others) Gottfried Reiche who was a Stadtpfeifer (city piper) and not a member of the Kammeradshaft. Reiche played on a coiled trumpet that didnt look like a trumpet, but nonetheless sounded the same. It was called a Jgertrompete (hunting trumpet). So Bach could compose for natural D trumpets because the instrument he was composing for was not a trumpet, but a hunting trumpet. By giving the trumpet a different name, he could get around the prohibition. So, it seems likely that Bach probably wrote for a 3 m. long alphorn , but if challenge as to why he brought a shepherds trumpet into the church could explain that it wasnt a shepherds trumpet at all, but the revered, sophisticated, honoured instrument of the Roman Empire; it was a lituus.

The Natural Scale in Folk Music of the Past

A point in support of my theory is that the transcription process followed by folk music transcribers can be reversed so as to put the music back into notation that reflects the perhaps original notes once played on a wooden shepherds trumpet. I did this in a recent version of The Celtic Lyre published by Sol Cultural Enterprises (2012). 23 I believe that most transcribers attempt to accurately write folk music as they hear it. Sometimes, however, many try to improve or disguise the music by embellishing it with diatonic conventions; this is often done to make the music appear to have mainland conventions due to cultural bias levied against the originators of the songs. Such alteration gives a patina of respectability often coveted by maligned cultures. This last point should not be underestimated. Racial and cultural bigotry were once quite virulent.24 I have noticed this myself when travelling, even at sound archives at universities in Scotland. Having said that, I have noticed that, in general, the pitches of the stressed notes (the strong beats) have almost always been correctly delineated by transcribers in musical transcriptions. Contrarily, the pitches of unstressed syllables placed on unstressed beats are generally placed halfway between the pitches of the two stressed beats flanking them whether they are performed that way or not. For example, if the performer is playing/singing a sequence of syllables where the pattern is stressedunstressed-stressed, and the stressed syllables are located on an E4 and a G4 , the transcriber will often indicate that the linking unstressed syllable is an F4 between the two, regardless of its actual pitch. However, if the tune is ascending in pitch between two stressed beats/syllables and a middle note also falls on a stressed beat, the transcriber will annotate the pitch correctly; the transcriber will write it as performed as either an E4 or a G4 but not as an F4 . The transcriber will often have a deep familiarity with the diatonic scale and see it even if the performer is unaware of its existence. Another point in support of my theory that folk music is based on the natural scale can be seen by utilizing the work of trained art musicians who attempted to classify folk music by using the ecclesiastical modes. As mentioned above, it should first be noted that diatonically trained musicians perhaps should not have applied the ecclesiastical modes to folk music in the first place if they believed them to be tetratonic, pentatonic, or hexatonic. The ecclesiastical modes only apply to heptatonic (seven notes per octave)/diatonic music. This is because the ecclesiastical modes require two half steps per octave. If there
23 24

Whyte The Celtic Lyre . For example, Boswell, J. 1896 Boswell's Life of Johnson: Together with Boswell's Journal of a Tour of the Hebrides and Johnson's Diary of a Journey into North Wales , ed. Boswells Life of Johnson vol. III. Westminster: Archibald Constable & Co. Birrell, 1896. The Clarendon Press, displays bigotry that is quite shocking to modern sensibilities. This should not be discounted, but understood as normal for the times. If t his prejudice is embraced, then the force which impelled people to defend their "national" music might be better understood.

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are not two half steps per octave, the ecclesiastical modes become indistinct. It is therefore questionable using the ecclesiastical modes when describing any tune that does not possess seven notes per octave. Folk music did not seem to follow the major/minor tonality system of art music. Tunes would end on notes that might be seen as being other than the tonic or root. This may be why the ecclesiastical modes were used to describe folk music;25 the shepherds trumpet also explains the percentages with which each individual ecclesiastical mode is alleged to have occurred. If a tune played on a shepherds trumpet ends on the 3rd , 4th , 5th , etc. partial, transcribers would suggest that the tune would be, in order: G major (3 rd partial; I have never seen this occur and will ignore this possibility), C major (4th partial), E minor (5th partial, as the relative minor to G major with the 11th partial heard as F 5 ), G major or G mixolydian (6th partial), A minor (7th partial, as the relative minor to C major), C major (8th partial), D dorian (9th partial), E phrygian (10th partial), etc., from easiest to play to more difficult to play (which is a reflection of airstream flow and how we speak as well). In general, this matches what musicologists have said of folk tunes of the past. For example, concerning Celtic melodies, Bradley suggested that 60% were ionian (major), 20% were mixolydian, 12% were aeolian (natural minor), and 8% were dorian. 26 Breathnach suggested 60% were ionian, 15% were mixolydian, 10% were dorian, and aeolian tunes were the least numerous.27 I have found similar results. While I was taking a break from the University of Otago and living in a Gaelic-speaking region of North America, I was approached by a publisher and asked to re-set The Celtic Lyre, a set of four music books from about 1885; he wanted me to bring them up to modern standards. I decided to place the melodies so that the natural scale was apparent if applicable. Of the sixty-eight tunes, sixty-six could be easily played on a shepherds trumpet (thats 97%); the other tunes I thought simply sat too high in pitch (although I found later that might not be a concern; see the next section, An Example of Transcribed Lur Music, below). The tune s set rather high also may have been composed for/on the bagpipes, which, since it is diatonic, would place the tune rather high for a shepherds trumpet. I found the tunes ended on the following notes with these percentages: C: 54%, G: 21%, D: 13%, A: 12% . This is roughly in-line with the ecclesiastical modal attribution percentage that Bradley and Breathnach had given to Celtic folk songs. If this is written as the percentages of The Celtic Lyre /Bradley/Breathnach, we have: ionian (54%/60%/60%), mixolydian (21% 28 /20%/15%), aeolian (12%/12%/least numerous), and dorian (13%/8%/10%). Thats quite a coincidence considering that 97% of the tunes of The Celtic Lyre could easily be played on a shepherds trumpet. This implies that the tunes analysed by Bradley and Breathnach could also be played by shepherds trumpets. If we match the natural scale to the ecclesiastical modes, we get in order of theoretical likelihood:29 ionian (C4 , C5 , also G4 ), aeolian (E4 , A4 ), mixolydian (G4 ), dorian (D5 ).30 This would suggest why [T]he modes
25

The ecclesiastical modes were brought into Europe from Greece albeit in a distorted form. When a tune ended on a particular note of the diatonic scale, it was thought to impart a particular sentiment to the listener; the Church found that this purported trait made it very useful in orchestrating the emotions of the congregation. The original, permissible ecclesiastical modes were dorian (ended on D), phrygian (ended on E), lydian (ended on F), and mixolydian (ended on G). Ionian (ended on C, the major mode) and aeolian (ended on A, the natural minor) were originally proscribed; the ionian (major) mode acquired the epithet of the modus lascivus (lustful mode). 26 Bradley, Seirse and Breathnach, Breandn, "Ireland," in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians , ed. Stanley. Ed. Sadie (London: MacMillan Publishers, 1980), 317. 27 Breathnach, Breandn 1996 Folk Music and Dances of Ireland , Cork: Ossian Publications, Ltd., 10. 28 I have given the notes ending in G to be that of the mixolydian mode, it could also be G-ionian. 29 It is generally more likely for tunes to begin and end on lower pitches.

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on A and C were excluded from the ecclesiastical list, their effect judged as being lascivious and worldly and unsuitable for religious use since their influence would be pernicious. 31 So if you assume that my theory is correct, everything makes sense. Pastoral melodies were played on shepherds trumpets that trained musicians would describe as being the equivalent to the ionian and aeloian (and some mixolydian and some dorian) modes. The church banned those modes and pastoral instruments from church because they were linked to coarse, immoral behaviour. Over time, the forbidden modes became increasingly acceptable until they overwhelmed the ecclesiastical modes. 32 By that time, the culture and the instruments that created that fulcrum of change had all but disappeared. I should also point out that shepherds trumpets were spread all over Europe; folk music from various cultures, including those of the English, Welsh, Irish, Scottish, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and others, exhibit the same pitch-traits and have been described in the same way and with the same endingnote percentages as I found in The Celtic Lyre . The various languages represented by the names of shepherds trumpets listed above testify to their widespread use throughout Europe. So, consider Figure 8, above. If played on a natural instrument, tunes must end on one of the notes in that figure. Generally, tunes tend to end in the lower range of an instrument at the end of the final phrase. I believe that this is due to the natural intonation patterns of people when they are speaking. 33 Most people, most often, begin a sentence at a low pitch, ascend through the middle of the exhalation and then lower the pitch toward the end. This is natural and makes physiological/physics sense. A persons airstream speed increases to the middle of the exhalation and then decreases to the end (the diaphragm is much like the range of skeletal muscle power; when performing an arm curl with weights, the onset is weak and gets stronger toward the centre of the motion and then gets weaker at the end of the arm movement). Bernoullis equation/theory explains this rather well with the range of motion of the diaphragm. Frequency is a function of air speed (other variables held constant). So, the likelihood of ending a tune on a particular pitch decreases as the pitch increases (more tunes end on low pitches than high pitches). Referring to Figure 8, from high probability to low probability, a tune played on the natural scale should
30

This explains why the early Christian Church eschewed both the ionian (major) and aeolian (mino r) modes. They wouldnt want the pastoral music being played during a church service. 31 Vincent, J. 1951 The Diatonic Modes in Modern Music University of California Press 225. 32 Instruments that played the natural scale also had a strong effect on the history of art music concerning harmonies and tunings. With Pythagorean tuning that was used for the diatonic scale and ecclesiastical modes , major thirds were 22 cents sharp. Major thirds on instruments that produce the natural scale are exactly in -tune, as are fifths. Church musicians were forbidden to play triads since they were terribly out-of-tune, but they knew triads could be played in-tune since they heard shepherds trumpets that played thirds and triads in-tune. So they tried to temper the diatonic scale to make thirds as in-tune as on shepherds trumpets (called just intonation). In essence, we have major and minor modes and harmonic progressions of triads because of natural instruments that existed in Medieval (and Antiquity) Europe, not because of what was imported from Greece. I have found it helpful to think in terms of two warring camps in order to organize things in my mind. In one camp is the music of the Christian Church; the Church was trying to convert the uncouth pagans. The Church brought in new music not only to direct the emotions of the congregations, but also to be different from what currently existed; they associated this music to dancing and drunkenness (partying). So the Church introduced the diatonic scale, the diatonic modes (that is supposed to direct the congregations emotions, but they actually altered the modes by one step when they brought them in from Greece, which effectively refuted the theory that listening to the modes resulted in a particular emotion), the diatonic scale, octave equivalency, in-tune fifths, but out-of-tune thirds. In the other camp, the heathen had the natural scale, in-tune thirds and fifths, but only a gamut of notes. They fought and plundered from each other. 33 Here is a more detail approach: Shanahan, Daniel and Huron, David 2011 Interval Size and Phrase Position: A Comparison between German and Chinese Folksongs, Empirical Musicology Review Vol. 6, No. 4, 187-97: 187.

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have a greater probability of ending on a low pitch such as C4 (the 4th partial; I have never seen a tune end on the 3rd partial, G3 which generally takes a good amount of air and effort). Diatonically trained musicians would label this ionian/major. Ascending the natural scale, if the tune ended on E4 (5th partial), it would be named phrygian/aeolian (relative minor of G-this occurs when the 11th partial is thought to be F 5 and there is a good deal of action around G4 , which often happens). If the tune ended on G4 (6th partial), it would be considered mixolydian or, again, with an F 5 , ionian. This last example should not be undervalued, as there seems to be a great deal of focus on tunes in G major in Gaelic nations, particularly Ireland.34 The leading tone of tunes thought to end on G5 is often called F-flat and might be associated with the 11th partial which is halfway between F5 and F 5 . The Irish call the leading note in this condition F-flat (F) not because it is lower than F5 , but because it is a flat F5 in what most people are told is G major. If the tune ends on A4 (7th partial), diatonically trained musicians would label this aeolian (relative minor of C major). If the tune ends on C5 (8th partial), diatonically trained musicians would label this ionian/major. If the tune ends on D5 (9th partial), they would label this dorian. If the tune ends on E5 (10th partial), they would label this phrygian, etc. Therefore, if you summed all of this, and if natural instruments were the creators of folk music tunes, you would expect diatonically trained musicians to label folk music tunes as, in order of prevalence: ionian, aeolian, mixolydian, dorian, and phrygian (perhaps a few lydian). Comparing the application of the ecclesiastical mode names to the natural scale and the application of the ecclesiastical modes to folk music yields a staggering coincidence. Moreover, the completely theoretical postulate that folk tunes would be named according to the pitches of the natural scale according to the order of low pitches to high pitches (ionian, aeolian, mixolydian, dorian, and phrygian) almost matched the analysis of actual tunes (ionian, mixolydian, aeolian, and dorian). Note the low incidence of lydian and locrian modes in folk music as termed by past researchers. Although locrian is inherently unstable, the low incidence of the lydian mode does not make sense if the ecclesiastical modes (using the diatonic scale) define folk music. The hierarchy of what would be the most dominant ending pitch is significant. The early Christian Church banned the playing of the ionian (major) and aeolian (Minor) modes for hundreds of years; only the dorian, Phrygian, lydian, and mixolydian modes were allowed (and then later the plagal variations). As Cazden states of the policy of using the ecclesiastical modes to describe folk music:
[It] shamefacedly called for the invention of two hitherto unused or obscure Greek mode names, Ionian and Aeolian, in order to account for the obvious prominence of major and minor in music now gove rned by harmonic tonality, so as to bring these scale forms also under the protective color of seemingly ancient authority. The earlier church rules had rigorously excluded both the use of such constructions, save surreptitiously under the illuminating excuse "musica ficta", or their recognition as theoretical possibilities, for all their seeming logical inevitability in a complete scheme. Let the lesson not be lost on theorists tempted to devise Bronson-type, Hauer-type, Hindemith-type, Kayser-type or Schenker-type diagrams[.]35

The ionian mode was dubbed modus lascivus (lustful mode) and was played by the folk. As even Bronson says, [T]he Ionian scale has been taken as the starting-point because it has been from time immemorial

34 35

See Bunting and a host of other sources. Bunting is probably the best reference. Cazden A Simplified Mode Classification for Traditional Anglo -American Song Tunes 51-52.

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designated as the mode of popular song [...] and because, in bulk, it is by far the predominating mode in the extant folksong record-at least in British-American tradition. 36 That would make sense if folk music was played on natural instruments which displayed the tonic tendency as described above . You wouldnt want the rough nature of shepherds and merry music-making intruding on the serious business of religion. More to the point, church musicians would want to have a special musical language all their own that was apart from that played by the common people. Just as the professional poets of Ireland, the filidh , had special complicated poetic structures and only composed in those forms, so too, Christian Church musicians had their own special musical formulae. To compose outside such forms would be professional suicide. Therefore, only the structures of ecclesiastical music were expounded in writing. The just, righteous, correct music of educated people found its way onto parchment. Over time, [T]he archaic song of the common people has ever been drawn by instinctive tropism towards the musical forms and formulas taught over the centuries by a benevolent Church. 37 In the end, the modi lascivi were ignored or forbidden. Therefore, we have no obvious written record of it. Still, The devil has all of the best tunes and folk tunes weeded their way into Church music regardless. If indeed wooden shepherds trumpets were the foundation of folk music, then a good deal of speculation concerning Middle Age chordophone (lyres, harps, etc.) tuning might be re-examined. If you have no reference to the diatonic scale in your personal life and experience as a common shepherd, tuning to a circle of fifth/octaves as in a cloister would be asynchronous. If you were accustomed to the intonation of the natural scale, it would be logical to have tune-able instruments match that of the un-tuneable natural instruments if the two groups were playing together. Eivind Groven noted this. He had grown up surrounded by the sound of folk instruments in his native Norway. When he first heard the intonation of an orchestra, he was astounded. He then attempted to show that the intonation of Norwegian folk music was bound or tied to the intonation of the willow flute (seljeflyte -sallow/willow flute); a willow flute is a natural instrument made from the bark of a willow branch which is removed in one piece, making a tube that plays two superimposed natural scales (one scale with the tube open; one scale with the tube stopped at the end with a finger). He believed that the hardingfele (hardanger fiddle) and other tune-able folk instruments were tuned to the willow flute. If you cant change the tuning of one instrument, the chances are that tune-able instruments will match the un-tune-able instruments intonation. Here are the pitches of the willow flute (Figure 11). Note that there are two scales superimposed, one series as in Figure 8, above, with no finger inserted, the other with a finger inserted, closing the end of the tube.

Figure 11: Approximate Location of the Willow Flute's Pitches

If Western European folk music is built on the natural scale, it answers a great many other questions concerning chordophone tuning. For example, what was the intonation/tuning of the crotte (crowd, crwth , cruit, rotte, chorus, etc.) in the Early Middle (Dark) Ages? The instrument had approximately six strings. One might speculate that it probably matched the pitches available on a shepherds trumpet (G3 , C4 , E4 , G4 , A4 , C5 , D5 , etc.). Another question might be, why did the eleven-stringed harp suddenly become a thirty-stringed harp, especially in the British Isles? The early harp had roughly eleven strings. This would
36 37

Bronson Folksong and the Modes 43. Cazden A Simplified Mode Classification for Traditional Anglo -American Song Tunes 45.

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make sense if a harp was tuned to match a natural instrument, as typically, an average trumpeter can play from the 3rd to the 12th /14th partial.38 The harp could be tuned to match the pitches that the shepherds trumpet could produce. There was then a development around the twelfth century or earlier in Ireland where the number of strings shot up to about thirty strings. This would imply that the technological advantage provided by the Pythagorean tuning system entering Europe through the urging of the Christian Church39 would then allow more strings to be added to the harp. In other words, the early instrument was probably limited to matching the natural scale. When a new technology appeared that allowed for more strings to be added, more strings were added. One shortcoming of the theory presented in this paper is that the eleventh partial is problematic. Folk tunes often leave this pitch (F5 ) out. This gives the music a glamour that it is octave-equivalent and pentatonic (missing F4 , B4 , F5 ). There are two possible solutions for explaining this anomaly. The first is that since pipes (pitched in G at the time and tuned using the just intonation method), the harp (tuned to a type of Pythagorean method called the Natural Key or High Bass which centred around G), and natural instruments (pitched probably in C with the 12th partial falling on G5 with the leading tone being the 11th partial) all had different frequencies for F5 , it was probably avoided. 40 The second possible solution is that the 11th partial when performed melodically is disagreeable when there is harmony around it. This tendency has been noted by scholars observing throat singers who sing in harmony (with themselves) who then avoid the eleventh partial when singing the melody. This might have a connection to Scottish Gaelic music which has been described as sitting higher on the notational staff, with a penchant for omitting B4 and F5 while Irish Gaelic music has been said to sit lower with missing F4 and B4 . The implication then is that Scottish Gaelic music possesses perhaps originally more higher, triadic harmony (not referring to a good deal of Scottish Gaelic choral music produced at the turn of the last century) than Irish Gaelic music. This triadic harmony does not imply modern harmonic progressions. I noticed this to be true when I listen to older Irish Gaelic music. Irish Gaelic musicians experiment with the music by adding and subtracting voices, not by having any chordal, progression-based harmony; however, there is low-pitched droning on the pipes. This implies that Scottish Gaelic music might have had more affinity for higher pitched shifting triads not necessarily based on non-shifting drone harmony.

An Example of Transcribed Lur Music

In order to see the natural scale in folk/pastoral music, it might be interesting to observe the way that trained musicians have transcribed instruments playing the natural scale. Here is an example of a tune played on a lur from the article Norway in the Groves Dictionary of Music and Musicians. In the article, the example is presented after stating, [...] the longest [lur] (150 to 200 cm) were generally
38

Typically, early trumpeters were known to play to the 13th partial, but most competent trumpeters played to the 16 partial. Some very good ones could play to the 24th partial (Brian Shaw and Civiletti can play the Franz Xaver Richter's Concerto 5 voc. per clarino principale and have recorded it and similar works which rise to that extreme height. 39 Variations of the diatonic scale were said to facilitate a sympathetic emotional response in the congregation. An ecclesiastical mode could be selected to affect the appropriate congregational emotional response. Unfortunately, when transferring the modes from Greece to Rome, the modes became disjoined by one st ep, yet the wrong response in the congregation was not observed. In other words, creating an emotion by using the ecclesiastical modes did not work. 40 An example of this can be seen in Cape Breton fiddle music where the fiddle is accompanied by the piano. The piano is equally tempered while the fiddle uses a different intonation system. When there would be a conflict of tuning with the melodic fiddle, the piano avoids the conflict by not playing the note.
th

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played in a very high register, their melodies resembling those played on the large alphorns in other parts of Europe. 41 The article uses information previously published by the co-author Reidar Sevg from Det gjallar og det laet (Oslo, 1973). Below is Sevgs transcription of a tune as played on a lur42 (see Figure 12). The hash mark before the B5 , indicates that the sounded pitch is approximately a tone below the annotated note.

Figure 12: A Reproduction of Det gjallar og det laet

Because of the way it is presented, it looks as though the transcriber placed the notes on the staff as if sounded on a piano with A4 =440 Hz. The B5 with the preceding hash mark would tend to suggest that that pitch is the 11th partial. So the first step is to try to transpose the music down as low as possible while keeping the notes within those delineated in Figure 8. Since the lower end of the Natural Sale becomes increasingly gapped compared to the diatonic scale, it becomes more difficult to fit the natural scale on the musical staff at lower pitches. Therefore, since lower pitches are easier to play, the basic procedure is to lower the melody until just before the trumpeter cannot play the notes. In the case with the above figure, that transposition is down a perfect fourth. If the tune is transposed down a perfect fourth, the following results (see Figure 13, below):

41

Huldt-Nystrm, Hampus and Sevg, Reidar, "Norway," in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians , ed. Stanley. Ed. Sadie (London: MacMillan Press Limited, 1980), 325. 42 Ibid., 324.

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Figure 13: Det gjallar og det laet Transposed to S ee the Natural S cale

This matches the natural scale as shown above in Figure 7. As is the custom, when transposing a melody to fit into the pattern of the natural scale for the trumpeter to read (as in Figure 7 and Figure 8), the pitch of the instrument is placed in the upper left hand corner of the music; here, that is F Trumpet. So the lur in this example probably was about 2 metres long. Since this is a transcription of an instrument that actually plays the natural scale, I have done nothing but annotate the music for an instrument as if it is pitched in F; that is, the tune was probably played by an F trumpet. I have not done anything to the music but am simply going through the steps necessary to place the music as it normally appears for a natural trumpeter to read and play. The F 5 and original hash mark can be interpreted as the half-flat symbol F 5 . If this is done, the music appears as follows (Figure 14, below):

Figure 14: Det gjallar og det laet 11th Partial Adjustment

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Note the presence of B4 in the above figure. The tune ends on C5 . B4 is not in the key of C major. The note is between A4 and B4 (closer to B4 ) but B is not in the key of C major and is not an option for the typical transcriber. The 7th partial is between A4 and B4 . It is closer to A4 . The typical transcriber would write an A4 . The above authors are trying to be precise in what they hear and not force the music to match art music strictures. This was not done in the past but is becoming more commonplace. In the case of the 11th partial, F 5 is not in the key of C major. The note is between F5 and F 5 , but F 5 is not in the key of C major and is not an option for the typical transcriber. The typical transcriber would write an F5 . Therefore, one can expect the overwhelming majority of trained musicians to transcribe Figure 14 when

listening to the music as is shown below (Figure 15):

Figure 15: Det gjallar og det laet 7th and 11th Partial Adjustment

A trained musician would also declare that the above tune is hexatonic since it lacks B4 . Since there is no doubt that the instrument that played this tune was a natural instrument and natural instruments do not possess octave-equivalency and cannot play the diatonic scale, labelling this tune as hexatonic would be an error. A note should be made of the tessitura of the tune; the tune ascends to concert D6 . Since ability to play high pitches is generally linked to skill, this would put the lur performers ability on a par with J.S. Bachs best trumpeters, Reiche and Ruhe (although Bach occasionally wrote higher pitches, most works mainly ascended to C6 for a D trumpet, albeit with A 4 =415 Hz.; the above example was probably transcribed with A4 =440 Hz. which is higher/more difficult than A 4 =415 Hz.). The pitch height is also equal to Girolamo Fantini (1600-1675) who was the leading trumpeter at the court of Ferdinando II, Grand Duke of Tuscany. It also surpasses the ability of Cesare Bendinelli (1542-1617) foremost trumpet player at the Viennese court (1567-1580) and the court of Munich (1580 until his death). That is, a

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Norwegian shepherd in the above example is showing equal or more skill than some of the leading trumpeters throughout history. The above analysis can be applied to folk/pastoral tunes in order to see the natural scale as the possible genesis of the tunes. This is shown below.

Examples of Converting Folk Songs/Tunes to the Natural Scale:

Here are a few examples of how to remove diatonic elements from a transcribed folk tune so as to see its natural scalar base, if it has one. The process is not difficult to perform, but it is not intuitive. I had always suspected that the natural scale was the foundation of the natural scale, but could not understand how to take the notes that were present in a transcribed tune and fit it exactly to the natural scale. As mentioned above, I was asked to re-set The Celtic Lyre by the publisher of Sol Cultural Enterprises; this occurred in the summer of 2011. I thought that it would be a simple and quick project. I took a total of sixty-eight songs under four separate editions of The Celtic Lyre (ed. Henry Whyte) and began to re-set the songs. Unfortunately, after about two months I realized that the rhythms were not correct; they had been written to match the English translations (the original words were in Scottish Gaelic). Since the edition was solely in Scottish Gaelic, I then had to research the songs and find the correct rhythms. Later, three-quarters of the way through the work, I saw the natural scale in the music and had to re-set the entire book, again. What follows is the process that I developed to find the lowest starting pitch that a natural instrument can start in order to play the entire tune. The best way to do this is through using some examples of this conversion from The Celtic Lyre (2012) (note, since this is a working paper and is not published, I have begun to include tunes from outside The Celtic Lyre ). I would like to strongly stress that the analysis below happens to be focused on Gaelic song tunes. This same type of analysis can be done on English, French, German, Italian, etc. folk songs with the same result. The prevalence of shepherds trumpets was consistent and dense throughout Eastern and Western Europe in the Middle Ages and earlier. Example 1: Mo nighean donn bhidheach. This tune was chosen because the 11th partial is prominent. The first step is to transcribe the tune directly into a computer application such as Finale or Sibelius. You can do this by hand, but if you need to transpose a tune three or four times, it can be laborious; a computer application is much faster. For a computer application, I used Sibelius because solfa notation was required for the new edition of The Celtic Lyre and Sibelius had an automatic plug-in solfa generator. Whether you choose to use Sibelius, Finale, LilyPond or another application, the first step in the process is to locate the music that you want to convert to the natural scale; normally, this music has been identified as being pentatonic or hexatonic. In the example below example, I used selection #27 from The Celtic Lyre entitled Mo nighean donn bhidheach. This is a rather well known song. This version is slightly different from that as sung in Nova Scotia, Canada, but if this version (below) were performed, Nova Scotians would recognize it. The music from the original The Celtic Lyre looks something like that shown below (Figure 16).

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Figure 16: Mo nighean donn bhidheach from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885

The first step is to take the tune, above, and put it into the Sibelius or Finale software computer application (ignore this step if doing this process by hand). The result can be seen below (Figure 17):

Figure 17: Mo nighean donn bhidheach Placed into a Computer Application

The next step is to remove the accidentals by transposing the key into C major (actually, the key is not important; you just have to remove the accidentals while keeping the tunes melody unchanged -this is important if the tune is displayed as heptatonic mixolydian, dorian, phrygian, lydian, etc.-the ending pitch might be G, D, etc. with no accidentals; this is fine). Changing the key to C major takes approximately 30 seconds and is the fastest way of removing the accidentals from the key signature. This step is important because it removes a great deal of initial confusion. Figure 8 displays a certain series of notes. If you cannot place the tune into a form that matches Figure 8, it will be difficult to see the natural scale, if it exists. It is also important to move accidentals in the corpus of the tune to the key signature before transposing. Often transcribers will leave accidentals on the staff so that the tune will have a final note which is in synchronous with the key signature. Transcribers will also add accidentals to the key signature even though those notes do not appear in the tune; for example, transcribers may add F to the key signature although F does not appear in the tune. They do this often when the tune ends on G; this forces the tune to appear to be ionian/major instead of mixolydian. This was a common practice.

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As mentioned above, most transcribers of folk tunes believe that the tunes are pentatonic or hexatonic, but might be unaware that pentatonic tunes lack half-steps.43 Without half-steps being present, the system of keys breaks down. In this case, the result is that you can take a pentatonic tune (not just any pentatonic tune, but one missing half-steps) and transpose the tune up (or down) a perfect fourth or a perfect fifth. This moves the tune on the notational staff, but does not add accidentals to the tune nor does it change the melody. So there are a number of transpositions to try, in order, to see the natural scale (harmonic series) if it exists: 1. Move the tune down/up by an octave. 2. Move the tune up by a perfect fourth. If this is the proper placement, the stressed beats of the tune will match the natural scale. The examples presented below do not happen to require this transposition. 3. Move the tune up by a perfect fifth. If this is the proper placement, the stressed beats of the tune will match the natural scale. 4. Move the tune up a major third or sixth. This rarely is needed, but is a part of the process to see if the tune is based on the natural scale. 5. Once the natural scale is seen, it is often appropriate to lower the tune by an octave. This is because, although it is possible to play the tune on a natural instrument, if it can be played in the lower octave, it shows a more organic base (it is physically easier for a trumpeter to play lower pitches). That is, if the tune can be played at the lower range of the instrument, it shows that the tune may be very old and date from the time when pastoral instruments were more prevalent. 6. If the tune appears to be hexatonic, convert the piece to C major and then attempt to place the missing note at B4 . More often than not, if you perform this transposition and then look at the music, you will see that F5 is present, but F4 is absent. D4 will be absent as well. In the example before us, once the tune is transposed to C major, the following results (Figure 18):

Figure 18: Mo nighean donn bhidheach in C Major

Voil. There is the natural scale. The third note, circled in blue, is not in the natural scale, but is a passing note; it is the only note in the entire tune that is not in the harmonic series. Transcribers often write a note in between two stressed notes that is in the diatonic scale, but not in the natural scale when transcribing tunes. They subconsciously hear it, yet the performers never knew that such a note was in existence. The singers were merely sliding a bit to the next pitch and did not realize that a listener possessed knowledge of another note in between the two stressed pitches. The onus is on the transcriber to understand how the
43

Importantly, Western European folk tunes are not merely often described as being pentatonic, but are missing half steps. This is extremely important and has been generally ignored by musicologists. There are many other cultures which have pentatonic music but which include half steps. The absence of half steps in music described as pentatonic points squarely toward the natural scale.

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performer thinks. It is not the performers function to educate the stray listener about the music al structure. Moreover, the performer is probably unaware of the musical structure. Once the note in question is adjusted (generally, this moves the diatonic pitch up to a higher pitched note when the melody falls, and a lower pitch when the melody ascends) the following results (Figure 19):

Figure 19: Mo nighean donn bhidheach Notation for a Natural Instrument

On a B, natural (9/3 m. long) trumpet, this tune is very easy to play. This tune is sung like this in Nova Scotia (below, Figure 20):

Figure 20: Mo nighean donn bhidheach as S ung in Nova S cotia

The tune sits slightly high in the natural scale (it possibly originated an octave lower: the G3 - C4 interval is very distinctive of natural instruments), so the F5 /F# 5 (you can use the half-sharp symbol F 5 here if you wish) 11th partial sounds very odd when heard. Transcribers, when hearing this pitch, heard the odd nature of it (with respect to the diatonic tuning system and made notes concerning this 44 ). If the tune ended on C4 or C5 , then transcribers annotated the 11th partial as F 5 since F# 5 was not in the key of C major. Occasionally, they annotated it as F# 5 if it ended in C5 , and then stated that the tune was mixolydian. Significantly, transcribers annotated it as F# 5 if the final pitch was G4 or G5 . In such a case, it would be very flat compared to equal temperaments F# 5 or certainly Pythagorean tunings F# 5 . Example 2: Amazing Grace from Gallaher. The tune for Amazing Grace came from a number of pre-existing tunes. The one most closely matching is a tune named Gallaher. By its name, the provenance would tend to indicate that it came from Ireland. By the fact that it exactly matches the natural scale, one would assume that it came from the transhumance culture. Below is the tune as it appears using shape-note notation (below, Figure 21):

44

I find Vincent The Diatonic Modes in Modern Music very useful in that he discusses intonation issues that art musicians had with folk singers.

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Figure 21: "Gallaher"

Notice the range of the tune is very similar to Mo nighean donn bhidheach, ranging from G4 to G5 . Example 3: Fear a bhta. This tune was chosen because the 7th partial is prominent. This treatment is perhaps the least satisfactory of all of the examples in this paper, as I was forced to adjust the pitch on a note that fell on a stressed beat. If I had transposed this up any higher to remove this anomaly, it would place the range of the tune too high for an average trumpeter. As it is, the converted tune would be very agreeable to an older person from the Gaeltachd . Here is the tune (#11) as it appears in the first book of The Celtic Lyre (see Figure 22, below):

Figure 22: Fear a bhta from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885

As before, the first step is to place the tune into a computer application program (see Figure 23, below). I altered the tune to compound time to match how it is sung. I did not change the pitches.

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Figure 23: Fear a bhta in S ibelius

Placing this in A Minor (again, the keys/modes are not important, only modulating the tune so that the accidentals disappear while keeping the melody intact) results in the following (see Figure 24, below):

Figure 24: Fear a bhta in A Minor (No S harps or Flats in the Tune or the Key S ignature)

If you look carefully, you can see that the natural scale is displayed on all of the stressed beats except for two. These two notes can be moved up or down without significantly impacting the melody. In fact, I have heard the melody sung in just such a manner in recordings in archives. You can see this below with notes on stressed beats being circled in red if in the natural scale and circled in blue when the stressed beats fall outside the natural scale (see Figure 25, below)

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Figure 25: Fear a bhta with S tressed Beats Circled

If the two stressed notes and two passing notes that fall outside the natural scale are adjusted to fall within the scale, the following results (Figure 26):

Figure 26: Fear a bhta Adjusted for the Natural S cale

For those accustomed to the equally tempered diatonic scale, this tune is somewhat difficult to listen to as the root/final of the song is on the very pitch which is so much out-of-tune with respect to the diatonic scale. If played on a piano, it would be immediately recognised. Example 4 : Eilean an Fhraoich. This is another of many examples that display almost no notes outside the natural scale. The notes that are outside the natural scale are only passing or neighbouring notes. Here is the tune (#52) as it appears in The Celtic Lyre (Figure 27):

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Figure 27: Eilean an Fhraoich from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885

Below is this song transposed to C major with diatonic notes not in the natural scale circled in blue (Figure 28). I changed the metre of the song, but this has no effect on the pitches.

Figure 28: Eilean an Fhraoich from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885 in S ibelius

These two passing tones can easily have been mis-heard by the transcriber. If they were made to be C 5 , the listener probably wouldnt notice; however, the 7th partial would stand out to the equally-temperedaccustomed listener. Example 5 : Henenfeld. A great deal of information is beginning to emerge from Europe concerning the playing of shepherds trumpets. As an example, here is a transcript ion of a tune as played on a shepherds trumpet (below, Figure 29):

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Figure 29: Henfenfeld

Information of this tune and copious quantities of material can now be found at a site called Hirtenmusik in Europa (shepherds music in Europe): http://www.schwaben-kultur.de/hirtenmusik/en/index.html. Notice that the pitches are not at deviance with the natural scale. However, German transcribers often have difficulty in annotating the 7th partial. I have seen it represented as A 4 , B4 , or even B 5 . The 11th partial is always represented as F 6 . Example 6 : Am fleasgach donn. This tune was chosen because the tune, after going through the above processes, ends up being an octave above where it probably should lie; transposing it down by an octave places it so low that any novice trumpet player can play it easily. Placing the tune this low is possible for many of the tunes in The Celtic Lyre ; I avoided doing this as the casual observer might think that I was using a heavy hand. This is actually far from the case. All of the stressed beats would be playable by a natural instrument, and easily so. This proclivity, more than any other, convinced me that Gaelic music (and by extension, European folk music in general) was created on wooden shepherds trumpets. The example below is significant since any school child could play this tune, and it would be immediately recognizable to every member of the Gaelic community. If you look at the song Am fleasgach donn (Faill ill , agus h r ile) which was #30 in the second book of the original, you will see the following (Figure 30, below):

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Figure 30: Original Am fleasgach donn

As before, the first step is to place the tune into a computer application program (see Figure 31, below):

Figure 31: Am fleasgach donn in S ibelius

I should note that I changed the rhythm. This has no bearing on this exercise; it simply did not fit the stresses as it is normally sung. The tune above is in F major. I transposed it up to C major with the following result (Figure 32):

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Figure 32: Am fleasgach donn Adjusted to C Major

This can be played on a natural instrument, but is rather high which makes it difficult for the average trumpeter. If you look at the stressed beats, you can see that the stressed beats are comprised of pitches E5 , C5 , C5 , E5 , G5 , C5 respectively, which is indicative of the lower octave pattern of the natural scale E4 , C4 , C4 , E4 , G4 , C4 (Figure 33):

Figure 33: Am fleasgach donn S ome S tressed Notes Highlighted

So I then transposed the music down by an octave and see if the natural scale fits. This has been done in Figure 34, below:

Figure 34: Am fleasgach donn Brought Down an Octave

There is the natural scale again. It does not quite look like it, but its present. This is difficult to see because, firstly, transcribers often become confused when they hear pitches on unstressed beats (sung on unstressed syllables) and dont know exactly where to place them. So the transcriber will put most of the

36

pitches of unstressed beats between the pitches of the stressed beats. If I circle the stressed notes that are in the natural scale, you can see the pattern (see Figure 35, below):

Figure 35: Am fleasgach donn Natural S cale stressed Beats Highlighted

Secondly, I had the benefit of hearing this song sung in the Gaelic community. I knew that the note of the 12th measure was incorrect (F4,). Additionally, the F4 pitches beginning measures 19 and 21 are normally sung as E4 and G4 respectively. One might speculate that the original musical editor was deliberately trying to give the song a bit more diatonic complexity, but that cannot be proven. However, the pitches are clearly wrong in the original version of The Celtic Lyre . If I write the song as it is normally sung, and highlight the stressed beats that include the natural scale (stressed natural scale in red, stressed diatonic scale in blue), the following results (Figure 36, below):

Figure 36: Am fleasgach donn Natural S tressed Notes in Red, Diatonic in Blue

With the exception of the second-to-last note and its parallel in the phrase above it, every stressed beat in this song is contained in the natural scale. Placing the second-to-last note one step above the final is

37

something that musical editors often did to make the music sound more in-line with mainland European standards. However, it is not that simple. The Gaelic community itself has embraced those tendencies, and often sings this song with a D4 at the end today. If I adjust the pitches of the unstressed beats and the last two phrasal endings, the following results (Figure 37):

Figure 37: Am fleasgach donn Corrected to the Natural S cale

It may appear that I radically changed the music to force it to match the natural scale. This is not true at all. Only two stressed notes were changed. Those two notes fit a pattern of falling to the tonic that the original musical editor followed with several sequential tunes in the original publication. The unstressed notes that were not in the natural scale in Figure 36 all fell between two stressed notes of the natural scale; for example, the first three notes original pitches are E4 , F4 , and G4 with E4 and G4 being the pitches on stressed beats. It is quite common for a diatonically-trained musician to transcribe an unstressed note with a pitch between the two stressed pitches; this occurs even though the performer did not perform it that way.45 In essence, since diatonically-trained musicians are accustomed to seven notes per octave, they use those notes even if the music that they hear does not have them. This is particularly true with pitches that fall on unstressed beats (or unstressed syllables). If I played this on a natural trumpet, you would immediately recognize the tune because all of the stressed beats, except those mentioned above, would be correct. I up-loaded a demonstration of this which can be viewed here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3scougnTfA. As mentioned above, what is so remarkable about this tune is that it sits very low in the natural scale. Any youngster who just started learning how to play the trumpet could play this tune (this can be demonstrated on a modern, valved B trumpet. Just remember that the player would need to pull out all of the tuning slides and push down all of the valves to do it).

45

This is quite common. I am reminded of a time when I sang in a Gaelic choir. The fellow to the right of me was from the Carolinas in the United States. The women in front of me and to my left were from Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia. If we were to sing a song that had a pattern as in the first measure of Figure 36, he would sing E4 , F4 , G4 ; she would sing E4 , E4 , G4 . This happened in every song where we sang the melody in unison.

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It may appear that because I have used tunes from the Scottish Gaelic tradition, that there is something particular to that culture that is most analogous to music produced by shepherds trumpets. That is not the case. I am simply more familiar with Gaelic music. The type of analysis performed above may be done on the music of any culture that once practiced transhumance. This is true whether shepherds trumpets are extant in the community or not (shepherds trumpets are no longer used in Irish or Scottish Gaelic culture). Example 7 : Frre Jacques. To further support this, consider music from French culture. The few remaining areas in France where transhumance is practiced no longer use shepherds trumpets. That does not mean that the music does not reflect the presence of shepherds trumpets. The same type of analysis performed above on Am fleasgach donn may be performed on French, German, Spanish, Italian, et al., tunes as well. Here is an example of a well-known French tune Frre Jacques. Below is an example from an 1811 publication (see Figure 38):46

Figure 38: Frre Jacques

Putting this music notation in a computer application programme and transposing up to C major results in this (altered to 2/4 time, Figure 39, below):

Figure 39: Frre Jacques in C Major

As above in Am fleasgach donn, the low G and preceding/following C is indicative of the natural scale with a trumpets G3 to C4 . To see this, here is the above example transposed down an octave with unstressed notes adjusted to match the natural scale (see Figure 40, below):

Figure 40: "Frre Jacques" Transposed Down an Octave

The unstressed second beats of each measure remaining on the lower tone (in the first measure, D 4 is replace by C4 , et al.) might seem odd to the reader, but that is only because the reader is accustomed to the
46

Capelle, Pierre Adolphe 1811 La Cl Du Caveau, L'usage De Tous Les Chansonniers Franais, Des Amat eurs, Auteurs, Acteurs Du Vaudeville & De Tous Les Amis De La Chanson , Paris: Capelle et Renard, de l'Impr. de Richomme , 309.

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diatonic scale/piano keyboard. If this music (Figure 40) is played on a piano, the tune is clearly recognizable and identifiable as Frre Jacques. One might scoff at this, but there is a deep -rooted structure in the tune that is based upon the natural scale that is quite different from the diatonic scale. It is not coincidence that the tune is recognizable. This process can be applied to folk song that was transported from Europe to the Appalachians. Although many of the tunes as captured by Campbell and Sharp a hundred years ago which had many variations (Barbara Allen: "O Teannaibh dlth is togaibh fonn), many, such as songs describing animals (such as The Old Grey Mare and The Bird Song, A), had not. Here is an example from Campbell and Sharps English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians 47 (below, Figure 41):

Figure 41: "Had Me a Cat" Transcribed by Cecil S harp

If this is transposed into C major, the following results (Figure 42) :

Figure 42: "Had Me a Cat" in C Major

If the pitches of notes that fall on unstressed pitches are adjusted as was done above, the following results (Figure 43):

Figure 43: "Had Me a Cat" Up an Octave

Transcribers often adjusted the key signatures to apparently confuse the reader (adding accidentals to the music but kee ping the key signature correct) by making the music appear to be more complex than it was. For example: The Bird Song B (Figure 44, below):

47

Sharp English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians

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Figure 44: "The Bird S ong B" As Transcribed by Cecil S harp

Notice that the E natural is in the music, but the key is deliberately not reflective of it. This makes the music appear (as it is placed on the staff) to be in the locrian mode. Here is the same music with the superfluous note removed from the key signature (Figure 45):

Figure 45 "The Bird S ong B" With S uperfluous E Removed in Key S ignature

In this configuration, it appears to be simply aeolian. Why Sharp wished to manoeuvre this is an anathema. Since it is hexatonic, there is only one half step (pentatonic tunes with no half step intervals) make it very easy to manoeuvre on the notational staff. Notice that E (only one instance) and A are both missing? So the first step is to try to move the missing note(s) to either F or B. Transposing down a minor 3rd results in a tune ending on B natural with one C#. It does not particularly reveal anything. However, if the tune is transposed so that the missing A is in the missing B position (up a major second), the natural scale is revealed (Figure 46):

Figure 46: "The Bird S ong B" Transposed to C Major

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So there is a harmonic series, again. Generally, songs about domestic animals (cats, birds, sheep, cows, etc.) seem to exhibit tendencies of the natural scale more than love songs. It could be that the behaviour of transhumance of other animals with associated trumpets preserved a musical bond for longer than with other types of music. Considering the example above (Figure 46), the F in the second measure looks quite odd. Cecil Sharp mentions a number of times how the music must be precise. His mathematical approach would tend to make one believe that he would deliberately annotate an F in the second measure where the singer would not intend such precision. The intonation of the natural trumpet takes some getting used to; the 7th partial in particular will sound very odd. So, perform this exercise to check if the theory presented in this paper is correct: transcribe the recording of me playing the tune (here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3scougnTfA). If you are a trained European art musician, you will assume that it is in a major or minor key, but when you hear it, you will know that it is in the major mode. You will hear the last note of the tune. If you have a piano present, you will just write down the notes as they match the keyboard. If there is no piano present and if you do not have relative or perfect pitch, you will assume the key is C major. When you hear the 7th partial, you will be confused. Is the pitch A 4 , B4 , or B 4 ? The song is probably in the key of C major (the only other option is C Minor and it does not match the tune at all), so the note of the 7th partial cannot be B4 since B4 is not in the key of C major. The pitch is closer to A4 than B 4 , so you must write down A4 . Therefore, the natural scale/harmonic series will be written with the 7th partial as A4 and not as B4 . It should be remembered that this process does not work on all folk tunes: it does not work when the tune was composed on a diatonic instrument (harp, bagpipe, fiddle, etc.). 48 It also does not work on modern songs that were created in imitation of older songs. The reason for this is that composers trying to make a song that sounds old are diatonically trained and believe that traditional songs are merely pentatonic; they dont think to make it gaped in the lower octave only. I have had a few problems when setting what I thought to be old songs to the natural scale only to find the tunes were modern compositions (O Iosa, and Bha sneachda na chuibhrig). There is another example that might be of interest. I heard a song in the movie Brave produced by Walt Disney Studios. It was sung by Julie Fowlis and entitled Tha mo ghaol air ird a' chuain (My Love is on the High Seas). The lyrics seemed interesting and the tune enjoyable. I attempted to set it to the natural scale and failed; there were too many diatonic notes (D4 ) in the lower octave which were not passing or neighbouring notes, but important ones. I found out that the author of the words was Henry Whyte, the same person who had arranged to have The Celtic Lyre (all four volumes) published. It seems he had taken the tune from another song called, Jamies on the Stormy Sea with English poetry set to music by Bernard Covert in 1847. Bernard Covert composed the piece on the piano.

Interrelations with other Instruments:

One of the motivating factors that suggested that shepherds trumpets were the originators of the European folk music scale was in the documentation of tuning practices of other instruments that might
48

The natural scale seems particularly evident in the song tradition and less present in the instrumental tradition.

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have to play in ensemble with trumpets. In particular, two instruments acted as a fulcrum in Gaelic medieval musical society that implied a certain pitch placement of natural trumpets: the harp and the bagpipe. With the understanding of the typical instrumentarium that existed at a typical Gaelic Chieftains court49 and the documentation of other instruments tuning practices, the not es played by trumpets known to exist can be rather confidently predicted. In short, you can check my theory by predicting the length of the natural instruments that were used by looking at the notes that other instruments played. Here is a brief sketch of that reasoning: The Harp: Edward Bunting witnessed the 1792 Belfast Harpers festival and made copious notes concerning traditional harping practices. He ignored most of the truth of what he had gathered in order to sell music books to the classically trained public; however, he did publish some authentic observations, and we also have his unpublished notes. 50 Some of his published information concerns two main keys for tuning the medieval Irish harp. The most important is the Natural Key termed Leath Gleas (lit. Halfnote); there is also the High Bass Key. The Natural Key is a type of Pythagorean tuning which begins and ends on G. It employs tuning the strings to fifths and octaves with one fourth. This creates the G major scale (with F). The second tuning convention also begins and ends on G. It employs tuning the strings to fifths and octaves but with the addition of two fourths, which creates the G mixolydian scale (C major, but starting and ending on G instead of C). Here is the order in which a harper tuned the harp strings in the Natural Key (Figure 47, below):51

49

12th-century Book of Leinster and the 14th-century Yellow Book of Lecan delineate a possible seating arrangement in the court at Tara under the rule of King Cormac Mac Airt using the seating arrangements that existed when the books were being written. Musicians were placed according to their social position. There were (in no particular order): harpers, horn (shorter than trumpets) players, trumpet players, pipers, and fiddlers (missing from the Book of Leinster). It should be noted that there is a history, a development, of the fiddle from plucked lyre to bowed lyre. The lyres began to be bowed with the introduction of the technique of bowing brought in from Moorish Spain around 950 A.D. The bridges were flat and the melody was fingered on one string, shifting from string to string as the melody required. The other, non-fingered strings sounded as drones. 50 Through a personal meeting with the harper Simon Chadwick, I was able to see some copies of these fascinating notes. These included some of Buntings untouched first impression transcriptions of harp music. 51 Most theorists who support the idea that six-stringed lyres in Europe were tuned to the diatonic scale have never tuned a lyre. The diatonic scale is easy to reproduce on a 30-struinged harp because the intervals of an octave and fifth are easy to create (put your finger 1/3 or down the string you are tuning and pluck it to get the rough pitch of the next note). You cannot do this with o nly six strings. It is unreasonable to expect people to just know the major scale. Just as today, people have radio and pianos as references, so too in the past there must have been a reference. Since 30-stringed harps (which were portable, versus the organ) did not exist until about 1000 AD or so, there was not a ready diatonic reference available. Since shepherds trumpets were widespread, by default, they must have been the scale reference. This is proven by the fact that the natural scale appears to b e the foundation of folk songs, as demonstrated above.

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Figure 47: The Natural Key Tuning for Harp

This results in the creation of the following diatonic scale on a harp of thirty strings (Figure 48):

Figure 48: The S cale Resulting from Natural Key Tuning

Its difficult to see from the above figure, but the tuning is roughly centred from G3 to G4 ; the rest of the notes are obtained by tuning to those notes by octaves. Here is the second-most important tuning of High Bass where the harp is still centred from G3 to G4 , but the leading tone of F is lowered to F (Figure 49, below):

Figure 49: The High Bass Tuning for Harp

This results in the following scale (Figure 50, below), which appears to be C major, but is actually Gmixolydian:

Figure 50: The S cale Resulting from High Bass Key Tuning

The first tuning creates a scale that we today would call G major (Figure 48). The second tuning creates a scale that perhaps we would call C major (Figure 50). This is not exactly true; the second tuning would be more accurately referred to as G mixolydian since it starts and ends on G. This actually makes a difference as these tunings are not equally tempered; that is, the G major of the Natural Key and the C major of the High Bass have a different colour and impart a different feeling to the listener which doesnt occur today with precise equal temperament. It is also interesting to note that the two groups of strings meet at two strings called caomhluighe which means lying together (or the lovers/couplers)

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which were both tuned to the same pitch. The harpers right (strong/masculine) hand plays the bass notes until this point, and the left (weaker/feminine) hand then plays the treble notes above; the right hand plays notes that men would sing and the left hand plays notes women would sing. The harp rests on the players left shoulder. The difference between the two scales is the tead a leith ghleas (lit. string of the half note: the F/F string(s) which would be string numbers 10, 18, and 25). It should be noted that Bunting also mentions a seldom-used tuning which employs not just the F in the Natural Key but also adds a C . In modern thought, this would be the key of D major.52 As Boyle mentioned, Though their preference in pitch was in G, they nevertheless did not think in keys. Their thinking was modal and the pitch of their modes altered from G Doh to C Doh and D Doh. Bunting, being a man of his time, must be forgiven for not understanding it.53 This focus on G is important because it shows that the first accidental in Gaeldom was F and not B as it was on the European mainland. Both accidentals served the same purpose, and that is to allow the facility of shifting the ecclesiastical modes offered by Pythagorean tuning by half an octave. Before the advent of B on the continent, there was only a gamut of pitches. For example, the mixolydian mode comprised all of the notes of the dorian mode albeit with the half-steps in different places, but the entire pitch spectrum was up a perfect fourth. So with B as an accidental, C ionian (major) becomes F ionian (major) and all of the other modes shift as well (D dorian becomes G dorian, E phrygian becomes A phrygian, etc.). As a singer, the dorian mode might be easy to sing, but if the following chant is in the mixolydian mode, it might place the range too high to sing. There was a gamut, a rigid set of pitches that existed, and our current method of transposition didnt exist. Adding one accidental gave singers much needed flexibility. This limitation of available notes is an additional reason to suggest that before the advent of Pythagorean tuning in the early Christian Church, the available notes were that of the natural scale and not that of the diatonic scale since diatonic scale tuning incorporated the concept of octave equivalency and hence limitless pitches which didnt exist in the early Christian Church. In essence, the special notes of B (and F in Gaeldom) allowed singers to sing all of the modes comfortably. On the mainland, B was such an important note that it was considered to be musica vera and not musica ficta although it was actually false since it wasnt a part of the diatonic scale. In insular Britain, the functionality of shifting a tune by a half-octave was supplied by F . So with F as an accidental, C ionian (major) becomes G ionian (major), and all of the other modes shift as well (D dorian becomes A dorian, F lydian becomes C lydian, etc.). There were three substantial benefits to using F. Firstly, the F/F shift allowed singers to shift melodies by half an octave so that a baritone could easily sing a song performed by a soprano, as mentioned above with B. Secondly, it allowed for that strange tuning of the F/F string to be positioned where the 11th partial falls on the natural scale. Thirdly, it more closely matched the tuning of the bagpipes.
52

Bunting, Edward 1969 The Ancient Music of Ireland: An Edition Comprising the Three Collections by Edward Bunting Originally Published in 1796, 1809 and 1840 , Dublin: Waltons' Piano and Musical Instrument Galleries. 53 Boyle The Irish Song Tradition 12.

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The Bagpipe s: The origin of the Scottish Great Highland Bagpipes has been hotly contested over the years. Most early theories suggest that the instrument was imported from India. This seems doubtful. Most instruments develop over time due to technological advancements. Instrumentalists are always searching for easier or better ways of playing or tuning. For example, the early medieval harp in Ireland is documented as having eleven strings or so before at least the tenth century. When Pythagorean tuning was introduced, this new technology allowed for a way of arranging/tuning strings in a methodical manner. More strings could be added; the number of strings on the harp then shot up to about thirty. This also implies that the harp had a pre-Pythagorean tuning system that limited it to eleven strings. Natural scale tuning springs to mind. As another example, the technology of bowing was introduced in Moorish Spain around 950 A.D. with the rebec. This was a new technology that allowed a chordophone to sound more like the human voice; that is, have a longer sustain than the normally plucked gut string of the lyre. The technology was the bowing of the strings, not the bow and rebec combination, so the technique of bowing was subsumed into the tradition of the plucked lyre (crotte, rotte, crowd, chorus, crwth, etc.). The lyre (as in Sutton Hoo, Prittlewell, Trossingen, Snape, etc.) was multi-stringed, with a flat bridge; so when the European medieval lyre was bowed, the non-fingered strings would vibrate causing droning on those open strings. The lyres also became waisted so the curves of the viol and subsequent violin came from the tradition of the plucked lyre. The Great Highland Bagpipe may have also come from a similar development. It possibly began as a lipvibrated aerophone on a cane with an animal horn inserted at the end (literally, a hornpipe). Holes were probably drilled in it in order to match the intonation of other instruments of the same type. With the addition of holes, there was no need for a mouthpiece; a double reed would work as well. With other instruments incorporating drones playing alongside of it, the bagpipe probably added a drone as a separate pipe, much like the aulos. In time, having two pipes in the players mouth becomes irksome, and a wooden manifold was probably added so that the player might have only one pipe inserted into the mouth (the modern hornpipe looks something similar to this). Wooden manifolds leak, and an animals stomach as a bladder would work better. With this bladder, more drones could be added. This type of slow progression and development is the general process by which our modern instruments evolved. Most instruments in a European Orchestra came from folk origins. It is generally supposed that the bagpipe chanter (or section which is fingered to produce the melody) is tuned using the just intonation method. The holes are cut larger with a knife or reduced through the addition of tree sap or tape so that the nodal points of the chanter lock in to the nodal points of the drones overtones. So in a medieval chieftains court with the trumpet, bagpipe, and harp, there are three intonation systems: natural scale,54 just intonation, and Pythagorean all working at once. Just as the ecclesiastical system perhaps should not be applied to the folk music tunes, so too I am beginning to wonder if the application of the term of just intonation is also inappropriate when directed at the tuning system employed by a bagpipe chanter. The term of just intonation is applied to the machinations that were made to Pythagorean tuning to make out-of-tune thirds (22 cents sharp for major thirds and 22 cents flat for minor thirds) more tolerable. The intonation of the bagpipe chanter is not determined through this method. The pipe chanter tuning system is independent of the Pythagorean
54

As Cristiano Forster rightly suggested to me in personal correspondence, one should never say, natural tuning since the natural scale is not obtained through tuning at all.

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method as described above. Therefore, since just intonation is a type of manipulation of Pythagorean tuning, and bagpipe tuning is independent of the Pythagorean method, just intonation is not related to bagpipe chanter tuning. To show how independent bagpipe tuning is to Pythagorean (and hence just intonation), it might be wise to take a quick look at how the bagpipe chanter is tuned. Highland Bagpipe chanters (the part of the instrument that creates the melody) are tuned to the drones. There are two drones that are an octave lower than the low A on the chanter. Another drone is set at an octave lower than that. The pitch of each individual pitch that the chanter produces is altered by carving out the drilled hole of the chanter if it needs to be altered. In the past, sap or pitch was added to the top or bottom of the hole oppose to the carving. Today, often a piece of strong tape is used. The determination of exactly where each hole should be placed on the chanter is made according to its relationship to the drones. The pitch is adjusted up or down until the chanters pitch locks in to the pitches of the drones. In essence, the wavelength of each pitch of the chanter is lengthened or shortened to match the nodal points of the overtones of one of the two drones (A 2 or A3 ).55 A nodal point is the starting point and the ending point of each wave. A pictograph might be useful here (Figure 51, below):

Figure 51: Aligning Nodal Points on a Chanter

To most who are familiar with intonation systems, this method of tuning a bagpipe chanter might seem in-line with just intonation. However, the intent is different;56 therefore, since tempering out-of-tune thirds is not the impetus for the tuning method for bagpipe chanters and bagpipe chanter thirds are not
55

When tuning to fifths or fourths (say, on a violin or guitar), the tension of one string is increased or decreased so that beating stops. It is not widely known that the beating is not caused by the interference between the principal frequency of one wave to the other; beating is caused by the interference between an overtone of the lower pitch with the second string. 56 The intent of the tuning system is more important than the physical similarities. Consider the way we differentiate between the terms fewer and less than. Whether a noun can be counted or not (a so -called non-count noun) is irrelevant. What is important is the intent of the speaker to count the noun or not; for example, the sign over the express cashier as a grocer of Ten items or less is inappropriate since you are counting each item. It must be Ten items or fewer. However, if you say that you will meet someone in Ten minutes of fewer is not correct even though it is possible to count the minutes. Your intent is to indicate a hunk of time and to carve off a portion of the time. The resulting amount of time is inexact; therefore, Ten minutes or less is correct in this case. In a like manner, using just intonation to describe chanter tuning is incorrect because the intent of just tuning is to temper Pythagorean thirds, regardless of how similar the results are between just intonation of Pythagorean -tuned instruments and a bagpipe chanter.

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tempered to have their thirds sound consonant in triads, bagpipe chanters cannot be said to be tuned using a just intonation method. In short, bagpipe chanter tuning has nothing to do with Pythagorean tuning. There are no progressions of fifths and octaves in the tuning system at all, nor is there any tempering of thirds. Like many instruments, the Highland Bagpipe, which is said to be pitched in A, has gone through pitch inflation; the original pitch probably may have been closer to G than A, although this is not known for certain, since measurements taken of old Highland Bagpipe chanters can be said to be in A (A=415 Hz.). However, many other types of bagpipes are in G. 57 Additionally, iconography of bagpipes seems to suggest that the Highland Bagpipes were in G. Today, the Great Highland Bagpipes are pitched slightly above B . That means that the drones are in B, and when a bagpiper plays its mixolydian scale,58 its root pitch is equal to B or higher when played on a concert instrument such as a piano (where A=440 Hz.). Many pipers now have two chanters: one is pitched high for pipe and drum competitions and another is pitched in concert A so as to play with other concert-pitched instruments. The notational system seems to have gotten stuck at annotating the pipes when the pipes were placed in A, so the key signature has not moved from this point and has two sharps. This might seem rather odd for the casual observer since the drones are in A, the pipes are said to be in A, yet the key signature reads D major, and the actual pitch is B. A diagram might make this less confusing (Figure 52, below):

Figure 52: A Comparison of the Concert Pitches of the Highland Bagpipes

If the key signature was changed to reflect the pitch gamut and drone placement, the result might look somewhat odd (Figure 53, below):

Figure 53: Bagpipes Written in both D Major and A Major

This can cause a great deal of confusion. For example, Amazing Grace59 is often played by an Amixolydian bagpipe; the piece must be placed in the key of D major (in the key signature) if being accompanied by other instruments since the ending pitch is D, not A. Add to that the fact that the
57

Note the "keys" in Shields, Hugh 1998 Tunes of the Munster Pipers: Irish Traditional Music from the James Goodman Manuscripts, Dublin: Irish Traditional Music Archive, as well as the pitch of the Uillean (Union) pipes. 58 As mentioned above, if the tuning system of the bagpipe is not just intonation since it is not related to the Pythagorean-tuned diatonic scale, then the ecclesiastical modes do not apply as well. They are in fact slightly different on every pitch except the two Gs. I am using the appellation of mixolydian because it is convenient. 59 Most people are familiar with the song Amazing Grace , the words of which were first published in 1779. Eventually, it was set to the tune New Britain ; that tune was supposedly formed from the merging of the tunes Gallaher and St. Mary . Interestingly, Amazing Grace was once in a hymnbook The Sacred Harp which was reprinted in 1991. Many of the hymns in that book such as Love Devine and Prospect were set in C major and clearly demonstrate the natural scale.

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Highland Bagpipes are now in B; so Amazing Grace is actually in E for other instruments unless the piper has an A Chanter, but regardless, the music you give the piper (if you are going to do this) will be in D major in the key signature. Orchestrating the A-mixolydian Highland Bagpipe to other instruments is not for the faint-of-heart. If you attempt to fit a natural trumpet in with this scale, a natural trumpet pitched in G will not have as many congruous notes as if it is placed in C. If a C natural trumpet and G Bagpipe attempt to play the same scale, only B4 is missing in the trumpets range (Figure 54):

Figure 54: Natural Trumpet in C and G-Mixolydian Bagpipes

As mentioned above, Bunting mentioned that there was a key that was seldom used that had both F and C in the key signature. As Bradley and Breathnach mentioned, When using these modes, traditional instrumentalists confine themselves almost wholly to keys requiring only one or two sharps. 60 This second option produces an intriguing possibility. If the Highland Bagpipes were in A (at A=415 Hz.) and had not gone through pitch inflation, the harp would need to raise its tuning by a full step, placing its tuning into a key that appears to be D major. If a natural trumpet was to play along, it would have to be in D major (about a foot shorter than if in C) and the trumpet and bagpipe scales would look something like this (Figure 55):

Figure 55: Natural Trumpet in D and A-Mixolydian Bagpipes

This may have important ramifications in the classical music world, as it is well known that most natural trumpets in the Baroque era were pitched in D (or E with crooks to lower the pitch). When playing with other instruments or singers, music with two sharps was called the choral key ostensibly to match the standard length of the natural trumpet. In light of the above information, choral might refer not to the addition of singers, but rather the fact that it was the key that could accommodate all instruments so that they might play in chorus. That would be the Natural Key with an additional C for the harp, D natural trumpets, and bagpipes in A. If we combine the ranges of the natural trumpet in C, the G-mixolydian bagpipe, and the Pythagorean Gmixolydian/ionian tuning of the harp, the total gamut of pitches produced might be as follows (Figure 56):

60

Bradley Ireland 318.

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Figure 56: Natural Trumpet in C, G-Mixolydian Bagpipes and Harp Pitch S pectrum

While it should be acknowledged that there is a great deal of fluctuation in intonation from one intonation system to another (natural scale in C, just intonation of pipes, Pythagorean on G for the harp), instrumentalists often adjust how they intone depending upon the instruments with which they are playing. This is becoming more and more apparent as scholars are beginning to question the importance of fixed-pitched instrument limitations, especially in Baroque and early music. If you look at Figure 56, above, and observe the notes encompassed by the over-arching bracket, you can see that all three instruments can play each of those notes with the exception of B4 which is absent in the trumpet. This implies that a tune consisting of this spectrum is indicative of trumpets playing with bagpipes since the trumpet has a greater range in the lower end of its compass; to omit those notes might seem unusual although it did occur with the lur in the Figure 12 example above. This would tend to suggest that tunes such as Figure 19, Mo nighean donn bhidheach was composed in the presence of a bagpipe. Although triadic harmony was clearly precent due to the presence of natural trumpets, we should not jump to the conclusion that the harmony at a chieftains court contained the harmonic progressions that we have today. Trumpet triad motifs are extremely old,61 but harmonic progressions are not necessarily old. Triadic harmony probably existed mainly in drone harmony, although that harmony may have shifted at key points.

Conclusions:
The theory presented in this paper seems to answer all of the anomalies that previous theories on European folk music did not address. The intonation of natural instruments, like shepherds trumpets, does sound odd to an ear accustomed to equal temperament. Yet, according to written accounts of witnesses hearing such music for the first time, this was precisely the case. 62 The present theory explains why pastoral instruments and pastoral music were banned from the Christian Church, why the ionian and aeolian modes were proscribed, why folk music has a flat leading tone, why the intonation of folk music is often different from art music, and why the music is gapped, and why the music has been described as being tetratonic, pentatonic, or hexatonic. It also explains why folk music is known to be cyclical; that is, it is not like art music with patterns of tension and release, but rolls over and over as Sen Rada said, like the serpent with its tail in its mouth. 63 Figure 6: Natural Scale: Notes Available vs. Frequency (Cycles per Second) demonstrates this. In short, the present theory seems to address all of the elements of how scholars, musical dilettantes, and casual observers have used to describe early folk music.

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I believe that the first time that natural trumpet music was written down for performance was by Monteverdi. Before that time, trumpet music was the venue of the trumpet guilds and brotherhoods that existed. They zealously guarded their craft and music. Music was passed on through aural/oral techniques. 62 Again, I find Vincent The Diatonic Modes in Modern Music extremely illuminating in this regard. 63 Riada, Sen 1982 Our Musical Heritage , Mountrath, Ireland: The Dolmen Press

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There are a number of implications if this theory is assumed to be correct: 1. Since it suggests that pastoral music was based on shepherds trumpets which utilized the natural scale, then early Medieval European folk music probably was also based on the natural scale. 2. The definition of folk music that we have today does not address the intonation of shepherds trumpets. Therefore, the dividing line between art music and folk music can perhaps be made sharper with a distinction of intonation and available pitches. This is not a prescription, but a viewpoint of a spectrum. At one time, the difference between folk music and art music was probably delineated by the intonation system each used. The natural scale and its intonational properties were utilized by the folk; the diatonic scale and its properties were utilized by the Church. The courts were probably open to whatever was agreeable and where the two systems melded. 3. The connection between field and court was probably closer in the past than we imagine today. There is no reason to believe that only metal trumpets were pla yed in a petty king/chieftains court in Western Europe. Indeed, because of the vestige of bosses on metal trumpets, wooden trumpets were probably seen as the ideal. Most research on the history of the trumpet suggests that the modern trumpet evolved from its use on the battlefield. This does not seem probable. The pitches played in the field were lower in the natural scale than those played at court; court music played on trumpets often made use of the upper partials. This would require longer instruments and the skill to play them in the clarin register. That skill would have been developed by shepherds, not soldiers. Examples of a corps of trumpeters playing difficult music in the field is the result of a noble bringing his retinue into the military encampment with him, not using existing trumpeters drawn from the military ranks. 4. The early music notation that we do have might not reflect the diatonic scale but that of the natural scale; that is, the musical staff may not necessarily represent the diatonic scale in Early Music. Altenburg explained this to a small degree in his treatise. 64 Early Christian Church singers had only the range of a gamut of approximately nine notes. This implies that the gamut of pitches available to the early Christian Church came originally from the natural scale and not from the diatonic scale. Guido d'Arezzo spent a good deal of time on hexatonic scales, so there may be a connection. It also suggests that all music or instrumental range that at any time showed a limited gamut of pitches should be analysed to see if the natural scale may have been present. 5. Very early European music research has been approached entirely from a diatonic scale viewpoint. Although the influence of the natural scale is not known, it was in existence. This has been completely ignored by early music scholars. For example, the aulos might also have used the just intonation principal, as does the Scottish Highland Bagpipes today. Yet, these suggestions are most probably of little interest to the typical modern musicologist trained in diatonic theology. I am reminded of the reaction of musicologists to the suggestion by Eivind Groven that Norwegian folk music is based on the willow flute. The response has been often severely derisive. 6. Current compositional practices might find some new stimulus in this. While dissatisfaction of equal temperament has produced investigative efforts such as the now-defunct Just Intonation Network and other organizations, the natural scale is quite a bit different than Equal Temperament and has different strengths. The most important is that it is not a simple combination of ratios. Instruments playing the
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Altenberg, Johann Ernst 1974 (repr. 1795 ed.). Versuch Einer Anleitung Zur Heroisch-Musikalischen Trompeter Und Pauker-Kunst. (Trumpeters' and Kettledrummers' Art). Trans. Edward H. Tarr Nashville: The Brass Press.

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natural scale often ascend to the eleventh to sixteenth partial. Most composers and fixed-pitched instrumentalists think in harmonies composed from combinations of the lower partials. The upper partials display harmonic consonances not often investigated. For example, if you look at a waveform of a pitch produced by a natural instrument, you will see that it is comprised of a combination of all of the partials the instrument can play. That is why a Baroque trumpet sounds fatter than a piccolo trumpet playing the same note. The partials of the longer tube are present in the waveform of the higher pitch being played; they are absent in the shorter piccolo trumpet. Also, all of the partials are being produced at once as the trumpeter plays a note ; you are just hearing the loudest partial. Since the instrument is in harmony with itself, if you add other like instruments that are emphasising different partials, the sound will be harmonious. For example, if you had three natural trumpets in C playing the sixth, seventh, and eighth partials at once (G4 , sharp A4 , C5 ), the sound will have a kind of harmonious sound; however, it will be a different type of simple harmony to which we are accustomed. This will not happen if you play the same three notes on a piano, no matter how you tune the strings.

As this is a theory and not a dictum, the purpose of putting this hypothesis forward is not to proscribe, prescribe, or set forth rules and regulations. The purpose of offering this hypothesis to the musical community is a healthy and positive one: to encourage discourse and discussion so that our knowledge of the past might enhance our approach to our lives and our music today. As Cazden proposed:
[O]nce we free ourselves from the arbitrary and limited categories, the erroneous and cumbersome archaic terminology, the misread historical settings and the rigid schematics embedded in the system of modes now infesting so many fine field collections of traditional song, often as their sole and unwittingly empty gesture towards study of their melodies, the way will lie open to more meaningful and positive approaches. At first it would be inevitable that analysis, to avoid the theorist's penchant for preconceptio ns, proceed along deductive lines, deriving generalizations from the observed data. Yet as a background to understanding which is not in fact divorced from real history, the music analyst ought surely to offer tentative hypotheses derived from the wider field of study of musical systems and suggesting at least some initial criteria of probable relevance to the marshalled facts. The most marked departure from the current mode classification would thus be the statement of such hypotheses as subject to testing , particularization and modification in accordance with the findings, rather than treating the real data merely as phenomenal evidence of the infallible truths already revealed as to a mystically immanent hierarchy ordained by assertive authority. 65

I may have failed, but this paper is the result of such a challenge.

65

Cazden A Simplified Mode Classification for Traditional Anglo -American Song Tunes 62-63.

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Audio Links Significant Examples of Wooden Shepherds Trumpets :

1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1yRLeCxgKE. Svetozr Straina a trombita z Pchovskej doliny. You can find this song in the album Svetozr Straina -Re pastierska by Svetozr Straina ; Samo Smetana, Bratislava ,Vydavates tvo Slovenskho rozhlasu, 1996. 2. Here are five important audio files: http://www.theapricity.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13183. They are individually here: A. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MzrXd8CUCg&feature=player_embedded. B. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MJyYBOtMXY&feature=player_embedded C. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7fjKcT2sos&feature=player_embedded D. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IZEIBQotzo&feature=player_embedded E. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DN6f7XfoLc0&feature=player_embedded 3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gItzU9xvUkA. Trembita beskidzka + piew - Jzef Broda. This is a very good player and singer 4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTyC7DfWeSo. Die letzten Alphornmacher im Emmental (The Last Alphorn Maker in Emmental) 5. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kebanxFZRyo. GOLEC uORKIESTRA TRBITY 6. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuRXA4OWZOM&feature=related: Hutsul funeral with trembitas. . 7. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EJ5e1de81k&feature=related. Hutsul ceremony 8. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQR4Af96Bdc. Trembita huculska - Ostap Kostiuk 9. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpviSW-QNwM: Actual shepherd calling to sheep to gather them. 10. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJbNMhVpeiw. Koncovka + piew - Michal Smetanka: Konkovka and voice

Less Significant:
1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fqf7rgN5DlM: Lithuanian folk instrumental festival. Wooden trumpets (ragai). 2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HVNpeLwNLI 3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_63Z_R3epfA&feature=related: Ukrainian Trembity Calling during Christmas 4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8veNYhP-E8&feature=endscreen&NR=1: A Hutsul Carol, Part I (time index 3:21) 5. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6qy8RVo4v4: Alphorn band 6. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpvHlfXZU_o: Lisa Stoll playing an alphorn 53

7. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIbATZHZE44: Lisa Stoll playing an alphorn 8. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SuCXZqFJ3Y: Trombiti Bratia tefnikovci, Pavol tefnik fujara trombita - Re Pastierska Spomienka na Svetozra Strainu a Joka Peka. 9. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXJA8qgDu3Q: Gos Siemiatycz TV, Ligawki w Ciechanowcu 10. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vF3PSN6mLu8&NR=1&feature=endscreen: Numai cant si dor de Bucovina (time index 1:03) 11. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwV4pb28Mpo. Dwiki trembit na Kopcu Kociuszki.MP4 12. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPd3x_Hgb40 13. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiT32Y2EBGg. An alphorn song 14. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bG7cT2lW5W8. An example of a birch bark lur 15. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yKTBEXXPA4. Midwinterhoorn blazen op lemeleberg. An example of a Midwinterhoorn 16. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXJggy_0AKY Midwinterhoorn playing in Ruurlo, 2011 17. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9heSIew7hcQ. Trembitas playing in chorus 18. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTnNVfju4_Y&NR=1&feature=endscreen. A trembita player 19. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-IQDg1-HnI: Another trembita player 20. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9gl_v0pizQ: Trombita - Krocienko n/D

Willow Flute:
1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJbNMhVpeiw. Koncovka + piew - Michal Smetanka: Konkovka and voice 2. http://wn.com/ukraine_mykhajlo_mykolajevych_tafijchuk_plays_the_volynka : Mykhajlo Mykolajevych Tafijchuk playing a telynka. 3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVmKKKWGxSI&list=PLBA2457A45C86A702: Modern song played on two willow flutes

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Illustrations Cited
Figure 1: Various Shapes of the Trombita : http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trombita Figure 2: A Romanian Shepherd and his Trumpet. Photograph: Hielscher, Kurt 1938 Rumnien: Landschaft-Bauten-Volksleben, Leipzig: F.A. Brockhaus. Figure 3: For example, a recent interview of a trombita maker and player (the episode Predchodcovia telefnov? Trombity on the show Nehate ud mj) can be found here: http://tv.sme.sk/v/23365/predchodcovia-telefonov-trombity.html. Figure 4: Pictorial representation of the Billingsgate Trumpet c.1300: Museum of London; found in Billingsgate (City of London) in 1984. Date 1360 AD - 1400 AD. Image Number 000193: http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/London-Wall/Whatson/Galleries/medieval/objects/record.htm?type=object&id=330249. I used a graphics application to attach the separate sections together Figure 5: The Diatonic Equally Tempered Scale, Notes Number vs. Frequency: I created this myself Figure 6: Natural Scale: Notes Available vs. Frequency (Cycles per Second): I created this myself Figure 7: The Natural Scale as it is Often Presented: I created this myself Figure 8: The Natural Scale as Transcribers Have Used It: I created this myself Figure 9: Relative Importance of the diatonic scale and the natural scale: I created this myself Figure 10: A Lituus: http://realize.be/ancient/legere.html Figure 11: Approximate Location of the Willow Flute's Pitches: I created this myself Figure 12: A Reproduction of Det gjallar og det laet from Huldt-Nystrm, Hampus and Sevg, Reidar, "Norway," in The New Grove Dictionary of Musical Instruments, ed. Stanley. Ed. Sadie (London: MacMillan Press Limited, 1984), 324. I created this copy myself Figure 13: Det gjallar og det laet Transposed to See the natural scale: I created this transposition myself Figure 14: Det gjallar og det laet 11th Partial Adjustment: I created this transposition myself Figure 15: Det gjallar og det laet 7th and 11th Partial Adjustment: I created this transposition myself Figure 16: Mo nighean donn bhidheach from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885: from http://archive.org/ Figure 17 Mo nighean donn bhidheach Placed into a Computer Application: I created this myself Figure 18: Mo nighean donn bhidheach in C major: I created this myself Figure 19: Mo nighean donn bhidheach Notation for a Natural Instrument: I created this myself Figure 20: Mo nighean donn bhidheach as it is sung in Nova Scotia: I created this myself Figure 21: Gallaher from Shaw and Spilmans Columbian Harmony 1829: I created this myself Figure 22: Fear a bhta from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885: from http://archive.org/ Figure 23: Fear a bhta in Sibelius: I created this myself

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Figure 24: Fear a bhta in A Minor (no sharps or flats in the tune or the key signature): I created this myself Figure 25: Fear a bhta Stressed Beats Circled: I create d this myself Figure 26: Fear a bhta Adjusted for the natural scale: I created this myself Figure 27: Eilean an Fhraoich from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885: from http://archive.org/ Figure 28: Eilean an Fhraoich from The Celtic Lyre c. 1885 in Sibelius: I created this myself Figure 29: Henfenfeld in Sibelius: I created this myself Figure 30: Original Am fleasgach donn: from http://archive.org/ Figure 31: Am fleasgach donn in Sibelius: I created this myself Figure 32: Am fleasgach donn Adjusted to C major: I created this myself Figure 33: Am fleasgach donn Some Stressed Notes Highlighted: I created this myself Figure 34: Am fleasgach donn Brought Down an Octave: I created this myself Figure 35: Am fleasgach donn Natural Scale Stressed Beats Highlighted: I created this myself Figure 36: Am fleasgach donn Natural Stressed Notes in Red, Diatonic in Blue: I created this myself Figure 37: Am fleasgach donn Corrected to the natural scale: I created this myself Figure 38: Frre Jacques from Capelle, Pierre Adolphe 1811 La Cl Du Caveau, L'usage De Tous Les Chansonniers Franais, Des Amateurs, Auteurs, Acteurs Du Vaudeville & De Tous Les Amis De La Chanson, Paris: Capelle et Renard, de l'Impr. de Richomme, 309. Figure 39: Frre Jacques in Sibelius. Adjusted to C major: I created this myself Figure 40: Frre Jacques Brought Down an Octave: I created this myself Figure 41: The Natural Key Tuning for Harp: I created this myself Figure 42: The Scale Resulting from Natural Key Tuning: I created this myself Figure 43: The High Bass Tuning for Harp: I created this myself Figure 44: The Scale Resulting from High Bass Key Tuning: I created this myself Figure 45: Aligning Nodal Points on a Chanter: I created this myself Figure 46: A Comparison of the Concert Pitches of the Highland Bagpipes: I created this myself Figure 47: Bagpipes Written in both D major and A major: I created this myself Figure 48: Natural Trumpet in C and G-mixolydian Bagpipes: I created this myself Figure 49: Natural Trumpet in D and A-mixolydian Bagpipes: I created this myself Figure 50: Natural Trumpet in C, G-mixolydian Bagpipes and Harp Pitch Spectrum: I created this myself

56

Limited Bibliography
Altenberg, Johann Ernst. Versuch einer Anleitung zur heroisch-musikalischen Trompeter und PaukerKunst. (Trumpeters' and Kettledrummers' Art). Trans. Edward H. Tarr. Nashville: The Brass Press, 1974 (repr. 1795 ed.). Barclay, Robert. The Art of the Trumpet Maker . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Benade, Arthur. Fundamentals of Musical Acoustics . New York: Oxford University Press, 1976. Benade, Arthur. The Physics of Brasses Scientific American , July, 1973. Benade, Arthur. Horns, Strings and Harmony . New York: Anchor Books, 1960. Bendinelli, Cesare. Tutta l'arte della Trombetta (The Entire Art of Trumpet Playing ). Trans. Edward H. Tarr. Nashville: The Brass Press, 1975 (repr. 1614 ed.). Boswell, J. Boswell's Life of Johnson: Together with Boswell's Journal of a Tour of the Hebride s and Johnson's Diary of a Journey into North Wales . Edited by ed. Boswells Life of Johnson vol. III. Westminster: Archibald Constable & Co. Birrell, 1896. The Clarendon Press, 1896. Bradley, Seirse and Breathnach, Breandn. Ireland. In The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, edited by Stanley. Ed. Sadie. London: MacMillan Publishers, 1980. Breathnach, Breandn. Folk Music and Dances of Ireland . Cork: Ossian Publications, Ltd., 1996. Bronson, Bertrand H. Are the Modes Outmoded? Yearbook of the International Folk Music Council 4 (1972): 23-31. Bronson, Bertrand H. Folksong and the Modes. The Musical Quarterly 32, no. 1 (1946): 37-49. Bunting, Edward. The Ancient Music of Ireland: An Edition Comprising the Three Collections by Edward Bunting Originally Published in 1796, 1809 and 1840 . Dublin: Waltons' Piano and Musical Instrument Galleries, 1969. Cazden, Norman. "A Simplified Mode Classification for Traditional Anglo-American Song Tunes." Yearbook of the International Folk Music Council 3 (1971): 45-78. Collinson, Francis. The Traditional and National Music of Scotland . London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1966. Culwick, J.C. Distintive Charictaristics of Ancient Irish Melody: The Scales . Vol. 31897. Dauney, W., and F. Dun. Ancient Scotish Melodies: From a Manuscript of the Reign of King James Vi: With an Introductory Enquiry Illustrative of the History of the Music of Scotland : Edinburgh Printing and Pub. Co., 1838. Fantini, Girolamo. Modo per Imparare a Sonare di Tromba . Trans, E. H. Tarr. Nashville: The Brass Press, 1978 (repr. 1638 ed.). Make sure you get the full book and not the small, separate introduction. Foss, George. "A Methodology for the Description and Classification of Anglo-American Traditional Tunes." Journal of the Folklore Institute 4, no. 1 (1967): 102-26. Gilchrist, Annie G. "Note on the Modal System of Gaelic Tunes." Journal of the Folk-Song Society 4, no. 16 (1911): 150-53. Grattan-Flood, William H. . A History of Irish Music , Book. Dublin: Browne and Nolan Limited, 1905. Groven, Eivind. Naturskalaen; Tonale Lover I Norsk Folkemusikk Bundne Til Seljeflyta . Skien: Norsk folkekulturs forlag, 1927. See: https://archive.org/details/NaturskalaenTonaleLoverINorskFolkemusikkBundneTilSeljefloyta

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Hielscher, Kurt. Rumnien: Landschaft-Bauten-Volksleben . Leipzig: F.A. Brockhaus, 1938. Hirt, Aindrias. The Connection Between Fenian Lays, Liturgical Chant, Recitative, and Dn Dreach : a Pre-Medieval Narrative Song Tradition. Language and Power in the Celtic World: Papers from the Seventh Australian Conference of Celtic Studies (Anders Ahlqvist & Pamela ONeill, Ed.). Sydney, Australia. 2010. See: http://www.academia.edu/715967/The_Connection_Between_Fenian_Lays_Liturgical_Chant_Recitat ive_and_Dan_Direach_a_Pre-Medieval_Narrative_Song_Tradition Huldt-Nystrm, Hampus, and Reidar Sevg. "Norway." In The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, edited by Stanley. Ed. Sadie, 320-28. London: MacMillan Press Limited, 1980. Kennedy-Fraser, Marjory. Songs of the Hebrides . 3 vols. Vol. 1. London: Boosey and Co., 1909. MacDonald, Donald. Irish Music and Irish Scales . London: Breitkopf and Hrtel, c.1900. McCormick, Scott. "Scale and Structure in Anglo-American Folk Songs: An Analysis of Child Ballads in the Sharp Collection." Ph.D. Thesis, 1989. Boyle, San. The Irish Song Tradition . Toronto: MacMillan of Canada, 1977. Riada, Sen. Our Musical Heritage. Mountrath, Ireland: The Dolmen Press, 1982. Roseborrough, Andrew Jay. "The Modern Pedagogical Potential of the Baroque Natural Trumpet." (Ph.D. Thesis) University of Miami, 2010. Sachs, Curt. The History of Musical Instruments . New York: W.W. Norton and Co. Inc., 1940. Shanahan, Daniel, and David Huron. "Interval Size and Phrase Position: A Comparison between German and Chinese Folksongs." Empirical Musicology Review Vol. 6, No. 4 (2011): 187-97. Sharp, Cecil J. English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians. Edited by Maud Karpeles. 2 vols. London: Oxford University Press, 1932. Shields, Hugh. Tunes of the Munster Pipers: Irish Traditional Music from the James Goodman Manuscripts. Dublin: Irish Traditional Music Archive, 1998. Smithers, Don. The Music and History of the Baroque Trumpet Before 1721 . Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 1973. Tarr, Edward. The Trumpet. Portland, Oregon: Amadeus Press, 1988. His short entry in the Groves Dictionary under trumpet, is short but informative a s well. Vincent, J. The Diatonic Modes in Modern Music : University of California Press, 1951. Whyte, Henry. The Celtic Lyre . Edited by Ed. Truman Matheson and Musical Ed. Aindrias Hirt. 2012 ed. St. Andrews, Canada: Sol Cultural Enterprises, 1885. See: http://www.academia.edu/1536150/The_Celtic_Lyre-Preface

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