Page:One Hundred English Folksongs (1916).djvu/17

 It will be seen that more than half of the tunes here presented are cast in one or other of the ancient (excluding the major, or “”), the forerunners of our modern scales. Hitherto, musicians have regarded these modes as relics of a bygone era, which were employed in the early days of the history of music in default of something better, but were eventually discarded (circa 1600) in favor of a scale-system better suited to modern requirements. But the diatonic mode is the natural idiom of the English peasant, not one, be it noted, originally acquired from without, but one which he evolved from his own instinct. That the mode has always been, and is still, his natural vehicle of melodic expression, and that it should not, therefore, be regarded in any way as evidence of antiquity, is shown by the manner in which the folksinger will frequently translate into on or other of the modes the “composed” songs which he takes into his repertory. The model character of so many folksongs has no doubt brought this question very prominently before musicians. For here we have scores of melodies which, although cast in scales long since discarded by the art-musician, nevertheless throb with the pulse of life and make a strong appeal to modern musical taste and feeling. Manifestly, such tunes as these cannot be quietly dismissed as mediæval survivals and relegated, as such, to the lumber room. They reveal, rather, a new species of meloldy suggesting many possibilities to the composer of the present day.

The modes commonly used by the English peasant are the (typified by the white-note scale of A), the  (white-note scale of D), and the  (white-note scale of G). The (E) and the  (F) he uses but rarely; a dozen tunes in the former mode, and less that half that number in the latter are, perhaps, as many as English collector have as yet unearthed. Of the songs in this collection, twenty-seven are in the Æolian mode, twenty in the Dorian, and nine in the Mixolydian, while four, though modal, are irregular and cannot be concisely classified.

What form the ideal accompaniment to a folksong should take is question upon which many divergent views may legitimately be held. With the purist, a simple solution is to dispense with an accompaniment altogether, on the ground that it is an anachronism. But this is surely to handicap the folksong needlessly and to its detriment. For just as it takes an artist to appraise the value of a picture out of its frame, so its is only the exert who can extract the follfull [sic] flavor from an unharmonised melody. Musically we live in a harmonic age, where every one, consciously or subconsciously, thinks in chords; when even the man in the street is under the influence—if only he knew it—of the underlying harmonies of the popular air he is whistling. And herein lies one of the fondamental distinctions between folk and art-song. The former, in its purest form, being the product of those in whom the harmonic sense is dormant, is essentially a non-harmonic tune; whereas the the latter, of course, is demonstrably constructed upon a harmonic basis.

If, then, the need of an instrumental setting to the folksong be granted, we have next to consider what is its ideal form; and this, likewise, is largely a matter of individual taste. , for instance, advocates a frankly modern treatment. “The airs,” he says, “are for all time, their dress must vary with the fashion of a fraction of time.” Personally, I take a different view—and Sir Charles admits that there are two sides to the question. For it seems to me that of the many distinctive characteristics of the folk-air one of the most vital— at any rate, the one I would least willingly sacrifice— is that which makes it impossible to put a date or assign a period to it, which gives to the folk-air the quality of permanence, makes it impervious to the passage of time, and so enables it to satisfy equally the artistic ideal of every age. Now, if we follow Sir Charles Stanford’s advice and frankly decorate our folk-tunes with the fashionable harmonies of the day, we may make very beautiful and attractive music,—as Sir Charles has undoubtedly done,—but we shall effectually rob them of their most characteristic