Re: Musical conlangs

I remember - dimly to be sure - reading a while back about the use of
different-pitched drums in Africa to "speak", the change in pitches and the
general rhythm following speech rhythms so people could reportedly hold a
"conversation" via the drums.

I wish I knew just where I read that, though.

Wesley Parish

On Thursday 17 October 2002 02:17 am, Adrian Morgan wrote:
> The possibility of a true musical language occured to me a long time
> ago, but I haven't known - and don't know - if it's really possible.
> I can't prove that it isn't, though.
>
> By "true musical language" I mean to imply far more than a code that
> just happens to use notes as phonemes. A language where the word for
> "thief" happens to be mi-fa-re-do, for example, and every word in the
> lexicon has a similar mapping, is not a true musical language in this
> sense. I have in mind a language where morphemes correspond to
> collections of notes defined as obeying certain parameters, rather
> than as following precise sequences.
>
> These parameters would be flexible enough that any sentence could
> actually be tuneful, with a skilled player being able to make a more
> tuneful version of exactly the same sentence via ornamentations and so
> on, without changing the meaning, or changing it only in subtle ways
> such as emphasis. A study of music theory would be essential for
> designing such a language.
>
> I've had some ideas for a grammar:
>
> Let's suppose that a "stressed beat" is one in which the left hand
> plays a do-so cord (e.g. E and B if playing in the key of E), that a
> stressed beat is usually the first beat of a bar, but that not every
> first beat of a bar is stressed.
>
> Then perhaps: Two quick identical notes on a stressed beat (OSB)
> indicate the beginning of the subject phrase, two quick notes the
> second a tone above the first OSB indicates the beginning of the verb
> phrase, and two quick notes the second a tone below the first
> indicates the beginning of the object phrase.
>
> Or perhaps: If the second beat in a phrase is lower than the first
> then this indicates the first person in some form, if the second beat
> in a phrase contains two notes on either side of the notes on the
> first beat then this indicates the second person, and if the second
> beat in a phrase is higher than the first then this indicates a third
> person or object.
>
> Or perhaps: A verb can be made negative by delaying the first stress
> in its object phrase until the the third beat, or using a dummy object
> for object-less verbs.
>
> Or perhaps: A return to the key note (do) OSB indicates a pronoun
> similar to "it", referring to the object.
>
> These are miscellaneous ideas, and I'm not convinced of the
> possibility of such a project - you'd surely end up with morphemes
> being very long if they're to be flexible. It's just that: if it
> *could* be done, and could be done well, it would be a magnificent
> achievement.
>
> It's just a thought, and I must rush and cannot stop to proofread and
> tidy up this post, which has been written hastily.
>
> Adrian.
--
Mau e ki, "He aha te mea nui?"
You ask, "What is the most important thing?"
Maku e ki, "He tangata, he tangata, he tangata."
I reply, "It is people, it is people, it is people."

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