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IN THREE PARTS APPENDIX 1151
scripts indicate that the original phrase has been transposed
upward or downward. Thus, A^ means a repeat
of phrase A, transposed upward a third, whUe A4 would
indicate an A phrase transposed downward a fourth.
There is a tendency for the last phrase to become
progressively shortened as the melody is repeated. The
final phrase may simply be broken off, or the principal
singer may interrupt himself in order to caU out directions
to others. (These caUs are so important that they
are apt to be given even by one who is singing alone.) A
phrase that is broken off is indicated by a slash: for
example, E/ or X/. A double slash, as X//, means even
more abbreviation. Such incomplete phrases may also
occur in the middle of a song. Sometimes a singer may
hesitate at the beginning of a song, or some other factor
may operate so that the initial refrain appears as a
reduced version of the melody. A phrase that is incomplete
at the beginning may be indicated as: /A or /X.
Clearings of the throat, comments, calls of the song
leader, or other "interruptions" are most apt to occur
within the last phrase, as if "the singer thinks that the
main business of the song is now over and that this
phrase is not very important," WhUe coughs are tolerated
when the singer is as respected and venerated as
Frank Italio or Mrs, Frank Dick, the latter indicated
quite clearly that such noises are to be deprecated.
The song is apt to be resumed after such an interruption
just as if there had been no break. The song leader's
caUs, however, are an integral feature of the musical
style and, when given, take the place of one or more
syUables of the song. The latter may be carried by
another singer. To some songs, special cries (Raven
caws, Tsimshian whistling caUs) are traditionaUy added
at or near the end of the melody.
Most Yakutat songs are "strongly rhythmic, very
syncopated, the most so in my experience of American
Indian music, ... In hne with this flair for syncope,
drununing is often on alternate beats, and when this is
the case, almost every long note begins on the offbeat,"
Such drumming is usuaUy so regular that it is sufficient
to indicate the beats only at the beginning of the song.
A tremulo effect is occasionaUy employed when attempting
to indicate the noise of a rattle.
Although the Yakutat TUngit liked to acquire foreign
songs, there was a strong tendency to fit these into their
own style. Songs which depart markedly from the
Tlingit pattern, even though they may have Tlingit
words, I suspect to be of foreign origin. On the other
hand, the most aberrant of aU (1952, 7-2-A and 7-2-B)
are traditional Raven Moiety songs referring to Raven's
Theft of Dayhght, and are beheved to be very ancient
Thngit songs,
Agi Jambor has made the foUowing observations on
the songs:
"It is almost paradoxical to try to transcribe aboriginal
Indian music in Western musical notation.
It is as if we would explain a pear by means of an
apple. Our notation preserves with ahnost a shorthand
technique a musical style which is more or less
systematized. Between the sources and the manifestation—that
is, between our soul and the music—is
our Western knowledge of that art, Minnie Johnson
expressed it so beautifuUy on one of her tapes:
'Nobody taught me this song; it hved in my heart.'
Our feehngs have finer shadings than the 12 notes of
a scale or the musical forms that we have to foUow in
our compositions.
"The performance of Thngit music is an organic
part of the composition, and sometimes speech and
melody cannot be divorced from each other. To quote
Minnie Johnson again: 'My grandmother was crying
and singing, singing and crying.' Where did the
crying end and the singing begin? And when she
explained the reason for composing her childrens'
songs, she said: 'I compose them to make my grandchildren
happy. It is a laughing music'
"How can we put this down, these infinite shadings
of the human soul, with our musical notations?
"When singing these songs we should always see
behind the five fines and httle black dots Minnie
Johnson who didn't learn her songs; they hved in her
heart."