The Finger-Millet-Grain of Lyrics

The Finger-millet-grain of Lyrics is a form of music used during marches and military engagements originating in The Pincers of Moving. The form guides musicians during improvised performances. One to five singers recite nonsensical words and sounds while the music is played on a izesos. The music is melody and rhythm without harmony. The entire performance is at a free tempo. The melody has short phrases throughout the form. It is performed using the anon scale and in the goruk rhythm. Throughout, when possible, performers are to use grace notes, syncopate and add fills.

• Each singer always should perform with feeling.
• The izesos always does the main melody and should perform sweetly.
• The Finger-millet-grain of Lyrics has a well-defined multi-passage structure: an introduction and a chorus and a verse.
• The introduction is voiced by the melody of the singers reciting nonsensical words and sounds and the melody of the izesos. The passage is to become softer and softer. Each of the singers' voices ranges from the middle register to the high register and the izesos ranges from the crisp middle register to the dull high register. This passage is richly layered with full chords making use of the available range.
• The chorus is voiced by the melody of the singers reciting nonsensical words and sounds and the melody of the izesos. The passage is to be moderately soft. Each of the singers' voices stays in the middle register and the izesos stays in the crisp low register. Only one pitch is ever played at a time in this passage.
• The verse is voiced by the melody of the izesos and the rhythm of the singers reciting nonsensical words and sounds. The passage is to be soft. The izesos ranges from the crisp middle register to the dull high register and each of the singers' voices stays in the low register. Chords are packed close together in dense clusters in this passage.
• Scales are conceived of as two chords built using a division of the perfect fourth interval into eight notes. The tonic note is a fixed tone passed from teacher to student.
• As always, the anon hexatonic scale is thought of as two disjoint chords drawn from the fundamental division of the perfect fourth. These chords are named un and ong.
• The un trichord is the 1st, the 4th and the 8th degrees of the fundamental perfect fourth division.
• The ong tetrachord is the 1st, the 3rd, the 4th and the 8th degrees of the fundamental perfect fourth division.
• The goruk rhythm is made from two patterns: the comthad and the tamosh. The patterns are to be played over the same period of time, concluding together regardless of beat number.
• The comthad rhythm is a single line with seven beats. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | x - x - x`- x |
• where ` marks a beat as early, x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.
• The tamosh rhythm is a single line with three beats. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | - x x`|
• where ` marks a beat as early, x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.

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