The Musicianly Sprig

The Musicianly Sprig is a devotional form of music originating in The Confederacy of Dowels. The rules of the form are applied by composers to produce individual pieces of music which can be performed. The music is played on a necbeh, a ijatamng, a ime and a shac. The music is melody and rhythm without harmony. The entire performance is consistently slowing. The melody has mid-length phrases throughout the form. It is performed using the furithali scale and in the warosp rhythm. Throughout, when possible, composers and performers are to locally improvise. From beginning to end, when improvising or composing, artists should sometimes include a rising-falling melody pattern with sharpened fifth degree on the rise as well as trills and legato, sometimes include a falling-rising melody pattern with grace notes, mordents and legato, often include a rising melody pattern with sharpened seventh degree as well as rapid runs and arpeggios and sometimes include a falling melody pattern with mordents.

• The necbeh always should feel mournful.
• The ijatamng always does the main melody and should be melancholic. The voice uses its entire range from the piercing low register to the strident high register.
• The ime always should evoke tears.
• The shac always should be fiery.
• The Musicianly Sprig has the following structure: a theme and a lengthy series of variations on the theme possibly all repeated.
• The theme is voiced by the melody of the necbeh, the melody of the ijatamng, the melody of the ime and the melody of the shac. The passage is to be soft. This passage features only melodic tones and intervals.
• The series of variations is voiced by the melody of the ijatamng and the rhythm of the shac. The passage is to be loud. This passage is richly layered with full chords making use of the available range. The passage should be composed and performed using legato.
• Scales are constructed from twenty-four notes spaced evenly throughout the octave. The tonic note is fixed only at the time of performance.
• The furithali heptatonic scale is thought of as joined chords spanning a perfect fifth and a perfect fourth. These chords are named deh and iquur.
• The deh pentachord is the 1st, the 4th, the 6th, the 12th and the 15th degrees of the quartertone octave scale.
• The iquur tetrachord is the 15th, the 18th, the 20th and the 25th (completing the octave) degrees of the quartertone octave scale.
• The warosp rhythm is made from two patterns: the vishages and the pethrebinpu. The patterns are to be played over the same period of time, concluding together regardless of beat number.
• The vishages rhythm is a single line with four beats divided into two bars in a 2-2 pattern. The beats are named kungujith (spoken ku) and udal (ud). The beat is stressed as follows:
• | - x | - x |
• where x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.
• The pethrebinpu rhythm is a single line with two beats. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | x x |
• where x is a beat and | indicates a bar.

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