The Ripe Flower

The Ripe Flower is a form of music used to commemorate important events originating in The Bamboo of Enlarging. The form guides musicians during improvised performances. The music is played on a vecethi, a newo and a ulabe. The musical voices join in melody and counterpoint, harmony and rhythm. The entire performance accelerates as it proceeds. The counterpoint melody has short phrases throughout the form. It is performed using the ifiyo scale and in the omarime rhythm. Throughout, when possible, performers are to syncopate.

• The vecethi always should evoke tears.
• The newo always should be jumpy.
• The ulabe always should evoke tears.
• The Ripe Flower has a well-defined multi-passage structure: a theme and a series of variations on the theme, a bridge-passage and a brief finale.
• The theme is voiced by the melody of the vecethi, the melody of the ulabe and the rhythm of the newo. The passage is to become louder and louder. The passage has short phrases in the melody. This passage is richly layered with full chords making use of the available range.
• The series of variations is voiced by the melody of the newo, the melody of the ulabe and the counterpoint of the vecethi. The passage is to be soft. The passage has short phrases in the melody. This passage is richly layered with full chords making use of the available range.
• The bridge-passage is voiced by the melody of the newo, the harmony of the vecethi and the harmony of the ulabe. The passage is to become softer and softer. The passage has long phrases in the melody. Chords are packed close together in dense clusters in this passage.
• The finale is voiced by the melody of the vecethi and the melody of the newo. The passage is to be in whispered undertones. The passage has short phrases in the melody. This passage features only melodic tones and intervals. The passage should be performed using legato.
• Scales are constructed from twelve notes dividing the octave. In quartertones, their spacing is roughly 1-x--x-x-x-x-xx-x-x--x-xO, where 1 is the tonic, O marks the octave and x marks other notes. The tonic note is fixed only at the time of performance.
• The ifiyo heptatonic scale is constructed by selection of degrees from the fundamental scale. The degrees selected are the 1st, the 2nd, the 3rd, the 5th, the 6th, the 7th and the 8th.
• The omarime rhythm is made from two patterns: the tafalofi (considered the primary) and the emayethi. The patterns are to be played over the same period of time, concluding together regardless of beat number.
• The tafalofi rhythm is a single line with two beats. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | - x |
• where x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.
• The emayethi rhythm is a single line with ten beats divided into five bars in a 2-2-2-2-2 pattern. The beats are named ithi (spoken ith) and seyawi (se). The beat is stressed as follows:
• | x - | x`x | x - | x'- | x - |
• where ` marks a beat as early, ' marks a beat as late, x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.

Events