The Melodic Orange

The Melodic Orange is a form of music used for entertainment originating in The Doorstop of Spiny-Dogfishes. The rules of the form are applied by composers to produce individual pieces of music which can be performed. A singer recites nonsensical words and sounds while the music is played on a ngtuk. The musical voices bring melody with harmony. The entire performance should be vigorous and accelerates as it proceeds, and it is to become louder and louder. The melody has phrases of varied length throughout the form. The voice ranges from the low register to the middle register.

• The Melodic Orange has the following structure: a theme and a series of variations on the theme possibly all repeated.
• The theme is voiced by the melody of the ngtuk. Only one pitch is ever played at a time in this passage. The passage is performed using the tinos scale and in the sak rhythm.
• The series of variations is voiced by the melody of the singer reciting nonsensical words and sounds and the harmony of the ngtuk. This passage features only melodic tones and intervals. The passage is performed using the kekorith scale and in the rokul rhythm.
• Scales are constructed from fourteen notes dividing the octave. In quartertones, their spacing is roughly 1-x-x-x-x-xx-xx-x-xx-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. After a scale is constructed, notes are named according to degree. The names are vazast (spoken va), mudesod (mu), liloran (li), toker (to), madensham (ma), imkekir (imk) and rekom (re).
• The tinos pentatonic scale is constructed by selection of degrees from the fundamental scale. The degrees selected are the 1st, the 4th, the 6th, the 10th and the 13th.
• The kekorith heptatonic scale is constructed by selection of degrees from the fundamental scale. The degrees selected are the 1st, the 2nd, the 4th, the 7th, the 10th, the 12th and the 13th.
• The sak rhythm is made from two patterns: the tamosh and the lesul. The patterns are to be played in the same beat, allowing one to repeat before the other is concluded.
• The tamosh rhythm is a single line with seven beats. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | - - - - - x - |
• where x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.
• The lesul rhythm is a single line with four beats. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | x x'x x |
• where ' marks a beat as late, x is a beat and | indicates a bar.
• The rokul rhythm is made from two patterns: the lesul and the ozol. The patterns are to be played in the same beat, allowing one to repeat before the other is concluded.
• The ozol rhythm is a single line with three beats. The beats are named mer (spoken me), zulal (zu) and kistek (ki). The beat is stressed as follows:
• | x x'x |
• where ' marks a beat as late, x is a beat and | indicates a bar.

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