The Flowery Lemon

The Flowery Lemon is a form of music used for entertainment originating in The Diagonal Sea-Monster. 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 abam. The melody has mid-length phrases throughout the form. Only one pitch is ever played at a time. It is performed in the orustrur rhythm. Throughout, when possible, composers and performers are to glide from note to note, use grace notes, play rapid runs and play arpeggios.

• The abam always does the main melody and should be spirited.
• The Flowery Lemon has a well-defined multi-passage structure: a theme, a bridge-passage and a series of variations on the theme.
• The theme is slow, and it is to become softer and softer. The passage is performed using the ragu scale.
• The bridge-passage is very fast, and it is to become softer and softer. The passage is performed without preference for a scale.
• The series of variations is very fast, and it is to be soft. The passage is performed using the daxst scale.
• Scales are constructed from eighteen notes dividing the octave. In quartertones, their spacing is roughly 1x-xxx-xx-x-xxxxxx-xx-xxO, 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 bagurod (spoken ba), sastospu (sa), assna (as), xuzestra (xu), roxstat (ro), tekug (te) and odo (od).
• The ragu hexatonic scale is constructed by selection of degrees from the fundamental scale. The degrees selected are the 1st, the 4th, the 5th, the 9th, the 13th and the 16th.
• The daxst heptatonic scale is constructed by selection of degrees from the fundamental scale. The degrees selected are the 1st, the 3rd, the 5th, the 7th, the 9th, the 10th and the 13th.
• The orustrur rhythm is made from two patterns: the strob (considered the primary) and the obst. The patterns are to be played over the same period of time, concluding together regardless of beat number.
• The strob rhythm is a single line with sixteen beats divided into four bars in a 4-4-4-4 pattern. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | x x - - | x - - - | x x - - | - x x x |
• where x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.
• The obst rhythm is a single line with four beats. The beat is stressed as follows:
• | - - - x |
• where x is a beat, - is silent and | indicates a bar.

Events