Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

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594 SONG
contemptuously termed il modo lasdAio, this
popular scale triumphantly survived the collapse
of the Gregorian system, and has formed
the basis of our modern system of scales and
keys.
Of secular songs antecedent to the middle of
the 16th century few have come down to us.
The principal relics are the songs in the Fayrfax
MS. 1 This manuscript, which once belonged
to and was probably written down by Dr. Eobert
Fayrfax, an eminent composer of the reigns of
Henry VII. and Henry VIII. , consists of fortynine
songs by the best musicians of that time.^
They are all written in 2, 3, and 4 parts in the
contrapuntal style ; some in the mixed measure
—four-time in the one part and three-time in
another—which was common at the end of the
15th century. But owing to the want of bars
the time is often difficult to discover, and there
is also a great confusion of accents. During
the latter half of the 16th century musicians of
the first rank seldom composed airs of the short
rhythmical kind appropriate to ballads, and
poets rarely wrote in this metre, for balladwriting
had become a separate employment.
It should also be noted that English Church
composers did not take popular or folk-songs
for the subjects of their masses and motets as
was the custom in foreign countries, though
they were freely used as themes for variations,
or canti fermi for polyphonic works by instrumental
composers.
In Queen Elizabeth's reign music was generally
cultivated, and song was universal
'
tinkers sang catches ; milkmaids sang ballads ;
carters whistled ; each trade, even the beggars,
had their special songs.' ^ The best -known
songs of this period from 1558 to 1603 were The
'
Carman's Whistle,' 'All in a Garden Green,'
'Duloina,' 'The British Grenadiers,' 'Death
and the Lady,'* 'Near Woodstock Town,'
'Light o' Love,' 'Children in the Wood,'^
'
The Bailiff's Daughter of Islington,' Willow
'
Song,'" 'Greensleeves,' 'The Friar of Orders
Gray,' '0 Death, rock me asleep,' ' and 'Frog
Galliard. ' This last song by John Dowland is
almost the only instance to be found in the
Elizabethan period of a favourite folk -tune
known to have come from the hand of a celebrated
composer. Dowland originally wrote it
as a part-song to the words, ' Now, now, I
needs must part,' but afterwards adapted it for
s Bumey, ii. 539. 3 chappell, i. 59.
4 A series of ballads from
'
The Dance of Death.'
6 Chevy Ohace ' ' was sung to this tune.
6 A ' poor soul sat sighing.'
7 This was the first ballad known to have an independent accompaniment
; it was for the lute. Chappell, i. 111.
one voice with accompaniment for the lute.
This practice of writing songs for either one or
many voices seems to have been common in
England, as in Italy ;
and in both countries
the lute or theorbo sustained the under parts
when sung by one voice. Dowland's contemporary,
Thomas Ford, published songs for
one or four voices, one of which, ' Since first I
saw your face, ' not only still retains its popularity,
but is remarkable as being one of the
earliest melodies written by a trained musician
in modern tonality. William Byrd's adoption
of the Carman's Whistle ' ' in the Fitzwilliam
Virginal Book is well known ; it is a dancetune,
and so also is ' Greensleeves,' and many
others. In fact, nearly all the dance-tunes
contained in these, and somewliat later collections
of lute and virginal music, are the most
valuable sources we possess for accurate and
trustworthy versions of the music of the folksongs.
They are trustworthy because they were
written down at the time by skilled musicians,
and therefore escaped the risks of transmission
by ear alone. The names or words of many
ballads are handed down to posterity in the
works of Shakespeare' and other Elizabethan
dramatists.*
A few words may be introduced here on the
form of popular English ballads, or, in other
words, folk-songs.'" In dance, or march, or
ballad music which has grown from the recitation
of words to a chant, or to a short rhythmical
tune, the musical design is found to reside chiefly
in the rhythm, and not in the balance of keys.
The ordinary rhythm of ballads was the even
fashion of four-bar phrases, as, for instance, in
'
:
The hunt is up '
Ex. 2.
T?ie Hvmt is up.
1st Phrase. 1 2.34
igii^^^p^^^
The hunt is up, the hunt is up, and it ie well nigh day;
2nd Phrase. 1 2 3 4
And Harry our King is gone hunting to bring his deer to bay.
The three-bar phrase rhythm is generally met
with in the jig and hornpipe tunes of England,
such as 'Bartholomew Fair,* but it sometimes
occurs in songs of other kinds. Of the rhythm
in My ' little pretty one,* which has three
phrases of two bars each, and a fourth of three
bars, there are several other examples ; and,
8 The following are aome of the ballads ShaTcespeare refora to:
'The hunt is up,' ' Heartsease.' 'Willow, Willow,' ' It was a lover
' ' '
and his lass,' OreenBleeves,' Under the greenwood tree,' Bonny
Sweet Robin,' etc.
8 '
Ben Jonson'a poem, Drink to me only,' Is for ever associated
with the equally beautiful 18th- century time ascribed to Col.
Melliflh, about TTOO.
10 The word
*
ballad ' was applied in a loose senae to every kind of
song. The ballad ot this period and, indeed, np to the 18th century,
usually means 'pieces of narrative verse In stanzas,' the mnaic of
the first st&nza betng repeated for every successive one. It was
also used in England for that which in other countries is designated
a ' folk-aong,' and this term has of recent years been also accepted
in England for any form of song which essentially belongs to the
people.