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Native American Songs With Sheet Music, Notation & Commentary

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	SNAKE SONG NO. 6	101
	COURSE OF TONE: SNAKE SONG No. 6 Observed.                                                7/bttcL
	Argument. An augmented tetrad built up, A, from a minor third, c'-a, and an augmented triad, c'-ga-e, pendent from its summit, is developed, B, by attaching the triad to its upper mediant, a, by a lap with the lower, a-(e)de-cd, and then transferred, C, to its original base, e-cd-GA. In this song a salient minor third followed by a downward triad spanning a minor sixth from its summit (A) is twice repeated; first (B) with the triad shifted down a minor third and attached to the third by a lap, then (C) with the whole movement as thus modified shifted down a fourth (the lap omitted in C2). The triads are variously divided, in B1 at de, in B2 at e with an added note, d, at the fifth, to which D2 returns in closing, and with which the principal notes of the texture outline two fifths lapping by a tritonus (a, ga-d, cd). Apart from these variations, the repetitions are in general very close; iden­tical between B1 and B2, and varying widely only in the first move­ment of C and in D. The interest of this song does not lie in flexibility of structure, of which it has none, unless a shift be in preparation in D2, but in the apparent dependence of its form upon after images of previous notes. The initial segment, A, epitomizes the composition. The downward triad attached to its topmost note, c', is in B attached to the next lower, a, with a lap reproducing the next lower (initial and dividing), ga; and the whole movement is in C suspended from the final and