Phrasing, if steps are words, phrases are....

[albanaich]

Well actually - its a bit more complex than that. It's Greek v Anglo saxon verse forms and rhythm. Coleridge v Manely Hopkins.

if we compare African music and rhythms, they are much closer to Gaelic folk music than they are to formal European forms - the same could be said of dance.

[elisedance]

Interesting analogy.  Could you expand on the coleridge vs hopkins theme?

[Bordertangoman]

so its tone not timing you're saying?  but surely the timing difference is a factor...
besides the problem is not that I didn't do my homework but that I did it on the wrong asignment

the difference between staccato and legato but now i'm using musical terms because my example wasnt clear enough.

[albanaich]

Coleridge wrote in 'strict tempo' while Hopkins altered the stress, as is done ins Swing and Jazz music

Best done by example I think. . . . .. . this is Wordsworth (who wrote in a similar style to Coleridge). It's strict temp, dum di dum di dum.

MY heart leaps up when I behold   
  A rainbow in the sky:   
So was it when my life began,   
  So is it now I am a man,   
So be it when I shall grow old            5
    Or let me die!   
The child is father of the man:   
And I could wish my days to be   
Bound each to each by natural piety

Contrast wth Hopkins - if you're not acquainted with Anglo Saxon verse form you'll have to read it aloud a few times before it gels, the rhythm is not apparent until you listen to it (like swing music) Then you'll think Wow!!! The accents are there to help you see where the stree lies.

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies dráw fláme;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves - goes itself; myself it speak and spells,
Crying Whát I do is me: for thatI came.

Í say móre: the just man justices;
Kéeps grace: thát keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is -
Chríst - for Christ play in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men's faces.

This is considered the oldest piece of 'English Literature. It's a beauty.

http://www.soton.ac.uk/~enm/deor.htm

out loud

http://fred.wheatonma.edu/wordpressmu/mdrout/?s=Deor

A comparison to Gaelic....note she is not singing in the musical sense, but like Deor, telling a story.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvLe1ui0npM&feature=related

[elisedance]

very nice - thanks..

[albanaich]

The Hopkins piece is very clever. . . . . .

Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;

Notice the stress, on the first syllable of each word in the top line is like the plucking of a guitar string - sound, rhythm and imagery are one, the second line is similar, but this time it is one the last syllable of the word that is empghasised, so as to give the impression of swinging church bell.

We wouldn't normally emphasise the words that way, which is why the first couple of times you read it its difficult to pronouce. You have to 'feel' the rhythm