The Lacy Phrase

The Lacy Phrase is a form of music used for entertainment originating in The Gullies of Boarding. The form guides musicians during improvised performances. A speaker recites any composition of The Wooden Field while the music is played on a thefira and three thawa. The musical voices bring melody with harmony. The melody has phrases of varied length throughout the form. The music repeats for as long as necessary. It is performed in free rhythm. Throughout, when possible, performers are to use grace notes and play arpeggios.

• The speaker always should perform sweetly.
• The thefira always does the main melody and should be fiery.
• Each thawa always should be graceful. The voice uses its entire range from the heavy low register to the raspy high register.
• The Lacy Phrase has the following structure: a lengthy passage and an additional passage.
• The first simple passage is voiced by the melody of the thefira, the harmony of the thawa and the speaker. The passage gradually slows as it comes to an end, and it is to be soft. Only one pitch is ever played at a time in this passage. The passage is performed using the cebela scale. The passage should be performed using glides.
• The second simple passage is voiced by the melody of the thefira and the speaker. The passage gradually slows as it comes to an end, and it is to be moderately soft. This passage features only melodic tones and intervals. The passage is performed using the fidale scale.
• Scales are constructed from twenty-four notes spaced evenly throughout the octave. The tonic note is a fixed tone passed from teacher to student. After a scale is constructed, the root note of chords are named. The names are otoga (spoken ot) and dinade (di).
• The cebela hexatonic scale is thought of as two disjoint chords spanning two perfect fourths. These chords are named warere and fela.
• The warere trichord is the 1st, the 7th and the 11th degrees of the quartertone octave scale.
• The fela tetrachord is the 15th, the 17th, the 22nd and the 25th (completing the octave) degrees of the quartertone octave scale.
• The fidale hexatonic scale is thought of as two disjoint chords spanning two perfect fourths. These chords are named eyo and fela.
• The eyo trichord is the 1st, the 9th and the 11th degrees of the quartertone octave scale.

Events