African music is (was?) more rhythmically complex...

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

Well, assuming Africa/particular african societies have made comparable serious progress in music, music science and music theory in the last centuries like e.g. europe, then yes, we can try to compare african music with e.g. classical music.
I feel really sorry and don't go well with all those day dreamers out there, but my eyes tell me, no, we are two different worlds. This is not necessarily bad. I know people from ghana and can tell: completely different worlds in every department.

[Montpellier]

African "music" serves a different purpose to its society being associated with religion and ceremony.  It has been taking in by African popular music and expanded in the Caribbean where it mingled with many cultures.  Comparing or seeking it in western classical music doesn't seem productive.  Composers have quoted rhythms from many traditions but usually as a coloristic resource.  Occasionally a work of interest appears but I can't think of many using indigenous African music.     

[(poco) Sforzando]

I can't quite understand why this has been allowed to pass uncommented upon.

As a newcomer, call it just careless skimming on my part. But of course everything you say is 100% accurate - meters like 2/8, 3/8, 9/4, 12/16, etc. being nothing more than simple triple or duple - and there are certainly no examples of 11s or 7s in Bach or Beethoven. And in pre-20th-century music, even the occasional use of 5/4 time signatures - as Tchaikovsky does in the 6th symphony and one of the divertissements in the Sleeping Beauty - is not evidence per se of especial rhythmic complexity. In both cases, once the basic rhythmic/melodic motific patterns are set, there is little if any rhythmic variation. Also, the occasional use of 5/4 in Western music, at least in examples like the mad scene from Handel's Orlando or the climax of Tristan's frenzy in Act 3 of Wagner's opera, is specifically associated with mental breakdown.

What you do find in a composer like Mozart is unusual phrase lengths of music in common meter. The opening of the Marriage of Figaro overture consists of a first phrase of 7 4/4 bars (3+4), then a phrase of 4 (2+2), and then one of 6, before the whole pattern repeats. But despite this degree of rhythmic flexibility, comparing a Western musical language to the African is such an apples-to-orange proposition as to be meaningless.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Gunther Schuller fails to mention that 'negroes' have a genetic advantage in reaction time, endurance and muscular strength, which is why today they dominate sports, even though they represent circa 10% of the population (do the math).

What does this have to do with the rhythmic complexity of African music?

[karlhenning]

A self imposed limitation.

No, but that's an assertion you are unsuccessfully seeking to impose on the discussion.

As opposed to playing cultural egalitarianism

Strawman.  You must enjoy those, eh?

[karlhenning]

African "music" serves a different purpose to its society being associated with religion and ceremony.

Sort of like plainchant, roughly speaking.

[karlhenning]

And in pre-20th-century music, even the occasional use of 5/4 time signatures - as Tchaikovsky does in the 6th symphony and one of the divertissements in the Sleeping Beauty - is not evidence per se of especial rhythmic complexity. In both cases, once the basic rhythmic/melodic motific patterns are set, there is little if any rhythmic variation.

Actually, while the general idea that Tchaikovsky sets a pattern which repeats for a time is sound enough (something which I also found true in the African drumming seminar I've mentioned), there is more suppleness in his rhythmic play in the quasi-Valse of the Sixth Symphony than you give him credit for.  The A sections are based on a two-bar pattern of [( 3 + 2) + (2 + 3)], and the B section is a fairly steady [2 + 3] pulse.

[karlhenning]

Gunther Schuller fails to mention that 'negroes' have a genetic advantage in reaction time, endurance and muscular strength, which is why today they dominate sports, even though they represent circa 10% of the population (do the math).

When you make remarks like this, there is a rich irony in your calling anything "primitive."

[Josquin des Prez]

Sort of like plainchant, roughly speaking.

Or the choral music of Bach, roughly speaking.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Actually, while the general idea that Tchaikovsky sets a pattern which repeats for a time is sound enough (something which I also found true in the African drumming seminar I've mentioned), there is more suppleness in his rhythmic play in the quasi-Valse of the Sixth Symphony than you give him credit for.  The A sections are based on a two-bar pattern of [( 3 + 2) + (2 + 3)], and the B section is a fairly steady [2 + 3] pulse.

I can't find a score online to add as an image, but I hear the entire movement as 2+3. Think of the first two bars:
F# G (quarters) | AGA (quarter triplet) B C# (quarters)
D B (quarters) | C# (dotted half)

I don't hear it as:
F# G (quarters) AGA (quarter triplet) | B C# (quarters)
D B (quarters) | C# (dotted half)

Suppleness there certainly is, but it arises more from variations in the melodic curve than from strictly rhythmic means.

[karlhenning]

I can't find a score online to add as an image, but I hear the entire movement as 2+3. Think of the first two bars:
F# G# (quarters) | AG#A (quarter triplet) B C# (quarters)
D B (quarters) | C# (dotted half)

I don't hear it as:
F# G# (quarters) AG#A (quarter triplet) | B C# (quarters)
D B (quarters) | C# (dotted half)

This can depend upon performance/interpretation, I guess.  I do generally hear those triplets as a pickup;  I think it a little unmusical to "push" that triplet figure as a metrical accent.

[(poco) Sforzando]

This can depend upon performance/interpretation, I guess.  I do generally hear those triplets as a pickup;  I think it a little unmusical to "push" that triplet figure as a metrical accent.

I will have to check the score tonight in order to respond. It never felt "unmusical" to me to hear the pattern as 2+3.

[karlhenning]

That's all right; chalk it up to personal taste.

[gmstudio]

African "music" serves a different purpose to its society being associated with religion and ceremony. 

As one would learn in any Music History 101 class, our classical cannon has exactly the same roots.

[karlhenning]

Minor erratum: you mean canon, with one interior n.

[Florestan]

I couldn't care less about time signatures and the arithmetic of rythms, be they European, African or Klingonian. What I care for is feelings, emotions and thoughts expressed by the music. African drumming can be 10.000 times more complex than a string quartet, or the other way around; if it says nothing to my soul, I have no use for it.

[karlhenning]

I want to write a piece for string quartet and three drummers.

[Florestan]

I want to write a piece for string quartet and three drummers.

I can hardly wait to hear it! 

[MN Dave]

I couldn't care less about time signatures and the arithmetic of rythms, be they European, African or Klingonian. What I care for is feelings, emotions and thoughts expressed by the music. African drumming can be 10.000 times more complex than a string quartet, or the other way around; if it says nothing to my soul, I have no use for it.

Of course.

[Josquin des Prez]

What does this have to do with the rhythmic complexity of African music?

Well, let's see, an art form that is based entirely on improvisation, interaction and reaction time. I'd say physical capability would dictate how far such an art could go.