End-Accented Sentences: Towards a Theory of Phrase-Rhythmic Progression

Abstract

For centuries, theorists have debated whether musical phrases are normatively beginning-accented or end-accented. The last two decades of the twentieth century gave beginning-accented rhythm the upper hand; yet, recent work on end-accented phrases has reinvigorated the debate. I contribute to this discussion in two ways. First, I aim to rehabilitate a central position of end-accented rhythm by drawing attention to phrase-rhythmic tendencies in classical sentence structure. My analyses show that end-accented sentential schemas are well-established compositional options in various action spaces—including Primary and Secondary Themes—in late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century instrumental music. Moreover, integral roles of end-accented sentential themes are substantiated by their production—in tandem with their beginning-accented counterparts—of large-scale progressions analogous to tonal and formal ones. Awareness of these sentential themes re-energizes the century-old debate and deepens our understanding of phrase rhythm as a source of musical meaning. Second, in order to achieve the first goal, I develop a theory of phrase-rhythmic progression for categorizing phrase-rhythmic types and mapping their trajectories. This theory fills a gap in current spatial representations of rhythm and meter, which focus on metric dissonances and hierarchies without considerations of phrase–meter interaction.