One point must be very distinctly understood, namely, that what we call harmonization of a melody cannot be admitted as forming any part of folk song.  Folk melodies are, without exception, homophonous.  This being the case, perhaps my statement that the vital principle of folk music in its best state has nothing in common with nationalism (considered in the usual sense of the word), will be better understood.  And this will be the proof that nationalism, so-called, is merely an extraneous thing that has no part in pure art.  For if we take any melody, even of the most pronounced national type, and merely eliminate the characteristic turns, affectations, or mannerisms, the theme becomes simply music, and retains no touch of nationality.  We may even go further; for if we retain the characteristic mannerisms of dress, we may harmonize a folk song in such a manner that it will belie its origin; and by means of this powerful factor (an essentially modern invention) we may even transform a Scotch song, with all its “snap” and character, into a Chinese song, or give it an Arabian flavour.  This, to be sure, is possible only to a limited degree; enough, however, to prove to us the power of harmony; and harmony, as I have said, has no part in folk song.

To define the role of harmony in music is no easy matter.  Just as speech has its shadow languages, gesture and expression; just as man is a duality of idealism and materialism; just as music itself is a union of the emotional and the intellectual, so harmony is the shadow language of melody; and just as in speech this shadow language overwhelms the spoken word, so in music harmony controls the melody.  For example:  Imagine the words “I will kill you” being said in a jesting tone of voice and with a pleasant expression of the face; the import of the words would be lost in their expression; the mere words would mean nothing to us in comparison with the expression that accompanied them.

Take away the harmonic structure upon which Wagner built his operas and it would be difficult to form a conception of the marvellous potency of his music.  Melody, therefore, may be classed as the gift of folk song to music; and harmony is its shadow language.  When these two powers, melody and harmony, supplement each other, when one completes the thought of the other, then, provided the thought be a noble one, the effect will be overwhelmingly convincing, and we have great music.  The contrary results when one contradicts the other, and that is only too often the case; for we hear the mildest waltzes dressed up in tragic and dramatic chords, which, like Bottom, “roar as gently as any sucking dove.”

In discussing the origin of speech, mention was made of those shadow languages which accompany all our spoken words, namely, the languages of expression and gesture.  These were surely the very first auxiliaries of uttered speech, and in the same way we find that they constitute the first sign of advance in primitive melody.  Savages utter the same thought over and over again, evidently groping after that semblance of Nirvana (or perhaps it may be better described as “hypnotic exaltation”) which the incessant repetition of that one thought, accompanied by its vibrating shadow, sound, would naturally occasion.