Ex 11b: here it is claimed that the slurred notes have been picked out for the message, but in fact another note (the fourth) is also slurred in the Complete Edition.Įx 12: Instead of musically phrases, we here enter a new domain: that of picking out the accent signs, even if separated by 16 bars, and looking for messages in the series of accented notes. The second note, E in Ex 11a, can be made to yield letter O by calling it Fb by the other method, a double flat would have been needed, and even Mr Sams has not admitted this degree of “flexibility”. Why? Because shifting the mode does not yield the desired message. (Sams blames Schumann for this!) Moreover, in both this and Ex 11b a new device has been introduced: transposition of the music, instead of shifting the mode of the cipher as originally described. The rest of the message has two letters omitted. And this despite the fact that the cipher already allows a choice of at least six letters for any note, and a further choice of seven “modes” (produced by shifting the cipher along the scale).Įx 11a: the word Clara carries no weight, since the cipher has been constructed so that that phrase will yield the word Clara. But we find that in every case but one he has to allow some special extension of the cipher or breach of the rules or other “fiddle”, before the notes can be made Io yield the desired significant words. He gives us the cipher (Ex 10) along with the rules for its application, and then proceeds to apply it to Schumann's music. This piece of research is not likely to be undertaken, but I have described it to show how very far Mr Sams is from having given his cipher any real test. Meanwhile a statistician would calculate the number of words he would expect to emerge from the piece by chance alone. This piece, which would have to be one not previously examined in connection with the code, would then be thoroughly explored for coded words, using the rules but not allowing the slightest deviation from them apart from those specified in advance. One would also require a strict definition of the kinds of musical themes or other combinations in which Mr Sams thinks one may look for words and a list of German words, however many there might be, which he would regard as significant if found in a particular piece by Schumann. The other way to test Mr Sams' theory would be to ask him to lay down in advance of the test all the rules of his code, including all the ways in which he considers it possible that Schumann might have extended or broken the rules. You did try something of the kind, but mistakenly dismissed it as “irrelevant”. Instead of asking readers to try the cipher on more works by Schumann, you might more profitably have asked them to see if they could build up an equally convincing case for the use of the cipher by, for example, Handel. As Henry Moule used to say, it is a pity that musicologists are not made to learn a little elementary statistics. Neither you, Sir, nor Mr Sams seems to have it clearly in mind that any “test” of the cipher should primarily seek to show that the second of these alternatives is unlikely. This high productivity of the cipher from Schumann's music can be explained in two ways: either that Schumann was using it, or that its rules allow so many options that it can be made to extract words from any musical material. If this were a game it was a very agreeable one” (my italics). As he so aptly remarks, “it seemed that given patience the cipher could be trained to speak whole sentences even if in a halting and stilted way.
There is no doubt at all that the cipher constructed by Mr Sams can be used to turn words into musical phrases. Powered by primi sui motori con e-max Schumann and the Cipher - Letters and Comments on Eric Sams's Essay
0 kommentar(er)
