What's a Glee?

Subject: What's a Glee?
From: Jacob B
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 11:39 AM

I understand that the reason that Glee Clubs are called Glee Clubs is because they originally sang Glees. According to the dictionary, a glee is "A part song scored for three or more usually male and unaccompanied voices that was popular in the 18th century", but that definition doesn't tell me anything about what distinguishes a glee from other types of part songs. Can anyone explain what makes a glee a glee, and can you give an example?

While I'm at it, what about other terms for kinds of part songs? The dictionary says a catch is "A canonic, often rhythmically intricate composition for three or more voices, popular especially in the 17th and 18th centuries." What makes a catch a catch? Is the round "Come Hither Tom And Make Up Three" actually a catch?

Jacob

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 11:42 AM

ya got me. As I understand it - rounds are usually shorter and simpler. But I could easily be wrong.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Highlandman
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 12:28 PM

As to what makes a glee a glee, I dunno... but as I was taught, a catch is a round whose words make one sense in single line, but when all parts are put together make another sense altogether -- usually bawdy. The term "catch" may refer to the broken rhythm created by the oddly-place rests in each part where the interplay happens.

I'm not familiar with your example, but one by Peter Shickele (as PDQ Bach) will illustrate:

I
Please, kind sir, that portrait I see
If that's your daughter present her to me;
Look! (rest) her (rest) face could launch a thousand ships (2x)
Thousand ships, thousand ships...
II
Very well, it can be arranged if you will please
Sit you down, make yourself at home while she's
(rest) Up (rest) dress - ing, she'll be down in a jiffy (2x)
Jiffy, jiffy, jiffy...

Innocent enough, but when the parts are combined, the third lines form
"LOOK up HER dress" which never fails to elicit howls from the audience. Juvenile, yes, but evidently a time-honored musical form!

Use this info at your own risk as it is "undocumented" and may be a figment of my often unreliable brain.

-HM

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Highlandman
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 01:08 PM

From encyclopedia.com:
an unaccompanied song for three or more solo voices in harmony. The word glee [Anglo-Saxon, gligge or gliw =music] has been associated with vocal music from the time of the medieval gleeman or jongleur. The glee consisted of several short, individual pieces interpreting a poetic passage. The form is exclusively English and flourished mainly between 1750 and 1830, after which time it was displaced by the part songs of the Victorian composers.
And the same source agrees with my expatiating upon "catch."
-HM

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Ferrara
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 01:29 PM

Highlandman, when I read the song title "Come Hither Tom And Make Up Three" I immediately thought, "That sounds as if it could have a bawdy song hidden within it.... I'll bet a lot of those were absolutely full of double entendres -- they could have used the intricate rhythms to create them."

Thanks for the example from Peter Shickele, it's exactly what I was imagining. Made me grin.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Abby Sale
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 02:59 PM

I'll be interested if someone really knows this. I'm guessing that they weren't any very specific format, other than parts, but rather that they were sung by such groups as already described. I've several times seen in folksong books that a paticular song was once a glee.

A modern definition would be "anything sung by a glee club." These are likely to be called "chorales" now as in Roger Wagner Chorale or your high school.

On the other hand and drifting from the thread some, as to the nature of rounds, canons, fugues, etc. There is a truly fascinating discussion of these in Godel, Escher, Bach by DR Hofstadter. You might want to grab a quick read of that.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 03:27 PM

A 'glee' is defined in Webster's Collegiate Dictionary as a part song for usually male voices. They are generally high-spirited, short, joyful songs. The posts by Highlandman and others who have consulted their reference works are correct on the form.
I have several 19th c. songbooks including Carmina Princetonia and the Academy songbook, which contain glees; songs which were the meat for Glee clubs. Abby is essentially correct on the modern usage.

The term is not exclusively 'English,' but was used wherever English is spoken.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 03:47 PM

A glee tends to be a non-religious part-song often very similiar in form to some of the West Gallery anthems - complete with fugues etc. Reginald Spofforth's "Hail, Hail, Shining Morn" is a glee for 4 voices (SATB) so they're not all for only male voices. Incidently if anyone wants a score for the above PM me an email address and I'll send you a PDF file. You can find a MIDI file of it here.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: rich-joy
Date: 21 Jun 05 - 03:02 AM

: most interesting!


I seem to recall from my childhood in the 50s, a Sunday evening ABC (Oz) radio programme featuring The Village Glee - it was serious I think, not a Kenneth Williams type thing - most likely came from the BBC ... anyone know about this???


Cheers! R-J

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: treewind
Date: 21 Jun 05 - 03:26 AM

There was a programme on the BBC Radio 3 Early Music Show last Saturday, mostly about catches, but also exploring the evolution of informal part singing into glees. Try Listen Again or the link from the Early Music Show page.

Hurry up! it will only be there until Saturday. Recommended listening, the whole show. (applies most weeks too, for me)

Anahata

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Kaleea
Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:24 AM

I have a wonderful book called, "Come let us drink, Catches, Compleat, pleasant and Divertive, contriv'd by the late famous Mr. Henry Purcell." c 1972 Galliard Ltd. The editor, Michael Nyman states in his intro: " . . .From the 1630s on, the round, or catch as it had exclusively become, was taken up by the established composers of the time.   . . .Many of these catches are harmonically insecure, rambling & of a distinctive tunelessness. Purcell's, despite the obvious limitations of the form, are extremely attractive melodically, complex in texture, and marvellously characterised dramatically.
   Attempts to distinguish the round from the catch usually hinge on some minor musical or verbal technicalities. A round is continuous, the second voice follows on from the first without a cadential break; the catch on the other hand is sectional. . . .The catch, with its 8, 12 or 16 bars units (as against the round's 1. 2 or 4) was of necessity more poised and cadential.
   The distinction made between rounds and catches on purely verbal grounds is shaky. A catch is said to be a round which, by careful arrangement of the voices, produces hidden meanings (double entendres) when the voices are heard in combination which are not apparent when the text is read in linear sequence. . . .
The catch was a means of self-expression for the liberated middle class drinking man--it revolved around three subjects: sex, drink and politics. "
   
    These Catches by Henry Purcell are quite bawdy. [Purcell, born in 1659, & died when Bach was 10, but both are considered to have lived during the Baroque period] They were written around 1680. A couple were based on poems by a known poet of the time. They were not for the voice only, as the rounds usually were. They were often written with basso continuo accompaniment, sometimes with flute, guitar, or whatever.
   So, Catches were PUB/BAR SONGS that men in pubs sang, in 3 or 4 part harmony. The book was given to me when I was in college, & I have no idea if it is still in print. The fellers in the Symphonia frat had a great time singing them when I let them borrow the book.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:39 AM

I the '50s there was a programme called "Glee Club" on BBC Television, it was presented by George Mitchell who later was responsible for "The Black and White Minstrel Show".

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Notferjo
Date: 21 Jun 05 - 08:59 AM

What's a Glee? For all to be revealed why not listen to

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/mainframe.shtml?http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/index.shtml

on The Early Music Show BBC 3. Lucy Skeaping manages to infiltrate a men's Catch Club etc.
You've got 'til Saturday 25th June.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 22 Jun 05 - 08:07 AM

Wonderful programme, and very educational too - thanks Anahata for the link.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: GUEST,Gadaffi
Date: 22 Jun 05 - 09:07 AM

The Millen Family of Kent referred to all their harmony singing as 'glee-singing' likening it to a 'barber's shop quartet' and, yes, they also sing Spofforth's 'Hail, Smiling Morn'. They also thought of 'Buttercup Joe' as a glee song, although they mostly held that term referred to their Christy Minstrel songs.

In my research, I wrote to the late Bob Copper, when I realised the Millens shared a common repertoire, who told me that the Copper Family never thought of themselves as glee singers. Having said that, harmony singing and catch clubs were popular one hundred years ago judging by local newspapers.

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Amos
Date: 22 Jun 05 - 10:31 AM

The Whiffenpoof Song, the standard of the Yale Glee Club, is a classic glee, if I understand the term correctly. Done right it is a beautiful tightly-knit set of harmonies.

A

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 22 Jun 05 - 11:06 AM

Of course the lyrics of "The Whiffenpoof Song" are a parody of Kipling's poem "Gentlemen Rankers".

Subject: RE: What's a Glee?
From: Azizi
Date: 22 Jun 05 - 11:14 PM

Kaleea,

You wrote that "A catch is said to be a round which, by careful arrangement of the voices, produces hidden meanings (double entendres) when the voices are heard in combination which are not apparent when the text is read in linear sequence. . . ."

I've been collecting versions of "Miss Susie Had A Stemboat" and other children's rhymes that are composed with a profanity avoidance formula. In that formula the last word in a sentence is missing but flows into the first word of the next sentence and that word has both a naughty and a 'clean' meaning.   Since these rhymes are recited in unison, I gather that they wouldn't be called "catches", right? Does anyone know what they are formally called besides rhymes?

Here is the example:

Miss Susie had a steamboat,
the steamboat had a bell.
the steamboat went to heaven,
Miss susie went to
hello operator,
give me number nine,
and if you disconnect me,
I'll chop off your
behind the refrigerator
there lay a piece of glass
Miss susie sat upong it
and broke her little
ask me no more questions
tell me no more lies
the boys are in the bathroom
zipping up their
flies are in the city
bees are in the park
Miss susie and her boyfriend
are kissing in the
d-a-r-k
d-a-r-k
d-a-r-k
dark dark dark
the dark is like the movies,
the movies like the show
the show is like the tv set
and that is all i know...

{In some versions, the rhyme continues without the profanity avoidance pattern}...