All musical systems and styles have organisational rhythmic motifs. Rug weavers in Iran use chants with a complex musical structure to communicate weaving patterns to their co-weavers. Postal workers in Ghana hand-cancel stamps with a distinct rhythm. Workers performing hard labour such as rock breaking chant to keep their sledgehammers swinging in rhythm. Repetitive or complex work engenders rhythmic accompaniment, in some cases to break the monotony, in others to actually help you perform the work better. Poetic works thousands of years ago, such as those of Homer, were chanted or sung with rhythm serving a mnemonic function. Rhythm has been used for millennia to tie societal members together – the chants of a religious order or the cadence calls of military ranks are just two examples. What parent does not use rhythmic rocking to soothe a crying baby? The repetitive sounds and silences that comprise rhythmic patterns make dancing possible, aid in the memory and reproduction of music, and facilitate group singing, playing, or drumming. Music and rhythm are rooted in every known culture. Human-made rhythms include the built world – street grids, traffic lights, crop fields, mowed designs in baseball diamond outfields, the backsplash behind the kitchen counter, spatial patterns in geometric visual artforms. Tides, 17-year cicadas, lunar phases, perigees, and apogees are other naturally occurring rhythms. Frogs croak rhythmically to attract mates and change their rhythm to signal aggression. We have circadian rhythms – daily cycles of mental and physical peaks and troughs. We experience the rhythmic changes of the seasons.
Rhythm is much more than a component of music. It plays a role in listening, in language, in understanding speech in noisy places, in walking, and even in our feelings toward one another. Why do we care about rhythm? It connects us to the world. The waxing and waning of the accents and stress patterns become a calming, lulling, treasured experience that soothes and resets me after a long day. I begin to hear sounds and rhythms instead of words and story. I have noticed that after some time – it can be as little as a few minutes if I am especially tired – the meanings of the words are gradually eclipsed by the sounds. We deliberately choose books that are familiar – oft-read children's classics make frequent appearances – so I do not worry about missing something important when I drift off. My husband reads to me every night before we go to sleep.
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