Music Sound

The Bar form is an old and important musical form in which each stanza follows the pattern aab. It is named after the medieval German poetic form known as Bar in German. Such a poem contains three stanzas (or more), and each stanza is in aab form, composed of two Stollen followed by an Abgesang. The musical form thus contains two repetitions of one melody (Stollen - 'stanzas') followed by a different melody (Abgesang - 'aftersong'). The Abgesang may sometimes incorporate portions of the Stollen phrase.

The minnesingers of the 12th to 14th century in Germany wrote songs in this form, and Lutheran chorales also are typically in Bar form. A good example of barform is the Star-Spangled Banner.

References

• Harvard Concise Dictionary of Music, entries on Bar form and minnesingers. (ISBN 0674374711)
• Encyclopædia Britannica (2005), article on Bar form. [1]
• A History of Western Music by Donald Grout (ISBN 0393094162)