Translation of Martha Ulhôa de Tupinamba’s “Métrica derramada

Martha Ulha's essay on musical prosody in Brazilian popular song develops the theoretical concept of mtrica derramada, which I have translated as "fluid meter."Drawing in part on the work of her musicological forebear Mrio de Andrade (also represented in this special issue) and contemporary Luiz Tatit, Ulha considers how speech timing, vowel "tensity," and other factors crucial to expressive speech influence sung musical melody, resulting in a musical structuring that is essentially malleable rather than produced by expressive stretchings of an underlying stable, isochronous grid.To illustrate, Ulha considers passages from a recording by the luminary Brazilian singer Elis Regina, suggesting how a number of musical parameters (not just timing) work together as an expressive whole, all animated in large part by the way the singer interprets the text.