The Hocket

Collin Dennen

What is a hocket?

• Derived from French word “hoquet”– A brief interruption or hiccup

• Musical line is shared between two or more voices.– Alternately resting while other voice sounds.

The Hocket during the Ars Antiqua

• Characteristic of Notre Dame school– Sacred vocal music– 13th and 14th centuries

• In seculum d’Amiens longum (Anonymous)

The Hocket in Haitian Raras

• Raras and gagas– Traditional Haitian street processions

• Improvised melody shared between Vaksen– Bamboo or metal-pipe trumpets

Gamelan

• Gamelan– Traditional Indonesian music– Played on mostly mallet instruments

• Imbal and Kotekan– Both refer to technique of swapping melody

between two different instruments.– Imbal is used in Java, Kotekan in Bali

Hindewhu and The Central African Republic

• Hindewhu– Onomatopoeia– Alternately humming and blowing into flute

• Mimicked by Bill Summers on Herbie Hancock’s “Watermelon Man” using beer bottle.

Dirty Projectors

• The hocket is a primary characteristic of their music– Outline harmonic movement• Make chords less dense

– Create more interesting melodies– Hocket between voices or in guitar parts

The hocket is…

• A shared melodic line of music– Used to make music more interesting or exciting

• A technique used as early as the 13th century• Used in many different cultural contexts• Very common in today’s popular music