I *do* see a problem with calling something a hemiola that is EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE of what a hemiola actually is.
Of two examples given in the relevant _New Grove_ article, the second (from Lully) is of the type you call "reverse hemiola," and is characterized in the text as "an instance of the same basic phenomenon." Note that the writer of the article does not consider this an opposite at all--as neither do I.
I note, too, that in any case (such as the Lully) where there is a regular alternation of 2X3 and 3X2, the composer's choice of time signature (3/4 or 6/8) is essentially arbitrary, yet the musical meaning of the passage is not affected thereby, nor is the nature of the metric phenomenon under discussion.
What it all boils down to is that multiplication is commutative. Andrew Stiller Kallisti Music Press http://home.netcom.com/~kallisti/ _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
