Ancient Greek Music - "Hymn to the Muse"

Title:
Ancient Greek Music - "Hymn to the Muse"

Description:
A studio quality recording of this piece can now be heard on my NEW ALBUM, "An Ancient Lyre" : http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/mlevy4 This video features my arrangement for solo lyre, of "HYMN TO THE MUSE" - a hauntingly beautiful surviving fragment of the mostly lost music of ancient Greece. This piece was written almost 2000 years ago, by Mesomedes of Crete... Mesomedes of Crete was a Greek lyric poet and composer of the early 2nd century AD. More information can be found at: http://www.mlahanas.de/Greeks/Bios/Mesomedes.html It is written in the ancient Greek "Dorian" mode; E-E on the white note of the piano - not to be confused with the MEDIEVAL "Dorian" mode, which was D-D! Due to a misinterpretation of the Latin texts of Boethius, mediaeval modes were given the wrong Greek names! For the CORRECT names of the ORIGINAL ancient Greek modes, see: http://www.harmonics.com/lucy/lsd/corrections.html For what Plato & Aristotle themselves had this to say about these ancient musical modes, please see this fascinating link: http://www.pathguy.com/modes.htm The translation of this ancient, 2000 or more year old song (which mercifully, I am NOT going to attempt to sing!), are as follows: 'Sing for me, dear Muse, begin my tuneful strain; a breeze blow from your groves to stir my listless brain...Skillful Calliope, leader of the delightful Muses, and you, skillful priest of our rites, son of Leto, Paean of Delos, be at my side'. (translation by J. G. Landels). It is played here on a lyre strikingly similar to the ancient Greek Kithara; the large wooden 7 string lyre favoured by the professional musicians of ancient Greece. The lyre I am playing, though, is in fact a replica (based on an illustration on the back of an ancient Jewish coin), of the 10 string Hebrew "Kinnor"; the ORIGINAL "Harp of King David"...once played 3000 years ago, by King David himself, as he danced before the very Ark of the Covenant! For almost 1000 years, the Kinnor was played by my very own Levite ancestors, in the Temple of Jerusalem, to accompany the legendary singing of the Levitical Choir... Following the tragic destruction of the Jewish Temple by the Roman Legions under Titus in 70AD, the haunting, mystical resonance of the ancient Kinnor Lyre of King David can now be heard AGAIN...in my spare room, Salford, Lancashire!!;o) The most challenging aspect of playing this piece, is attempting to play the many accidententals required by the melody - on a DIATONICALLY tuned lyre...WITHOUT the aid of any fancy sharpening pedals, which are to be found on almost all modern harps! The ancient Greeks managed to get around this by a technique I have been working on, called "finger-stopping" - an accidental can be played, by increasing the pitch of a lyre string by a semitone; this is achieved by pressing the string (about a centimeter in from the tuning peg), with a finger of the left hand which shortens its vibrating length, and therefore increases the pitch of the note the string produces. This was obviously much easier to do on the original low tension gut or natural fibre string strings which were used in antiquity...NOT so easy to do, on the high tension, jangly nylon strings used, on my mass produced "bargain basement" lyre which is heard here!! Regarding the accidentals used in this piece, another fascinating similarity between ancient Greek music & ancient Jewish music can directly be heard - when the 3rd of the ancient Greek Dorian mode (E-E)is SHARPENED, this creates a scale which is IDENTICAL to the Jewish "Ahava Raba" mode (which still can be heard in 90% of Jewish Klezmer music today...including the most famous of all Jewish songs; "Hava Nagila"!): E,F,G#,A,B,C,D,E In this performance, another technique I have recently been attempting to revive from antiquity, is the "block and strum" lyre-playing technique - this entails blocking only the strings not required, whilst leaving open, strings which produce the notes of basic chords. By using this technique, it is possible to strum RHYTHM on the lyre - just like strumming a regular acoustic guitar! (This can be heard in the short improvisatory passage at the end of this video). To hear this wonderful fragment of ancient Greek music sang and played on authentic replica ancient Greek instruments, please see the amazing upload on Youtube by Michael Atherton & Melismos: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=piYpvpBgwRs For all details about my many "Musical adventures in Time Travel", please also visit: http://www.ancientlyre.com Many thanks fro watching!

Author:
Klezfiddle1

Tags:
Ancient, Greece, Bouzouki, Sparta, Delphi, Athens, Parthenon, Pyramids, Roman, Acropolis, Troy, Lyre, Lyra, Kithara, Harp, Classics, Homer, Iliad, Ἰλιάς, Οδύσσεια, Aristotle, Plato, Pythagoras,