Antiquity Flashcards
Music of Ancient Greece and Rome
• Dates: 750 BCE – 476 AD • Surviving sources o Writings, Paintings, Instruments • Influence on later music o Music Theory – Pythagoras (2:1 octave, 3:2 fifth, 4:3 fourth) o Performance use of music o Music -> Text Relationships
Lyre
- Antiquity
- Plucked string instrument with a resonating sound box, two arms, crossbar, and strings that run parallel to the soundboard and attach to the crossbar.
Kithara
- Antiquity
* Large Lyre
Aulos
- Antiquity
- A single or double reed instrument
- Can have twin pipes
Plato
- Antiquity
- Plato was a Greek philosopher who advocated harmony in the universe.
- To accomplish this in mind and body he advocated gymnastics and music.
- Within music he believed balance was necessary as well. For example, he favored Phrygian and Dorian modes because they evoked moods that balanced each other; courage and temperance.
- Additionally, musical styles, instrumentation, and rhythms must be kept balanced to keep uniformity in music and society.
Harmonia
• The union of parts in an orderly whole
o This is derived from the thought that musical sounds and rhythms were ordered by numbers.
Ethos
- The behavior or character of a person.
* Directly related to Plato and Aristotle’s doctrine of imitation
Genus (pl. genera)
- There were three classes of tetrachords
- Diatonic
- Chromatic
- Enharmonic
Greater Perfect System
- System of combining tetrachords to cover larger ranges
- Conjunct – tetrachords overlapped by one note
- Disjunct – tetrachords separated by a whole tone
Species (of Consonace)
- Theorist Clonides
- In the diatonic genus the perfect 4th, 5th, and octave could be divided into whole tones and semitones in only a certain number of ways – these ways were the “species.”
Tonos (p. tonoi)
• Scales within a specific range and associated with a character or mood.
Epitaph of Seikilos
- Found inscribed on a tombstone in Southern Turkey
- Uses the diatonic genus
- Octave range
- Uses the Phrygian octave species
Oral Transmission
- Antiquity
* Mode of transmitting music to future generations prior to the development of music notation.
Gregorian Chant
• Gregorian Chant developed as a way to provide uniformity of chants which had been previously past on orally.
• Providing uniformity of the chants helped to provide uniformity in religious services.
• The Gregorian Chant, possibly attributed to Pop Gregory I, was promoted as superior to other chant dialects.
o These dialects included Celtic, Gallican, Mozarabic, and Ambrosian. Gregorian Chant fused Roman and Gallican chants together.
• Syllabic chant provides 1 neume per syllable
• Neumatic chant: Compound neumes for each chant
• Melismatic: Extended melisma remaining on the same syllable
Chant Notation
- Antiquity
- Chant notation developed when monks in monasteries began writing the chants down for memory purposes. Chants were traditionally transmitted orally.
- Notated chants also provided uniformity of the chants across the carious regions
Non-Diastematic
o Notes were neumes written down like a sentence.
o Did not use height to differentiate pitch
o One must already know how the chant sounds
Diastematic
o Height differences were added to approximate pitch
o No staff or clef yet
Square Notation
o 13th century o Used a 4 line staff o Kept nuances that which can be lost when transcribing to modern notation o Vertical lines indicate a break o Quilisma • 1st loud • 2nd softer/lighter (this is the quilisma) • 3rd louder again
Compound Neume
o Groups of more than 1 neume
o Compound shows how many notes are sung on the syllable
o Music remains monophonic
o Read from bottom to top
Mass
• Main worship service – Catholic tradition
• Introductory, Liturgy of the Word, Liturgy of the Eucharist
• Proper
o Section of the mass that is different for each day of the year
o Includes: Introit, Gradual, Alleluia, Offertory, Communion
• Ordinary
o Section of the mass that is the same from day to day
o Includes: (Beginning) Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, Ite, missa est.
