Sunday, January 1, 2012

Athénaios Athenaíou - First Delphic Hymn to Apollo

Image via Wikipedia
This is the oldest music that we have on record where we know the name of the composer.  It was written around 138 BC and preserved on a stone tablet at the ancient Greek temple of Delphi.

The tablets were discovered in 1893 embedded in a wall, used as construction material some time after they were originally inscribed (a rather common ancient form of recycling).  Both vocal and instrumental parts are inscribed separately, and pitch and duration of the notes is given.  The composer's name translates roughly as "Athenios son of Athenios", and it's believed that he wrote this for the Pythian Games - a religious festival held every 10 years, accompanied by Olympic-style games.



I just thought this was cool.  It's sort of music from another planet.

4 comments:

  1. Guffaw in AZJanuary 1, 2012 at 11:08 AM

    Another planet? I was expecting something akin to a Theramin!
    Interesting, nevertheless!
    thx,
    gfa

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dave HJanuary 1, 2012 at 11:49 AM

    Stone tablets? I guess that means rock music is a lot older than we imagined.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Old NFOJanuary 1, 2012 at 12:07 PM

    Dave got me with that comment... (snort)...

    ReplyDelete
  4. SiGraybeardJanuary 1, 2012 at 5:00 PM

    It sounds like modern music, except for simpler rhythms and tone structures. I wonder what their musical scale was like and what it would have sounded like with the tonal system they used.

    Ours is so new, I've heard it speculated someone like Mozart would be made physically ill by listening to his ideas on our scales.

    ReplyDelete

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