How To Play The Music Of Ancient Greece (2 of 4)

The latest in my series of "Online Lyre Lessons"! In this video, I will demonstrate how to play one of the precious few fragments of surviving ancient Greek music! This haunting, almost dream-like fragment of melody was preserved in ancient Byzantine manuscripts (Conspectus codicum:
V. Venetus Marcianus appl. cl. VI, saec. XIII-XIV
N. Neapolitanus graecus III. C4, saec. XV
F. Florentius Ricc. 41, saec. XVI).

It was written in the unambiguous alphabetical musical notation used in ancient Greece, & the melodic fragment is catalogued as "Anonymous, Bellermann 97".

It is played here, on a lyre closely resembling the ancient Greek Kithara; the larger wooden lyre favoured by the professional musicians of ancient Greece(the lyre is in fact, a replica of a Jewish Temple lyre, depicted on a Jewish coin from 135CE - it is almost identical to the Kithara).

I heard this lovely melody for the first time, on the CD "Musique de la Grece Antique"(track 13).

It is in the ancient Greek "Hypolydian" mode; the equivalent intervals as heard on the scale from F-F on the white notes of the piano. The augmented 4th in this mode to me, creates the dreamy quality of the sound of this piece.

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/cor...

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

What a terrible tragedy, that of all the amazing cultures of ancient civilizations, so few fragments of their original melodies and music from antiquity have been preserved...

My Albums of Ancient Lyre Music are available, anywhere in the world, from iTunes:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/artist/michael-levy/id4324920

They are also available from Amazon MP3 Store:

http://amzn.to/eyI34H

Also, my 3 CD albums, "King David's Lyre; Echoes of Ancient Israel", "An Ancient Lyre" & "Lyre of the Levites" are available anywhere in the world from CD Baby:

http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/MichaelLevy

For full details, and all the historical research behind my myriad of "Musical Adventures in Time Travel", please visit my official website:

http://www.ancientlyre.com

Many thanks for watching!

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