|
|
|
|
|
|
|
It is conventional, in writing about ancient Greek music, to voice a lament that 'the music itself is almost entirely lost. So far as its melodic lines are concerned, this is true: we have only a few dozen specimens to represent a thousand years' music, and of these few dozen, most are tattered fragments with scarcely a line complete, and nearly all are from compositions of post-Classical date. Of music from before the last decade of the fifth century BC we have not a single note. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
On the other hand there is quite a considerable amount of music from the Archaic and Classical periods of which we can claim to know the rhythms, with at least a fair approximation to the truth. We should count ourselves fortunate that it is this way round. There would be little satisfaction to be had from knowing the ups and downs of the melodies if we had no idea of the rhythms that gave them shape. For rhythm is the vital soul of music. The Greeks acknowledged its fundamental role. |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
Melody in itself is lax and inert, but when combined with rhythm it becomes hard-edged and active.1 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Notes as such, because of the lack of differentiation in their movement, leave the interweaving of the melody obscure and confuse the mind: it is the elements of rhythm that make clear the character of the melody.2 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Some of the ancients described rhythm as male, melody as female, on the grounds that melody is inactive and without form, playing the part of matter because of its capacity for opposite qualifications, while rhythm moulds it and moves it in a determinate order, playing the part of the maker in relation to the thing made.3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
1 Ps.-Arist. Pr. 19. 49. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
2 Aristid. Quint. p. 31. 10-13, trans. Barker, GMW ii. 434. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
3 Ibid. p. 40. 20-5, trans. Barker, GMW ii. 445. The theory alluded to was probably Peripatetic; see Barker's n. |
|
|
|
|
|