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understood as a change of tonic (and thus of modality). But in some cases, as in the hymns of Mesomedes, one has a definite sense of reorientation. (d) Change of scale combined with change of tonic. The first recitative in the Oslo papyrus (30) alternates between the scale d e f g a  c' d', with f as tonic, and d e  g a b (c') d' with g as tonic. |
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The word chromaticism is here used not with reference to the chromatic genus but in its modern sense, of the use of semitone or other intervals that are extraneous to the key or scale in which a piece is written, for ornamental or expressive effect. If we want a term that avoids the possible ambiguity of 'chromatic' in ancient contexts, 'exharmonic' would be appropriate. |
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While not a regular feature of Greek music, at any rate in the Roman period, chromaticism does occur in some texts. The earliest of them is the Zeno Archive papyrus (7) of about 250 BC, apparently a passage from an impassioned tragic supplication. In the fragment as preserved, the basic scale notes are f g a  , with the focus on a. But in the second line the descending steps g f and  are embellished with inserted semitones, one of them emphasized by being set to a long note (Ex. 7.1). |
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In some unpublished Hellenistic fragments that have a similar basic scale, f g a  , the additional note  appears a number of times, especially in association with f or  . This note a semitone below the tonic is paralleled in Athenaeus' Paean (12), where, particularly in one clearly demarcated section (lines 9-16), irregular semitones are used with confident discipline to gorgeous effect. Moving in the basic framework of the fifth a (tonic) b c' d' e', the composer suddenly slides us down a little scree of semitones, e' d' b  a  , to land on the unconventional note just below the tonic, and it becomes temporarily an extra degree of the scale. Meanwhile the notes a  b d' are used as a chromatic (in the ancient sense) tetrachord, and beside the d' appears |
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