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all the technical tricks of his profession.54 The composition was characterized by a variety of rhythms, tempi, and timbres. It may well be that the effect of contrasted modes was exploited too, seeing that Sakadas is also credited with a Trimeles nomos, 'three-melody' or 'three-mode' nome, this one a choral song in which successive 'strophes' were in the Dorian, Phrygian, and Lydian modes.55 |
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Another auletic repertory item was the Polykephalos nomos, 'many-headed nome'. This again involved imitation of hissing serpents, the ones that grew from the scalp of the Gorgon Euryale; the hissing was a lament over the killing of her sister Medusa by Perseus. Midas of Acragas played this piece when he won the Pythian contest in 490.56 |
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In 558 BC unaccompanied kithara-playing was added to the events at the Pythian contest. We might expect the citharists to attempt the same sort of thing as the auletes had been doing with éclat since 586, and in fact Strabo represents the Pythikos nomos as being the prescribed piece for both.57 The kithara may seem a less suitable instrument than the auloi for mimicking chagrined ophidians. Syrigmos, however, is among the effects said to have been developed by the early Classical citharist Lysander of Sicyon.58 |
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We do not know how early the free form of this instrumental music was extended to compositions for the voice. The Trimeles nomos of Sakadas or Klonas sounds as if it might have been an example, though the source refers to 'strophes' and to a chorus. In later times astrophic song is much more associated with solo performers. From the mid-fifth century it was characteristic of citharodes' competition and recital pieces (called nomoi, like those of the instrumentalists). Melanippides introduced it to the dithyramb (p. 205); and gradually it won its way into tragedy, but usually for actors' arias, not choruses. As in the instrumental compositions, the emphasis was on virtuosity, variety of rhythm and mood, |
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54 Cf. p. 93 for the specialized 'Pythian aulos' and 'Pythian aulete' of later times. |
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55 Ps.-Plut. De mus. 1134b, cf. 1132d. Others attributed the composition to Klonas of Tegea or Thebes. |
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56 Pind. Pyth. 12 with schol.; cf. U. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, Pindaros (Berlin, 1922), 144. Some attributed the composition to one Crates, others to Olympus, or to someone else of the same name (Pratinas, PMG 713, ps.-Plut. De mus. 1133de). According to Aristox. fr. 80, Olympus was also the first to perform on the auloi a lament for the Pythian serpent in the Lydian mode; others said Melanippides (ps.-Plut. 1136c). This sounds like a variation on the Pythikos nomos. |
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57 Paus. 10. 7. 7, Strab. 9. 3. 10 p. 421. |
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58 See p. 69. |
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