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The Early Classical Period |
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The Archaic age saw some advances in the techniques of playing solo instruments, and among the western Greeks the development of larger melodic structures. But our sources do not suggest that much change was taking place in the varieties of scale used or in general principles of matching words to music. Anacreon is said to have still used only the old modes of Olympus, the Dorian, Phrygian, and Lydian.53 There is a vague mention of Ibycus, Anacreon, and Alcaeus (or Achaeus) having given 'flavour' to their harmonia, which is somehow analogous to their wearing of elegant Ionian clothes, but we cannot tell what this amounts to.54 |
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Towards the end of the sixth century, however, there are definite signs of innovation in one particular quarter, associated with an intellectual and analytical approach to music. This approach was developed by two musicians from the Argolid, Epigonus of Sicyon and Lasus of Hermione. |
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Epigonus, Lasus, Simonides |
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Epigonus was remembered as the author of certain theoretical ideas about pitch, and I have argued that he attempted to work out an integrated system of modal scales using a specially constructed zither with strings tuned at quarter-tone intervals.55 It is further recorded that he and his school were the first to practise enaulos kitharisis. The meaning of this expression is debated. Many scholars take it to be kithara-playing that is either accompanied by or in some way similar to aulos-playing.56 But enaulos usually means 'echoing in the ears', of something once heard that remains vividly present, with no reference to auloi. So the meaning is most likely a technique of kithara-playing with sustained notes or echo effects, perhaps using 'upper partials' by bisecting the vibrating length of strings as described on p. 66.57 This interpretation fits very well with what is |
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53 Posidonius fr. 471 Theiler ap. Ath. 635cd. |
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54 Ar. Thesm. 161-3. Ancient scholars disputed over whether Aristophanes named Alcaeus or Achaeus, and if it was the former, whether the Lesbian Alcaeus was meant or another. |
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55 pp. 78f., 225f. |
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56 Philochorus, FGrH 328 F 23; A. Barker, CQ 32 (1982) 266, 269. |
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57 E. K. Borthwick ap. Winnington-Ingram in Gentili-Pretagostini, 260 n. 25. |
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