The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #77353 Message #1379998
Posted By: MarkS
16-Jan-05 - 02:34 PM
Thread Name: What are the oldest surviving tunes?
Subject: RE: What are the oldest surviving tunes?
Kind of rough to date any tunes prior to there being a written record of the words and the notation. I seem to recall that Guido D'Arezzo was the fellow who invented the ideas of the clef and the cleftular system of notation which has evolved into the stuff we still use today.
Ancient Greek used something called Modal notation, but I do not know if there are any written records of examples. However, from my student days I recall our music professor explaining that the "Myxolidian" mode was supposed to be the one which, if sung by men, caused women to melt in your arms. Which was one hell of a concept to tell to a class of young guys.
Wonder if some of the epic Roman poetry which was chanted rather than recited might qualify? Chanting a story makes it more memorable to those raised in an oral rather than a written tradition.
Mark