Oldest known musical instrument

Subject: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jun 09 - 08:16 PM

Found in Germany - think it was an accordion?

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Emma B
Date: 24 Jun 09 - 08:23 PM

Hmmm wood maybe...but a stone age accordian?
LOL

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Bill D
Date: 24 Jun 09 - 08:42 PM

If it played "Lady of Dusseldorf" we can be sure!

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jun 09 - 08:56 PM

It's actually a flute...

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Peace
Date: 24 Jun 09 - 08:58 PM

"The earliest Early music?"

See that thread started by Emma.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 02:24 AM

Earliest instrument according to Wikipedia

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Gedpipes
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 07:31 AM

2 stones

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Elijah Browning
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 10:03 AM

heard this on the drive in...wish we could hear the sound it makes...couldn't they have picked a better first song from 40,000 years of music?
40,000-year-old flute

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: GUEST,Mr Red
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 10:05 AM

not the Jawbone of an Ass.

but a vulture bone. Culture Vultre I guess.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Emma B
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 10:15 AM

The BBC news programmes yesterday all included a brief snatch of the replica flutes being played

Here is a link to the 6pm news - the article about the Hohle Fels flute (described on Wiki as the 'earliest unambiguously musical bone pipe') is 28 mins into the 31 min programme

- and no ......it's not the Star Spangled Banner :)

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Songbob
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 01:37 PM

All this aside, I have a theory about the bow and arrow. It's usually assumed that the "mouth bow" or "ground bow" (a string and a sapling, sometimes with a drum head somehow attached) came from the bow and arrow. The hunter would like the "thummmmm" of the string and use it (without the arrow) in communal music.

But I think the bow came first, since it's only one thing, and doesn't require the second part (the arrow) to be useful. I think someone came up with the string-and-tensioned stick (the bow) first, and it was used for communal music making. Then one day a bow-player was hitting the string with a stick, and the string caught on a rough spot on the stick, and flung said stick across the campfire into the capacious butt of the shaman. Voila! These bow thingies could "toss" sharp sticks, and thus could be used for hunting. And thus the bow-and-arrow was born.

That's my theory -- music instrument first, hunting apparatus second. Probably within the first week of the invention of the bow, for sure, but still, the bow and its sound came first.

Bob

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 01:49 PM

This makes three threads on this....

~S~

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: GUEST,Ken Brock
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 01:56 PM

Bows could also be useful for turning a vertical stick with one end in a rock hole for the purpose of firestarting.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Emma B
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 02:03 PM

Bow drill
used for making fire
I saw this task performed a couple of weeks ago at the replica Crannog on Loch Tay

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: semi-submersible
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 02:41 PM

I like Bob's theory that the strung bow started as a musical toy or instrument, with practical applications following.

Amusing as that campfire scene is, though, I don't believe an accident would be needed. Early humans who gathered all their own food and made their own tools (have you ever tried it?) must have been more than imaginative enough to discover that a bow could fling things, and straight sticks would give the most interesting results.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 04:35 PM

I read a lot of books, so I can't remember which book told this. But once a team was doing archeology in a cave that had been inhabited by primitive hominids - earlier than the Neanderthals. The team was baffled by certain smooth places on cave formations. Finally somebody tried hitting the stone and discovered that different formations made different made notes. Having discovered that, it was only natural to start hitting one after another to make music.

That cave, wherever it was, was probably the first musical instrument. We're not even talking Homo sapiens yet.

I've heard the same sounds in a cave here in Missouri. The player was our 12-year-old guide, and he called it rock music.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 04:54 PM

In western China, 'stone music' is still in the traditions of a few. Quite complex, when several play together. Tan Dun, the Chinese composer, incorporates it in one of his operas. Chinese Water music also interesting.
No artifacts, of course, but mouth music ancient.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 05:38 PM

There is an interesting theory about music and where art is located in ancient caves: CLICK HERE and HERE.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 25 Jun 09 - 05:43 PM

One of my friends once insisted that the first musical inspiration came to early man through the medium of the sphincter. When he wanted a sound that was more dependable, he went to the other end...The buzzard flute was probably way down the line somewhere. When I was a young farm boy, we used to take blades of barley or wheat grass, stretch them across the mouth and hum, as with a kazoo. We would also make flutes out of the hollow stems. I's amazing what one will do to make sound.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Artful Codger
Date: 26 Jun 09 - 12:21 AM

Skin flute?

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Arnie
Date: 26 Jun 09 - 06:32 AM

Several flutes were discovered in the cave in Ulm. Together with the rock music mentioned above,this suggests to me that this cave was the site of an early folk club. I suspect that Neanderthals were not invited to the Homo Sapiens folk clubs as their heavy barrel-chested build meant they sang so loud that they would have drowned out the other singers. Mind you, Neanderthals did have extremely large nostrils which would have been handy for playing those nose flutes so perhaps they started their own breakaway folk clubs? This could explain why Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals never got it together, with the result that the latter eventually died out.

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: banjoman
Date: 26 Jun 09 - 09:34 AM

When I heard that an ancient musical instrument had been buried 40000 years ago, I prayed that it was a melodeon and had been dug up by mistake. I hoped that our ancient ancestors had started a great tradition in getting rid of this heinous instrument . Alas my dream turned out not to be true.
The earliest instruments must have been percussion of some sort surely

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Stringsinger
Date: 26 Jun 09 - 03:09 PM

They found remnants of a "mouth bow" among the Neanderthals. It has to be one of the oldest at least.

Unfortunately nobody knows the music they made.

What about percussion instruments? Did ape predecessors beat out rhythms with twigs and dance around shrieking tunes?

Subject: RE: Oldest known musical instrument
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 26 Jun 09 - 04:09 PM

Seconding banjoman.
Suzuki melodion blurb-
"Highly acclaimed throughout the world, the Melodion has come to be looked upon as one of the single most advanced learning systems ever devised."

As long as the learner is confined to a sound-proof room.