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Music was a normal part of social life in Mesopotamia [14] and was used in many secular contexts. [15] Music played important roles at funerals, [16] among royalty, [17] and was also depicted in relation to sports and sex. [18] Mesopotamian love songs, which represented a distinct genre of music, nevertheless shared features in common with ...
- Scales and Tuning in Ancient Music
- Playing Sumerian Musical Instruments
- Construction Details
- Glossary of Musical Terms
Among the many cuneiform tablets studied we have been fortunate to have recognized, since 1959, a small number of texts that relate to the tuning and playing of ancient instruments (see map on p. 3). Thus far, cuneiformists have identified ten Mesopotamian tablets (Fig. 5) that contain technical information about ancient musical scales. We now kno...
The instruments from Ur have a large enough number of strings (several have eleven and one has thirteen) on which to carry out the tuning procedures using intervals of fourths and fifths (the most important in initiating the tuning series) and to accommodate the octave. While we have not identified an Akkadian or a Sumerian word for the octave, i...
In Berkeley we also have a playable replica of the lapis lazuli-bearded lyre that was expertly handcrafted by the late Mr. Eli Richman of Atlanta. His widow, Josephine Richman, donated it to me some years ago for the ancient Near Eastern collections in Berkeley’s Hearst Museum (formerly the Lowie Museum) on the University of California campus. Mr....
Heptatonic: Hepta (Greek: seven) seven tone division of the octave. One example of a heptatonic scale is the “do-re-mi” scale. Third: An interval of three steps; an imperfect consonance which our ears accept as pleasing. Fifth: An interval of five steps. Like the octave the fifth creates no interference waves. In equal temperament tuning our fift...
The music of Mesopotamia played a very important role in recording historical events. Musical instruments used in Mesopotamia were generally of the most primitive form. A small, stringed instrument known as the Oud was quite popular in Mesopotamia. Pictorial representations of this musical instrument place it to about 5000 years from now.
Music was ubiquitous throughout Mesopotamian history, playing important roles in both religious and secular contexts. Mesopotamia is of particular interest to scholars because evidence from the region—which includes artifacts, artistic depictions, and written records—places it among the earliest well-documented cultures in the history of music.
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Sep 28, 2014 · Through them I met Andy Lowings, who organized the Gold Lyre of Ur Project, which built a replica of a 4,550-year-old Mesopotamian gold lyre. He asked me to compose music for the lyre, and last ...
