Lost Sounds Orchestra: Ancient Musical Instruments Brought Back To Life

Scientific Blogging ^ | August 30, 2009 | News Staff

[decimon]

Do you long to hear the dulcet sounds of the salpinx, barbiton, aulos or the syrinx? Of course not, because no one has heard them in centuries. Most people have never even heard of them.

But you will soon have the chance to experience musical instruments familiar to ancient civilizations but long since forgotten.

[decimon]

Change of tune pine.

[decimon]

pine = ping

Pining for the pings. Pinging for the pines.

[prisoner6]

Bumping for later.

prisoner6

[SunkenCiv]

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[SamiGirl]

Very interesting.

Thanks for the post.

[AnAmericanMother]

I like early music as much as the next guy -- in fact I play a lot of it. I play the harpsichord and my husband plays the lute.

But there's a reason most of these instruments passed out of use . . . .

. . . they don't work very well. Most of them are difficult to play and take real dedication.

Some of them are interesting and make pretty noises. Some of them just sound . . . odd.

Here are some sackbuts in action - with a 'muffled drum' - if you ever wondered what that is.

Purcell's March - Funeral Sentences

(these are the ancestor of the trombone).

(the reconstruction of the Scarlatti G Major Sonata (NOT D minor - it's L. 388 and one I play myself) is played WAY too fast - some of Scarlatti's sonatas have the direction 'prestissimo' ('fastest') or even 'as fast as possible', but this isn't one of them). And the epigonion, whatever it is, sounds like a large harpsichord with bad dampers, more or less.

[AnAmericanMother]

Having never heard of a keyboard instrument called an epigonion, I went and looked it out . . .

It was a large harp or psaltery, ancient Greek, and it could no more play a Scarlatti sonata than it could fly to the moon.

Here is something else from the ASTRA project -- something the instrument could actually play in real life. It's a chanson by Guillaume DuFay, leader of the Burgundian School in the early Renaissance.

DuFay chanson

And it took FOUR epigonions to play that . . . .

Computer modelling can really lead you astray.

[decimon]

But there's a reason most of these instruments passed out of use . . . .

I've heard that classical music played with period instruments can be pretty bad. Maybe that's why people like Stradivarius were so valued. Maybe music of that period began sounding much better.

[decimon]

Computer modelling can really lead you astray.

It will still be interesting to get an idea of what ancient instruments were.

[bgill]

Thanks for the info since the confusing article never showed one. Putting the sound on a computer is hardly what I’d call bringing any of these instruments back. Build them, show them, and play them otherwise there is no point.

[NCjim]

Pine is not Elm :-)

[NCjim]

I play the harpsichord

A fascinating instrument was E.Power Biggs' "Pedal Harpsichord" that was made for him by John Challis.

[ctdonath2]

Interesting. Indeed, the instrumentation (while now notable for simple novelty) lagged way behind the music of the time.

[decimon]

Pine is not Elm :-)

Nor fjord. My typos have a mind of their own.

[AnAmericanMother]

People went nuts over Stradivarius, Amati, and the other good instrument makers precisely because their instruments were so much better than what was generally available.

Of course, they're still better . . . for the time being. Unfortunately, wood has a useful life, it's measured in hundreds of years but it DOES wear out. My mother in law gave me a book that is a survey of some of the great instruments, and the author noted that there is a horizon line beyond which they are going to start to fail. Some of them are preserved in nitrogen-filled cases and never played for precisely that reason. Which is a shame.

But the average quality of violins continues to improve. Even the mass-produced Chinese ones sound remarkably well for what they are.

[AnAmericanMother]

The vocal music is outstanding. Thank goodness somebody invented music notation before DuFay's Masses were lost.

Our choirmaster is an early music fan (he took his master's at Oregon, which is Early Music Central) and he's determined to have us sing a complete DuFay Mass someday . . . if you're used to singing modern music the early stuff will throw you for a loop. The harmonies and everything are SO different. And it sounds strange to modern ears - strange but beautiful.

[AnAmericanMother]

Pedal-harpsichords were fairly common in Germany in the 18th century - they were used by organists as a practice instrument.

Biggs played a lot of Bach organ works on his pedal-harpsichord - it certainly brings out different aspects of the music! And it's easier to keep one at home than a pipe organ!

[Joe 6-pack]

Interesting...IIRC, Chip Davis of Mannheim Steamroller fame dabbled in resurrecting some ancient instruments from depictions on urns and other classical depictions. Vocally, two groups that have done some incredible modern interpretations of ancient music are Dead Can Dance and Medieval Babes...both of which are well worth looking into if this type of thing is of interest to you.

[AnAmericanMother]

I think that they ARE building reproductions of the original instruments. If you listen to the DuFay chanson, it sounds like actual stringed instruments - unlike the Scarlatti computer reproduction. There are slight variations in the plucking, tempo, decay, etc. that indicate actual live performance. Maybe the computer was able to put that in, but that would be so much trouble it would be easier to build one and get a harpist to play it.

The problem with computer generated or electronic music is always that it has no variation - it sounds completely mechanical. It also lacks the overtones of an actual vibrating string, they try to put them in but the harmonics are so complex that they can only approximate it.

And while you don't want your live musicians to make HUGE errors or mess up tempi and stuff, there's a warmness in the sound that computers can't seem to manage.