Music 4,000 Years Ago Soothing the Savage Within or Riling Them Up

 Nadene Goldfoot                                             

      Someone in this family group will hum and sing.  They will sing in the minor key as they are in Mesopotamia. 

Here we go;  the ancient music of Mesopotamia: A depiction of a singer and a lyre player entertaining guests at a banquet c. 2500 BCE. Music was a normal part of social life in Mesopotamia. Detail from the Standard of Ur. British Museum, London.

                                               

Musicians of the Assyrian army c. 645 BCE. Nineveh, bas relief in Gypsum alabaster. Palace of Ashurbanipal, Nineveh.The Assyrians made battle music a real influence in the determination of conquest. Their footmen struck to the sound of drum, cymbal and shrill double-flutes, and when the fierce Assyrian horsemen charged they did so to the clashing of iron bells (like modern sleigh-bells), with which their harness was hung. From 1100 B.C. until its conquest by the Persians, Asia danced to the tune of the Assyrian war-pipes, and blood flowed where they sounded. 

The Babylonians, Hittites, Canaanites, Syrian Phoenicians, Jews, Egyptians and Lydian Greeks yielded up their goods and treasure to these martial pipings, and gold, silver, lapis lazuli, gums, spices, war-chariots, horses, cattle and slaves pour into the Assyrian capital to the tempo of their military.

             Ofra Haza, parents from Yemen, sang the yearning Jewish Yemenite songs in Israel. She was interpreting traditional Yemeni Jewish songs with lyrics coming from the poetry of 16th century Rabbi Shalom Shabazi.  The album was recorded with both traditional and modern musical instruments; wooden and metal percussion, Yemenite tin and tambala, strings, brass and woodwind as well as drum machines and synthesizers. The songs are sung in Hebrew with a Yemenite accent and in Arabic.

The history of music is as old as humanity itself. Archaeologists have found primitive flutes made of bone and ivory dating back as far as 43,000 years, and it’s likely that many ancient musical styles have been preserved in oral traditions.  The earliest fragment of musical notation is found on a 4,000-year-old Sumerian clay tablet, which includes instructions and tunings for a hymn honoring the ruler Lipit-Ishtar.Cantor David Roitman's voice was a flexible Iyric tenor with a wide range, an exceptional coloratura and a pure pianissimo from which he was able to pass directly into the forte voice.Born in 1884 David Roitman held position as Chazzan in Vilna, and then later St. Petersburg where he served until the Russian Revolution of 1917. For three years he stayed in Odessa until the situation there became very difficult, and he crossed the border to Romania.

         Cantor Schwartz sings “T'fillat Tal" ("Prayer for Dew")

The human voice has sung.  It discovered the minor key throughout the Middle East, while the West chose the major keys.  Jews sing their prayers, and this is done by the Cantor in the synagogue, so man probably did the same long ago.  Many of the Eastern European Yiddish liturgy were sung in a minor key. It expresses suffering. It expresses the the heartfelt yearning and plea to connect with God in prayer.

     Blowing the ram's horn on special occasions in a certain melody alerted people like a warning siren.  They discovered another musical instrument this way.  On Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur we hear the ram's horn.  

                     Getting attention in the Temple,  They would sing the prayers, too.                                                                

The geographical origin of the drum is Egypt, Turkey and Armenia, although it became very popular throughout the oriental music market in many different countries  .According to academic circles, its origins trace back to three percussion instruments played in the Arab world during the Middle Ages:  Darij, Kuba and Kabar.  Many iconographic elements testify to the existence of these instrument in ancient Egypt, from the Middle Kingdom, as well as Babylon, with "drums to drink" (approx 1100 BC), and even in Sumerian cultures. The Mesopotamian, Anatolian and central Asian civilizations also played similar instruments.

Floor pavement representing female harpist. Marble mosaic, ca. 260 AD (CE)  (Sasanian Era). From the iwan of the so-called palace of Shapur at Bishapur, Iran.

This leads us into David (reined from 1010 BCE to 970 BCE)  playing a harp.  Harps had been invented, lyres, such stringed instruments.  Harp strings were made from sheep gut.  It turns out that real people have been making instruments out of bones for centuries: flutes made from femurs and percussion instruments from skulls. 

Original Klezmer music, the music of the Jewish soul.  Klezmer is the music of Eastern European Jews of the 1800s, often played by a small band or orchestra featuring stringed instruments such as violins, guitar and wind instruments such as clarinet. By the early 1900s immigrants had brought Klezmer music to the United States and began to meld it with American jazz influences. Of course, it's in the minor key.  it's my soul music.                            

Today's animals even enjoy listening to music.  I wonder what their favorite type is?  The howls of wolves, maybe?  Bach, Chopin,  Jazz? Dogs in particular hear very high notes we can't hear.  That's why we can't hear the dog whistle, but they do.                                   

Israel Philharmonic Orchestra - Itzhak Perlman - Beethoven - Egmont & 6th Symphony, 22.3.2010

Watch

Notice, our teeny Israel is made up of music from the East with Ofra's Yemenite strain to Klesmer of Poland; with thinking from Left to Right, all in one of the smallest countries on earth.  What an orchestra they have!  

Resource:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCrnR_-oVec

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Mesopotamia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_music

https://www.gotjudaica.com/Product.asp?dept=3040&Product=lp-david-roitman

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=819873332206685

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_instrument