Greek Music

Greek Music, music primarily of ancient Greek civilization. Most of the compositions seem to have been monophonic, that is, composed of one unharmonized melodic line. Melodies and rhythms in vocal music were related to the rhythms and speech inflections of the text; instrumental music may have been similarly related to dance movement. The peak of musical activity came during the classical age (450-325 bc), when annual festivals and contests of vocal and instrumental music were held.

The principal instruments were two forms of lyre, the lyra and the kithara; and a double oboe, the aulos. They were all used as solo instruments and to accompany singing and recitation. Stringed instruments were associated with religious ceremonies and the cult of Apollo, and wind instruments were used in the cult of Dionysus and in drama.

The ancient Greek philosophers ascribed a divine origin and a continuing religious significance to music. They believed that music represented in microcosm the order and harmony of the universe and that by studying the acoustical properties of musical intervals they would come closer to understanding the cosmos. For instance, Pythagoras (c.580-500 bc) demonstrated that the pitch of a plucked string was directly related to the length of the string, with the pitch rising one octave each time the length is halved. Different divisions in the length of the string gave him the fourth and fifth interval. The ancient Greeks also believed that music had power over human emotions and behaviour and that when written in the various modes, or scales, music would cause predictable reactions. The truth of these beliefs has never been conclusively proved or disproved.

Since the 1950s and 1960s several Greek composers have become famous, most notably Iannis Xenakis, who is also an architect.