Curiosities of Music: A Collection of Facts not generally known, regarding the Music of Ancient and Savage Nations

by Louis Charles Elson

CONTENTS

[I Introduction] 7 [The Hindoos] 8 [II Ancient Egyptian] 15 [III Biblical and Hebrew] 26 [IV Ancient Greek Music] 35 [V The Public Games of Greece] 39 [VI The Philosophers, and Greek Social Music] 53 [VII Greek Theatre and Chorus] 67 [VII The Dances of Ancient Greece] 79 [VIII Ancient Roman Music] 85 [IX Music of the Roman Theatre] 95 [X Music of the Roman Empire] 99 [XI History of Chinese Music] 114 [XII Chinese Music and Musical Instruments] 142 [Of the Sound of Stone] 145 [Of the Sound of Metal] 148 [Of the Sound of Baked Clay] 149 [Of the Sound of Silk] 149 [The Sound of Wood] 151 [The Sound of Bamboo] 153 [The Sound of Calabash] 155 [Miscellaneous Instruments] 156 [The Sound of the Voice] 158 [XIII Chinese Musical Compositions and Ceremonies] 162 [Hymn to the Ancestors] 164 [XVI The Chinese Theatre and Dances] 176 [XVII Music of Japan] 201 [XVIII Music of Savage Nations] 229 [XIX African Music] 251 [Praise of Dingan, A Very Celebrated Chief] 254 [XX Music of the Early Christian Church] 280 [Greek Church] 288 [Syrian Church] 290 [The Armenian Church] 292 [The Churches of Africa] 293 [General Synopsis of Early Christian Music] 296 [XXI The Ambrosian and Gregorian Chant] 299 [XXII Music in Europe from the Fifth Century] 308 [XXIII The Ancient Bards] 323 [XXIV The Troubadours and Minne-Singers] 329 [XXV Curiosities of the Opera. Modern Composers, and Conclusion] 352 [Footnotes] 364 [Index.] 365

CURIOSITIES OF MUSIC.

CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION.

Music has been broadly defined by Fetis as “the art of moving the feelings by combinations of sounds;” taken in this broad sense it may be considered as coeval with the human race.

Vocal music, in a crude form, is as natural in man, to express feelings, as it is for a cat to purr or a lion to roar; as regards instrumental music, the primitive man might have found in every hollow tree a reverberating drum, and in every conchshell or horn of cattle, the natural beginnings of instrumental music; we shall find later that many nations ascribe the discovery of their music to the accidental appliance of some natural instrument; our surest guide in watching the rise of the art, should be the manner in which savage peoples, yet in a state of nature, produce music, and we shall find too, that even the lowest in the scale, even those beings who make the monkey tribe nearer and dearer to us, as possible relatives (the bushmen of Australia for example), have still a method of “moving the feelings by means of combinations of sounds.”

It is therefore, really in barbarous nations, that we may, reasoning by analogy, find in what state music existed when our own ancestors were in a state of nature; but in order to give a more chronological character to our sketches we will begin with the Music and Musical Mythology of the Ancients.