Alexandria's founded by Alexander

Alexandria's founded by Alexander the Great (by year BC): 334 Alexandria in Troia (Turkey) - 333 Alexandria at Issus/Alexandrette (Iskenderun, Turkey) - 332 Alexandria of Caria/by the Latmos (Alinda, Turkey) - 331 Alexandria Mygdoniae - 331 Alexandria (Egypt) - 330 Alexandria Ariana (Herat, Afghanistan) - 330 Alexandria of the Prophthasia/in Dragiana/Phrada (Farah, Afghanistan) - 330 Alexandria in Arachosia (Kandahar, Afghanistan) - 330 Alexandria in the Caucasus (Begram, Afghanistan) - 329 Alexandria of the Paropanisades (Ghazni, Afghanistan) - 329 Alexandria Eschate or Ultima (Khodjend, Tajikistan) - 329 Alexandria on the Oxus (Termez, Afghanistan) - 328 Alexandria in Margiana (Merv, Turkmenistan) - 326 Alexandria Nicaea (on the Hydaspes, India) - 326 Alexandria Bucephala (on the Hydaspes, India) - 325 Alexandria Sogdia - 325 Alexandria Oreitide - 325 Alexandria in Opiene / Alexandria on the Indus (confluence of Indus & Acesines, India) - 325 Alexandria Rambacia (Bela, Pakistan) - 325 Alexandria Xylinepolis (Patala, India) - 325 Alexandria in Carminia (Gulashkird, Iran) - 324 Alexandria-on-the-Tigris/Antiochia-in-Susiana/Charax (Spasinou Charax on the Tigris, Iraq) - ?Alexandria of Carmahle? (Kahnu)

Sunday, January 24, 2021

Alexander in India, a musical intermezzo

A dear friend of mine recently shared this wonderful musical rendition created by Peter Pringle entitled Alexander in India - Surbahar & Kithara.

I am sharing this unique musical interpretation for two basic reasons. On the one hand, I find it quite amazing that Alexander is still remembered in India, although he hardly spent a full year in that country, which includes modern Pakistan as well. On the other hand, I am very much impressed by the reconstructed Greek lyre, Alexander’s favorite instrument. As far as I am concerned, this beautiful kithara reminds me of the lyre Apollo is holding in his arms at the Museum of Tripoli in Libya. This labeling, however, appears to be incorrect since the lyre counts “only” four strings, whereas the professional kithara counts seven strings. The instrument Apollo is holding seems to have even more than seven strings, or is it my imagination?

For further information, I copy hereafter the accompanying explanation about this piece of music and the instruments involved.

The surbahar belongs to the Veena Family of the classical instruments of India, and is comparable to the western cello in size and register. The one you see in the video was made for me about 50 years ago by the great Indian luthier, Kanai Lal of Calcutta.

The Greek “kithara” was built by master luthier, Anastasios Koumartzis, of LUTHIEROS MUSIC INSTRUMENTS, which is located in the Macedonian region of Northern Greece. This is the same area in which Alexander the Great was born. The kithara was the instrument of choice for professional musicians during the Golden Age of Greece which reached its height around 500 B.C.E.

In his military exploits, Alexander travelled east as far as the Indus River, which he reached in 326 B.C.E. By that time, he was far from home, his men were getting tired, and they were met by fierce opposition from the armies of the rulers whose territories they invaded. As a result, Alexander never penetrated into the Indian subcontinent, and died in Babylon in 323 B.C.E., on his way back home.

This composition is in the Indian scale (“thaat”) known as “bhairav” (flat 6th and flat 2nd). The surbahar was built to be tuned to an F#, so the kithara is tuned F# G B C C# D F F#.

In more than one way, India is the missing link in my earlier blogs about music and musical instruments in antiquity as I explored ancient music, starting with the Seikilos inscription (see: Revealing ancient Greek music, the Seikilos Epitaph and Reconstructing ancient Greek music, an impossible task?) and continued with Persia (see: What is Persian music like?) and Uzbekistan (see: A thought for Roxane, Alexander’s Bactrian wife).

Music truly is of all times and certainly unites peoples from around the globe! And I can’t help wondering what Alexander would have thought about all this. He must have liked most of it!

4 comments:

  1. The problem is that we know barely nothing about the Greek music.
    Only very few fragments are survived.
    We not know the difference between the various centuries ( the III BC music was different by the music of V century?) and if was a difference between a "pop" music and a "classical" music.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The appellation "pop music" was born last century and what we know as "classical" music was just music in the days of Bach, Beethoven or Mozart.

      Delete
  2. Yes, But the question is for a Greek of III or II century BC the musical music pieces from we said Euripides 's tragedies, or hymns from V century were perceived as the classical music for us?
    And about "pop", mean populars songs ( for exemple for banquets) compared with ancient and "high" music.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Quoting Robin Lane Fox in The Making of Alexander (movie):
      There was also the difficult question of music. Oliver [Stone] was wondering if the film might be set to a replay of ancient Greek music: what do we know about it and can we research it? One of the great experts on the subject had kindly agreed to attend, but he was rightly unable to give any guidance about the correct sort of music at particular points in the story. Even the Greeks’ instruments are hard to reconstruct with certainty. What would have been played, Oliver asked, at a fourth century wedding to Roxane in Bactria? We simply do not know. “Well, I’m staging another wedding, this time in fourth century Macedonia: what sort of music should we play here?” Correctly, the expert view was that we have no idea.

      Delete