leftybassman392

The second article in the series, covering the basics of Greek scale structure, has been posted in the sticky thread above. Enjoy!

Second Installment. The Ancient Greek approach to scale construction ( Note: this whole topic is inevitably laced with lots of technical terms and words. Where necessary I will make a habit of explaining them 'in situ', but I try always to make sure I have checked several sources to make sure that more detailed explanations are available. For the most part, I have found Wikipedia very useful as a first-stop resource – I would recommend having a second window open on your browser, pointing at the Wiki homepage, when reading these articles. Wiki does get a well deserved bad press for the things it does badly, but it just so happens that the Greeks and Music Theory are on the whole covered pretty well – not that I agree with it all mind you! Like all such resources though, it's a good idea not to overuse it as it will make the main argument harder to follow, especially if you land yourself in the middle of a highly technical Wiki article. ) 1. The way we do it. In order to get a handle on the way the Greeks constructed their scales it wouldn't be a bad idea to briefly summarise the way we do it. (Apologies if you've heard this before a zillion times, but I'm going to get at the Greek approach by comparing it with contemporary practice – which will serve several useful purposes, so please bear with me.) Contemporary music practice centres around the Octave as the standard unit for scale construction. The octave is then subdivided into 12 equally spaced semitones using a system called Equal Temperament. This is a system that makes it easy to move between registers and move between keys – accidentals, modulation and transposition would all be a lot weirder without it! (Note: The harmonic theory that sits behind the Equal Temperament system is actually quite awkward unless you have a good working knowledge of geometric series' and base 2 logarithms, but thankfully someone has come up with a brilliant idea that makes things a bit easier to follow – cents! Using this ingenious device we can talk about musical intervals using simple arithmetic. An octave is 1200 cents, and since there are 12 tones in the octave that means exactly 100 cents per semitone – it works best if you think about each note in the scale being at the centre of a 100 cent band, i.e. 50 either side. If you've never looked closely at the markings on your electronic tuner, now might be a good time... ) However, as with so many things in life there's a price to pay – in order to have this freedom of movement, we have to give up something called Sonic Purity. What this means in practice is that the only interval in the octave that maintains an absolutely pitch accurate relationship (in the sense of an exact ratio) is the octave itself. All the other interval relationships within the octave are something of a compromise (in simple terms, they're all slightly off-pitch, but close enough so that we can live with it). Actually, precise pitching of notes in relation to each other is a historically knotty problem for musicians, so much so that in recent years I believe there's been a number of attempts to ditch Equal Temperament and revert back to older tuning methods (the fearlessly curious amongst you might want to check out something called 'Just Intonation' – but you have been warned..). I'll need to talk about this a bit more when I get to the Greek approach, but for now suffice it to say that they did it a different way. The other thing to say about western musical scales is that by convention we talk about them as starting at the lowest (root) note and ascending in interval increments up to the highest (octave) note. In fact we're so used to doing it that way that most people will likely be finding it hard to imagine doing it any other way – 'why would you want to?' may well have been uttered out loud by someone already... Tell you what – we'll come back to that one later. 2. The Ancient Greek approach. ( Note: before starting this section I should say that in this article I will stick to the basic concepts and avoid going into specific details about the scales as they were used by the Greeks in practice. This is for two reasons: firstly, once we get into that level of detail it is a very substantial topic on it's own – much too long to include as an add-on to this article; and secondly I feel it would be better at this stage to give people the basic idea and suggest some examples that people can try out for themselves at home, so that you get a chance to play around with the methodology. ) The Tetrachord. Musical scales in Ancient Greece were organised around the concept of a Tetrachord, an interval equivalent to a modern Perfect Fourth. The Greeks certainly knew about octaves and used them routinely, but in situations that called for an octave note span they would simply stick two tetrachords together, along with a Major Second interval (in practice the process was of course somewhat more involved than this, but I've deliberately simplified so as to make the point about octaves). Structurally a Tetrachord is a fixed interval of a perfect fourth (expressed as the ratio 4:3 – ratios are the key to understanding how Greek music works; and although we can usefully skirt around it for the time being, a proper explanation of how to construct the kind of scales that Greek musicians would actually have used will eventually require us to tackle it head on). The scale is then subdivided using (usually) two subdivision points, giving a four note scale equivalent to a perfect fourth. The placement of these subdivisions is another critically important factor in the process – although the two notes at either end of the Tetrachord were fixed relative to each other, the remaining notes could in principle be more or less anywhere. (Again, I've deliberately oversimplified the situation: this explanation makes it sound like a 'pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey' game - which of course it wasn't - but the technicalities governing placement of intermediate intervals will require a further article.) There were three generic tetrachord types in common use. The best way I can describe them at this stage is to place the intervals using modern scale theory, but with the HUGE caveat that this is being done only to illustrate the general characteristics of the scales, and to allow you to have something you can play: the actual notes used – and hence the sounds you would hear – would be somewhat different from the ones you will hear when you try these out for yourselves. One final point – as you probably anticipated from earlier in the article, the Greeks thought downwards for their scales, i.e. the starting note (sometimes called the Principal note to distinguish it from the modern concept of a Tonic or Root note) was at the top. The Diatonic scale genus consisted of (approximately) Tone, Tone, Semitone; The Chromatic scale genus consisted of (approximately) Minor Third, Semitone, Semitone; The Enharmonic scale genus consisted of (approximately) Double Tone, Quarter, Quarter. ( Notes: 1. Notice that I have used the word 'genus' in the descriptions; this is because each type permits many subtypes within its structure by making small alterations to the positioning of the subdivisions – the size of the first interval down from the Principal note is the determining factor. 2. As mentioned in an earlier article, we are seeing technical words that look as if they should be familiar, when in fact it is clear that they have different meanings to their modern counterparts – although by reversing the order of notes on the Greek Diatonic tetrachord and adding a whole tone followed by another diatonic tetrachord, it is possible to see how the modern diatonic major scale developed. 3. For those of a curious nature, the original source for this classification is Aristoxenus. Usual rules and warnings apply – doubly so in this case as this is an original Greek source: reading stuff like this, even after translation, is hard! ) This gives you something you can actually play! (Yay!!) You may want to play around with these ideas – the quarter tones are gonna be fun! As a suggestion, you might want to play it on a stringed instrument, or a keyboard with a pitch wheel. Time to get your fretless or EUB out perhaps? Hints & Tips Don't forget to play downwards. Avoid open strings on fretted instruments – you'll understand why when you try to play a quarter tone for the first time. Use pitch bend or string bend to approximate quarter tones (less of a problem with fretless instruments of course). Music in Ancient Greece was commonly played in unison with notes sung by a singer (usually in the telling of epic tales using epic poetry), so for extra added effect you might like to try this out if you have an epic poem or two handy – can't wait! Plenty to keep you busy again. Any questions please ask either through PM or on the other thread. Feel free to chime in with comments as well. In the next article we'll begin looking at Rhythm. See you next time. Andy

[quote name='EBS_freak' post='589374' date='Sep 4 2009, 08:46 AM']But it still wouldn't get you *that* bass... and if you want *that* bass... cough up![/quote] ...and I don't doubt somebody will

What were they thinking! For that kind of money you could get any of a selection of really rather nice cars, and still have change for a couple of really rather nice basses.

[quote name='foal30' post='586356' date='Sep 1 2009, 11:06 AM']tutor is good no need to be bass specific either in fact if it's theory you want a good argument can be made to get your lessons from a Pianist[/quote] Good point! Local music shops (especially if they do a lot of business with the education sector) should have lists of tutors who can take you through what you need to know. As a bass player you would be looking mainly at bass clef, but any half-decent tutor will want you to learn the whole language and not just a part of it. This is a good thing! - hence the comment by foal30 about having a pianist.

Another route might be to find yourself a local tutor who can teach you. (Not everybody does well with books.) A lot of BC members (myself among them) earn a living as tutors, so it might be an idea to make yourself known in the 'bass tutors' forum, making sure you tell people that you want to learn theory - without wishing to hurt anybody's feelings there's a lot of people on Basschat that are very good players, but sometimes they've sacrificed theory for the sake of a good technique. Also you will need to tell people where you live so that you get responses from tutors who live locally. Andy

[quote name='EssentialTension' post='585362' date='Aug 30 2009, 08:36 PM']I think I read on one of the sites that the Sihtar originally had three strings but a fourth was added in modern times. Couldn't find it when I checked again. I could be talking rubbish here but ... according to Liddell & Scott ... and if I'm understanding correctly ... the Greek verb [i]kitharizein[/i] was used to mean 'playing music' on any of several instruments including the phormigx and the lyra as well as the kithara. I'm not clear though what the relationship between these instruments was, e.g. how they differ.[/quote] In the Persian, the 'tar' apparently refers to a string or strings, so it may be a reference to vibrating strings in general, (which would tend to support your point).

[quote name='Fraktal' post='583440' date='Aug 28 2009, 12:21 PM']I dont want to start a flame war here, but I think that wasnt an opinion, more like a common sense fact. Lets go back to 1960, when the Jazz Bass was released. Now think about the clothing people used to wear back in those days. Think about 1960 furniture, cars, electrodomestics or anything else. Would you say those designs arent outdated? Would you prefer to use "old-fashioned" as the word here? The designs of that age (late 50's-early 60's) are outdated from a technical/design/engineering point of view. On the aesthetics side, they are old-fashioned. Some of us may like old stuff, but that doesnt transform it magically into contemporary/new/modern stuff. An opinion would be more like "the Jazz Bass looks crap" and I never said that. Again, please try to understand that is not my aim to bash Fender, neither trying to impose my personal opinion above anyone's else. Im just saying its a late 50's design.[/quote] In terms of the number of people that have done it, the Jazz has to be the most cloned instrument in the history of the bass guitar - in fact there are companies out there who've built their reputation making Jazz clones - Sadowsky for example. You don't think there might be a good reason for that? Can't all be old farts buying them...

[quote name='Zoe_BillySheehan' post='584545' date='Aug 29 2009, 03:26 PM']I've borrowed a 5 string from my dads guitarist. and I've been playing through some stuff like 'Rage against the machine' and 'Stone sour' i'd like some more suggestions.. I know you can just use the 5th B in other songs... but i'd like some songs that are usually played on a 5 string, or a 4 string tuned to BEAD. Z x[/quote] You a fan of Evanescence? 'Bring me to Life' is fun. And it uses all 5 strings. (Great to see you back btw) Andy

First installment Introductory remarks and basic ideas 1. Background The Ancient Greek civilisation is an endless source of fascination for me. Modern Western civilisation owes more to the Greeks than to any other single source; Science, Mathematics, Art, Philosophy, Politics, Social structures – and, of course, Music. I don't think it's too much to say that they provided the blueprint from which modern western civilisation has developed. Many aspects of Greek culture are well covered in the literature, but music – surprisingly – isn't one of them. When I studied the topic in the early 1980's there was very little by way of modern commentary on this important aspect of Greek life in the period. I remember having to wade through massive dusty tomes for small snippets of information, most of which had a Mathematical bias; there wasn't much that I found that dealt with music from a musician's perspective. In the 20-odd years that have passed since then, more work has been done on the subject, so that music has become more widely accepted as having a key role in everyday life for the Ancient Greeks. 2. Sources and preparatory reading A lot of people will no doubt be happy to follow this main text, and that's just fine as it saves me some work! However one or two of you have already indicated to me that you may want to investigate some of the material a bit more thoroughly for yourselves. As a general point, Wikipedia covers the Ancient Greeks in some detail, and is actually not bad at all for getting some background to a lot of what is said. Although quality is sometimes a bit patchy by academic standards, it will be plenty good enough for most people. (If you do a Wiki search on 'Ancient Greece' for example, you should find plenty to keep you busy.) There's also quite a lot of Wiki articles that cover musical scales, intonation and other related subjects – again though, be careful because quality does vary, and a lot of it isn't written in a particularly reader-friendly way. When we get into the nitty gritty of the Greek approach to developing and using scales, it will definitely help if you have a comfortable working knowledge of intervals and scale structures – shouldn't be too much of a problem for members of this forum I would hope! (A knowledge of how to express musical intervals in cents wouldn't do any harm either, but I'll go through it when we get there). For those of you prepared to do more digging, there are works of a more academic nature that will allow you to form your own opinion of the topics being discussed – be warned though that most of them are either academic studies by scholars mostly talking to other scholars and/or very advanced students; or else translations of works from original texts (either Ancient Greek or Latin in their original form). This really is doing it hard way, and is definitely not for the casual reader! I'll try to point things out as we go. 3. Language issues Modern European languages are laced with words that have their origins in Ancient Greek culture. Words like Scale, Chromatic, Harmony, Chord and Diatonic are all direct descendents of Greek originals. However there is a problem here. Almost without exception, the Greek originals had substantially different meanings from their modern counterparts. Whenever these words come up in discussion (and they will!), you need to be very careful to resist putting a modern interpretation on them. Perhaps an example will help to make the point: Let's take the phrase 'Ionian Mode'. The standard modern take on this is 'a fancy name for the Major Scale'; forms the basis of a series of 7 interdependent patterns – once you have defined one of them you have in effect defined all of them. However in Ancient Greece it would have meant something quite different. Ancient Greece was populated by a number of distinct tribes or regional groups. The music from a region was a reflection of the tribe's collective 'personality'. The scale devised to make this music was named after the tribe from whom it originated. The Ionian Mode or Ionian Scale was a scale devised by the Ionians. This scale would have been distinct from the scales from other regions, and not musically related to any of them beyond the most basic elements of its structure. More to the point, the Ionian scale of the Ancient world would have borne little resemblance to the modern Major scale – indeed the whole methodology of scale construction was different. More on this in a later article, of course. In the next article I propose to start looking at the basic mechanics of scale construction. Don't forget to do your homework...

Fascinating stuff. Definitely adds some historical perspective. Tar looks particularly interesting. Do you happen to know whether these are modern recreations of ancient instruments or modernised versions? My feeling would be the latter (unlikely to be both as that would mean the instrument has not changed significantly in over 4000 years which seems very unlikely, and some of the sites you've located appear to view them as contemporary), but I'd be happy to be wrong. If there's a downside to this result it's that we're still not really close to knowing why the Greeks used a variation of this name to identify what is clearly a different instrument [url="http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/kith/hd_kith.htm/The"]Check this link[/url] - actually I don't entirely agree with this description, in particular as to the number of strings, but it give you a good idea what it would have looked like. Ah well, the search goes on...

Nice one! Looks like I need a new search engine Still it was only a quick search...

[quote name='leftybassman392' post='583362' date='Aug 28 2009, 11:11 AM']It's a pretty good start though! It gives an interesting insight into the historical and geographical spread of stringed instruments. They notion of plucking strings to make music clearly goes back much further into Indo-European history than I knew of. It just seemed a bit odd that the Kithara (which by this reasoning sits within the chain, but is clearly a different type of instrument from all the others) should occupy the place it does, whilst the instrument that would appear to be a more likely candidate has a completely different name. Actually it would be a good idea to see if I can find out what a Sihtar looked like. Time to do a bit more digging methinks.[/quote] Haven't been able to find a direct reference to this instrument, but there is an article in Wikipedia (admittedly vague and a bit short on supporting evidence) that refers to guitars and lutes separately in ancient Persian music going back to around 2,500 BC. Hmmm...

[quote name='EssentialTension' post='583058' date='Aug 27 2009, 11:15 PM']Not much of an answer to the question asked though.[/quote] It's a pretty good start though! It gives an interesting insight into the historical and geographical spread of stringed instruments. They notion of plucking strings to make music clearly goes back much further into Indo-European history than I knew of. It just seemed a bit odd that the Kithara (which by this reasoning sits within the chain, but is clearly a different type of instrument from all the others) should occupy the place it does, whilst the instrument that would appear to be a more likely candidate has a completely different name. Actually it would be a good idea to see if I can find out what a Sihtar looked like. Time to do a bit more digging methinks.

Quick update folks. I've been in conversation with one of the Mods, who has kindly consented to putting the series up as a sticky thread (I have been surprised at the number of requests I've had for this topic, and it was becoming clear that using PM's was going to be impractical). Will be getting things going on Saturday. Andy

[quote name='velvetkevorkian' post='582856' date='Aug 27 2009, 08:11 PM']I'd also be interested- thanks for taking the time Leftybassman![/quote] Yup no problem

[quote name='skankdelvar' post='582280' date='Aug 27 2009, 11:14 AM']But such a strange name for a company. Like buying a car from 'Breakdown Motors'.[/quote] Guy that runs the business calls himself Buster Stringfellow - I think it may be a made up name...

[quote name='SteveO' post='582700' date='Aug 27 2009, 05:51 PM']I'd also be very interested in this mr lefty sir. Can you add me to your list please. [/quote] Certainly my son. Done.

A little something to get the collective little grey cells working: India has the Sitar originating from the thirteenth century (technically a member of the lute family); Persia has the Setar, dating from about the birth of Islam (i.e. around 7th/8th century and also a type of lute) Ancient Greece had the Cithara (Latin spelling) or Kithara (no 'c' in the Greek alphabet) - a type of lyre; Italy has a traditional folk instrument called a Chitarra that dates back several hundred years at least - somewhat similar to a modern classical guitar; We have the guitar. What, if any, is the connection? Not a trick question or one I know the answer to, but the etymology is striking. Problem is - all these instruments are lute based or lute derived, except the Kithara... the Greeks had a lute - but it had a completely different name (Pandoura)

[quote name='lowdown' post='582547' date='Aug 27 2009, 03:39 PM']This sounds interesting Lefty. Can you put me on the list. Garry[/quote] Done.

[quote name='The Funk' post='582436' date='Aug 27 2009, 01:49 PM']Thanks for the explanation, Lefty! Does your knowledge reach further back than the Church's interventions? This whole topic sounds fascinating![/quote] You want me to put you on the mailing list?

[quote name='The Funk' post='582436' date='Aug 27 2009, 01:49 PM']Thanks for the explanation, Lefty! Does your knowledge reach further back than the Church's interventions? This whole topic sounds fascinating![/quote] Actually the Ancient Greeks is more my area than the medieval period - as I see it the early Church hijacked most of their notions from the likes of Plato and (especially) Aristotle anyway. Greeks are a much more interesting culture all round IMHO.

[quote name='EssentialTension' post='582087' date='Aug 27 2009, 02:14 AM']Andy, I'd much appreciate being in on that if possible. PM sent.[/quote] And replied.

[quote name='The Funk' post='582100' date='Aug 27 2009, 06:00 AM']I remember one lesson when I studied Ancient Greek in which a discussion began about an odd translation along the lines of "the exotic-sounding Ionian scale". Our extremely knowledgeable teacher assured us that while the names of the modes are derived from Ancient Greece, the actual scales to which they refer are not necessarily the same.[/quote] Most people know them as the Ecclesiastical Modes because (to cut a very long and convoluted story to shreds) the medieval church took over an immensely complex and varied set of musical ideas from the Greeks (with some Roman input along the way), and whittled it down to something the masses could get along with (sound familiar?). The system of modes we have today is a development of that, with some other stuff like equal temperament thrown in. The original names are taken from early Greek tribes - The Ionians, Dorians, etc. Each of the tribes had their own notions of music, so that an Ionian scale in it's original Ancient form could well sound exotic, both to other tribes of the period and to us. One thing I can tell you is that it almost certainly didn't sound like a modern Major scale.