Music in Ancient Greece and Rome

by John G. Landels

Music in Ancient Greece and Rome provides a comprehensive introduction to the history of music from Homeric times to the Roman emperor Hadrian, presented in a concise and user-friendly way. Chapters
* contexts in which music played a role
* a detailed discussion of instruments
* an analysis of scales, intervals and tuning
* the principal types of rhythm used
* and an exploration of Greek theories of harmony and acoustics.
Music in Ancient Greece and Rome also contains numerous musical examples, with illustrations of ancient instruments and the methods of playing them.

Genres: Music, History

312 pages, Hardcover

First published May 11, 1998

About the author

John G. Landels was Lecturer in Classics at the University of Hull from 1953 until 1959, and the University of Reading from 1960 until his retirement in 1989. His work, in collaboration with the Engineering Department, involved making working replicas of ancient machines and testing them in the field.

Reviews

[Linda · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a book I was hoping to like a lot more but it wasn't what I was hoping it would be. That's probably my fault for simply checking the ebook out of the library without really understanding what it was.

I was hoping for a good overview of the type and variety of music performed in Ancient Greece and Rome and how that related to our modern musical ideas. What I got was something really aimed at someone with more musicology background than I have. Though it tries to be accessible to the reader outside the field it didn't always succeed.

That isn't to say that parts of the book weren't fascinating but large chunks were essentially opaque to me.

This is the kind of book that screams out for multimedia accompaniment. The author uses words like Lydian and Phrygian and tries to describe them but the descriptions didn't connect with me. I wish I could have heard what he was describing. It would have helped a lot.