music = code

In the coming posts, I would like to approach the phenomenon of music in a slightly different way. Especially these days, when AI and similar things don't even stop at music, I think it's very important to write about what connects us humans within music and what makes it special. I hope I can arouse your interest.

Music can be seen as a malleable mass that enables us to reflect our condition as human beings and as a society. Now this mass has a disadvantage: it dissolves again immediately after its creation. Music alone is therefore only suitable as a carrier material over time to a limited extent. Apart from the oral tradition, there is another, particularly efficient form of transmission. We have learned to encode music.

The history of the development of this method is of course linked to the history of the development of music itself and of societies in general, and it provides a deep and extremely exciting insight into our past and a glimpse into our future.

our musical CODE

We would immediately place the word CODE in the digital world. In our case, we go back a little further, almost 2,000 years. The year is approximately 150-200 AD. In ancient Greece, a man named Seikilos has a text hammered into a stone cylinder. Perhaps he did it himself. The text is a poem, not unusual in style for this era. The translation sounds something like this:

I am an image

in stone; Seikilos placed

me here,

in eternal memory,

as a timeless symbol.

As long as you live, you too will appear.

Grieve over nothing too much.

A short time

remains to live.

The end brings the

time itself.

Lennart Larsen, Nationalmuseets fotograf - Nationalmuseet 14897

Researchers long assumed that it could possibly be a gravestone. The absence of part of the stele allows a certain amount of leeway for different interpretations of its final purpose. Etymologically, this text is very easy to deduce and so it seems that this object was intended as a testimony to “timeless” music. The material stone was considered to be the best bearer for future generations, i.e. the courier of a message that encompassed not only words but also music.

The text consists of two parts: an introduction in which the bearer, i.e. the stone itself, introduces itself, so to speak, followed by a principle that is still valid today. In short, to use or rather enjoy one's time here on earth. This way of looking at life probably goes back to Horace, who was probably one of the first to formulate this in his Ode to Leukonë around 160 years earlier. “Carpe diem”, for example, is still valid today and is often quoted.

Above the text are symbols that determine the length and height of the notes to be sung. Greek letters in inverted form, absolutely common at the time. In other words, a musical notation! It is in no way similar to ours, but this method allows the essential elements of the music to be linked to the text and thus made legible.

We now travel almost 2,000 years into the future. In 1883, a man finds this stele and the link from the past to the present and future is established. The stone has fulfilled its task with flying colors. It has delivered the message and the CODE can still be deciphered. So we can play, sing and listen to this melody. We can connect with our history in a marvelous way.

The opportunity to listen to this song today not only gives us an insight into the creative world of earlier eras, no, it shows us how connected we are to our history. The music and notation of the Greeks will continue to have an effect until the Middle Ages and will only gradually be replaced by a different kind (new notation, etc.). This, in turn, will continue to evolve until it becomes the musical notation we use today. Our music is thus represented in a constantly changing CODE, which had to do justice to an increasingly complex music. It has therefore itself become ever more complex and more precise and unambiguous in its expressiveness. What the future holds will be extremely exciting.

There is a profound and inseparable connection between musical notation, music itself, and the development of a society.

The Seikilos Epitaph is, to this day, the oldest fully preserved piece of music – a testament to humanity’s ability to send a code through time. In this case, it carries the message to live in the moment, to make use of time, and not to worry too much. Such a “timeless” achievement is something one cannot expect from an AI.

I wish you much joy while reading and look forward to your comments.

Ronald

Preview: The next post will explore the 2,000-year history of music – a mirror of humanity’s worldview and self-image.

P.S.: On a well-known platform for cat videos and all sorts of tutorials, you can also find some beautiful interpretations of the Seikilos Epitaph.