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Page 34
When the revolt under Vindex broke out (68 A.D.), a new
instrument had just been brought to Rome. Tertullian, Suetonius,
and Vitruvius agree in calling it an organ. This instrument,
which was the invention of Ctesibus of Alexandria, consisted
of a set of pipes through which the air was made to vibrate
by means of a kind of water pump operated by iron keys. It
was undoubtedly the direct ancestor of our modern organ. Nero
intended to introduce these instruments into the Roman theatre.
In planning for his expedition against Vindex, his first
care was to provide carriages for his musical instruments;
for his intention was to sing songs of triumph after having
quelled the revolt. He publicly vowed that if his power in the
state were reestablished, he would include a performance upon
organs as well as upon flutes and bagpipes, in the exhibitions
he intended to institute in honour of his success.
From a musical point of view, Suetonius's biography of Nero
is interesting chiefly on account of its giving us glimpses
of the life of a professional musician of those days. We read,
together with many other details, that it was the custom for a
singer to lie on his back, with a sheet of lead upon his breast,
to correct unsteadiness in breathing, and to abstain from food
for two days together to clear his voice, often denying himself
fruit and sweet pastry. The degraded state of the theatre may
well be imagined from the fact that under Nero the custom of
hiring professional applause was instituted. After his death,
which is so dramatically told by Suetonius, music never revived
in Rome.
In the meanwhile, however, a new kind of music had begun;
in the catacombs and underground vaults, the early Christians
were chanting their first hymns. Like all that we call "new,"
this music had its roots in the old. The hymns sung by the
Christians were mainly Hebrew temple songs, strangely changed
into an uncouth imitation of the ancient Greek drama or worship
of Dionysus; for example, Philo of Alexandria, as well as Pliny
the Younger, speaks of the Christians as accompanying their
songs with gestures, and with steps forward and backward. This
Greek influence is still further implied by the order of one
of the earliest of the Church fathers, Clement of Alexandria
(about 300 A.D.), who forbade the use of the chromatic style in
the hymns, as tending too much toward paganism. Some writers
even go so far as to identify many of the Christian myths and
symbols with those of Greece. For instance, they see, in the
story of Daniel in the lions' den, another form of the legend of
Orpheus taming the wild beasts; in Jonah, they recognize Arion
and the dolphin; and the symbol of the Good Shepherd, carrying
home the stray lamb on his shoulders, is considered another
form of the familiar Greek figure of Hermes carrying the goat.
Be this as it may, it is certain that this crude beginning
of Christian music arose from a vital necessity, and was
accompanied by an indomitable faith. If we look back, we note
that until now music had either been the servant of ignoble
masters, looked upon as a mathematical problem to be solved
scientifically, or used according to methods prescribed by
the state. It had been dragged down to the lowest depths of
sensuality by the dance, and its divine origin forgotten in
lilting rhythms and soft, lulling rhymes.
On the other hand, the mathematicians, in their cold
calculation, reduced music to the utilitarianism of algebra,
and even viewed it as a kind of medicine for the nerves and
mind. When we think of the music of Pythagoras and his school,
we seem to be in a kind of laboratory in which all the tones
are labelled and have their special directions for use. For
the legend runs that he composed melodies in the diatonic,
chromatic, and enharmonic styles as antidotes for moods such
as anger, fear, sorrow, etc., and invented new rhythms which
he used to steady and strengthen the mind, and to produce
simplicity of character in his disciples. He recommended that
every morning, after rising, they should play on the lyre and
sing, in order to clear the mind. It was inevitable that this
half mathematical, half psychologically medicinal manner of
treating music would, in falling into the hands of Euclid
(300 B.C.) and his school, degenerate into a mere peg on
which to hang mathematical theorems. On the other hand, when
we think of Greek dances, we seem to pass into the bright,
warm sunshine. We see graceful figures holding one another by
the wrist, dancing in a circle around some altar to Dionysus,
and singing to the strange lilt of those unequal measures. We
can imagine the scheme of colour to be white and gold, framed
by the deep-blue arch of the sky, the amethyst sea flecked
with glittering silver foam, and the dark, sombre rocks of the
Cretan coast bringing a suggestion of fate into this dancing,
soulless vision. Turning now to Rome, we see that this same
music has fallen to a wretched slave's estate, cowering in some
corner until the screams of Nero's living torches need to be
drowned; and then, with brazen clangour and unabashed rhythms,
this brutal music flaunts forth with swarms of dancing slaves,
shrilling out the praises of Nero; and the time for successful
revolution is at hand.
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