L'Italo-Americano

L'Italo-Americano THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 2018 www.italoamericano.org 8 FRANCESCA BEZZONE A s usual, Cicero is illuminating: "a life w ithout mus ic is like a body without its soul." There's an undeniable truth in his words the people of his motherland, glorious Rome, always kept in mind. Indeed, the Romans loved music and if they didn't give to it the same ethical and didactic value the Greeks did, they cer- tainly recognized to it immense virtues. Sources tell us Romans' lives were filled with music, just as ours are today: they had mus ic during w ed dings and funerals, parties and holy rituals, theatre representations and even during battle. Yet, music is ethereal and, without standardized ways to write it, the melodies of Rome went, like the buzz of her streets and the heady s cents of her matrons. But Rome left us litera- ture, visual and performing art, technology, she left us the very blueprint of how our society works: in each and every one of these aspects Roman music sur- vived. Memories of its role and pres ence filled Latin vers e, prose and theatre; its soulful nature was the matter of philoso- phy; the instruments used to per- form it, clever - albeit not always original to the Romans - ves tiges of human inventiveness. O f cours e, the people of Rome didn't discover music, nor were they the first to make of it an important part of their exis- tence. From the Greeks, they inherited musical system and melodic elements, but refrained from embracing the typically H ellenic idea of mus ic as a means of moral and ethical edu- cation. In the end, Athens was mother to philos ophers , but Rome -a bit like Sparta had been - was mother to soldiers and mil- itary leaders: music was martial, it was used to encourage fighters during battle and to solemnly accompany parades, military ceremonies, the return of victori- ous warlords. But music was powerful as it was godly, so its flow pinned to memory propitia- tory rituals and religious func- tions. But soon, the Romans discov- ered how versatile music could be. In the 1 st century BC, it became part of theatrical repre- s entations s uch as the pan- tomime, where protagonist were common men and women and their daily lives. Historical and mythological plays became also popular, and music was always part of them. Theatre, then, is where music, so to speak, turned into a popular affair in Rome. And theatre, in those 50 years before the birth of Christ, was fairly important in the Eternal City: its first stable one was built by Pompey in 55 BC and not so long after, in 17 BC, Horace Car m en Saecular e w as per - formed with music. In Rome, then, music soon lost that quintessentially spiritual and moral connotation it used to have in G reece, to be trans - formed into a faithful companion of people's everyday life, which it describes and punctuates often. To meet the first solely musical representations, in the form of instrumental and vocal perfor- mances, we have to wait the late imperial period, when talented musicians and singers were cov- eted members of the Emperor's court. Speaking about the historical face of Roman music may be interesting, but the question is: how did it sound like? We may not have recordings or scores, but certainly we do know how their instruments looked like and, thanks to the usual heady mix of archaeology, history and crafts- manship, we ended up reproduc- ing them. Romans rocked wind instruments like the tibia, similar to the Greek aulos, and the tuba, an ancestor of our trumpets; they also had a cornu (or buccina), a curved metal instrument similar to the modern natural horn. Wind instruments were also important for the martial role of music, as they were used in the castrum to organize its daily activities and, never to be forgot- ten, it was to their voices that battles would begin. Flavius Vegetius, Latin writer of the 4 th century, tells us that "every legion has someone playing the trumpet, the horn and the bucci- na. The trumpet tells to soldiers it's time to attack or retreat. When the horns call, it's standard bearers who answer. Again, trumpets resound when soldiers are called to some mission." Each instrument, it seems clear, had a specific role and duty. Trumpets and horns were used largely during battle; the buccina called soldiers to gather, but was also an instrument of power, as it was used in presence of a gener- al, or when leading a soldier to gallows, as a symbol of the authority that wanted his convic- tion. The buccina was also com- monly used to stress the various moments of military life, like the beginning and the end of a guard's shift, the beginning of a mission and the end of daily manual work in the castrum. Horns were used, as Flavius Vegetius told us, to give orders to standard bearers and signal when they had to begin and stop marching. Of course, Rome knew also string instrument such as the notorious cithara, made popular by the - false - image of Nero playing it while watching Rome burning, and the lyre. Percus- sions were also common with timpani and cymbals among the most used. Historical and literary texts of Roman times have been an essential source for our knowl- edge of music in those centuries, however, no example of Latin musical notation and composi- tion has reached our times, excepted for a small fragment, but in Greek notation, of a come- dy by Terence, Silicius' epitaph and an Apollonian hymn com- posed in Delphi, thus of Greek origin, were a certain Limenius sang the power of Rome. Nothing remains of the music of those centuries, you may think, but it's not entirely true: it's because of Rome's own love and appreciation for music that early Christians began using it in their own ceremonies and prayers, as witnessed by the Oxhyrhyncus Papyri of the 1 st - 2 nd century AD, where a prayer dedicated to the Holy Trinity was punctuated by the use of a xylo- phone. And since the Middle Ages, all the way through the Renaissance, the Baroque era, up to the times of Romanticism and even in the 20 th century, sacred music has been representing one of the highest embodiments of western musical production: in way, we owe this to the Romans, too. Following an old melody: music at the times of Ancient Rome LA VITA ITALIANA TRADITIONS HISTORY CULTURE Music in ancient Rome was initially used for military purposes, then it became popular entertainment

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