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Ancient and ArchaeologyΒ  permalink

Sounds from the Past

• Message 1.Β 

  Posted by raundsgirl (U2992430) on Friday, 22nd April 2011

  Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio4 last Tuesday broadcast a wonderful programme called 'Ghost Music'.
  I heard again the shivery sound of the silver and bronze trumpets from Tutankhamun's tomb, played by a miliary trumpeter and recorded by the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ in the days when such things were possible.
  I first heard that sound as part of a schools broadcast so it was around 1950.
  That was it; I was hooked, on archaeology in general and Egypt in particular. Hearing the trumpets again brought a lump to my throat.
  
  It's still available on iPlayer (they talk about re-creating other ancient instruments too)

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• Message 2

  , in reply to message 1.

  Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Friday, 22nd April 2011

  Unfortunately, what you heard is extremely unlikely to bear any resemblance to the original sound, as the trumpeter used a modern mouthpiece to allow him to get a tune out of Tut's trumpet

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• Message 3

  , in reply to message 2.

  Posted by raundsgirl (U2992430) on Friday, 22nd April 2011

  You have just rained heavily on my parade, Ur!

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• Message 4

  , in reply to message 3.

  Posted by raundsgirl (U2992430) on Sunday, 24th April 2011

  Well it's on again at 3.30 thisafternoon

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• Message 5

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  Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 24th April 2011

  Raundsgirl
  
  Pretty useless information but, probably in the late seventies , the brother of the cricketer Robin Jackman did some supply work in our school and I listened to an LP he had made of his own attempts to recreate the Egyptian soundscape.. I think he entitled it "Horus"..
  
  But it may well never have been released commercially.. And as he was only a "temp" I do not know what success he may have had.. Sounds like the kind of thing that film-makers look for to match their images.
  
  But at least your post has reminded me of listening to it.
  
  Cass

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• Message 6

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  Posted by somewhatsilly (U14315357) on Sunday, 24th April 2011

  And here it is
  
  

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• Message 7

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  Posted by raundsgirl (U2992430) on Sunday, 24th April 2011

  Thank you, Ferval. And I DON'T CARE if it had a modern mouthpiece, it still sends shivers down my spine! (and I'm an 8-year-old again, sitting on a dusty school floor, hearing the sound that captivated me for ever)

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• Message 8

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  Posted by Jak (U1158529) on Tuesday, 26th April 2011

  Very interesting, but would a modern trumpet mouthpiece really have made much difference to the sound?
  
  Presumably the ancient trumpet had a mouthpiece of some sort, for the player's lips to vibrate against. So could it have been very much different from the mouthpiece of any modern brass instrument?
  
  Or was there perhaps a reed of some sort, as in a woodwind instrument?

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• Message 9

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  Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Tuesday, 26th April 2011

  Well, if a mouthpiece isn't used, you get an instrument (and require a playing technique) more like a didgeridoo than a trumpet. Mouthpiece style makes a tremendous difference, both to the ability to get into higher overtones (clarino style tends to use very small aperture mouthpieces) and the amount of breath used (which controls both volume and how long a phrase can be played without breathing or using circular breathing).

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• Message 10

  , in reply to message 9.

  Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Tuesday, 26th April 2011

  I remember a school visit in which the pupils were entertained by a "brass-man" who applied his mouthpiece to various things- including lengths of garden hose.
  
  Obviously as players tend to have their own mouth-pieces familiarity with this part of the instrument is crucial, as is the whole tradition and culture of brass playing that "expert" players like these will have been subject too.
  
  But I will defend raundsgirl's right to be thrilled.
  
  Though those players came from a Western musical tradition, I think that we have tended to lose the reality of globalisation that was very much something of an obsession between the wars. The trend can be seen in for example Nineteenth Century music as it moved from the classical to the folk tradition, and European composers started to not only compose using their native folk tunes, but also to try to incorporate a sense of the wonder and strangeness of cultures far away in time and space.
  
  I think that there was a recent new radio production of Louis McNiece's radio play "Christopher Columbus" from c1947 with a score that tried to imagine the musical tribute with which "West Indians" might have greeted Columbus.
  
  In this case the players are very obviously influenced by the idea of mighty Pharoahs and the way that a trumpet might have saluted them..But it seems reasonable to assume that a trumpet is always made in order "to trumpet", and there is a tradition of "sounding brass". And at least this metal was made to sound once again.
  
  He who has ears to hear, let him hear.
  
  Cass

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