Musing on Stone Age Music

Reported here (and everywhere, it seems) was the latest about really old flutes discovered in Germany. This article wanders (and wonders) about really old music. You know what I'd really like to hear, a composition from the few remaining stone-age tribes in existence today, to get a feel for what music may have sounded like 30,000 years or so ago. Hmmm, with You Tube and whatnot, there should be something out there??? Anyone with a heads up, please let me know (if you read this). (Image: bones as musical instruments, image from Irish Musical Instruments). From The New York Times Pondering Prehistoric Melodies By DANIEL J. WAKIN Published: June 27, 2009 “I have a reasonable good ear in music,” says Bottom in Shakespeare’s “Midsummer Night’s Dream.” “Let’s have the tongs and the bones.” A Stone Age ancestor living near what is now Ulm, Germany, did Bottom one better. He took the hollow bone of a griffon vulture, carved five holes in it and made one of the first flutes known to exist. (Perhaps it was a she; there are lots of great women flutists.) [In fact, it has now been acknowledged that probably a majority of the cave artists were females; and it makes sense that, given the small size of the bone and ivory flutes that have been discovered, the smaller hands of female musicians would have plyed upon them, just like the smaller hands of female artists plyed the colors upon the walls of ancient caves where early people lived). This was at least 35,000 years ago — maybe even 40,000 years ago. Could it have been around the time of the birth of human-made melody, a period when speech perhaps began to develop? It must have been a fine improvement on the whack of tongs and bones. A report of the flute’s discovery last week gives rise to all sorts of speculation about the origins of music and how it creates a palpable link between us and our prehistoric predecessors. “It’s easier to think of them as conscious, autonomous individuals if they’re making music,” said Sato Moughalian, a New York-based professional flutist. “To make the step from just breathing to actually producing a sound requires a different sense of self.” At the least, the find delights flute players, who like to point out that their instrument (outside of percussion) is the most elemental of all. No reeds to blow past, no strings to make vibrate, no mouthpiece to buzz. “It’s very simple,” Robert Langevin, the principal flutist of the New York Philharmonic. “There’s no intermediate thing to produce the sound. Our way of breathing is similar to the way of singers.” And nothing is more natural to the human organism than breathing. Of course, Mr. Langevin and his colleagues play something much different than the cave flute. Their flutes are generally made of metal (sometimes even gold), have keys and pads that cover holes. They are also played sideways. The five-hole vulture bone flute has a notched end, across which the player blows. Its discovery was reported in an article in the journal Nature. Nicholas J. Conard of the University of Tübingen in Germany was one of the authors. He said an experimental archaeologist named Wulf Hein made a reproduction and recorded several tunes, including “The Star-Spangled Banner.” The flute’s basic scale replicates the notes accompanying the line “Oh say can you see,” Dr. Conard said. The flute and several other types found nearby indicate a high-level of musical and technological sophistication, he said. While the nature of the music they made at the time is unknown, “There had to have been Paganinis, Mozarts, Hendrixes,” he said. The discovery is also a reminder that music was present at the earliest flowering of human culture, an idea that musicians and music lovers can embrace with great joy, said Steven Stucky, a composer (who has written a double concerto for flutes and orchestra). “This must have been a fundamental part of life,” he said. It is, of course, impossible to establish how humans became musical. The song of birds and patter of rain may have provided examples. “Once humans got the musical bug going, I can imagine sort of looking at everything,” said Peter Schickele, the composer and alter ego of P. D. Q. Bach. “Can you hit it, can you blow it, can you make a sound out of it?” He added, “I’ve done a fair amount of that in my own life.” Dr. Conard suggested music strengthened and extended social bonds, perhaps contributing to the evolutionary survival of homo sapiens. The flute was found in an area also inhabited by Neanderthals, who — according to the archaeological record — did not appear to be very musical. About 10,000 years later, they fell extinct. [NOT a logical conclusion to this otherwise good article, but evidence of the author getting lazy and going for the easy punch line against "ape man" Neanderthal. Bad form, tsk tsk.]

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Wow - learn more about the ancient practice of using bones to make music: The Bones - Ancient to Modern, by Sue E. Barber