Vox Populi
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Video: Music from a Neanderthal flute
Found by archeologist Ivan Turk in a Neanderthal campsite at Divje Babe in northwestern Slovenia, this instrument made from the femur of a cave bear is estimated to be 43,000-80,000 years old. The flute’s four finger holes seem to match four notes of the diatonic (Do, Re, Mi…) scale. In the video, Macedonian musician Ljuben Dimkaroski plays a clay replica of the flute.
The prehistoric instrument does indeed produce the whole and half tones of the diatonic scale, so completely, in fact, that Dimkaroski is able to play fragments of several compositions by Beethoven, Verdi, Ravel, Dvořák, and others, as well as some free improvisations “mocking animal voices.” Dimkaroski says that he figured out how to play the instrument in a dream.
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Extraordinary. To hear Ode To Joy played on a 60,000 old flute is moving beyond words!
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Reblogged this on theshammuramat.
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The fragment for Le Sacre du Printemps gave me a chuckle.
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Pingback: Music from the ages | Jacob Russell's Magic Names
Reblogged this on Thoughts, Raves, and Outright Beatings.
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I would like to get a reproduction of this ‘flute’ myself!
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I read about the Neanderthal flute decades ago. I’ve always had an interest in ethnomusicology, and, when I went to play the notes clearly possible on the Neanderthal flute, I was transported by the fact that they were both diatonic and chromatic. I can still clearly remember the feelings I had, the intensity of the emotions, knowing that I was reproducing the very notes played so long ago. Whether or not the Neanderthal’s played Albinoni’s “Adagio” is another question. I like the way VP makes this — I think for most people — obscure bit of musicology accessible.
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Thanks, John. Vox Populi is, as one reader put it, an “eclectic” mix of posts. We try to appeal to the imagination through poetry, music, and film. And we also try to have an ongoing discussion of political power and how it plays out in issues of the environment, law enforcement, race, and war and peace… The dialogue between imagination and power continues…
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Amazing how we’re all connect in fragments.
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Reblogged this on kailashkatheth1's Blog.
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