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Echos
Echos (Greek: "sound", pl. echoi ; Old Church Slavonic: "voice, sound") is the name in Byzantine music theory for a mode within the eight-mode system ( oktoechos), each of them ruling several melody types, and it is used in the melodic and rhythmic composition of Byzantine chant ("thesis of the melos"), differentiated according to the chant genre and according to the performance style ("method of the thesis"). It is akin to a Western medieval tonus, an Andalusian tab', an Arab naġam (since 1400 " maqam"), or a Persian parde (since 18th-century dastgah). Overview and semantics The noun ''echos'' in Greek means "sound" in general. It acquired the specialized meaning of ''mode'' early on in the development of Byzantine music theory since the Octoechos reform in 692. In general, the concept of echos denotes a certain octave species, its intervallic structure as well as a set of more or less explicitly formulated melodic rules and formulae that represent a certain category ...
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Hagiopolitan Octoechos
Oktōēchos (here transcribed ""; Greek language, Greek: pronounced in Koine Greek, koine: ; from wikt:ὀκτώ, ὀκτώ "eight" and wikt:ἦχος, ἦχος "sound, mode" called ; Church Slavonic, Slavonic: , from wikt:осмь, о́смь "eight" and wikt:гласъ, гласъ "voice, sound") is the name of the eight musical mode, mode system used for the composition of religious chant in most Christian churches during the Middle Ages. In a modified form, the octoechos is still regarded as the foundation of the tradition of monodic Orthodox chant today (Neobyzantine Octoechos). The octoechos as a liturgical concept which established an organization of the calendar into eight-week cycles, was the invention of monastic hymnographers at Mar Saba in Palestine, at the Patriarchates of Antiochia and of Constantinople. It was officially announced as the modal system of hymnography at the Quinisext Council in 692. A similar eight-mode system was established in Western Europe du ...
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Byzantine Music
Byzantine music () originally consisted of the songs and hymns composed for the courtly and religious ceremonial of the Byzantine Empire and continued, after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, in the traditions of the sung Byzantine chant of Eastern Orthodox liturgy. The ecclesiastical forms of Byzantine music are the best known forms today, because different Orthodox traditions still identify with the heritage of Byzantine music, when their cantors sing monodic chant out of the traditional chant books such as the Sticherarion, which in fact consisted of five books, and the Irmologion. Byzantine music did not disappear after the fall of Constantinople. Its traditions continued under the Patriarch of Constantinople, who after the Ottoman conquest in 1453 was granted administrative responsibilities over all Eastern Orthodox Christians in the Ottoman Empire. During the decline of the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century, burgeoning splinter nations in the Balkans declared autonomy o ...
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Nenano
Phthora nenano (Medieval Greek: , also ) is the name of one of the two "extra" modes in the Byzantine music, Byzantine Hagiopolitan Octoechos, Octoechos—an eight-mode system, which was proclaimed by a synod of . The phthorai nenano and Nana (echos), nana were favoured by composers at the Mar Saba, Monastery Agios Sabas, near Jerusalem, while hymnographers at the Monastery of Stoudios, Stoudiou-Monastery obviously preferred the diatonic mele. The ''phthora nenano'' as part of the Hagiopolitan ''octoechos'' Today the system of eight diatonic modes and two ' ("destroyers") is regarded as the modal system of Byzantine music, Byzantine chant, and during the eighth century it became also model for the Latin ''Tonary, tonaries''—introductions into a proper diatonic eight mode system and its psalmody, created by Frankish cantores during the Carolinigian reform. While was often called "chromatic", the second ' was named "nana (echos), nana" (gr. ) and called "enharmonic", the names ...
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Nana (echos)
Phthora nana (Medieval Greek ) is one of the ten modes of the Hagiopolitan Octoechos consisting of 8 diatonic Echos, echoi and two additional Phthora (music), phthorai. It is used in different traditions of Byzantine music, Orthodox chant until today (→ Neobyzantine Octoechos#Enharmonic Genos and Triphonia of Phthora Nana, Neobyzantine Octoechos). The name "nana" is taken from the syllables (written in ligatures "ʅʅ") sung during the intonation which precedes a melody composed in this mode. The name "phthora" derived from the verb and means "destroy" or "corrupt". It was usually referred to the Tetrachord, diatonic genus of the eight mode system and as a sign used in Byzantine chant notation it indicated a "change to another genus" (), in the particular case of phthora nana a change to the enharmonic genus. Today the "nana" intonation has become the standard name of the third authentic mode which is called "echos tritos" () in Greek and "third glas" () in Old Church Slavonic. T ...
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Tonary
A tonary is a liturgical book in the Western Christian Church which lists by incipit various items of Gregorian chant according to the Gregorian mode (''tonus'') of their melodies within the eight-mode system. Tonaries often include Office antiphons, the mode of which determines the recitation formula for the accompanying text (the psalm tone if the antiphon is sung with a psalm, or canticle tone if the antiphon is sung with a canticle), but a tonary may also or instead list responsories or Mass chants not associated with formulaic recitation. Although some tonaries are stand-alone works, they were frequently used as an appendix to other liturgical books such as antiphonaries, graduals, tropers, and prosers, and are often included in collections of musical treatises. Function and form Tonaries were particularly important as part of the written transmission of plainchant, although they already changed the oral chant transmission of Frankish cantors entirely before musical ...
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Oktoechos
Oktōēchos (here transcribed "Octoechos"; Greek: ;The feminine form exists as well, but means the book octoechos. from ὀκτώ "eight" and ἦχος "sound, mode" called echos; Slavonic: Осмогласие, ''Osmoglasie'' from о́смь "eight" and гласъ, Glagolitic: , "voice, sound") is the eight-mode system used for the composition of religious chant in Byzantine, Syriac, Armenian, Georgian, Latin and Slavic churches since the Middle Ages. In a modified form the octoechos is still regarded as the foundation of the tradition of monodic chant in the Byzantine Rite today. Nomenclature The names ascribed to the eight tones differ in translations into Church Slavonic. The Slavonic system counted the plagioi echoi as glasa 5, 6, 7, and 8. For reference, these differences are shown here together with the Ancient Greek names of the octave species according to the Hagiopolites (see Hagiopolitan Octoechos Oktōēchos (here transcribed ""; Greek language, Greek: pr ...
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Musical Modes
In music theory, the term mode or ''modus'' is used in a number of distinct senses, depending on context. Its most common use may be described as a type of Scale (music), musical scale coupled with a set of characteristic melodic and harmonic behaviors. It is applied to major and minor keys as well as the seven diatonic modes (including the former as Ionian mode, Ionian and Aeolian mode, Aeolian) which are defined by their starting note or tonic. (Olivier Messiaen's modes of limited transposition are strictly a scale type.) Related to the diatonic modes are the eight church modes or Gregorian modes, in which Gregorian mode#Tonality, authentic and plagal forms of scales are distinguished by Ambitus (music), ambitus and tenor or reciting tone. Although both diatonic and Gregorian modes borrow terminology from ancient Greece, the Musical system of ancient Greece, Greek ''tonoi'' do not otherwise resemble their medieval/modern counterparts. Previously, in the Middle Ages the term ...
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Octave Species
In the musical system of ancient Greece, an octave species (εἶδος τοῦ διὰ πασῶν, or σχῆμα τοῦ διὰ πασῶν) is a specific sequence of interval (music), intervals within an octave. In ''Elementa harmonica'', Aristoxenus classifies the species as three different genera, distinguished from each other by the largest intervals in each sequence: the diatonic, chromatic, and enharmonic genera, whose largest intervals are, respectively, a whole tone, a minor third, and a ditone; quarter tones and semitones complete the tetrachords. The concept of octave species is very close to Mode (music)#Tonoi, tonoi and akin to musical scale and Mode (music), mode, and was invoked in Medieval and Renaissance theory of Gregorian mode and Byzantine Octoechos. Ancient Greek theory Greek theorists used two terms interchangeably to describe what we call species: ''eidos'' (εἶδος) and ''skhēma'' (σχῆμα), defined as "a change in the arrangement of incompo ...
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Ison (music)
Ison is a drone note, or a slow-moving lower vocal part, used in Byzantine chant and some related musical traditions to accompany the melody, thus enriching the singing. It was not considered to transform it into a harmonized or polyphonic piece. History It is widely believed that ison was first introduced in Byzantine practice in the 16th century.History of Byzantine chant
at the Divine Music Project of St. Anthony Monastery
It stresses or supports the melody.
at the Divine Music Project of St. Anthony Monastery
Before that Greek church chanting was purely (a ...
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Cantor (church)
In Christianity, the cantor, female chantress, sometimes called the precentor or the protopsaltes (; from ), is the chief singer, and usually instructor, employed at a church, with responsibilities for the choir and the preparation of the Mass or worship service. The term is also used for a similar task in Reform Judaism and in Ancient Egypt. Generally, a cantor must be competent to choose and conduct the vocals for the choir, to start any chant on demand, and to be able to identify and correct the missteps of singers placed under them. A cantor may be responsible for the immediate rendering of the music, showing the course of the melody by movements of the hand(s) (''cheironomia''), similar to a conductor. Western Christianity Roman Catholicism A ''cantor'' in the Roman Catholic Church is the leading singer of the choir, a ''bona fide'' clerical role. The medieval cantor of the papal Schola cantorum (papal choir), Schola Cantorum was called ''Prior scholae'' or ''Primi ...
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Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Central Europe, between the early 16th and early 18th centuries. The empire emerged from a Anatolian beyliks, ''beylik'', or principality, founded in northwestern Anatolia in by the Turkoman (ethnonym), Turkoman tribal leader Osman I. His successors Ottoman wars in Europe, conquered much of Anatolia and expanded into the Balkans by the mid-14th century, transforming their petty kingdom into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the Fall of Constantinople, conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed II. With its capital at History of Istanbul#Ottoman Empire, Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) and control over a significant portion of the Mediterranean Basin, the Ottoman Empire was at the centre of interacti ...
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Neume
A neume (; sometimes spelled neum) is the basic element of Western and some Eastern systems of musical notation prior to the invention of five-line staff (music), staff notation. The earliest neumes were inflective marks that indicated the general shape but not necessarily the exact Musical note, notes or rhythms to be sung. Later developments included the use of heightened neumes that showed the relative Pitch (music), pitches between neumes, and the creation of a four-line musical staff that identified particular pitches. Neumes do not generally indicate rhythm, but additional symbols were sometimes juxtaposed with neumes to indicate changes in Articulation (music), articulation, duration (music), duration, or tempo. Neumatic notation was later used in medieval music to indicate certain patterns of rhythm called rhythmic modes, and eventually evolved into Modern musical symbols, modern musical notation. Neumatic notation remains standard in modern editions of plainchant. Etymol ...
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