Pythagorean Philosophy and its influence on Musical :: essays research papers

Fundamentals of Musical Acoustics. New York DoverPublications Ferrara, Lawrence (1991). Philosophy and theAnalysis of Music. New York Greenwood Press.Johnston, Ian (1989). Measured Tones. New York IOPPublishing. Rowell, Lewis (1983). Thinking About Music.Amhurst The University of mammy Press. "Music isthe harmonization of opposites, the unification of disparatethings, and the conciliation of warring elements...Music isthe basis of agreement among things in nature and of thebest government in the universe. As a rule it assumes theguise of harmony in the universe, of lawful government in astate, and of a sensible way of life in the home. It bringstogether and unites." - The Pythagoreans both schoolstudent volition recognize his name as the originator of thattheorem which offers many cheerful facts about the squareon the hypotenuse. Many European philosophers will callhim the father of philosophy. Many scientists will call himthe father of science. To musicians, nonetheless,P ythagoras is the father of music. According to Johnston, itwas a much told story that one day the young Pythagoraswas qualifying a blacksmiths shop and his ear was caught bythe regular intervals of sounds from the anvil. When hediscovered that the hammers were of different weights, itoccured to him that the intervals might be related to thoseweights. Pythagoras was correct. Pythagorean philosophy maintained that all things are numbers. Based on the beliefthat numbers were the building blocks of everything,Pythagoras began linking numbers and music.Revolutionizing music, Pythagoras findings generatedtheorems and standards for musical scales, relationships,instruments, and creative formation. Musical scales becamedefined, and taught. Instrument makers began a precision preliminary to device construction. Composers developednew attitudes of composition that encompassed afoundation of numeric value in addition to melody. All threeapproaches were based on Pythagorean philosophy. Thus,Py thagoras relationship between numbers and music had aprofound influence on future musical education,instrumentation, and composition. The intrinsic discoverymade by Pythagoras was the latent order to the chaosof music. Pythagoras began subdividing different intervalsand pitches into distinct notes. Mathematically he dividedintervals into wholes, thirds, and halves. "Four distinctmusical ratios were discovered the tone, its fourth, its fifth,and its octave." (Johnston, 1989). From these ratios thePythagorean scale was introduced. This scalerevolutionized music. Pythagorean relationships of ratiosheld true for any initial pitch. This discovery, in turn,reformed musical education. "With the standardization ofmusic, musical creativity could be recorded, taught, andreproduced." (Rowell, 1983). Modern day fingerexercises, such as the Hanons, are neither based on melodyor creativity. They are simply based on the Pythagoreanscale, and are executed from various initial pitch es.Creating a foundation for musical representation, works