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Echoes of Ancient Egypt (Improvisation on an Ancient Egyptian Scale)

from An Ancient Lyre by Michael Levy

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"Echoes of Ancient Egypt" - this improvisation on the lyre, uses a genuine pentatonic ancient Egyptian scale...last heard, some 3000 years ago! Although tragically no actual written music from ancient Egypt has survived, we do know from many ancient illustrations, that the ancient Egyptians did use a form of musical notation, whereby specific gestures of the hand represented specific changes in pitch in a given musical scale - this is ancient form of musical notation is known as "Chironomy". We also know some of the specific scales once used in ancient Egypt, thanks to the discovery of serveral ancient Egyptian flutes, still in playable condition! The ancient lost art of Chironomy, and details of this haunting, ancient Egyptian scale are discussed at length in this fascinating article:

www.rakkav.com/biblemusic/pages/chironomy.htm

The minor pentatonic scale I am using in this improvisation, was deciphered from ancient chironomy gestures by the late Professor Hans Hickmann, of the Museum in Cairo.

This improvisation is therefore my attmept to evoke the sounds of the Lyres heard in the New Kingdom of Ancient Egypt, over 3000 years ago...

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from An Ancient Lyre, released July 20, 2009

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Michael Levy UK

Michael Levy is a composer for the recreated lyres of antiquity,

Michael has collaborated with the Rufus Wainwright - Rufus Orchestrated Michael's "Hymn to Zeus" in 2 scenes of his second opera, "Hadrian".

In 2022 - 2023, Michael collaborated with the iconic American artist, Jeff Koons – his music for ancient Greek kithara was the soundscape of Koon’s sculpture, “Apollo Kithara”.
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