Music and Image in Classical Athens [Hardcover]

Bundrick proposes that depictions of musical performance were linked to contemporary developments in music.During the fifth century BC, Athens witnessed the explosion of images depicting musical performance, such as Apollo and the Muses, frisky satyrs, the poet Orpheus, youths at school, brides at weddings, and the dead at tombs. Primarily found in vase paintings, but also in sculpture and now-lost wall paintings, these images provide significant insight into the musical culture of the time and place, especially given that so much of the literary evidence for musical culture in Athens has been lost. In this study, Sheramy Bundrick proposes that the depictions of musical performance were intimately linked to contemporary developments in the field of music itself.During the fifth century BC, Athens witnessed the explosion of images depicting musical performance, such as Apollo and the Muses, frisky satyrs, the poet Orpheus, youths at school, brides at weddings, and the dead at tombs. Primarily found in vase paintings, but also in sculpture and now-lost wall paintings, these images provide significant insight into the musical culture of the time and place, especially given that so much of the literary evidence for musical culture in Athens has been lost. In this study, Sheramy Bundrick proposes that the depictions of musical performance were intimately linked to contemporary developments in the field of music itself.Sheramy Bundrick proposes that the depictions of musical performance in fifth century BC Athens were intimately linked to contemporary developments in the field of music itself, such as the debate over music in education, theories of musical ethos, and the growing popularity of professional musicians. Moreover, she argues that music became a visual metaphor for the harmony or disharmony of the city. Her book is the first to consider the broad range of musical images in the dynamic classical period, as well as their sociocultural and artistic implications.lƒ-