Talk:Octoechos
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Actually "Octoechos" is a book in use in Orthodox Christian churches that contains chants with Ressurrection content in all the 8 Byzantine Music Modes... I will collect more information.
- This is wrong, and not just because this book is more commonly known by another name in the Greek churches which I cannot now recall. You might be familiar with the Sunday Octoechos only, which is the most commonly available in English, but there are Octoechos chants for every day of the week. This is also available in English from at least two sources, but since it's more expensive and not used as often in parishes it's not seen as often.
- It's only the Sunday chants that are called "Resurrectional tones" due to the Resurrectional character of the Sunday services, but this is inaccurate in modern usage -- at least Slavic usage; I'm not so familiar with Greek chant. The tones -- which is to say, the musical modes (in modern use the actual melodies) -- don't change, only the words do.
I think there is a slight confusion between "Octhoechos" and "Paraklitiki". The former contains only the Ressurectional chants per mode (that is saturday vespers-sunday matins), whereas, the latter, chants for every day of the week per mode. I found out the hard way when i purchased myself a copy of octoechos expecting that it would contain the chants of the whole week per mode and it actually didn't. Tryfon (talk) 12:23, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
- The 8-tone system predates the organization of liturgical chant around it by St. John of Damascus. In origin it therefore meant not the words of the chants themselves, but the musical modes in which they are to be sung. With regard to this modal system, the article is not inaccurate to the best of my knowledge. I'm therefore removing the {{accuracy}} tag, which I can only imagine was added in good faith with regard to the above comment. (The editor who added it didn't actually say why on this page as he should have, so if there's a good reason for it I hope its removal will spark some discussion.) TCC (talk) (contribs) 04:57, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Origins Disputed
Actually it is the origins section that it is disputed. It is without sources and ignorant of other theories. No mention of Ancient Greek modes etc. I am sorry to say, that very few Western scholars comprehend the modes of the Greek Orthodox Church and their relationship to the Hellenistic world. --Kupirijo 06:30, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
- Okay. I may have had a different version of the article in mind. I didn't read this one closely, but I could have sworn there was once a description of the ancient modes. Or perhaps I was thinking of a different reference. Anyway, given that explanation I'm not going to argue about replacement of the tag. TCC (talk) (contribs) 07:37, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
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- Putting {{disputed}} seems like overkill for on that basis. Shouldn't there be at least one specific factual assertion in the article that is in dispute? There are unsourced statements, true: so tag it with {{sources}}. There are other points of view that ought to be added - fine, add them. But I don't see a basis here for saying that the factual accuracy of the article is disputed. Mrhsj 22:51, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
First off, Kupirijo, are you a chanter? Second, it is a huge overstatement to say that very few Western scholars comprehend the modes of the Greek Orthodox Church. In basic terms, Byzantine Chant is a form of atonal music. Now if your telling me an average music professor can't understand what a microtone is or what atonal music is; then they have no right to be considered a "scholar". But yes, there is a problem with the origins section. How in the world is 8 modes with different tuning settings for each simple? Also, Western and Byzantine music seem to be inter-related at the end of the article when mentioning the 8 modes. Unless, of course, it can be shown that there were atonal aspects to Western music. But yes, Byzantine and Western music have had some sort of Jewish influence. Other than this, the article is pretty good. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.22.2.36 (talk) 02:24, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Edits
I've added a section about the liturgical book. I've also moved the {{accuracy}} tag to the origins section where it appears, based on the comments above, to have been intended. I don't know if there is an accuracy tag that refers to a section rather than the entire article. If so, it would be good to replace it here. MishaPan 23:09, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
- I split the book material off into its own article, which I think it deserves. These two subjects are related, but not identical. TCC (talk) (contribs) 23:45, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Enharmonic Scale Description Disputed
My understanding is that Byzantine enharmonic echoi are not, in general, playable on a modern Western 12-equal instrument. While the small steps of the Byzantine diatonic are slightly larger than those of a modern Western diatonic, the small steps of the Byzantine Enharmonic are typically smaller than those of a modern Western diatonic and may be as small as a quarter-tone. However I accept that the 12-equal version could be taken as a borderline case of a Byzantine enharmonic. My sources are scales described in the Scala archive http://www.xs4all.nl/~huygensf/scala/ as Byzantine Enharmonics. I wrote the section on Byzantine Enharmonics in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enharmonic some years ago and it has not yet been disputed. It is confirmed in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatonic_genus which I had nothing to do with. The almost complete disparity between ancient Greek enharmonic tetrachords and Byzantine enharmonic tetrachords only makes sense if enharmonic in this context was taken (misunderstood?) to mean "containing approximate quartertones". The ancient Greek enharmonic tetrachord contains two such intervals, the Byzantine enharmonic tetrachord contains only one and would be better called an improper diatonic or hard diatonic. D.keenan 06:43, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
