Readings for Thu 1.25 (short)

Ó hAllmhuráin: 25-46 “Music in Early and Mediaeval Ireland” and “Tudor and Stuart Ireland”

These chapters pick up the history of music in Ireland from approximately the time of the Fianna (after 100AD), where our history lecture left off. What aspects of very early Celtic esthetics seem to have been maintained in later periods: about music’s power, about musician’s role, about the treatment of musicians, about music’s job in retaining cultural history and cultural identity? Note the dates and the protagonists of the various English invasions, note the response of the invaders to music and language, and ask yourself why invaders saw music and language as such severe potential threats.

Readings Packet:

Liner notes to the Altramar CDs

rossroads of the Celts (focusing on music of the insular Celtic languages: that is: Welsh, Scots Gaelic, and Irish Gaelic; in other words, primarily pre- and very early-Christian music) and

From Galway to Galicia (focusing on music of the “Atlantic Celtic” coastal culture); these notes roughly parallel the time period covered by Ó hAllmhuráin, above.

What was the role of sound in ancient Celtic society? What were music’s powers? To what categories did the Celts assign music? To what extent did these beliefs about the spoken word, the memory, and “music as sacred sound” carry on into the more recent folk-music tradition?