[Download links at the end]
(Adapted) excerpts from the article (Introduction):
The insistence of Mainstream Western Archaeomusicology at force-fitting the Babylonian musical system into the Western model is one of the greatest oversights in the History of music. It came from the methodology (or rather of its absence) of certain Assyriologists and of their determination at spearheading “their discoveries” by means of unsuitable Western models.
The manner in which Musical systems are constructed, whether consciously or not, are part of the culture of a people and must be unveiled with the utmost respect and without linkage to theories of later cultures as this would lead to colonialist unification.
This article is the consequence of my determined endeavor at academically fostering the proof of the evidence against unproven presumptive inference, and more significantly to assert, scientifically, that heptatonism – which is not universal – is by no means engraved onto mankind’s unconscious. It is a structure, among others, which eventually hatched in the Near-East, as part and consequence of another or other systems, but not as a new, independent and exclusive concept.
Richard Dumbrill: “The Truth about Babylonian Music,” Near Eastern Musicology Online 4 6 |2017-08| p. 91–121.
- Additional material:
- Mixed score (Tonogram reproduction of the intonations in parallel with the score) of Hurrian song H6 (Richard Dumbrill-Amine Beyhom-Rosy Azar Beyhom) – pdf
- Midi reproduction of Hurrian song H6 including intonations (Richard Dumbrill-Amine Beyhom-Rosy Azar Beyhom) – mp3
- Recording of Hurrian song H6 with singer Lara Jokhadar (Richard Dumbrill-Amine Beyhom-Rosy Azar Beyhom) – mp3