<<  -- 4 --  Gordon Rumson    FRAGMENTS OF FORGOTTEN SOUNDS

A Don's Fancy

I think Robert Graves called Tolkien's work a 'don's fancy' and for a long time Tolkien's work didn't appear on the literary radar. But the influence has been huge and Tolkien's conception of subcreation has led many to further his artistic visions and auditions. Here are some sites that delve into the lore of Elvish music.

This is a site with information about the music of Middle Earth, some essays, some suggestions and even a couple of samples of Celtic harp ...
www.tcinternet.net/users/jfinnamore/df
(Link permission pending)

More material with links to many more sites can be found at Eugene C Hargrove's site at:
www.cas.unt.edu/~hargrove
(Linked with permission)

But, far and away, the most elaborate music site devoted to Tolkien's world is the Tolkien Music List. It is a data base of songs inspired by Tolkien and while it is mostly pop oriented there are many Celtic things and some death metal (Yikes!) but also some items that will interest the gentle readers of Music & Vision!

www.vikings.lv/~witchcraft/jrrt/
and
www.telia.lv/~witchcraft/jrrt/jrrt1.htm
(This has clear links to mp3 versions of songs and compositions)
(Linked with permission)

Anaphoria

Anaphoria -- a place, a culture, a strange truth? An island that is somewhere, with unusual music that is something. What exactly? Visit and discover for yourself. Sadly, there are no streaming audio files, but there are CDs you can purchase.

www.anaphoria.com
(Linked with permission)

Ancient Greece

This is skipping ahead a bit (I'll come back to China and the East next time), but I wanted to end with a collection of real sounds. Here are the surviving bits and pieces of Greek music played in MIDI and in Real Audio. Is this really what Euripides' poetry sounded like? I find it haunting. The site also has a link to a reconstruction of the singing of the Homeric epics with an 11 minute sample! Amazing.

www.oeaw.ac.at/kal/agm
(Linked with permission)

See you next month...

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