Hello from… well, not Dumbarton Oaks, not quite. I’m in Washington, DC, at the George Washington University Mount Vernon campus, where our housing is. Friday night I went to bed at 12:30am so I could wake up at 2:30am so I could leave for the airport at 3:45am to get on a 6am flight so I could get to DC by 10:30am… except that we couldn’t check in here until 3pm. Well, my longtime e-acquaintance Ivan Plis took pity on me and hung out with me for lunch, taking me to Nando’s Peri-Peri just off of DuPont Circle, which is easily the flame-grilled Portuguese chicken I have ever had. Yes, it’s also the only flame-grilled Portuguese chicken I’ve ever had, but it was still delicious. After lunch, Ivan walked me around the area a bit, or at least as much as was possible with two suitcases, and then we parted ways. Getting the rest of the way here was a bit of an adventure; my iPhone 3GS just will not hold a charge anymore, and it died just as a bus was coming that may or may not have been the bus I wanted to get on. I got on, only to realize about fifteen minutes later that it was the wrong one. I got off to wait at the stop across the street for the bus going in the opposite direction, which theoretically should have been about a half hour away… except that it was an hour away. It finally appeared, and I was able to get off at the right stop, only to still have a half mile left to walk, with most of it uphill. I guess I got my exercise today. This morning I attended Matins and Liturgy at St. Sophia Greek Orthodox Cathedral, which is about a mile away as the crow flies (but of course it’s not that simple; it’s about 2 miles by cab) and has a new protopsaltis in residence; I spent the afternoon walking around the area, attending Choral Evensong at the National Cathedral (right next door to St. Sophia, as it happens), and had a lovely day all around until I tried to go home and took a shortcut through a park’s forest trails. Zigged when I should have zagged, I had three bags of groceries, and wound up getting stuck with an uphill route I was trying to avoid. All in all, it took me about an hour and a half to get home when it should have taken about twenty minutes. Oh well. Orientation at Dumbarton Oaks is 9am Monday; we’ll see what happens.
By the way, there is going to be a group blog for Andrew Gould‘s expanded New World Byzantine concept, sort of an Orthodox version of the New Liturgical Movement. It looks like there are some definite parallels between what the Saint John of Damascus Society has in mind and what Andrew is trying to get going for liturgical crafts across the board. Should be fascinating to see where it goes. (And incidentally, there are already some big things in the works for SJDS, things that have already started to come together much more quickly than we thought might happen. Announcements to come soon.)
A few months ago I got invited to review a book titled The Past is Always Present: The Revival of the Byzantine Musical Tradition at Mount Athos by Danish ethnomusicologist Tore Tvarnø Lind. My review will be appearing in a future issue of Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies, but since I was limited to around 2,000 words (yes, I said “limited”), there was a lot that I wanted to say that I didn’t have space for (all good stuff — the book is great). I was going to have a blog post specifically about the book, but then I had to get my paper in order for the North American Patristics Society conference, do what I could to help get the house ready for impending baby, and then pack for D.C., so that didn’t quite happen.
But then, Friday, there was an unexpected post someplace I don’t check all that often.
So, I’ve noted before, perhaps somewhat infamously, that there are ways in which the internet is a problematic venue. Every imaginable cause in the world probably has a website out there run by a person for whom the sun probably only rises and sets because that issue has his voice advocating for it properly; heck, I’m sure probably somebody thinks that about my little corner of the net. Anyway, I’m somewhat reluctant to participate in many online forums, or even to monitor them too often; I’m not sure, to name but one example, that Byzantine chant needs its own version of Facebook. But, you know, it kinda has its own version of Facebook anyway, and it has its utility as a resource. Still, there are a lot of disputes that get hashed over there that I don’t care to get involved with, and the one time that I got noticed enough to be mentioned in that forum it was bad news (although my friend Taso Nassis is somebody I would not have met without that incident, so all’s well that ends well, I suppose).
On Friday, a notice was posted by one of the more argumentative individuals on that forum about a statement released by the Ecumenical Patriarchate. The Greek is here; this is my (somewhat hurried) translation:
Bulletin from the Holy and Sacred Synod on the subject of ecclesiastical music.
The Ecumenical Patriarchate, from the decision of the Holy and Sacred Synod of 29 March 2012, upon relevant public notice of the Patriachal and Synodal commission concerning divine worship, from 23 March 2012 concerning the subject of our ecclesiastical music, because of the fault of some cantors in applying a theoretical work, at first on the one hand imperceptibly, with time on the other hand more systematic, [a work] published in 1982 under the title “Method of Greek Music: A Theoretical Treatise” [by Simon Karas] and [which] created an uneasy situation, declared that:
1. It dismisses and condemns the “Theoretical Treatise”‘s self-willed, irresponsible, showy retractions to the liability and authority of the decisions of the Mother Church, as even an attempt to disseminate something – as characterized above – outdated and abnormal to the prevailing canonical order of the theory and practice of our ecclesiastical music.
2. It denounces every work of difference, adulteration, and forgery in appearance of old musical works of composers formally recognized by the Mother Church that is unlawful and strange to the prevailing works, and
3. As a musical system it recognizes, applies, and teaches according to the theory, practice, and tradition, [the system which] was established in the years 1812-14 by the Three Teachers, Chrysanthos Metropolitan of Prousa, Gregory the Protopsaltis, and Chourmouzios the Archivist, as “The New Method of Analytic Notation of Musical Melodies,” and approved by the Mother Church.
In the Patriarchate, 28 May 2012
From the Chief Secretary of the Holy and Sacred Synod
Okay. Back up a couple centuries.
As Lind’s book lays out quite well (and he’s not Orthodox, so he doesn’t himself have any particular dog in the fight), in the early part of the nineteenth century there was a reform of the notational system we usually call “Byzantine notation” or “psaltic notation”. This reform reduced the number of signs used, and also introduced a way of being able to more accurately notate rhythm, tempo, and accidentals. Well, the problem is obvious: when you change how something is written down, you effectively fork the tradition, and that’s what happened. Cantors who were trained before the reform continued either singing from old notation or singing the new notation as though it were the old notation, thus passing on the pre-reform tradition. Cantors who were trained from books compiled after the reform without any level of pre-reform tradition learned something different. Subtly different, perhaps, but different, and this appears to have become known as “patriarchal style”, as in the style practiced at and endorsed by the Ecumenical Patriarchate. The Three Teachers didn’t really give an account of their system of reform, so were they intending to preserve what came before, only simplifying how it was represented on the page, or were they intending to turn it into something else? This is the crux of the problem, it seems. (Oh, and if I’m over-simplifying or getting things wrong, please jump in. I’m trying to give a reasonably economical account here of what I think I know, but I don’t want to misrepresent anything.)
To give but one example of the practical difference that I have seen: there is a sign in Byzantine notation called a klasma. It’s a little half oval that can appear either above or below a sign depending on the sign.
Now, the way I was taught to realize a klasma by (now-Dr.) Ioannis Arvanitis is that adds a beat to the sign, but that it also has the function of adding an ornament — a little break in the voice. This ornament is suggested by the name klasma, and according to Arvanitis, it’s a holdover from the old notation, with the ornament being what distinguishes it from simply adding a dot (which also extends the sign by one beat). A somewhat clumsy way of realizing this in staff notation might be this:
When I visited Holy Cross Seminary, I got to sit in on Byzantine chant classes with Dr. Grammenos Karanos, who I’m told is an exemplar of patriarchal style. He told his students that the klasma has the principal function of adding a beat, and only in the context of a relatively small number of specific phrases does one add the ornament. Otherwise, it’s the same the thing as an aplē (adding a dot) and is maintained separately from the aplē for orthographic purposes. That would mean the above phrase would look like this in staff notation:
There’s no shortage of other examples.
Anyway, Simon Karas was an ethnomusicologist who was interested in these differences maintained through oral tradition, as well as the relationship to Greek vernacular music, and he tried to systematize what he observed in the 1982 book referenced in the Patriarchate’s bulletin. (I translated an article about him by Lycourgos Angelopoulos last year that goes into some of this.)
One can perhaps see the divide between those who sang as though the new notation were the old notation and those following the new notation more strictly in the Patriarchate’s choice of the word “outdated” (παρωχημένος) in point one. The irony that I see is that both approaches are conservative; one is performatively conservative, the other is notationally conservative. There is almost a sola Scriptura issue here (but even patriarchal style is informed by oral tradition, so not quite).
Among other things, Lind’s book talks about how Karas’ work influences the monastery of Vatopedi on Mount Athos; students of Angelopoulos (“grandstudents” of Karas, then) work with them on manuscripts, vocal style, and so on. The monks want to preserve an authentic tradition going back before the reform, and there is concern that something is lost in how the reform has been realized. One of the things I find interesting is that the tensions surrounding these preservation efforts seem to follow the old theoretical poles of cathedral (or city) and monastery, with an additional pole of the university. Vatopedi is trying to assert a certain authority and pre-eminence regarding psaltic tradition, Constantinople is trying to do the same thing (as represented by “patriarchal style”), and Karas and his legacy represent a line of academic inquiry that influence how both sides act and react. Who “owns” the tradition? Who speaks for it? Certainly there are issues surrounding how Byzantine chant is understood as something authentically “Greek”, with Constantinople looming large for obvious historical reasons, but with Karas perhaps trying to contextualize Constantinople in a larger “Greek” picture. Constantinopolitan cantors (and those faithful to them), Athenian academics, and Athonite monks — I’m not sure I can think of any particular equivalent issue in this country that’s working itself out in precisely the same way.
The thing of it is, speaking from my previous life as an opera singer, none of this is anything new. “My teacher can beat up your teacher” is part of any musician’s game from the first day they step into the studio. I remember the first time I ever took a lesson with my first voice teacher in college, and he asked me to tell him how I was thinking of certain things. I explained it the way Dennis Kruse taught me, and I can still picture the patronizing smile on this guy’s face when he said, “Oh, that’s all wrong. We’ll fix that.” I can also still remember the way Dennis shook his head when I explained to him what the new guy was telling me, saying, “He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Get out of his studio as soon as you can.”
Heck, just speaking in terms of the Greco-Roman world, none of this is exactly news. If you were a student of rhetoric in what we might broadly call “the ancient world”, you could count on getting hazed by students of other teachers, you could count on getting beaten up by students of other teachers, and there was even a possibility you could get kidnapped upon arrival in the city by students of other teachers and forced to study with somebody other than your intended teacher. Studying something so marinated in tradition that requires a close relationship with a teacher makes this kind of thing simply inevitable.
Still, nobody here has been declared either a heretic or anathema, there’s nothing here that says “Whatever you do, don’t sing a klasma with the ornament lest your soul be in danger”, and on the whole I can’t really imagine how anything in this notice is going to have any practical force whatsoever without something that looks a lot like an Inquisition or HUAC. “Are you now, or have you ever been, influenced by the 1982 Method of Greek Music by Simon Karas?” Nope, I just don’t see that happening. This strikes me as a sop to somebody at most, but I really don’t know enough about the inner workings of the Ecumenical Patriarchate to know to whom or by whom or why. With all due respect to the Patriarchate, this comes across as over-the-top and heavy-handed, to say the least.
In any event, Ioannis Arvanitis, however poor of a student I may have been, was my teacher (and I hope someday he will be again), he’s one of the great cantors and composers of our day, he’s one of the greatest men I’ve ever had the privilege to know or learn from, and he was a Simon Karas student. Given all of this, I’m left scratching my head at what seems to be the disconnect from reality.
Anyway, I may have more to say about Lind’s book later — perhaps when the review is published I’ll put together a “director’s cut” of it. In the meantime, consider it recommended; it’s a very readable work and should be of great interest to people interested in monasticism, Byzantine music, Greece and modernity, and so on.
Leitourgeia kai Qurbana: Contra den Zeitgeist 
Hi, Richard.
“My teacher can beat up your teacher” is certainly the issue here, but as far as the actual musical concerns, I’d like to tweak a couple things.
For one, I would suggest using a musical example that doesn’t include a πεταστή, as in any virtually tradition, especially when combined with a κλάσμα, it will denote an ornament like the one you describe, with variation depending on melodic context, and different realizations among the various schools. Anyone looking at the score you provided would attribute the ornament to the πεταστή, not the κλάσμα.
Secondly, the two sides of the chant brawl do have something to do with oral tradition, but you may have the parties reversed in this case. The true “Patriarchal style,” i.e. the style sung at the Patriarchate, oral tradition is king. Many (even quite elaborate) melodies are sung from memory. A cantor with “ύφος,” or style, is one who can embellish a given melody according to the learned, received tradition of the cantors of the Patriarchate. So, the real “oral tradition” party is the Patriarchate.
Part of the problem, and Alex Khalil’s thesis touches on this, is that everyone and their dog claims to chant with the “Patriarchal Style,” even if they’ve never been to the Patriarchate, studied with someone from there, or sound anything like the Patriarchal cantors. It has now become (for those not in Constantinople) simply a buzz word for those who, as you rightly point out, want to claim the tradition. What they don’t realize (or choose to ignore) is that the real experts on “Parriarchal Style,” the Patriarchal cantors themselves, would not describe anyone outside the Patriarchate as having the Patriarchal style, even – and this is the clincher – even if they chant, sound, execute everything exactly like the Patriarchal cantors do. For them, the “Πατριαρχικό ύφος” is about having grown up at the Phanar and experiencing the life of an Orthodox Christian cantor in the City of Constantine ruled by Turks.
Patriarchal cantors are so stee
Quite right on the musical example, and it jumped out at me this morning, too. That’s what I get for picking things when I’m tired.
Most appreciated on the rest of your comments; I hope some other people jump in as well.
Let’s try to finish that:
Patriarchal cantors are so steeped in oral tradition, in fact, that they bother very little with theory, by and large. And therein lies the problem:
Simon Karas worked in Athens, where in most schools oral tradition, “ύφος,” had all but died out, and most cantors would chant extremely literally, reading the notes on the page and little else. Karas’ approach was to listen to traditional cantors around the Greek Orthodox world and *systemetize* what he heard – *theoretically.* He also reintroduced characters from the pre-reform notation to indicate certain expressive devices he heard sung by traditional cantors.
It is these two elements: 1) Extensive and thorough musical theory which (in some cases) adds a great deal to what is explicit in the tradition, and
2) The addition of characters that had been taken out of the notational system by the 19th century Patriarchal teachers.
It may be (at least I believe) that most of the people who speak out against Karas and his Method have never bothered to read it. What infuriates them more than anything, it seems, is that Karas’ students and grand-students have been so many, so influential, and so successful. So, they declare him and his school “musical heretics,” and (at least would like to) treat them the same way that the Church has historically treated theological heretics: with anathemas and book-burning (let’s bope they done go as far as executions). Well, we now have an anathema from the Patriarchal Synod – which is curious, considering that it was just 15 years ago that Karas received a commendation from the very same people (or rather, the people then in the same positions).
I agree with you that this seems very much like the bending to the will of some very vocal characters with friends in high places.
Having spoken to one or two people who take this adversarial approach toward the Karas school, what I will say is that the conversation rarely goes anywhere, simply because they are so caustic, antagonizing and unreasonable that no common ground can be found. And, often enough, the entire discipline for them is an avocation, a glorified hobby, and so, unlike in their professional lives, where (one would assume) they must conduct themselves with a modicum of respect for those with whom they have disagreements, they act more like fans viciously arguing over which Spiderman series is the best and most “authentic;” or like Red Sox fans dealing with Yankee fans: it becomes about loyalty and threats to one’s tribe rather than the supposed issue at hand.
Hope to see you in DC, in Christ,
JMB
Dear Mr. Barrett and Mr. Boyer,
@Mr. Barrett:
If I have not misinterpreted your thoughts, they are condensible to the following three main questions:
1) Why is the Karas Method/Theory such a lightning rod?
2) Why did the Patriarchate come out with the recent Decision on the matter?
3) What are the implications of this Decision?
In as brief a manner as possible, respecting that this is your space and not necessarily a public domain, I will summarise responses.
1) The Karas Theory assigns an arbitrary and personal interpretation (e.g. musical cadences, ornamentations and combinations thereof) to old paleographic neumes that fell into disuse in the early part of the 18th century. That personal interpretation of Karas has never been heard at all in the earliest recorded material (the earliest recordings of Byzantine Chant available; Naypliotis, Vamvoudakis, Maneas, Kambanidis) and cannot be identified in any of the students of the 19th century psaltae who lived in the 60s and from whom there are recordings.
2) If Karas had heard psaltae of his day performing such interpretations he leaves no such evidence in any of his writings.
3) Karas introduces tonal intervals that, especially for the chromatic genus, are way off the mark when compared to what is heard among the earliest recordings of the psaltae of Constantinople and Smyrna.
4) Karas divides the simple 3-Genus system of the Three Teachers, later affirmed by the Patriarchal Committee of 1881, into more than 130 individual “scales” that resemble more the thinking of the maqamat, even as the tonal intervals contituting these “scales” don’t even form fourths and fifths upon which the fundamental theory of Byzantine music is built. Some intervals that he proposes, when examined by sound generation software, are not even perceptible by the human ear.
The issue then becomes whether Karas followed a scientific method and considered historical and accepted practices and trends or if he arbitrarily REVISED and/or created something new and novel. Had his theory exhibited any merit, the psaltae of his period would have seriously considered it (just as some had considered the notation system of George Lesbios-which did have merits); the Patriarchate would have convened a committee as it did in 1881 and the Church of Greece would have done the same. Yet nothing like this occured. In fact, Iakovos Naypliotis is on record as stating (and I paraphrase: “Mr. Karas shows strong interest in the music, but it is obvious that he does not understand it”, in Voudouris’ chronicles).
The Patriachal Musical Committees and the subsequent music conservatories of Constantinople agreed that the Chrysanthine exegesis was not only appropriate but that it translated the oral tradition faithfully. Thus, why Karas’ revision and arbitrary invention should bear weight over numerous such committees which consisted of the most renowned psaltae of the time, as many of the current day Karas proponents advocate is curious.
Karas viewed all the psaltae of his day disdainfully. There is much evidence of this (see the book and witnesses therein in Theodore Akridas’ book as well as the comments by
clear that none of the consensus chanters worked with him as he refused to work with the consensus chanters of his day.
Instead, as we read his introduction, he offers the reason for the two-volume theory. I quote the original Greek: «συνέτρεξαν ἐκ Θεοῦ συγκυρίαι», ὅπως ἡ «ἐκ τυχαίας χειρονομίας πτῶσις τοῦ μουσικοῦ παλαιογραφικοῦ παραπετάσματος». In English, we can translate this, the most critical sentence of his work and the trigger that made him start thinking about Byzantine music, as “A number of God-sent coincidences occured that, serendipitously tossed away the veil that had kept obscure the musical paleography”.
That was his trigger: a series of coincidences (that he does not describe at all, although he is very prolific in the minutiae of his more than 100 tonal interval relations) and serendipity.
Karas’ Theory, outside of his own circle, was not accepted by the remainder of the chantors for the greater part of the last century until 1982, when Lycourgos Angelopoulos began a systematic campaign to enforce its primacy first in music conservatories where Byzantine Music was being taught as an elective and then, in the early 90s, in university courses taught by members of his choir who went on to obtain musicology degrees and university positions.
While Byzantine music can be an object of academic and musicologic study where all hypotheses can be proposed and tested, it is also subject to ecclesiastic canon law. Canons and edicts have been issued over the centuries on acceptable music. In the late 1800s, two very severe edicts were issued against harmonised polyphonic music that resulted in the triumph of Byzantine Chant in Greece. The Patriarchate, at the time, reacted to protect its musical heritage, seeing that a foreign influence was eroding its centuries-old musical tradition and if left unchecked would possibly replace it.
Unlike Western polyphony whose basis is solid and whose musicology is clear, the Karas Method, as summarised above, suffers very serious problems. In the past decade, the proponents have become militant to the point where they advocate that the Chrysanthine System is flawed, that the psaltae of old-time were unlearned and were clueless on theory and that they did not inherit the “old glory” of “authentic” Byzantine chant. The disingeniousness of these arguments is revealed by the following historic realities:
a) If the Chrysanthine system was so flawed, why would no less than three Patriarchal Committees consisting of the most respected men of letters, psaltae (even those who knew the old notation system) affirm it and its authenticity in faithfully reproducing the old melody?
b) The minutes of the meetings of the various Musical Committees of Constantinople reveal a deep theoretical knowledge (Psachos, Kamarados, Papadopoulos for example) that debunk the argument (John Boyer) that the psaltae of old were trained only by oral tradition and had no theoretical grounding, but only Karas did.
c) Chanter training was not an arbitrary act of attending a church, standing alongside a chantor for 20 years and then, in a monkey-like fashion, learn aimlessly by memory. All the renowned psaltae of Constantinople and ALL those entrusted with teaching passed through either the Patriarchal Schools of Byzantine Music or the Musical Schools set up by the psaltae themselves, recognised by the Patriarchate. The syllabus was 5 years. The first three consisted of learning to read the notation and to INTERPRET it according to the teachers (indeed, the teachers of the first 3 years were usually the protopsaltis or the lampadarios of the phanar along with people who had served inside the Patriarchal church) and the last two years were devoted to the THEORY (Kamarados, Papadopoulos and Psachos are noted serving these positions). Thus, again, exposing the factual incorrectness of John Boyer’s assertion that the psaltae were theoretically clueless.
Given that the teachers of the first psaltae to come to Greece consequent to pogroms of 1922 were rooted in the Patriarchal manner of interpretation, and the significant importance placed on listening and, it is no wonder that what one listens to in the recordings of psaltae of Greece of the 40s, 50s and 60s is so homogeneous (in terms of interpretation). A cursory listening to those recordings will debunk the myth that anything but Karas-inspired chant is metrophonia (dry-note recitation).
Returning to modern time. The militancy of the Karas proponents to question the authenticity of the Patriarchal tradition and the Chrysanthine system as well as 60+ years of psaltic tradition, caused a reaction among the overwhelming majority of their colleagues. As early as 1995, letters were being sent to the Church of Greece and the Patriarchate sensitising them that the Karas “movement” was calling into question facts and history and perverting traditional Byzantine Chant. Over time, these letters increased in volume and this time, they were accompanied by historical, musical and musicological supporting evidence. Between 2000-2005, the Church of Greece, having considered both sides of the argument, came to issue two notices and both were clear that there was no need to change the currently-practiced and received traditions of the Chrysanthine System. Since 2005, the Karas militancy evolved to the point where the Patriarchate had to intervene in the decision you write about.
The Patriarchate has every right to defend its traditions and to issue specific and clear guidelines. It considered both sides of the argument for many years. It consulted musicologists and psaltae across the spectrum. It even invited Mr. Angelopoulos in person, recently, to offer his insight and his arguments. Taking all this into account the Patriarchate concluded that the Karas Theory does not represent its traditions.
The implications depend on what one thinks of the church, as a canonical body and as a metaphysical entity. If we believe in respect of the church, then all its decisions should become our mission to protect and promote. If we do not, then we can arbitrarily dismiss them in the name of some post-modernist relativism where we can “pick and choose”, a la carte.
Of course, it should come no suprise if the Patriarchate, someday, decides to enforce its decisions in very specific ways that could involve disciplinary measures in line with its Canon law. The wording of the Decision imply that it can be applied with the full power and authority of Canon law if the Patriarchate so decides.
Richard Barrett and John Boyer thanks so much for your thoughts! I was really curious what each of you thought re: this topic.
Richard, as for the following …
“I’m somewhat reluctant to participate in many online forums, or even to monitor them too often; I’m not sure, to name but one example, that Byzantine chant needs its own version of Facebook. But, you know, it kinda has its own version of Facebook anyway, and it has its utility as a resource. Still, there are a lot of disputes that get hashed over there that I don’t care to get involved with … ”
… what we see on your very own blog reminds me of Yakov Smirnoff, a comedian (born in 1951) who emigrated to America from the USSR. One of his classic comedic insights, you may recall, is “In America, you can always find a party. In Soviet Russia, Party always find you!” … haha
Oh, and re: this by Nick Giannoukakis…
“Of course, it should come no suprise if the Patriarchate, someday, decides to enforce its decisions in very specific ways that could involve disciplinary measures in line with its Canon law. The wording of the Decision imply that it can be applied with the full power and authority of Canon law if the Patriarchate so decides.”
The Patriarchate (and other church hierarchy) can also decide to continue to support Karas-influenced chanters, scholars, and choirs as it has over the years. The Patriarchate can also soften this announcement with subsequent blessings, praises, and acknowledgments of Karas-influenced practitioners. That is, if the special interest anti-Karas lobbyists allow it to … =)