In the previous newsletter, I mentioned that I had submitted a dirge as part of my reflection on the Sappho fragments we read for class. Given that a dirge is a lament for the dead, a mournful song, piece of music, or poem, that seemed an appropriate reaction to a long gone someone’s work where most of the said work has disappeared.
This musical effort was the result of a conversation in class about the fact we are missing some critical information about how to experience Sappho’s poetry because her work was meant to be presented with accompaniment. Though we think she would have performed her work while being accompanied by the lyre, beyond that, we aren’t sure what the music might have sounded like.
One of our classmates is a musician, someone who makes stringed instruments. He noted that the rhythm of some of Sappho’s surviving lines could easily be fitted to 12-bar blues. I found someone on YouTube playing the blues on guitar and experimented a bit with putting a few phrases to the music.
[Before we go any further, let it be known that not only can I not spell, I am NOT a singer - and, the evening when I went down this path of inquiry, I had a TERRIBLE cold, so as a result, my lamentations sound as though I have been smoking heavily and pounding back considerable quantities of whisky. **]
I wanted to find some appropriate music to which to set a longer piece, but my go-to music guy, Kein MacLeod didn’t have any bluesy options available in his large stock of royalty-free music. He did have something called Southern Gothic and after some experimental moaning and wailing, I recorded this:
Thanks to Sappho, my classmate, and Kevin MacLeod many centuries after she first wrote her words back in Ancient Greece, we now have this weird-ass collaboration.
I wasn’t going to risk my week’s grade on a dirge, so I also submitted this piece, which is a reflection on our other reading of the week (Plato’s Phaedrus) written as a handful of Sapphic fragments. (I posted this before when I was talking about trying to draw Plato’s idea of the soul… if you’ve seen this already, scroll on by…)
If Plato and Sappho Had a Soul-baby
perpetual flight
in ceasing from movement, perishes.
principle into being
at all. does not perish
First either be destroyed
come into being, or else the whole
universe collapse
immortal
no shame
essence of soul.
powerful winged team
dark, surly
all that is light and good.
travel above earth
borne aloft by wings designed
carry what is heavy upwards.
horses grazing in a meadow
there rose
the rattle of castanets
all the chariots
road to great Olympus.
Stand upon the outer rim of the heavens
turn gaze upon
what is unseen
but for Aphrodite.
Why come this time
to speak
reading, the ruin of memory
When you are dead you will lie forever unremembered
fragments.
Deathless Aphrodite, you asked,
what in my heart
longs for an orphan, ugly, weak
Draped in burlap
pull her rags
down over her ankles.
Come… walk with me
fairest of stars
gardens of letters.
And, because I wasn’t going to risk only handing in some fragments, most of which were stolen from Plato and Sappho, I also submitted a short introduction, which we discuss in the Intellectual Magpies podcast episode about Plato and Sappho - coming soon to a podcast provider near you.
**To be clear… despite the typos and the gravelly voice, no whisky was harmed in the completion of my homework or this newsletter.
Love this! And you CAN sing! Sappho to music! Love this ...
Love this! And you CAN sing! Sappho to music! Love this ...