THE OLDEST SONG IN THE WORLD

This song to the Hurrian goddess Nikkal, is the oldest piece of music for which we have both the words and the accompanying musical notes. The work was written on clay tablets around 3500 years ago, and was discovered by archaeologists in the 1950’s in the ruins of the ancient city of Ugarit. The tablets, which are written in the Hurrian language using Sumerian cuneiform script, have been studied for years by a number of eminent scholars, and several theories have been advanced as to how the music should be interpreted. In my opinion, the most thorough and convincing interpretation (and by far the most musical), is that offered by archaeomusicologist, Dr. Richard J. Dumbrill, and that is the one which you hear in this video. The long-necked lute you see me playing is a cross between the Turkish baglama and the Persian setar. I made this instrument myself as an experiment. It has four strings but the bass notes are a double course. It is tuned F-C-F. Lutes of this type have been played since the most ancien