Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music

Lithuanian traditional polyphonic songs, known as sutartinės, are characterized by a distinctive musical language and have almost no analogues in world music. The aim of this article is to explore the peculiarities of their musical language and the socio-cultural context of their performance traditi...

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Main Author: Eirimas Velička
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2024-02-01
Series:Frontiers in Psychology
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1285394/full
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author Eirimas Velička
author_facet Eirimas Velička
author_sort Eirimas Velička
collection DOAJ
description Lithuanian traditional polyphonic songs, known as sutartinės, are characterized by a distinctive musical language and have almost no analogues in world music. The aim of this article is to explore the peculiarities of their musical language and the socio-cultural context of their performance tradition in order to reveal their archaic origins. The archaic nature of sutartinės songs is shown not by individual features of their musical language, but by the totality of these features, the peculiarities of their poetics, and performance traditions. An examination of the musical elements and poetry of these songs, and their juxtaposition against examples of archaic vocal polyphony from other cultures, leads to the convergence of arguments in favour of the very ancient origins of these songs, possibly dating back to Old Europe (c. 3 millennium BC). A deeper insight into sutartinės songs significantly enriches our understanding of the origin and development of traditional vocal polyphony.
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spelling doaj.art-1c0d42e6a0064f858dd90676cb4acc882024-02-22T04:35:50ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychology1664-10782024-02-011510.3389/fpsyg.2024.12853941285394Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global musicEirimas VeličkaLithuanian traditional polyphonic songs, known as sutartinės, are characterized by a distinctive musical language and have almost no analogues in world music. The aim of this article is to explore the peculiarities of their musical language and the socio-cultural context of their performance tradition in order to reveal their archaic origins. The archaic nature of sutartinės songs is shown not by individual features of their musical language, but by the totality of these features, the peculiarities of their poetics, and performance traditions. An examination of the musical elements and poetry of these songs, and their juxtaposition against examples of archaic vocal polyphony from other cultures, leads to the convergence of arguments in favour of the very ancient origins of these songs, possibly dating back to Old Europe (c. 3 millennium BC). A deeper insight into sutartinės songs significantly enriches our understanding of the origin and development of traditional vocal polyphony.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1285394/fullsutartinėsethnomusicologyarchaic musictraditional songsworld musicmusical language
spellingShingle Eirimas Velička
Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music
Frontiers in Psychology
sutartinės
ethnomusicology
archaic music
traditional songs
world music
musical language
title Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music
title_full Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music
title_fullStr Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music
title_full_unstemmed Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music
title_short Lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartinės: the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music
title_sort lithuanian polyphonic songs sutartines the archaic nature of their musical language in the context of global music
topic sutartinės
ethnomusicology
archaic music
traditional songs
world music
musical language
url https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1285394/full
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