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What he didn't say was whether those "dogs howling" were drunk, or whether people were thorwing things at them. There's a lot of people that "sing" when less inhibited, and get their mates to join in. I imagine that's not changed in many millenia.
Yeah & it also really doesn't help much, considering that almost every ancient source all the way up to the colonial Era describing another culture's music is just them saying it sucks.
I have both coyotes and high school sports near where live, and it can definitely take a minute to figure out which it is I'm hearing. Unless I have my dog near me, since she growls at coyotes really intensely from before I can even hear them!
I mean, think about how Heavy Metal or alternative rock music might sound to someone from another culture who is used to very different sounding music…. They might describe it as “dogs howling but worse.” But obviously, a lot of people love Metal and Rock. Descriptions are very subjective.
Your Eastern traveler did not mention the context of the singing. I would imagine the loud shouty singing at the end of a well-lubricated feast has not changed much in the intervening centuries...
About those "special effect instruments", my granma used to make those out of random buttons and strings and the smaller they go, the faster they can move, but funnily enough, at some point they reach a max speed and no matter how hard you pull on the string, they will end up with some high pitch and that's it. The bigger thing you use, the lower pitch you get this way. In other words, if those bones were used with a coiled string like that, there could be a chance that they could have been used as a tuning instrument - if one bone can only go one highest pitch at all times, then by tuning your instrument to that pitch guarantees you a pretty decent consistency in its sound as well.
I got to see Wardruna live for the first time in 2017 and Einar gave a free one-hour lecture about his instrument-making/selection process, and his approach to music in general (which seems intertwined with his view of life). This was in a small theatre he had rented at a local college - we all then had to head to the concert venue, which was located a few blocks away. Amazing experience! I am now a fan for life.
One thing I was told during my music studies, was that the vikings sang in parallell thirds and sixts, which scared the crap out of monks and the like. They were only used to the pure intervals: perfect fourths and fifths, and the sound of the vikings alone was enough to nearly make them swoon (as the music theory teacher said). I don't know how much evidence there can be found for this, but it is a cool thought, neverteheless!
Tbh, having listened to quite a few drunken danish bar songs in my partying years, I can totally see why someone could compare the music at a rowdy feast that was held in his honor as "howling dogs"
It's a bit pre Viking-age, but there was a lovely lyre in the Sutton Hoo ship burial. The metal fittings and even some of the wood survived. They're in the British Museum, alongside a reconstruction. Sad the noise turned out to be the washing machine, and not the shade of some ancient Norse Skald trying to start a jam session.
Oh, the sheer joy on Jimmy's face when talking about the possibility of the pan-piper and lutist jamming together a 1000 years ago. And why not? I grinned along with him. About the howling dogs reference. I wonder if the writer encountered more than one session of Norse music, or if it was a one time experience. If only once, then I wonder if he was observing a boisterous and rowdy celebration of (possibly) drunken Norse. Not unlike rowdy sports fans of today celebrating their team winning a game.
For all we know, the "Singing sounds like dogs howling" could just mean: "Their singing style is different from my cultural singing style, which is of course far superior."
I always appreciate the nuance in your videos! The more a historian says "I don't know", the more I trust their opinion. Also I want to hear the spinny bone go whoosh.
It makes me think, a thousand years from now, if someone were to dig up the instruments we use now.... how could they ever know the music we made with them? Our music is so varied, and the same instrument can be used in such different ways, by different people. I appreciate how you keep things real.
My MIL had a circle of wood/cardboard with two strings running through it. You hold it at the end of each string, swing it in a circle to "wind" it up and then pull back and forth on each side to make a noise. She called it a Bull Roarer and said it was used to imitate the sounds mountain lions make. It was a weird sound! The family was Scots Irish (and, we found out Welsh, too), very musical
The "howling" and people connecting it to throat singing; isn't it likely to be more like 'kulning' (somewhat related to yodelling)..? Still practiced in Sweden today.
Had a bit of an epiphany with this video. What makes your video so good I the fact it feels like a conversation, not someone talking at you giving you instructions, there is a warmth and tone to the delivery that just makes it so very easy to listen to and engaging. Well that's my tuppence worth, love you dude. TTFN.
I would recommend anyone interested in this topic check out Farya Faraji's videos on Norse music, especially if you like listening to rants. He also does a great rendition of Þrymskviða, a tale from one of the sagas (edit: it's from the Poetic Edda). Yes it's a bit speculative but it sounds great and it's as close as we can get to Viking music for the time being.
I will also add that some mediæval arab guy would not have had a whole lot of exposure to nordic music and it's not surprising he would dislike it. If you have a listen to other cultures' music styles today, they often sound very grating and unpleasant, purely because it's not what you're used to. Traditional iranian music or Indonesian gomalon music for example is tuned differently and has a separate history of music theory. I can totally imagine a guy with little exposure to that type of music being put off by it
Yeah, when the 'dogs howling' comment came up I could immediately think of a number of folk music traditions that might sound like that to an outsider with a very different cultural conception of 'music'.
"Howling dogs" makes me think of the heavy metal growl. I have a hunch he was referencing what a group of half-drunk guys singing at a bar would sound like today.
Growling and howling are such completely different sounds though? A howl is a clear, high-pitched sound that usually carries a note and has some vibration. Growling not so much
As a coincidence, when I was watching this with my headphones on, my kids found the flute and started playing. They didn't know what I was watching. They haven't played in months. I could hear the faint sound and thought it was background music for the video.
Very cool! I'm attending a harp workshop in February, "What do we REALLY know about Viking music?" Our only instruction is this: "If you have more than one harp, bring your smallest and plainest." No problem: I have a tiny 12-string cheapie!
The battery on my camera ran out. As a person totally used to field archaeologists talking I heard: "my Bactrian camel ran out." It took me a bit to figure out why you would say that.
I love how authentic and humble you are even though you seem to know what you're talking about more than a lot of things I've come across. It's okay to just say "we don't really know" and i wish more people did that. My idea of certain parts of history was so skewed before but I'm trying to find more honest sources like your channel because it's so nice to get as accurate as possible of an idea, not just the romantic or epic versions people try to push because it's what they want history to be. The more honest and accurate interpretations like yours always make our ancestors out to just be human, like us, as they should be. Different of course in ways but still human and it makes me smile imagining them telling each other stories and playing instruments together just because it was a fun bonding activity 😁
That’s really kind of you, diolch! I generally don’t know what I’m talking about, but the people whose sources I use often do! And that’s very helpful!
Fun fact - the Teutons were named after their love of trumpet-like horn instruments. Their contemporaries would hear them from a village away and remark, "there go those tootin folks again"
Ah, the bone buzzers! The Jorvik folk discussed them with me a while back as 'ancient fidget spinners' - which is why they ended up in midden heaps (exasperated parents getting fed up of the noise, and 'losing' them in the toilet overnight) 😆
Howling dogs really vary in their sounds... A Malamute who used to sit on my door step is really different sounding than my minature schnauzer. So I am going to imagine yodeling or yoiking, but also with bawdy folk songs found at celebrations!
Woodwind player here: one option for consistent tuning of string instruments is that you could tune it to a flute/recorder which has a pretty consistent pitch. If you were playing together, you might have to, because a woodwind instrument that's made all in one piece can't really be tuned. The player may be able to change the pitch somewhat with the way they blow into it, and the pitch can also chance based on the temperature, but it's pretty limited.
OH MY GOD, you did the music episode!!! 🥰 (Interesting discovery: apparently the word "polyphonic" is used differently in English and German contexts. When we talked about polyphony in music theory class, we always meant the composition style of several harmonizing melodies playing at the same time - like a canon or a fuge. But in English polyphony usually means "several voices" which just implies that there isn't only one melody in unison.)
Just as i was rewatching Farya Faraji's video of debunking the so called evidence of throat singing in Norse people and also listing what instruments the Norse used and what their music could be lke. Your video is equally just as good.
Farja Faraji (ethnomusicologist, iirc?) has a few very good video essays on this topic… Thank you for adding to it! ❤ And while I too love Wardruna and Heilung they are ultimately modern pop music, and both groups clearly say they are not “Viking” music.
I wonder how Kulning is situated within norse music. I was taught to look for absences in discourse/literature. Specifically, the things that may have been lower class/done by women. I haven't looked much into kulning's history though so I don't have much to say about it.
I'd love to learn more about that too! It's sad, but not surprising, that we've no records of it's history. All I've been told is that it's old, and I live smack dab in the middle of the stronghold for kaukning and fäbodkulturen.
I am inspired by heilung due to turkic and Siberian ancestry and spirituality but im glad ppl are knowing the difference between artistic and spiritual freedoms vs what is historical
Alas, Viking Age music is probably lost forever. But I'd recomend listening to the old Faroese Ballads (Kvæði), those songs may be the closest we have. And of course, there's nothing wrong in listening to bands like Wardruna, Heilung or ever from the Faroese side, Týr and Hamradun; the modern interpretetion of Viking Music is beautiful and well made. Great video, really have fun watching it, praises from Brazil, Noble One!! :)
Yodeling was developed as a form of distance communication in the mountains. It is my understanding that the sounds could carry while the words could not I think that if it had been a practice in the northern countries, they would still be doing it. But that did bring to mind that there is a Scandinavian practice of calling the cows which is unique and somewhat melodic. But it does not involve musical instruments. Found the term for it: kulning.
The Falster pipe (middle section) has a parallel in Friesland, Netherlands. It is heavily decorated with knotwork and dated into the 'full middle ages'. No parallels were known sixty years ago so archeologists were puzzled by it, but wow! It's probably closer to a thousand years old. The wooden pipe is now in the museum at Hegebeintum where it was found in the terp-mound, over a century ago.
I too, love Wardruna and Heilung. They don't claim to be making old Norse music, but are inspired by the old times while writing music. Thank you Jimmy, as always, a pleasure to watch your videos!
i remember like one specific piece of interview with Einar from Wardruna where he said the band ain't viking music because we have no clue how that sounded like. anyway, as always, i am beyond grateful for the quality of your videos. keep on keeping on
I remember seeing an article about a stringed harp found in a permafrost grave; the article was more than 30 years ago but it amazed me then that the harp was as intact as it was.
YES!!!! As a musician I squealed a bit when I saw the title of this video. And yes, I figured it wouldn't be much more than extant instruments and written/artistic depictions, but still SO COOL. About the pan pipes (and other instruments if they are, in fact, at all functional); are we able to tell what notes they produced? By extension, do we have any rough idea of what scales or tonalities they used? I say this as someone who tutored undergrads in music theory and is fascinated by it in general - yeah, I get it, it's a pain in the butt. One of the music theory profs I worked with kept a box of tissues handy because of how many people cried in his office.
the live realisation that the washing machine reaching takeoff speed noise was in fact a washing machine was delightful. unless of course it was actually viking throat singing? many people online think this so it must be true
I clicked this immediately!! I'm a musician myself, and I have a number of traditional world and medieval instruments, some I've made myself from wood and deer bone! (I even have a small Irish Harp, a Crwth and a Pibgorn!). I'd love to get ahold of an Anglo-Saxon/Trossingen Lyre and a bukkehorn/prillar horn/cornetto.
16:40 Dude, I'm pretty sure your washing machine is about to break the sound barrier... But seriously, fascinating stuff! Music is one of the most basic human things, I love that people had opinions and tastes and played so many interesting instruments.
What I always find amusing with blanket statements about music - not just Viking music either - is that people back then were no different to people today. Some people like Abba, some people like Led Zeppelin (using group names I know are vastly different here) or the band Lordi - the lot who won Eurovision a few years back - and others prefer the Seekers or a nice bit of Mozart or possibly even Verdi or Tomas de Victoria (or even a nice bit of Saxon music for that matter). And it would probably have been the same in Viking times. Some might have liked the aforementioned Anglo Saxon music (Winchester Cathedral) but some might have preferred the music of the Rus while others might have liked that of the (modern names here) Turkish people or the French or Italians. Why would they be any different in tastes to modern people, especially as they traded over such a huge area - a friend lectured in Viking studies in Stockholm & Cambridge and was keen to tell anyone interested about their huge trading empire among other things, a fount of knowledge if you were interested - and would have been exposed to a wide variety of musical experiences/tastes. I expect they even took their new found ''pop'' music back with them to anyone at home who liked the same thing as well, just as they, travellers, do nowadays (ok, it would have been slower without the modern miracles of cassette tapes/radio/tv etc) and it would naturally have changed slightly along the way. Given the range of instruments we know were used back to the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans you can probably assume at least some made their way to Norse areas. Interesting video, thank you (my choice in music being more Anglo Saxon religious music up to Tomas Luis de Victoria although I also have some great Roman (supposedly) music on CD as well and I could see the Vikings going for similar sounds without an issue).
As a professional violinist, I’m so psyched about this video! Thanks, Jimmy! It’s the blessing and the curse of music that it only exists in the moment. A fleeting joy!
Ah, I've been waiting for this. I've been trying my best to recreate some of the instruments from around the time, and there's lots of people who know a great deal who share their knowledge freely, which is of course a wonderful thing.
2:45 The Latin-style plural of 'corpus' is actually 'corpora', similar to how the plural of 'opus' is 'opera'. I once made the same mistake as Jimmy and said 'corpi', having remembered that 'corpus' had an irregular plural but forgotten what it was exactly.
People often confuse alumni and alumnus too, I think because as English speakers it seems "obvious" that the version of the word that ends in 's' is the plural.
Wish I could give you more than one like for this! This is the perfect intersection of two of my main interests - archaeology and music. My main point of contact with medieval music is the occassional bit of gregorian chant, which today sounds unusual or even weird to many people, since it doesn´t use our key system. I would assume that Norse music maybe sounded vaguely similar, but there is of course no way to know that. In gregorian chant this sound is derived from ancient music modes, as far as I´m aware, although the way we are performing these pieces now is heavily reconstructed. The first kind-of-notation dates back to the 9th century, I think? But the style of music fell out of favour with the church during the counterreformation and only was partially re-introduced in the 19th century, by which point a lot of things were guesswork. It´s a lot of fun as a singer regardless, although doing it in an ensemble requires way mor concentration than you´d think.
I'm trained as a flautist and was also 2nd soprano with my local cathedral choir for a few years. I totally agree on the mediaeval notation system. Several notes, apparently together like a chord but with the words squished together to indicate speed us just...weird. If we could slow it down to the speed of Satie, it might make more sense. Liturgical, folk, and court music always seem to have different styles to them so it's probably too hopeful to transfer ideas. Sadly. Still, nothing can stop artistic experiments.
Bone on a string! We still make these in Estonia, though generally as a children's toy instead of a musical instrument :D They're called "vurr", presumably after the noise they make. (Speaking of, shrove tuesday is coming up which is a traditional time when these are made, maybe I should look into acquiring some bits of bone...)
Edit: anyone else really interested in "recreating" prehistoric music based on the mammoth and cave bear bone flutes we've found? Plus, Wardruna and Heilung are based as hell, both in terms of representing modern paganism and dispelling certain myths/telling bigots where to stick it. Now, if only we could get people in that vein to stop using indigenous style frame drums...
@lenabreijer1311 there are drums like that, but for a long time, people in this vein of music use drums modeled after those used by indigenous peoples like First Nations, the Sami etc.
This is one of the things you won't ever know for sure, cause there's no way to revive a singer or drummer and ask them, what rhythm they followed? What tones were they using? Did they stretch the vowels while singing? So much, so much
Some points: -There are a lot of tuning pegs and lyre bridges found during the viking age in Scandinavia. There's also two lyre yokes whose shape implies a continuity to earlier anglo saxon lyres. Im hesitant to agree that there's large harps and lutes. Ive never seen any implications of instruments with neckboards being played like a lute/guitar (as a guitarist i wish there was!) -theres a find in hedeby of an unfinished instrument. Its near identical to an early gudok (the find is often called the hedeby rebec, but rebecs have fingerboards and this instrument doesnt seem to have so I dont like that naming) this instrument is the earliest evidence of any bowed instruments in Europe. My pet theory is this is an instrument called a gigja which means fiddle. According to the landnamabok there was a lawspeaker about the same time as the hedeby instrument find who was called Morth Gígja for the clear and loud sound of his voice. Gígja means Fiddle. As far as i can tell this is the earliest reference to a this instrument -during the viking age in Germany Hucbald writes a treatise on the lyre, he is discussing an earlier greek work on lyres, but its worth mentioning for the conversation as to whether his tunings work for contemporary lyres.
I have watched all of your videos! I love what you do and it is very informative and entertaining. I am a member of the OBOD (Order of Bards Ovates and Druids) and enjoy the history you provide. By the way, totally love your silver Torc! I would love to get one.
Glad to hear mention of Isidore of Seville, famous for his encyclopedia. That's probably why Pope John Paul II named him Patron Saint of the Internet. Also, that wooden horn is fascinating. Obviously must have been used to play the opening notes of the score of the movie "The Vikings" from 1958. And finally, thanks for sharing that you play the cello. I immediately pictured you in a duet with captain Jack Aubrey!
I'm trying to imagine why the music would have sounded like dogs howling. I imagine maybe there were a lot of pitch changes and sharp sounds, some rougher vocalizations. If we knew what kind of music the traveler was used to hearing, we might at least rule out what it *didn't* sound like. And to be fair to him, even today a lot of people think that bagpipes are the musical equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. I like them, but I'm part Scots-Irish, so it's in my blood.
4:14 There's a Viking reenactment place for tourists on the coast of Bohus Län, Sweden that me and my family went to some twenty years ago. Pretty sure that's where both me and my brother bought mouth harps, though I've never managed to play it well or even not-terribly.
Spent some 30-40 comprehensive hours playing an Anglo Saxon lyre at a reenactment recently and noted that the musical limitations of the instrument means we can hazard a nice guess what lyre music sounded like XD
I was fairly adept in Music Theory and I found it amazing to study. There is an example of polyphonic Norse Music in one of the 8 Museums in Uppsala. It’s a polyphonic hymn to a Christian Norse Saint Magnus. It’s an early form of polyphony before polyphony occurred on the European Continent. I don’t remember if it is a fragment or an intact manuscript. I’ll have to go back to refresh my memory. It’s been a long time ago.
@@TheWelshViking that’s what made it so interesting. It’s an example of polyphony a couple hundred years before it was being composed and performed on the continent.
When you said 'like howling dogs' my mind went to heavy metal singing and then to 'kulning' a swedish herding call tradition, like yoodeling it makes use of echoing. A modern swedish kulning singer, Jennie Tiderman-Österberg, said that the sound of kulning can range from falsetto to something like the metal growling. Wouldn't it be funny if it turns out that vikings really did like heavy metal?
I was also thinking that, whatever musical scales/harmonies Viking era Norse were singing in, it was probably different than Judeo-Arabic-Spanish music al Tarftushi* was used to, since musical modes you're not used to sound all sorts of wrong, until your brain latches on to the logic. So if we have written records explaining what "Arabic: music should sound like, we can at least make a reasonable conclusion that "Viking" music sounded "Not like that." Also, when I think of howling dogs, I think of notes held for a long time, with a lot of sliding between pitches (as opposed to barking, which is a lot more staccato). *(spelling? making a wild guess based on the closed captions)
@@CapriUni the sliding pitch thing is what brougth kulning to mind for me 😸I have very very little knowledge of music terms but I think that is what they are doing in kulning.
So glad you're getting sponsors! Love the channel and love seeing it grow. Would definitely be interesting to hear viking music. Probably one of those things we'll never really know or understand
Is that a torc? Also: How awesome that you're a cellist! (And, yes, music theory is wizard nonsense, and I do not like it. I think stringed instruments sound more like human voices, personally)
So glad to know that you feel free to multitask with us! Washing Room Jimmy will have to join us one day, perhaps talking about how Vikings cleaned their clothes and give Presenter Jimmy a break. 😂
Great vlog again. A couple of weeks ago I got to see the plan for the Sletten event in Denmark for the couple of years. In is a section about musical instrumentsis stated the following: We don’t have any sources or indications of drums in the period, so no drums should be used. Only archaeologically based instruments should be used. If you have a party or some special event where you have planned to use instruments from outside the period, just let us know. No drums..... I find that hihgly unlikely that one of the oldest pieces of instruments would not be allowed.
When I took music theory in high school I was told that Europe didn't have drums only the Africans had drums and they introduced them to the Native Americans. It was implied that the "dirty uncultured barbarians" used drums and that Native americans were too dumb to have invented them and white people were too good for them until Jazz was invented. Which never sat right to me because of many reason not excluding the blantant racism. I think there may be some of that invovled (uncounsious of course) Since you can use almost anything as a drum including your own body and knowing how some drums are constucted tanned leather stretched over thin wood, I would image what drums were made rotten pretty quickly. I'm not surpised we haven't found drums yet.
It's only that there's no evidence of them. There's no way to know what size, shape, or material to use. For an event that's trying to be historical, that's a good thing.
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"Business Jimmy" was the most entertaining sponsorship read I've yet seen -- your bit with the phone at the beginning was pitch-perfect, too 😅
Isador of Seville would have loved my two hours a day I practiced my clarinet during middle school and high school! 😅
You should do a video on trolls and the so called troll cross 😂
only if you play the cello for me 😻
People often describe music they don't like or understand as the noises of animals. I imagine that's a cultural universality.
Pretty sure there's tribal cultures across Siberia that imitate animal noises as a form of music though.
What he didn't say was whether those "dogs howling" were drunk, or whether people were thorwing things at them. There's a lot of people that "sing" when less inhibited, and get their mates to join in. I imagine that's not changed in many millenia.
Also they could have just been bad singers and not the best representative sample of Norse singers 😂
Yeah & it also really doesn't help much, considering that almost every ancient source all the way up to the colonial Era describing another culture's music is just them saying it sucks.
It reminds me of football fans sing/shouting "FREED FROM DESIRE!!!!"
I have both coyotes and high school sports near where live, and it can definitely take a minute to figure out which it is I'm hearing. Unless I have my dog near me, since she growls at coyotes really intensely from before I can even hear them!
I mean, think about how Heavy Metal or alternative rock music might sound to someone from another culture who is used to very different sounding music…. They might describe it as “dogs howling but worse.” But obviously, a lot of people love Metal and Rock. Descriptions are very subjective.
"...and now they sponsor ME"
Love this for you, Jimmy!
Your Eastern traveler did not mention the context of the singing. I would imagine the loud shouty singing at the end of a well-lubricated feast has not changed much in the intervening centuries...
About those "special effect instruments", my granma used to make those out of random buttons and strings and the smaller they go, the faster they can move, but funnily enough, at some point they reach a max speed and no matter how hard you pull on the string, they will end up with some high pitch and that's it. The bigger thing you use, the lower pitch you get this way. In other words, if those bones were used with a coiled string like that, there could be a chance that they could have been used as a tuning instrument - if one bone can only go one highest pitch at all times, then by tuning your instrument to that pitch guarantees you a pretty decent consistency in its sound as well.
I mean, we all want to hear Jimmy play now, right?
That’s a shame ;)
I got to see Wardruna live for the first time in 2017 and Einar gave a free one-hour lecture about his instrument-making/selection process, and his approach to music in general (which seems intertwined with his view of life). This was in a small theatre he had rented at a local college - we all then had to head to the concert venue, which was located a few blocks away. Amazing experience! I am now a fan for life.
One thing I was told during my music studies, was that the vikings sang in parallell thirds and sixts, which scared the crap out of monks and the like. They were only used to the pure intervals: perfect fourths and fifths, and the sound of the vikings alone was enough to nearly make them swoon (as the music theory teacher said). I don't know how much evidence there can be found for this, but it is a cool thought, neverteheless!
Tbh, having listened to quite a few drunken danish bar songs in my partying years, I can totally see why someone could compare the music at a rowdy feast that was held in his honor as "howling dogs"
Sorry about 2nd comment. We have a sign that sits outside our group tent (larpers sorry) warning all that all songs are sang in the key of off.
Brilliant. Are you collectively known ad Discord, by any chance?
It's a bit pre Viking-age, but there was a lovely lyre in the Sutton Hoo ship burial. The metal fittings and even some of the wood survived. They're in the British Museum, alongside a reconstruction. Sad the noise turned out to be the washing machine, and not the shade of some ancient Norse Skald trying to start a jam session.
Oh, the sheer joy on Jimmy's face when talking about the possibility of the pan-piper and lutist jamming together a 1000 years ago. And why not? I grinned along with him.
About the howling dogs reference. I wonder if the writer encountered more than one session of Norse music, or if it was a one time experience. If only once, then I wonder if he was observing a boisterous and rowdy celebration of (possibly) drunken Norse. Not unlike rowdy sports fans of today celebrating their team winning a game.
For all we know, the "Singing sounds like dogs howling" could just mean: "Their singing style is different from my cultural singing style, which is of course far superior."
I've heard Welsh Male Voice Choirs described that way.
I always appreciate the nuance in your videos! The more a historian says "I don't know", the more I trust their opinion.
Also I want to hear the spinny bone go whoosh.
We need to hear Jimmy playing the cello.
It makes me think, a thousand years from now, if someone were to dig up the instruments we use now.... how could they ever know the music we made with them? Our music is so varied, and the same instrument can be used in such different ways, by different people. I appreciate how you keep things real.
My MIL had a circle of wood/cardboard with two strings running through it. You hold it at the end of each string, swing it in a circle to "wind" it up and then pull back and forth on each side to make a noise. She called it a Bull Roarer and said it was used to imitate the sounds mountain lions make. It was a weird sound! The family was Scots Irish (and, we found out Welsh, too), very musical
I think I’ve seen those, yes!
The "howling" and people connecting it to throat singing; isn't it likely to be more like 'kulning' (somewhat related to yodelling)..? Still practiced in Sweden today.
Had a bit of an epiphany with this video. What makes your video so good I the fact it feels like a conversation, not someone talking at you giving you instructions, there is a warmth and tone to the delivery that just makes it so very easy to listen to and engaging. Well that's my tuppence worth, love you dude. TTFN.
I would recommend anyone interested in this topic check out Farya Faraji's videos on Norse music, especially if you like listening to rants. He also does a great rendition of Þrymskviða, a tale from one of the sagas (edit: it's from the Poetic Edda). Yes it's a bit speculative but it sounds great and it's as close as we can get to Viking music for the time being.
As a musical instrument enthusiast and an archeological anthropology enthusiast I love episodes like these!
That’s extraordinarily kind of you
I will also add that some mediæval arab guy would not have had a whole lot of exposure to nordic music and it's not surprising he would dislike it. If you have a listen to other cultures' music styles today, they often sound very grating and unpleasant, purely because it's not what you're used to. Traditional iranian music or Indonesian gomalon music for example is tuned differently and has a separate history of music theory. I can totally imagine a guy with little exposure to that type of music being put off by it
Yeah, when the 'dogs howling' comment came up I could immediately think of a number of folk music traditions that might sound like that to an outsider with a very different cultural conception of 'music'.
"Howling dogs" makes me think of the heavy metal growl. I have a hunch he was referencing what a group of half-drunk guys singing at a bar would sound like today.
Growling and howling are such completely different sounds though? A howl is a clear, high-pitched sound that usually carries a note and has some vibration. Growling not so much
As a coincidence, when I was watching this with my headphones on, my kids found the flute and started playing. They didn't know what I was watching. They haven't played in months. I could hear the faint sound and thought it was background music for the video.
Very cool! I'm attending a harp workshop in February, "What do we REALLY know about Viking music?" Our only instruction is this: "If you have more than one harp, bring your smallest and plainest." No problem: I have a tiny 12-string cheapie!
The battery on my camera ran out. As a person totally used to field archaeologists talking I heard: "my Bactrian camel ran out." It took me a bit to figure out why you would say that.
I love how authentic and humble you are even though you seem to know what you're talking about more than a lot of things I've come across. It's okay to just say "we don't really know" and i wish more people did that. My idea of certain parts of history was so skewed before but I'm trying to find more honest sources like your channel because it's so nice to get as accurate as possible of an idea, not just the romantic or epic versions people try to push because it's what they want history to be.
The more honest and accurate interpretations like yours always make our ancestors out to just be human, like us, as they should be. Different of course in ways but still human and it makes me smile imagining them telling each other stories and playing instruments together just because it was a fun bonding activity 😁
That’s really kind of you, diolch! I generally don’t know what I’m talking about, but the people whose sources I use often do! And that’s very helpful!
Fun fact - the Teutons were named after their love of trumpet-like horn instruments. Their contemporaries would hear them from a village away and remark, "there go those tootin folks again"
Ah, the bone buzzers! The Jorvik folk discussed them with me a while back as 'ancient fidget spinners' - which is why they ended up in midden heaps (exasperated parents getting fed up of the noise, and 'losing' them in the toilet overnight) 😆
Howling dogs really vary in their sounds... A Malamute who used to sit on my door step is really different sounding than my minature schnauzer. So I am going to imagine yodeling or yoiking, but also with bawdy folk songs found at celebrations!
Woodwind player here: one option for consistent tuning of string instruments is that you could tune it to a flute/recorder which has a pretty consistent pitch. If you were playing together, you might have to, because a woodwind instrument that's made all in one piece can't really be tuned. The player may be able to change the pitch somewhat with the way they blow into it, and the pitch can also chance based on the temperature, but it's pretty limited.
OH MY GOD, you did the music episode!!! 🥰
(Interesting discovery: apparently the word "polyphonic" is used differently in English and German contexts.
When we talked about polyphony in music theory class, we always meant the composition style of several harmonizing melodies playing at the same time - like a canon or a fuge. But in English polyphony usually means "several voices" which just implies that there isn't only one melody in unison.)
Fascinating! Thanks for the info!
Jimmy reckons his jewellery is on point; but he is all torc. 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍👍
Excellent.
“BIG LUTE”…god, I love this channel.
Just as i was rewatching Farya Faraji's video of debunking the so called evidence of throat singing in Norse people and also listing what instruments the Norse used and what their music could be lke. Your video is equally just as good.
Most kind, thank you!
Farja Faraji (ethnomusicologist, iirc?) has a few very good video essays on this topic…
Thank you for adding to it! ❤
And while I too love Wardruna and Heilung they are ultimately modern pop music, and both groups clearly say they are not “Viking” music.
Yup! They’re in his ‘epic talking’ playlist.
I LOVE music, but I'm already distracted about how cool- looking your neck jewelry is, just fantastic
ETA: the mystery of the washing machine!!
Im a Dane and im learning so much from you about where im from
Oh, thank you for letting me know :) That’s very kind of you and I hope that you have some great local museums and libraries for further research!
I wonder how Kulning is situated within norse music. I was taught to look for absences in discourse/literature. Specifically, the things that may have been lower class/done by women. I haven't looked much into kulning's history though so I don't have much to say about it.
I'd love to learn more about that too! It's sad, but not surprising, that we've no records of it's history. All I've been told is that it's old, and I live smack dab in the middle of the stronghold for kaukning and fäbodkulturen.
I am inspired by heilung due to turkic and Siberian ancestry and spirituality but im glad ppl are knowing the difference between artistic and spiritual freedoms vs what is historical
Alas, Viking Age music is probably lost forever. But I'd recomend listening to the old Faroese Ballads (Kvæði), those songs may be the closest we have.
And of course, there's nothing wrong in listening to bands like Wardruna, Heilung or ever from the Faroese side, Týr and Hamradun; the modern interpretetion of Viking Music is beautiful and well made.
Great video, really have fun watching it, praises from Brazil, Noble One!! :)
'"Singing like dogs howling" sounds to me like yodeling, maybe? I love the idea of massed choirs of big, hairy vikings yodeling in multi-part harmony!
Yodeling was developed as a form of distance communication in the mountains. It is my understanding that the sounds could carry while the words could not I think that if it had been a practice in the northern countries, they would still be doing it.
But that did bring to mind that there is a Scandinavian practice of calling the cows which is unique and somewhat melodic. But it does not involve musical instruments.
Found the term for it: kulning.
Multipart harmony? Like a Barbarian Shop Quartet? 😄
@@euansmith3699 I guess, but why stop at four parts? And howling (or yodeling?) instead of singing. 😄
I can't be the only one, now sitting here, wanting to hear Jimmy play his cello..
The Falster pipe (middle section) has a parallel in Friesland, Netherlands. It is heavily decorated with knotwork and dated into the 'full middle ages'. No parallels were known sixty years ago so archeologists were puzzled by it, but wow! It's probably closer to a thousand years old. The wooden pipe is now in the museum at Hegebeintum where it was found in the terp-mound, over a century ago.
I too, love Wardruna and Heilung. They don't claim to be making old Norse music, but are inspired by the old times while writing music.
Thank you Jimmy, as always, a pleasure to watch your videos!
Okay, Can I just say it's cool that you play the Cello? And that you named him.
1) super interesting topic. 2) get that sponsor money!
i remember like one specific piece of interview with Einar from Wardruna where he said the band ain't viking music because we have no clue how that sounded like.
anyway, as always, i am beyond grateful for the quality of your videos. keep on keeping on
I remember seeing an article about a stringed harp found in a permafrost grave; the article was more than 30 years ago but it amazed me then that the harp was as intact as it was.
YES!!!! As a musician I squealed a bit when I saw the title of this video. And yes, I figured it wouldn't be much more than extant instruments and written/artistic depictions, but still SO COOL. About the pan pipes (and other instruments if they are, in fact, at all functional); are we able to tell what notes they produced? By extension, do we have any rough idea of what scales or tonalities they used?
I say this as someone who tutored undergrads in music theory and is fascinated by it in general - yeah, I get it, it's a pain in the butt. One of the music theory profs I worked with kept a box of tissues handy because of how many people cried in his office.
the live realisation that the washing machine reaching takeoff speed noise was in fact a washing machine was delightful. unless of course it was actually viking throat singing? many people online think this so it must be true
'Actually, the plural of "corpus" is "corpora"', I say as I push my horn-rim glasses up a little higher on my nose.
I clicked this immediately!! I'm a musician myself, and I have a number of traditional world and medieval instruments, some I've made myself from wood and deer bone! (I even have a small Irish Harp, a Crwth and a Pibgorn!). I'd love to get ahold of an Anglo-Saxon/Trossingen Lyre and a bukkehorn/prillar horn/cornetto.
It is an absolute pleasure to make your cello's acquaintance!
16:40 Dude, I'm pretty sure your washing machine is about to break the sound barrier...
But seriously, fascinating stuff! Music is one of the most basic human things, I love that people had opinions and tastes and played so many interesting instruments.
What I always find amusing with blanket statements about music - not just Viking music either - is that people back then were no different to people today.
Some people like Abba, some people like Led Zeppelin (using group names I know are vastly different here) or the band Lordi - the lot who won Eurovision a few years back - and others prefer the Seekers or a nice bit of Mozart or possibly even Verdi or Tomas de Victoria (or even a nice bit of Saxon music for that matter). And it would probably have been the same in Viking times. Some might have liked the aforementioned Anglo Saxon music (Winchester Cathedral) but some might have preferred the music of the Rus while others might have liked that of the (modern names here) Turkish people or the French or Italians. Why would they be any different in tastes to modern people, especially as they traded over such a huge area - a friend lectured in Viking studies in Stockholm & Cambridge and was keen to tell anyone interested about their huge trading empire among other things, a fount of knowledge if you were interested - and would have been exposed to a wide variety of musical experiences/tastes. I expect they even took their new found ''pop'' music back with them to anyone at home who liked the same thing as well, just as they, travellers, do nowadays (ok, it would have been slower without the modern miracles of cassette tapes/radio/tv etc) and it would naturally have changed slightly along the way. Given the range of instruments we know were used back to the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans you can probably assume at least some made their way to Norse areas.
Interesting video, thank you (my choice in music being more Anglo Saxon religious music up to Tomas Luis de Victoria although I also have some great Roman (supposedly) music on CD as well and I could see the Vikings going for similar sounds without an issue).
As a professional violinist, I’m so psyched about this video! Thanks, Jimmy!
It’s the blessing and the curse of music that it only exists in the moment. A fleeting joy!
I like big lutes and I cannot lie
Which instrument do you play?
Some viking guy: «Bone on a rope.»
Ah, I've been waiting for this.
I've been trying my best to recreate some of the instruments from around the time, and there's lots of people who know a great deal who share their knowledge freely, which is of course a wonderful thing.
2:45 The Latin-style plural of 'corpus' is actually 'corpora', similar to how the plural of 'opus' is 'opera'. I once made the same mistake as Jimmy and said 'corpi', having remembered that 'corpus' had an irregular plural but forgotten what it was exactly.
People often confuse alumni and alumnus too, I think because as English speakers it seems "obvious" that the version of the word that ends in 's' is the plural.
Wish I could give you more than one like for this! This is the perfect intersection of two of my main interests - archaeology and music.
My main point of contact with medieval music is the occassional bit of gregorian chant, which today sounds unusual or even weird to many people, since it doesn´t use our key system. I would assume that Norse music maybe sounded vaguely similar, but there is of course no way to know that. In gregorian chant this sound is derived from ancient music modes, as far as I´m aware, although the way we are performing these pieces now is heavily reconstructed. The first kind-of-notation dates back to the 9th century, I think? But the style of music fell out of favour with the church during the counterreformation and only was partially re-introduced in the 19th century, by which point a lot of things were guesswork. It´s a lot of fun as a singer regardless, although doing it in an ensemble requires way mor concentration than you´d think.
I'm trained as a flautist and was also 2nd soprano with my local cathedral choir for a few years. I totally agree on the mediaeval notation system. Several notes, apparently together like a chord but with the words squished together to indicate speed us just...weird. If we could slow it down to the speed of Satie, it might make more sense.
Liturgical, folk, and court music always seem to have different styles to them so it's probably too hopeful to transfer ideas. Sadly. Still, nothing can stop artistic experiments.
Absolutely love learning about casual activities. Music and instruments are such an underrated topic. Thank you for another amazing video!
You’d better find that source before somebody calls you a lyre.
Bah-dum-tiss!
S-Tier dad joke! Well done!
one of my favorite Einar quotes about how he describes his music perfectly encapsulates this video, "definitely not as viking"
Bone on a string! We still make these in Estonia, though generally as a children's toy instead of a musical instrument :D They're called "vurr", presumably after the noise they make. (Speaking of, shrove tuesday is coming up which is a traditional time when these are made, maybe I should look into acquiring some bits of bone...)
Edit: anyone else really interested in "recreating" prehistoric music based on the mammoth and cave bear bone flutes we've found?
Plus, Wardruna and Heilung are based as hell, both in terms of representing modern paganism and dispelling certain myths/telling bigots where to stick it. Now, if only we could get people in that vein to stop using indigenous style frame drums...
I thought they were Irish drums.
@lenabreijer1311 there are drums like that, but for a long time, people in this vein of music use drums modeled after those used by indigenous peoples like First Nations, the Sami etc.
Were the trumpets - 'ritual' 😂
Actually probably yes! 🤣
This is one of the things you won't ever know for sure, cause there's no way to revive a singer or drummer and ask them, what rhythm they followed? What tones were they using? Did they stretch the vowels while singing? So much, so much
13:08 when you described it my first thought was that it sounded like a toy my kids had when they were little.
Anyone else wondering if Norse children annoyed the F outta their parents with a recorder?? Is that an American thing?
Oh I like to think so
that must be one of those universal, timeless experiences that unifies humans
My favourite part was when Jimmy's space ship started taking off at about 16 minutes in 😂
There’s always someone who thinks that the singing sucks 😂
Thank you for being honest about what we don't know.
Again with wonderful content!
"Did you do a load of laundry?" I ask Him Indoors just before the text about the washing machine appears...
👀
Some points:
-There are a lot of tuning pegs and lyre bridges found during the viking age in Scandinavia. There's also two lyre yokes whose shape implies a continuity to earlier anglo saxon lyres. Im hesitant to agree that there's large harps and lutes. Ive never seen any implications of instruments with neckboards being played like a lute/guitar (as a guitarist i wish there was!)
-theres a find in hedeby of an unfinished instrument. Its near identical to an early gudok (the find is often called the hedeby rebec, but rebecs have fingerboards and this instrument doesnt seem to have so I dont like that naming) this instrument is the earliest evidence of any bowed instruments in Europe. My pet theory is this is an instrument called a gigja which means fiddle. According to the landnamabok there was a lawspeaker about the same time as the hedeby instrument find who was called Morth Gígja for the clear and loud sound of his voice. Gígja means Fiddle. As far as i can tell this is the earliest reference to a this instrument
-during the viking age in Germany Hucbald writes a treatise on the lyre, he is discussing an earlier greek work on lyres, but its worth mentioning for the conversation as to whether his tunings work for contemporary lyres.
I have watched all of your videos! I love what you do and it is very informative and entertaining. I am a member of the OBOD (Order of Bards Ovates and Druids) and enjoy the history you provide. By the way, totally love your silver Torc! I would love to get one.
Glad to hear mention of Isidore of Seville, famous for his encyclopedia. That's probably why Pope John Paul II named him Patron Saint of the Internet. Also, that wooden horn is fascinating. Obviously must have been used to play the opening notes of the score of the movie "The Vikings" from 1958. And finally, thanks for sharing that you play the cello. I immediately pictured you in a duet with captain Jack Aubrey!
I'm trying to imagine why the music would have sounded like dogs howling. I imagine maybe there were a lot of pitch changes and sharp sounds, some rougher vocalizations. If we knew what kind of music the traveler was used to hearing, we might at least rule out what it *didn't* sound like.
And to be fair to him, even today a lot of people think that bagpipes are the musical equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. I like them, but I'm part Scots-Irish, so it's in my blood.
I love that you play the cello! I played in my youth. It's a beautiful instrument!❤
Another string player fan, checking in! (Violin here but adore that cello sound)
4:14 There's a Viking reenactment place for tourists on the coast of Bohus Län, Sweden that me and my family went to some twenty years ago. Pretty sure that's where both me and my brother bought mouth harps, though I've never managed to play it well or even not-terribly.
🇸🇪🇸🇪🇸🇪
I was pretty good at music theory until we got into atonal music in my second year. Writing an atonal matrix was like the world's worst sudoku.
Don't be a bad Cello-Daddy..... Tune and play. Don't worry, we'll wait for your next content
Spent some 30-40 comprehensive hours playing an Anglo Saxon lyre at a reenactment recently and noted that the musical limitations of the instrument means we can hazard a nice guess what lyre music sounded like XD
Another certified Welsh Viking banger!
Love the cello, Apocalyptica’s Hall of the Mountain King is one of my favourite pieces of music.
We need a clip of you playing yours❤❤
I will try to relearn it
I was fairly adept in Music Theory and I found it amazing to study.
There is an example of polyphonic Norse Music in one of the 8 Museums in Uppsala. It’s a polyphonic hymn to a Christian Norse Saint Magnus. It’s an early form of polyphony before polyphony occurred on the European Continent. I don’t remember if it is a fragment or an intact manuscript. I’ll have to go back to refresh my memory. It’s been a long time ago.
Uppsala is on the continent though…? And polyphony was used in the Bronze Age?
Love to see that manuscript! Another thing added to the list!
@@TheWelshViking that’s what made it so interesting. It’s an example of polyphony a couple hundred years before it was being composed and performed on the continent.
Are you seriously gonna sit next to that beautiful Cello for 20 minutes, talking to us about music and NOT give us a little demo? Come on Jimmy.......
Yep.
@@TheWelshViking c'mon Jimmy.... You know we all wanna see you play.
Nope!
where is an emoji pleadingly batting its eyelashes when we need it?
When you said 'like howling dogs' my mind went to heavy metal singing and then to 'kulning' a swedish herding call tradition, like yoodeling it makes use of echoing. A modern swedish kulning singer, Jennie Tiderman-Österberg, said that the sound of kulning can range from falsetto to something like the metal growling. Wouldn't it be funny if it turns out that vikings really did like heavy metal?
I was also thinking that, whatever musical scales/harmonies Viking era Norse were singing in, it was probably different than Judeo-Arabic-Spanish music al Tarftushi* was used to, since musical modes you're not used to sound all sorts of wrong, until your brain latches on to the logic. So if we have written records explaining what "Arabic: music should sound like, we can at least make a reasonable conclusion that "Viking" music sounded "Not like that." Also, when I think of howling dogs, I think of notes held for a long time, with a lot of sliding between pitches (as opposed to barking, which is a lot more staccato).
*(spelling? making a wild guess based on the closed captions)
@@CapriUni the sliding pitch thing is what brougth kulning to mind for me 😸I have very very little knowledge of music terms but I think that is what they are doing in kulning.
@@MsHedgehog I know there's a technical term in Western Classical music (opera, etc.) but I can only guess at the spelling. I'll look up kulning.
Great video! I'm a musician as well so this stuff is always fascinating. And of course the strings guy was jamming with a wind instrument guy!
So glad you're getting sponsors! Love the channel and love seeing it grow. Would definitely be interesting to hear viking music. Probably one of those things we'll never really know or understand
Is that a torc? Also: How awesome that you're a cellist! (And, yes, music theory is wizard nonsense, and I do not like it. I think stringed instruments sound more like human voices, personally)
That Spanish Arab traveler fellow just could not recognize good Metal!😉
Talking to your instrument? Phew. That means I’m not the only one.
Omg you're a cellist?? That's so cool!
An extremely bad one!
So glad to know that you feel free to multitask with us! Washing Room Jimmy will have to join us one day, perhaps talking about how Vikings cleaned their clothes and give Presenter Jimmy a break. 😂
Great vlog again. A couple of weeks ago I got to see the plan for the Sletten event in Denmark for the couple of years. In is a section about musical instrumentsis stated the following: We don’t have any sources or indications of drums in the period, so no drums should be used. Only archaeologically based instruments should be used. If you have a party or some special event where you have planned to use instruments from outside the period, just let us know.
No drums..... I find that hihgly unlikely that one of the oldest pieces of instruments would not be allowed.
When I took music theory in high school I was told that Europe didn't have drums only the Africans had drums and they introduced them to the Native Americans. It was implied that the "dirty uncultured barbarians" used drums and that Native americans were too dumb to have invented them and white people were too good for them until Jazz was invented. Which never sat right to me because of many reason not excluding the blantant racism. I think there may be some of that invovled (uncounsious of course)
Since you can use almost anything as a drum including your own body and knowing how some drums are constucted tanned leather stretched over thin wood, I would image what drums were made rotten pretty quickly. I'm not surpised we haven't found drums yet.
It's only that there's no evidence of them. There's no way to know what size, shape, or material to use. For an event that's trying to be historical, that's a good thing.
Lol of course the only thing written was a critical! Maybe they would liked the cover band instead!
Interesting as always!