Tag: Hourite

Imagine: A Scientific Fantasy 2 ‎–‎ A video-analysis in 3D of Hurrian Song H6 performed by Lara Jokhadar

This 47th video-analysis of the VIAMAP series is an anniversary video to commemorate the beginning of video-analyses at the CERMAA. It features 3D graphical techniques as well as a short introduction explaining the scale(s) used in the analysis. It is a sequel to the 46th video-analysis –‎ the first in the 3D series –‎ the publication of which is delayed. It is also a 3D remake of the first video-analysis by the CERMAA, featuring an alternate take of Hurrian Song H6 performed by Lara Jokhadar and arranged by Richard Dumbrill, Amine Beyhom and Rosy Azar Beyhom in 2012. Further details are explained below (the scale) and in the video as such, as well as in the original post for the first video-analysis.

Explanations about the graphic scale used for the 3D video-analysis of Hurrian Song H6 3D performed by Lara Jokhadar

The last sequence preceding the end credits proposes the following text:

now imagine what it would be if we could apply 3D graphic analysis and animation to all aspects and characteristics of sound; stop, rewind, slow down the music and animation at will, zoom in, zoom out, keep selected characteristics and look up each and all details from the desired point of view and, finally, apply all these to the analysis of multi-part music, with each part shown separately, or together with other parts…

Amine Beyhom, “Imagine – A scientific fantasy”

3D video-analysis of Hurrian Song H6 performed by Lara Jokhadar: take 4 recorded on the 21st of October 2012 by Amine Beyhom


A CERMAA production

Video Analysis (https://youtu.be/L2c5-IHOmTc)


Release of HURRIAN SONG 6 (H6) by CERMAA (DUMBRILL/BEYHOM/AZAR-BEYHOM) performed by Lara Jokhadar

Release of the first animated video produced at CERMAA.
HURRIAN SONG 6 (H6) was arranged by Richard Dumbrill, Amine Beyhom and Rosy Azar Beyhom in 2012, and performed by Lara Jokhadar.
The video (below) shows the Pitch analysis of Lara’s voice with Praat, in two sections (upper and lower). The upper section offers a general view, while the lower section shows the detailed analysis, with horizontal red dashed lines showing the tonic and the octave, blue dashed line for the fifth and green for the fourth.
Special thanks to Wim van der Meer and to Kabalan Samaha for their help in producing this first video.

FOREDOFICO, CERMAA and ICONEA with the “Friends of the National Museum” foundation to produce a documentary film on the Making of Hurrian Song H.6.

Lyre-reconstructed-by-R.-Dumbrill
A lyre reconstructed by Richard Dumbrill for the Hurrian song H.6. project in Lebanon

In October 2012, ICONEA Director Richard Dumbrill visited Lebanon, initially to attend a conference in Beirut on Rituals in the Ancient Levant. The conference was cancelled following a bombing in the metropolis. Dumbrill seeked help from CERMAA/FOREDOFICO to produce a documentary film on the subject he had intended to give at the National Museum. The documentary, funded by the Friends of the National Museum and CERMAA/FOREDOFICO is about the research work Dumbrill has undertaken for the past 25 years on the translation of the oldest known musical text, written in the Hurrian language, dating from about 1400 years BC, and found at Ugarit in North East Syria in the 1950s. The documentary was shot by Paul Mattar, Founding member of FOREDOFICO, in a renowned archaeological site, and at the headquarters of CERMAA, in the suburbs of Beirut.

Rosy Azar Beyhom and Amine Beyhom, CERMAA founding members contributed to the Orientalisation of Dumbrill’s original rendition of the Hurrian material. The song was recorded at the CALA recording studios, a subdivision of FOREDOFICO specialised in archival recordings. Saad SAAB, President of FOREDOFICO made improvisastions on the Ꜥūd on the theme of the original music. The singing of the melody, and the acting on site was entrusted to a young and promising Lebanese singer, Lara Jokhadar Al-Aro. There, Lara played the role of a young woman afflicted with the curse of being childless, and sang her sorrow to the moon goddess NIKKAL so that she may bear child.

 

Lara Jokhadar al-Aro

 

 

The original score for the Hurrian H.6. song has been published in Richard Dumbrill’s article for NEMO N°1 :

  • Dumbrill, Richard : “Modus Vivendi,” Near Eastern Musicology Online 1 1 |2012-11| p. 89–116.