Abstract
In this article, I discuss the persistence of Byzantium as a cultural model in the arts, and in music in particular, in the countries of the Balkans after the fall of Constantinople. By examining ways in which the idea of Byzantium persisted in Balkan artistic cultures (and especially in music) after the fall of Byzantium, and the way in which this relates to the advent of modernism during the later construction of the Balkan nation-states, I illustrate not only the pervasiveness but also the strength of Byzantinism as a pan-Balkan characteristic.
Highlights
The significance of Byzantium, and by extension Byzantine culture, might be thought to be so evident in the cultural history of the Balkans as to need little explanation, but western perspectives have rarely, until relatively recently, seen any need to take it into account, not least because Balkan cultures have been largely overlooked in cultural narratives dealing with music in Europe as a whole; at best, they have been relegated to the untidy back yard of the “Eastern European”, incomprehensible and unclassifiable
Angelov (2003) and Averil Cameron have shown, the latter demonstrating a profound understanding of the fundamental role of Byzantium in the construction of mediaeval Europe in general
Byzantium does not, merely refer to the city of that name
Summary
The significance of Byzantium, and by extension Byzantine culture, might be thought to be so evident in the cultural history of the Balkans as to need little explanation, but western perspectives have rarely, until relatively recently, seen any need to take it into account, not least because Balkan cultures have been largely overlooked in cultural narratives dealing with music in Europe as a whole; at best, they have been relegated to the untidy back yard of the “Eastern European”, incomprehensible and unclassifiable (a notable exception in historical musicology is Samson 2013). The question of the relationship of Serbian church chant to both Byzantine and neo-Byzantine repertoires is still very much open, though research is in progress; recent work by Vesna Sara Peno in particular has begun to shed light on a period during which there has been (until now), precisely on account of the lack of written evidence, a huge gap in the history of Serbian music (Peno 2005, 2008) Another important aspect of the post-Byzantine phenomenon is the interaction between composers of chant and their surroundings, most notably in the form of an involvement with Ottoman court music, something that is being increasingly studied by Greek and Turkish scholars, and others besides (Tsiamoulis and Erevnidis 1998; Feldman 1991; Wright 1991, 2000). As far as the present study is concerned, the significant change with regard to these cultural interactions, and the increasing prominence of secular music, comes precisely with the disengagement of the Balkan countries from the Ottoman Empire
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