The Rhythm Divine

It's Good Friday for the Eastern Orthodox churches and we travel to Mt Athos in Greece to hear their 1000 year old tradition of Byzantine chant. We keep the Easter Vigil inside the Xenophontos Greek Orthodox Monastery, and hear from musician Stephan Micus who made his own pilgrimage to the Holy Mountain.

Transcript

Mt Athos is a mountain rising about 2000 metres above sea level and it's also a peninsula jutting 50 kms into the blue Aegean Sea in north-eastern Greece. But most importantly Mt Athos is a semi-independent monastic site with 20 monasteries, each politically self-governing, but spiritually under the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. The first monastery was built in 963, so there's been more than a 1000 years of continuous Orthodox Christian religious observance

Mt Athos is the only place in Greece completely dedicated to prayer and worship of God and for that reason it's known as the Holy Mountain. And the reason we're travelling to Mt Athos is because it's Good Friday for the Eastern churches, and so tonight we taking a musical journey to Mt Athos, to catch a glimpse of the Greek Orthodox tradition.

We begin with a Good Friday hymn and then the Easter Vigil at the Xenophontos Monastery on Mt Athos. The monks are coming from outside the main church where they were beating thin wooden bars and strips of metal called simandra, and now as the oil lamps are lit they begin to chant, the traditional Byzantine chant using Eastern modes rather than scales, in a style going back more than 1500 years. Like Gregorian chant it's unison singing, by a male chorus, no women, with a solo chanter usually the priest.

We also hear from a man who made the first of many journeys to Mt Athos in 1988. Musician Stephan Micus spent nights in the monasteries on Mt Athos and days hiking through the forests that cover much of the 350 square kilometres of the peninsula. He then recorded a cycle of compositions to express the silent beauty at the heart of the Orthodox monastic tradition. We'll hear the first two parts of the cycle, beginning with the journey to the Holy Mountain featuring a Bavarian Zither and a Sattar, a long necked Central Asian stringed instrument, and then the First Night at the monastery. Orthodox churches use no musical instruments in their liturgy so the first night has only voices, 22 of them, singing prayer to the Virgin Mary.

We end with another chant from the Australian Byzantine Choir, a hymn for Easter Sunday proclaiming the Resurrection.

Further Information

Mt Athos
Mount Athos is situated in the entire third, eastern and most beautiful peninsula of Halkidiki, called the peninsula of Athos. It is the only place in Greece that is completely dedicated to prayer and worship of God. For this reason, it is called the Holy Mountain and is home to 20 self-governing monasteries.

Music

CD title: Byzantium: Byzantine Music
Track title: Australian Byzantine Choir
Artist: Australian Byzantine Choir
CD details: Fiidoo D24666
URL: http://www.australianbyzantinechoir.com/Recordings.html

CD title: Easter on Mount Athos; Greek Orthodox Chant
Track title: Rite for the Easter Vigil
Artist: The Monks of the Xenophontos Monastery, Mt Athos
CD details: Deutsche Grammophon 449 399 2
URL: http://www.inathos.gr/athos/en/

CD title: Athos
Track title: On The Way/ the First Night
Artist: Stephan Micus
Composer: Micus
CD details: ECM 1551
URL: http://www.ecmrecords.com/Catalogue/Artists/micus_stephan.php

Presenter

Geoff Wood

Producer

Geoff Wood