Oriental Essences in Lebanese Musical Arts

Abstract

Music can be considered as one of the supreme products of a civilization, as a living proof of the generations that succeeded each other over the centuries. Among the historical sources of Lebanon (a people of Phoenician origin) we find some allusions to the mourners of Adonis and to the songs of Achtarut, to the musical instruments that already existed (the harp and the lute). Names of international musical importance have grown, developed and flourished in Lebanon; although the country did not seem a favorable place, and ideal for this side of cultured music. Musical education was not so accessible, and comprehensive in the direction of the computerization of the artistic field, unlike Western education. But what proved an obstacle became the lever of the will of generations, the seeds from which blossomed the irresistible desire to expand knowledge.