Historiography of Byzantine music and the need of editing the opera omnia of great composers. The example of Grigorios Bounis Alyatis
Since the 1970s, with the publication of many analytical catalogues of Byzantine musical manuscripts (Gr. Stathis and his pupils, E. V. Gertsman a.o.), with the complex historiographical and discographical work by Μ. Chatzigiakoumis, the series “Studies” of the Institute of Byzantine Musicology (on various categories of chant within their diachronic evolution), and, more generally, with the worldwide creative explosion of Byzantine Musical Studies, historiography of Byzantine music stands on new ground. One of the major desiderata of Byzantine music’s historiography is the scientific edition of the opera omnia of important composers, which will reveal many yet unknown aspects of Byzantine music’s history. In this article, the development of historiography of Byzantine music, as well as different forms of editions of Byzantine chant are briefly presented, together with some thoughts on the edition of the opera omnia by the famous composer, teacher and theoretician Grigorios Bounis Alyatis, who was the last first chanter of the Great Church of Christ before the Fall of Constantinople in 1453.
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