Greek chanting
Thoughts – Recommendations
          Byzantine music is the music that the Greek Church uses in all of its sacraments. Every word of these sacraments is accompanied by this special music. Typically, there is no word during the most important sacraments that is spoken instead of be sung. Byzan-tine music took its name from the Byzantine Empire, where it was first created. This mu-sic has its own way of singing which is called “Chanting”. Byzantine music has its own music system, and it is clearly a type of music that uses the human voice as its unique and special instrument. The people that sing inside the churches are called Chanters, and they can only be men. This is a custom that Byzantine music and the Greek Church have fol-lowed until now. There are two chanters in the Church, the “Right Chanter” and the “Left Chanter”, who traditionally are named “Right Chorus” and “Left Chorus”. During the age of the Byzantine Empire, in addition to these men, there were two literal chorus group sang the hymns during the Church’s sacraments. Today, there are few places where similar choruses still exist; these can only be found in big churches in big Greek cities. In-stead of these, there are only two men, one at the left of the chancel screen (who is the right chanter), and one at the right (who is the left chanter). They are sometimes accom-panied by a few other men who help them with singing, or they are alone and without help have to accomplish quite a difficult task. The way that these two chanters sing is called Antiphonal. Firstly, the one chanter sings a hymn, and then the other one responds with another one.

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