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Composer says Leonardo painting has coded 'soundtrack'
By Ariel David
Associated Press
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ROME -- It's a new Da Vinci code, but this time it could be for real. An Italian musician and computer technician claims to have uncovered musical notes encoded in Leonardo Da Vinci's "Last Supper."

The find raises the possibility that the Renaissance genius might have left behind a somber composition to accompany the scene depicted in the 15th-century wall painting.

"It sounds like a requiem," Giovanni Maria Pala said. "It's like a soundtrack that emphasizes the passion of Jesus."

Painted from 1494 to 1498 in Milan's Church of Santa Maria delle Grazie, the "Last Supper" vividly depicts a key moment in the Gospel narrative: Jesus' last meal with the 12 Apostles before his arrest and crucifixion, and the shock of Christ's followers as they learn that one of them is about to betray him.

Pala, a 45-year-old musician who lives near the southern Italian city of Lecce, began studying Leonardo's painting in 2003, after hearing on a news program that researchers believed the artist and inventor had hidden a musical composition in the work.

"Afterward, I didn't hear anything more about it," he said in an interview with The Associated Press. "As a musician, I wanted to dig deeper."

In a book released Friday in Italy, Pala explains how he took elements of the painting that have symbolic value in Christian theology and interpreted them as musical clues.

Pala first saw that by drawing the five lines of a musical staff across the painting, the loaves of bread on the table as well as the hands of Jesus and the Apostles could each represent a musical note.

This fit the relation in Christian symbolism between the bread, representing the body of Christ, and the hands, which are used to bless the food, he said. But the notes made no sense musically until Pala realized that the score had to be read from right to left, following Leonardo's particular writing style.

In his book - "La Musica Celata" ("The Hidden Music") - Pala also describes how he found what he says are other clues in the painting that reveal the slow rhythm of the composition and the duration of each note.

The result is a 40-second "hymn to God" that Pala said sounds best on a pipe organ, the instrument most commonly used in Leonardo's time for spiritual music.

Alessandro Vezzosi, a Leonardo expert and the director of a museum dedicated to the artist in his hometown of Vinci, said he had not seen Pala's research but that the musician's hypothesis "is plausible."

Vezzosi said previous research has indicated the hands of the Apostles in the painting can be substituted with the notes of a Gregorian chant, though so far no one had tried to work in the bread loaves.

"There's always a risk of seeing something that is not there, but it's certain that the spaces (in the painting) are divided harmonically," he told the AP. "Where you have harmonic proportions, you can find music."

Vezzosi also noted that though Leonardo was more noted for his paintings, sculptures and visionary inventions, he was also a musician. Da Vinci played the lyre and designed various instruments. His writings include some musical riddles, which must be read from right to left.

Reinterpretations of the "Last Supper" have popped up ever since "The Da Vinci Code" fascinated readers and movie-goers with suggestions that one of the apostles sitting on Jesus' right is Mary Magdalene, that the two had a child and that their bloodline continues.

Pala stressed that his discovery does not reveal any supposed dark secrets of the Catholic Church or of Leonardo, but instead shows the artist in a light far removed from the conspiratorial descriptions found in fiction.

"A new figure emerges - he wasn't a heretic like some believe," Pala said. "What emerges is a man who believes, a man who really believes in God."

On the Net

Pala's site (in Italian), http://www.lamusicacelata.it

Official site for the "Last Supper," http://www.cenacolovinciano.it

Take a look
A laptop screen shows musical notes encoded in Leonardo Da Vinci's "Last Supper," during an interview with Italian musician and computer technician Giovanni Maria Pala, in Rome, Monday, Oct. 22, 2007. Pala, a 45-year-old musician who lives near the southern Italian city of Lecce, began studying Leonardo's painting in 2003, after hearing on a news program that researchers believed the artist and inventor had hidden a musical composition in the work. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
A laptop screen shows musical notes encoded in Leonardo Da Vinci's "Last Supper," during an interview with Italian musician and computer technician Giovanni Maria Pala, right, in Rome, Monday, Oct. 22, 2007. Pala, a 45-year-old musician who lives near the southern Italian city of Lecce, began studying Leonardo's painting in 2003, after hearing on a news program that researchers believed the artist and inventor had hidden a musical composition in the work. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
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Reader comments on this story - 13 total

Note: All views and opinions expressed in reader comments are solely those of the individual submitting the comment, and not those of the Pantagraph or its staff.

Cranky Yankee. wrote on Nov 11, 2007 5:37 AM:

" Deserves at least a Congressional investigation. I will bet it also shows that inflation in relation to Social Security is ONLY 2.4% this year. .... "

No it doesn't wrote on Nov 10, 2007 12:57 PM:

" Doesn't have anything of the sort. Sometimes a painting is just a painting. A sometimes a painter is more interested in inventing war weapons than being aritistic. "

To Non è bene: wrote on Nov 10, 2007 7:17 AM:

" Moved out of Bloomington, but still read the local paper, comment on it, and get excited by other posts. Hmmm, who is the ignorant one? "

Non è bene wrote on Nov 10, 2007 1:24 AM:

" I am so glad I moved out of Bloomington-Normal. People's ignorance abound as in the comments made by some. To be surrounded by it on a daily basis would make me as brain-dead as the others. "

Aliens wrote on Nov 9, 2007 10:32 PM:

" It was painted by aliens, and it also contains the schematics for an intergalactic spaceship if you look close enough. We should get Jodi Foster on the case. "

there was wrote on Nov 9, 2007 8:58 PM:

" a plot for a movie hidden in Picture...now a Music.......what next ? "

This is cool. wrote on Nov 9, 2007 7:43 PM:

" You all make fun. But this is a cool article. I love stuff like this. "

Right to Left wrote on Nov 9, 2007 7:13 PM:

" The recipe turns out fine if you read the directions from right to left. You know, because that is how DaVinci wrote stuff if you read the article. "

Galileo Galilei @ University of Padua Illinois wrote on Nov 9, 2007 6:08 PM:

" In Napoli where love is king When boy meets girl here's what they say When the moon hits you eye like a big pizza pie That's amore When the world seems to shine like you've had too much wine That's amore Bells will ring ting-a-ling-a-ling, ting-a-ling-a-ling And you'll sing "Vita bella" Hearts will play tippy-tippy-tay, tippy-tippy-tay Like a gay tarantella When the stars make you drool just like a pasta fazool That's amore When you dance down the street with a cloud at your feet You're in love When you walk down in a dream but you know you're not Dreaming signore Scuzza me, but you see, back in old Napoli That's amore (When the moon hits you eye like a big pizza pie That's amore When the world seems to shine like you've had too much wine That's amore Bells will ring ting-a-ling-a-ling, ting-a-ling-a-ling And you'll sing "Vita bella" Hearts will play tippy-tippy-tay, tippy-tippy-tay Like a gay tarantella "

Hmm wrote on Nov 9, 2007 3:53 PM:

" I tried following the recipe, but the bread always came out of the oven broken! "

Me Too wrote on Nov 9, 2007 2:51 PM:

" I found a really good fried chicken recipe by examining the American Gothic. "

Perhaps wrote on Nov 9, 2007 2:39 PM:

" A bread recipe. "

O rly? wrote on Nov 9, 2007 2:11 PM:

" Maybe it's a recipe, too. "
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