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Music Decoded in Last Supper

Italian musician finds requiem hidden in famous fresco

By Katherine Thompson,  Newser Staff

Posted Nov 10, 2007 8:13 AM CST
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(Newser) – Touting his find as a "real da Vinci code," an Italian musician claims to have found a musical score hidden by Leonardo da Vinci in The Last Supper.  "It sounds like a requiem," Giovanni Maria Pala tells the Discovery Channel, describing the short piece whose notes are made up of the loaves of bread and apostles' hands visible in the 500-year-old fresco.

"There's always a risk of seeing something that is not there," Pala admits, "but it's certain that the spaces are divided harmonically." In addition to the dirge, Pala says in a new book he's uncovered a Hebrew message and the image of a chalice. Such a glut of imagery "cannot just be coincidences," Pala insists.

Italian musician and computer technician Giovanni Maria Pala talks during an interview, in Rome, Monday, Oct. 22, 2007. Pala, a 45-year-old musician claims to have uncovered musical notes encoded in Leonardo Da Vinci's Last Supper, raising the possibility that the Renaissance genius might have left behind a somber composition to...
Italian musician and computer technician Giovanni Maria Pala talks during an interview, in Rome, Monday, Oct. 22, 2007. Pala, a 45-year-old musician claims to have uncovered musical notes encoded in Leonardo...   (Associated Press)
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,...
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....   (Associated Press)
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...
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,...   (Associated Press)
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Pala's (Italian) homepage
La musica celata

A hyper-close-up look at the painting
HAL9000

 
Giovanni Maria Pala • The Last Supper • hidden code • requiem • Leonardo da Vinci

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