was battle music a real thing?

by Fuglfalke

You've probably seen it in film where an army would be backed up by sometimes just a guy with a large drum and sometimes something borderlining an orchestra. Was that ever done in battle? And if so why? I can understand having music to pump you up but it doesn't seems like that's enough to make it worth it to put non-soldiers into the battlefield that the rest of the army then has to protect not to mention dragging the instrument's over long distances... It just seems like a lot of work for what is probably a minor psychological boost considering you aren't just running on a treadmill but fighting an actual army

gynnis-scholasticus

You might be interested in some earlier answers on this topic. Besides for morale, music could also be used to keep the rhythm for marching and to send signals. Here is a general answer by u/ResponsibleMushroom9 (nice username), and our u/Iphikrates has written about it for his speciality, Classical Greece, specifically here and more generally here. There is also this older discussion between u/XenophonTheAthenian, u/Hergrim and others on battle sounds and silence among the Greeks, Romans, and Persians