Introducing maqamat: Difference between revisions

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** Listen and identify the jins in [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D9vzrDVtfEjbflNQE3DXRYseCJ2BzJWE74GNYBASQQY/edit?usp=sharing these "violin" recordings] (a taqsim opening I recorded on my [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D9vzrDVtfEjbflNQE3DXRYseCJ2BzJWE74GNYBASQQY/edit?usp=sharing Roli]!)
** Listen and identify the jins in [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D9vzrDVtfEjbflNQE3DXRYseCJ2BzJWE74GNYBASQQY/edit?usp=sharing these "violin" recordings] (a taqsim opening I recorded on my [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1D9vzrDVtfEjbflNQE3DXRYseCJ2BzJWE74GNYBASQQY/edit?usp=sharing Roli]!)
** Sing and [https://www.alexdemartos.es/wtuner/ use this tuner to check your intonation]
** Sing and [https://www.alexdemartos.es/wtuner/ use this tuner to check your intonation]
* Putting it together in a song: [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/cierodsusvfb1wx/AABOcwSKWB8fQ2yJavwNjDKKa?dl=0 Ah Ya Hilu]
* Putting it together in a song: [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/cierodsusvfb1wx/AABOcwSKWB8fQ2yJavwNjDKKa?dl=0 Ah Ya Hilu] (performed by Sabah Fakhri, one of the Arab world's most celebrated classical singers)
* To learn more, see these resources:
* To learn more, see these resources:
** [https://www.artsrn.ualberta.ca/fwa_mediawiki/index.php?title=University_of_Alberta_Middle_Eastern_and_North_African_Music_Ensemble#MENA_music_theory_and_practice MENAME theory page]  
** [https://www.artsrn.ualberta.ca/fwa_mediawiki/index.php?title=University_of_Alberta_Middle_Eastern_and_North_African_Music_Ensemble#MENA_music_theory_and_practice MENAME theory page]  
** [https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1m7gSUCTQZHlvZKTNxnx6ucXRGnqaKqtJ?usp=sharing Historical theory]
** [https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1m7gSUCTQZHlvZKTNxnx6ucXRGnqaKqtJ?usp=sharing Historical theory]
* PLUG:  please join the Middle Eastern and North African Music Ensemble = MENAME (Winter 2022) to learn more about this music, through study and performance!  http://bit.ly/mename  You don't need to play any Middle Eastern instruments to join.
* '''PLUG''':  please join the Middle Eastern and North African Music Ensemble = MENAME (Winter 2022) to learn more about this music, through study and performance!  http://bit.ly/mename  You don't need to play any Middle Eastern instruments to join.

Revision as of 10:50, 22 March 2021

  • Maqam: مقام
    • from Arabic "qama" قام (to stand)
    • literally "place" where one can stand, "station"
      • maqam 1: saint's shrine
      • maqam 2: spiritual station
      • maqama : literary genre: a narrator recounts stories about people at a place he's visited
    • maqam 3: In music of the Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia: melodic mode (also sometimes a suite of pieces, featuring a particular mode)
    • Sometimes other names are used, depending on place: makam in Turkish, dastgah in Iran, Shashmaqam in Central Asia, Tab` in North Africa. (The modal concept of raga in Hindustani music is quite different, but genealogically related via Afghanistan, which features both kinds of tradition.)
  • Maqam vs Western modes/scales: similarities:
    • a transposable pitch collection, usually 7 tones replicating at the octave
    • (tonal functions, including tonic, dominant, like major/minor
  • Maqam vs Western scales: differences:
    • Each maqam features distinctive melodic patterns (opening, development [sayr], places to start, ascending vs. descending forms, points of repose or tension, ornaments, closing formulas). (Cf: Raga in Hindustani music)
    • Maqams may incorporate "microtones" (though popular music tends to avoid them, in order to incorporate Western instruments and harmony)
  • "Microtones" (the term is ethnocentric!)
    • intervals outside the frame of 12TET (12 tone equal temperament)
    • intervals outside the frame of low-integer "just" intonations (e.g. Pythagorean={2,3} or 5 limit={2,3,5}
    • i.e. you can't find them on the tempered piano or Western just intonation instrument! (but they're on the violin and trombone!)
    • Islamicate theorists like al-Farabi (872-950) struggled to reconcile these intervals with Greek theory, which insisted on integer ratios (Pythagoreans)
    • al-Farabi's theorization of oud tunings in his day
  • Due to these variables, the maqamat are numerous! (unlike our two primary scales: major/minor)
  • Maqam and jins (type)
    • Theorists conceive each maqam as constructed out of a number of smaller units, each one called "jins" (type) (plural: ajnas)
    • Confusingly, the jins carry the same names as the maqamat.
    • Usually each maqam centers on two primary jins: lower and upper
      • The lower jins is rooted at the tonic, and gives its name to the maqam as a whole.
      • The upper jins is rooted at the dominant.
    • Modulation is possible, usually by varying the ajnas slightly (changing the lower jins without altering tonic/dominant, or changing the upper jins entirely)
  • Saltana: getting the maqam stuck in your head! Today we'll try to generate some saltanah in bayati.
  • Maqam Bayyati and its ajnas.
    • Maqam is used in both composition and improvisation
    • Purest expression is thought to appear in improvisations, which are mostly ametric, thereby focusing attention on the maqam
      • taqasim: instrumental improvisation
      • mawwal: vocal improvisation
  • Compare the structure and sound of different ajnas
  • Maqam Shuri and its ajnas.
  • How about some ear training - Bayati, Nahawand, and Kurd
  • Putting it together in a song: Ah Ya Hilu (performed by Sabah Fakhri, one of the Arab world's most celebrated classical singers)
  • To learn more, see these resources:
  • PLUG: please join the Middle Eastern and North African Music Ensemble = MENAME (Winter 2022) to learn more about this music, through study and performance! http://bit.ly/mename You don't need to play any Middle Eastern instruments to join.