NORTH AFRICAN MUSIC

Five Processes in Music History

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Cosmopolitan Cultural Syria under the Centers Umayyads (661-750) Iraq under the Abbasids (750-909)

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Musical Traditions Mesopotamia Byzantium Persia Syria Music of North Africa and West Asia or Arabia

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Musical Results New Performance Techniques New Aspects of Intonation New Musical Instruments Retention of strong local elements (e.g., singing of poetical lyrics in Arabic) Court patronage of poets and musicians became commonplace

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Major Patrons The Abbasid Caliphs Al-Mahdi (reigned 775785) Al-Amin (reigned 809813)

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CLASSICAL PAST
The Bayt al-Hikmah House of Wisdom Established by Abbasid Caliph al-Mamun (reigned 813-833) A scholarly institution that translated into Arabic several Greek classics, including musical treatises by major Pythagorean scholars, Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus

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CLASSICAL PAST
Musical Results The term al-musiqa Music became a speculative discipline, one of al-ulum alriyadiyyah or the mathematical sciences An extensive musical nomenclature Theoretical treatises

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CLASSICAL PAST
Ibn al-Munajjim (d.912) Described an established system of 8 melodic modes, each had an octave span of Pythagorean half and whole steps (i.e., each had its own diatonic scale). These were used during the eighth and ninth centuries.

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CLASSICAL PAST
Abu al-Faraj alIsfahani (d.967) Kitab al-Aghani or Book of Songs. Each mode was indicated by the names of the fingers and the frets employed when playing the ud.

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CLASSICAL PAST
al-Kindi (d.873) Elaborated on the diatonic ud fretting known at his time and proposed adding a fifth string to the 4 stringed ud in order to expand the theoretical pitch range into two octaves; discussed the phenomenon of sound, intervals and compositions.

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CLASSICAL PAST
al-Farabi (d.950) Kitab al-Musiqa al-Kabir or The Grand Treatise on Music provided a lute fretting that combined the basic diatonic arrangement of Pythagorean intervals with additional frets suited for playing two newly introduced neutral, or microtonal, intervals. Described two types of tunbur or long-necked fretted lute, each with a different system of frets: an Arabian type whose frets produced quarter-tone intervals and another with intervals based on the limma and comma subdivisions of the Pythagorean whole tone.

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CLASSICAL PAST
Ibn Sina or Avicenna (d. 1037) discussed sound, dissonants and consonants, lute fretting and references to melodic modes by specific names as did alFarabi

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CLASSICAL PAST
Safi ad-Din al-Urmawi (d.1291) In two authoritative treatises discussed various aspects of musical knowledge, including rhythm and meter; expounded on the subject of melodic modes, describing the intervals of each mode in accordance with a detailed theoretical scale as did al-Farabi. Had a profound influence on later scholars and especially the musical systems of contemporary Iran and Turkey.

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MEDIEVAL WEST
Contact between North Africa and Europe at the time of the Crusades (11th, 12th, and 13th centuries) Contact between North Africa and Europe during the Islamic occupation of Spain (713-1492)

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MEDIEVAL WEST
Musical Results
scientific scholarship moved into the Muslim universities of Spain; influenced the Christian West; and promoted the translation of Arabic works, including commentaries on Greek sources, into Latin.

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MEDIEVAL WEST
Musical results (Introduced instruments to Europe) From al-ud to lute From naqqarat to nakers or kettledrums From rabab to rebec From al-nafir to the anafil or natural trumpet

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MEDIEVAL WEST
ZARYAB (d. 850) Compiled a repertoire of 24 nawbat (sing. Nawbah or nubah), each of which was a composite of vocal and instrumental pieces in a certain melodic mode. Nawbat were reportedly associated with the different hours of the day. This tradition was carried into North Africa and thrived there through the late fifteenth century, even after the Muslims were expelled from the Iberian Peninsula.

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MEDIEVAL WEST
Musical results A musical form that utilized romantic subject matter, featuring strophic texts with refrains (contrast with the classical Arabic quasidah, which followed a continuous flow of lines or of couplets using a single poetical meter and a single rhyme ending) The muwashshah form, used by major poets, emerged and survived in North African cities and in the Levant (greater Syria and Palestine, and was especially popular in Aleppo, Syria)

THE OTTOMAN PERIOD

The hegemony of the Ottoman Turks over much of North Africa (also Syria, Palestine, Iraq, the coasts of West Asia and parts of Eastern Europe) 1517-1917 Arab music interacted with Turkish music which had already absorbed musical elements from Central Asia, Anatolia, Persia, medieval Islamic Syria and Iraqan interaction concentrated in large cities such as Aleppo, Damascus, Baghdad, and Cairo. Rural communities such as areas inhabited by the North African Berbers (and Syrian Bedouins) maintained a fair degree of continuity and stability.

THE OTTOMAN PERIOD

Musical results Introduced the samai (or Turkish saz semai) and the bashraf (or Turkish pesrev), instrumental genres used in Turkish court and religious Sufi music, before the late 19th century Instrumental and possibly vocal and dance forms were transmitted partly through the Mevlevis, a mystical order established in Konya, Turkey (13th century)

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MODERN WEST
Results of Westernization (17981801) following the Napoleonic conquest of Egypt The military band imported by Muhammad Ali (19th century) Establishment of military schools which used Western instruments and musical notations

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MODERN WEST
Result of Westernization (17981801) following the Napoleonic conquest of Egypt

Building of the Cairo Opera House by Khedive Ismail (reigned 1863-1876) on the occasion of the opening of the Suez Canal Inaugural performance at the Opera House (November 1869) was of Guiseppe Verdis Rigoletto Notable subsequent performance was Aida (December 1871) by Guiseppe Verdi

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MODERN WEST
Result of Westernization (17981801) following the Napoleonic conquest of Egypt

Increase in the role of Western theory, notation, instruments, and overall musical attitudes Kamil al-KhulaI (Egyptian) mentions in his Kitab alMusiqa al-Sharqi (ca. 1904) the piano, accordion, mouth organ Shayk Sayyid Darwish (d.1923) composed a new theatrical form, combining comedy and vaudeville Arabized Congress of Arab Music held in Cairo (1932)

SUMMARY
OF ARABIC MUSIC CHARACTERISTICS

Intimate connection between music and the Arabic language The principal position of melody Compound forms predominate The traditional musical content of Arab social and religious life

The link between melody and modality, a conceptual organizational framework known as maqam (pl. maqamat) The use of metric modes and the modal treatment of rhythm The modern electronic media as a unifying factor, for example in the spread of ughniyyah Individuality in smaller areas and repertoires