Mugham
Encyclopedia
Mugam also known as Azerbaijani Mugham (Azerbaijani
: Muğam; مقام) is one of the many folk musical compositions from Azerbaijan
, contrast with Tasnif
, Ashugs. Mugam draws on Iranian-Arabic-Turkish Maqam
.
It is a highly complex art form that weds classical poetry and musical improvisation in specific local modes. "Mugham" is a modal system. Unlike Western modes, "mugham" modes are associated not only with scales but with an orally transmitted collection of melodies and melodic fragments that performers use in the course of improvisation. "Mugham" is a compound composition of many parts. The choice of a particular mugham and a style of performance fits a specific event. The dramatic unfolding in performance is typically associated with increasing intensity and rising pitches, and a form of poetic-musical communication between performers and initiated listeners.
Three major schools of mugham performance existed from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries - the region of Garabagh, Shirvan, and Baku. The town of Shusha
(Garabagh) was particularly renowned for this art.
The short selection of Azerbaijani mugham played in balaban, national wind instrument was included on the Voyager Golden Record
, attached to the Voyager
spacecraft as representing world music, included among many cultural achievements of humanity.
In 2003, UNESCO
recognized mugam as a Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
Azerbaijan
also has a great tradition of composers and musicians of western classical music. Uzeyir Hajibeyov
with his Leili and Majnun created the genre of mugham-opera. Fikret Amirov
(1922-1984) was the first Azeri composer symphonic mughams -- Shur, Kurd Ovshari, and Gulistan Bayati Shiraz. Azerbaijani composers created a plethora of compositions that fused mugham and traditional European genres. Among those, for example, Vasif Adigozal's mugham oratorio Shikestesi. Such works are obviously very different from traditional mugham formations but in fact incorporate many mugham idioms. On the level of musicians, there remains a strict separation between classical and "traditional" music in terms of training. Even if the musicians are educated at the same conservatorium they stick to one camp.
have retained their ancient musical tradition. Mugham belongs to the system of modal music and may have derived from Persian
musical tradition. The Uighurs in Xinjian (Sinkiang) call this musical development muqam, the Uzbeks
and Tajiks call it maqom (or shasmaqom), while Arabs call it maqam
and Persians dastgah
. In Azerbaijan the word is mugham from Arabic Maqam. It is based on many different modes and tonal scales where different relations between notes and scales are envisaged and developed.
The meta-ethnicity
and intricate complexity of this music also becomes apparent in the fact that terms such as mugham, maqam, or dastgah, omnipresent in oriental music, can mean one thing in the Turkish tradition, while the same term in the music of Uzbekistan takes on quite another meaning, and yet another in the classical Arabian tradition. So, in one culture mugham may be related to a strictly fixed melodic type, while in another it is only the cadences, the melody endings that are associated with it. In a third culture it may only correspond to a specific type of tone scales.
The genre itself has roots in prayer
and lullaby
and is passed on from mother to baby in this way. However, there are hundreds of varieties, such as songs similar to war chant.
It is therefore not surprising that reference works give insufficient information (if any at all) about the concept since it is not easy to define: "[M]usicologists mutter something incomprehensible (because, with a few exceptions, they don't know either), and the Azeri people explain it in such a roundabout manner that it is impossible to work it out." (Skans).
In the 16-17th centuries the art of mugam was passing through the development process as a folklore professional music of the palace conditions. In this period a dastgah form starts to develop in the structure and forms of mugam. New colors and shades as well as tasnifs developed in mugam performance. The masters of mugam of Azerbaijan sang gazals written in aruz genre by Fizuli
, Habibi and Khatai
. The music events were held in most regions of Azerbaijan in the 19th century and mugam was performed at these events. In the 19th century famous French scientist Alexandre Dumas
who attended the ceremony in Shamakhy, wrote in his works about his trip saying he was greatly impressed by mugam that sounded there. Such events held in Azerbaijan were attended by khanendes from Karabakh
, Baku
and Tabriz
which in turn caused the blending of singing traditions of different regions.
In the early decades of the twentieth century, a member of native intelligentisa, Uzeyir Hajibeyov, the author of the first national opera Leili and Majnun, also formulated the theoretical basis of Azerbaijani mugham in his work The Principles of Azerbaijani Folk Music. Famous Azerbaijani composer Gara Garayev
and Fikrat Amirov also made a great contribution to the development of the art of mugam through creating the mugam symphony.
According to the New York Times, mugham is a symphonic-length suite, full of contrasting sections: unmetered and rhythmic, vocal and instrumental, lingering around a single sustained note or taking up a refrain that could be a dance tune.
has the following explanation: “The expression mugham is used in two senses in the folk music of Azerbaijan. On the one hand the word mugham describes the same thing as the term lad [Russian for key, mode, scale]. An analysis of Azeri songs, dances and other folk-music forms show that they are always constructed according to one [of these] modes. On the other hand the term mugham refers to an individual, multi-movement form. This form combines elements of a suite and a rhapsody, is symphonic in nature, and has its own set of structural rules. In particular one should observe that the suite-rhapsody-mugham is constructed according to one particular mode-mugham and is subject to all of the particular requirements of this mode.” (Sovetskaya Muzyka 1949:3). Azerbaijani conservatory throughout the twentieth century produced significant scholars and scholarship. Among them, Rena Mamedova explored the philosophical content of mugham, as an Azeri "formula of creative thinking". Elkhan Babayev wrote extensively on rhtyhmic aspect of mugham performance. The native scholars continued and expanded Hajibeyov's analysis of mugham.
Mugham describes a specific type of musical composition and performance, which is hard to grasp with western concepts of music in another respect: for one, mugham composition is improvisational in nature. At the same time it follows exact rules. Furthermore, in the case of a suite-rhapsody-mugham the concept of improvisation is not really an accurate one, since the artistic imagination of the performers is based on a strict foundation of principles determined by the respective mode. The performance of mugams does therefore not present an amorphous and spontaneous, impulsive improvisation.
With respect to the concept of improvisation, mugham music is often put in relation to jazz, a comparison that is accurate to a certain point only. Although mugham does allow for a wide margin of interpretation, an equation with jazz is oversimplified, since it fails to account for the different kinds of improvisation for different Mugam modes. The performance of a certain mugham may last for hours. (For the uninitiated listener it is close to impossible to know whether a musician is actually improvising or playing a prearranged composition.) Furthermore, as Garayev stresses, mugham music has a symphonic character.
The songs are often based on the medieval and modern poetry of Azerbaijan, and although love is a common topic in these poems, to the uninitiated ear many of the intricacies and allusions are lost. For one, the poems do not primarily deal with worldly love but with the mystical love for god. Yet, strictly speaking, this is still secular music/poetry, as opposed to, say, Sufism. Nevertheless, mugham composition is designed very similarly to Sufism in that it seeks to achieve ascension from a lower level of awareness to a transcendental union with god. It is a spiritual search for god.
, who died in 1979, is credited with fusing jazz
with mugham. Mugham jazz is jazz based on the modal forms or scales of mugams, just as a mugam symphonies are symphonies based on mugams. Ordinary jazz is marked by metered rhythm. But mugam jazz does not follow a metered system. Both rhythm and scales are improvised.
In recent years, jazz mugham has seen rise in many western countries, particularly in the United States and Japan
.
In 2003, UNESCO
has acknowledged the authenticity, richness and cultural significance of mugham both national and global culture, and in 2003 announced it as a “Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity”.
Considered to be the classical music of Azerbaijan, the Mugam is a traditional musical form characterized by a large degree of improvisation and draws upon popular stories and local melodies. The recent evolution of the cultural industry has threatened the improvisational nature and the ear-to-ear transmission of this art form. During his official visit to the country in August 2005, the Director-General of UNESCO, in the company of President Ilham Aliyev
and several Goodwill Ambassadors, attended a foundation stone-laying ceremony of a Mugam Centre. In 2004, Mehriban Aliyeva
, the First Lady of Azerbaijan
, was named as a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for the oral and musical traditions.
During week of 18-25 March, 2009, Baku hosted International Festival "Space of Mugham." The program included academic symposium that brought together Azerbaijani scholars with their German, French, American, Sand yrian counterparts exploring theoretical, social, gender, and aesthetic aspects of "mugham" and related musical traditions. Dozens of groups from the "Mugham belt" took part in Contests -- group of Iranian musicians from Europe and America, Iraqi performers, guests from Central Asia and Uighurs of China. Each day of the festival was also marked by a rich concert program ranging from performancse of "mugham", attendance at a "mugham" opera in the State Opera House, concert of "mugham"-jazz and symphonic orchestra.
created under the decree of Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev
. In August of same year, on the territory of the Baku Boulevard
, Ilham Aliyev with his spouse, the Goodwill Ambassador of UNESCO Mehriban Aliyeva
and UNESCO Director General Koichiro Matsuura
, laid the first stone at the base of the complex.
Opening of the complex took place on December 27, 2008. The total area of center is 7500 meters squared, which also includes concert saloon of 350 people, recording studio, rooms for rehearsals. In the foyer, visitors can find busts
of famous mugham performers, also a rich collection of musical instruments.
s were known as country-loving, powerful, respectful characters, and mugam was popularly associated with sign of pain and hope during Nagorno-Karabakh war
.
Mugam has lived and sounded in Azerbaijan
in all periods, independently on political, public and economic situation and reserved its place in Azerbaijani culture
. The mugam masters play tremendous role in transition of mugam from generations to generations.
Azerbaijani language
Azerbaijani or Azeri or Torki is a language belonging to the Turkic language family, spoken in southwestern Asia by the Azerbaijani people, primarily in Azerbaijan and northwestern Iran...
: Muğam; مقام) is one of the many folk musical compositions from Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan , officially the Republic of Azerbaijan is the largest country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia to the west, and Iran to...
, contrast with Tasnif
Tasnif
Tasnif is one of the several forms of Persian Music and can be considered as the Persian equivalent of Ballad. It is a composed song in a slow metre. As is true of other forms of musical composition, most Tasnifs are of relatively recent origin and by known composers.A large number of Tasnifs were...
, Ashugs. Mugam draws on Iranian-Arabic-Turkish Maqam
Arabic maqam
Arabic maqām is the system of melodic modes used in traditional Arabic music, which is mainly melodic. The word maqam in Arabic means place, location or rank. The Arabic maqam is a melody type...
.
It is a highly complex art form that weds classical poetry and musical improvisation in specific local modes. "Mugham" is a modal system. Unlike Western modes, "mugham" modes are associated not only with scales but with an orally transmitted collection of melodies and melodic fragments that performers use in the course of improvisation. "Mugham" is a compound composition of many parts. The choice of a particular mugham and a style of performance fits a specific event. The dramatic unfolding in performance is typically associated with increasing intensity and rising pitches, and a form of poetic-musical communication between performers and initiated listeners.
Three major schools of mugham performance existed from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries - the region of Garabagh, Shirvan, and Baku. The town of Shusha
Shusha
Shusha , also known as Shushi is a town in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh in the South Caucasus. It has been under the control of the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh Republic since its capture in 1992 during the Nagorno-Karabakh War...
(Garabagh) was particularly renowned for this art.
The short selection of Azerbaijani mugham played in balaban, national wind instrument was included on the Voyager Golden Record
Voyager Golden Record
The Voyager Golden Records are phonograph records which were included aboard both Voyager spacecraft, which were launched in 1977. They contain sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth, and are intended for any intelligent extraterrestrial life form, or for...
, attached to the Voyager
Voyager program
The Voyager program is a U.S program that launched two unmanned space missions, scientific probes Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. They were launched in 1977 to take advantage of a favorable planetary alignment of the late 1970s...
spacecraft as representing world music, included among many cultural achievements of humanity.
In 2003, UNESCO
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
recognized mugam as a Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan , officially the Republic of Azerbaijan is the largest country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia to the west, and Iran to...
also has a great tradition of composers and musicians of western classical music. Uzeyir Hajibeyov
Uzeyir Hajibeyov
Uzeyir bey Abdul Hussein oglu Hajibeyov was an Azerbaijani and Soviet composer, conductor, publicist, playwright, teacher, translator, and social figure from Azerbaijan. He is recognized as the father of Azerbaijani classical music and opera...
with his Leili and Majnun created the genre of mugham-opera. Fikret Amirov
Fikret Amirov
Fikret Mashadi Jamil oghlu Amirov |Ganja]] - February 20, 1984, Baku) was a prominent Azerbaijani composer of the Soviet period.Fikret Amirov grew up in an atmosphere of Azerbaijani folk music...
(1922-1984) was the first Azeri composer symphonic mughams -- Shur, Kurd Ovshari, and Gulistan Bayati Shiraz. Azerbaijani composers created a plethora of compositions that fused mugham and traditional European genres. Among those, for example, Vasif Adigozal's mugham oratorio Shikestesi. Such works are obviously very different from traditional mugham formations but in fact incorporate many mugham idioms. On the level of musicians, there remains a strict separation between classical and "traditional" music in terms of training. Even if the musicians are educated at the same conservatorium they stick to one camp.
Background
In the course of its long history, the people of AzerbaijanAzerbaijani people
The Azerbaijanis are a Turkic-speaking people living mainly in northwestern Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan, as well as in the neighbourhood states, Georgia, Russia and formerly Armenia. Commonly referred to as Azeris or Azerbaijani Turks , they also live in a wider area from the Caucasus to...
have retained their ancient musical tradition. Mugham belongs to the system of modal music and may have derived from Persian
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
musical tradition. The Uighurs in Xinjian (Sinkiang) call this musical development muqam, the Uzbeks
Uzbeks
The Uzbeks are a Turkic ethnic group in Central Asia. They comprise the majority population of Uzbekistan, and large populations can also be found in Afghanistan, Tajikstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Pakistan, Mongolia and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China...
and Tajiks call it maqom (or shasmaqom), while Arabs call it maqam
Arabic maqam
Arabic maqām is the system of melodic modes used in traditional Arabic music, which is mainly melodic. The word maqam in Arabic means place, location or rank. The Arabic maqam is a melody type...
and Persians dastgah
Dastgah
Dastgāh is a musical modal system in traditional Persian art music. Persian art music consists of twelve principal musical modal systems or dastgāhs; in spite of 50 or more extant dastgāhs, theorists generally refer to a set of twelve principal ones...
. In Azerbaijan the word is mugham from Arabic Maqam. It is based on many different modes and tonal scales where different relations between notes and scales are envisaged and developed.
The meta-ethnicity
Meta-ethnicity
Meta-ethnicity is a relatively recent term that arises occasionally in academic literature or public discourse, and when it does, seems to be an attempt to describe a level of commonality that is wider and more general than ethnicity, but does not necessarily correspond to nation or...
and intricate complexity of this music also becomes apparent in the fact that terms such as mugham, maqam, or dastgah, omnipresent in oriental music, can mean one thing in the Turkish tradition, while the same term in the music of Uzbekistan takes on quite another meaning, and yet another in the classical Arabian tradition. So, in one culture mugham may be related to a strictly fixed melodic type, while in another it is only the cadences, the melody endings that are associated with it. In a third culture it may only correspond to a specific type of tone scales.
The genre itself has roots in prayer
Prayer
Prayer is a form of religious practice that seeks to activate a volitional rapport to a deity through deliberate practice. Prayer may be either individual or communal and take place in public or in private. It may involve the use of words or song. When language is used, prayer may take the form of...
and lullaby
Lullaby
A lullaby is a soothing song, usually sung to young children before they go to sleep, with the intention of speeding that process. As a result they are often simple and repetitive. Lullabies can be found in every culture and since the ancient period....
and is passed on from mother to baby in this way. However, there are hundreds of varieties, such as songs similar to war chant.
It is therefore not surprising that reference works give insufficient information (if any at all) about the concept since it is not easy to define: "[M]usicologists mutter something incomprehensible (because, with a few exceptions, they don't know either), and the Azeri people explain it in such a roundabout manner that it is impossible to work it out." (Skans).
In the 16-17th centuries the art of mugam was passing through the development process as a folklore professional music of the palace conditions. In this period a dastgah form starts to develop in the structure and forms of mugam. New colors and shades as well as tasnifs developed in mugam performance. The masters of mugam of Azerbaijan sang gazals written in aruz genre by Fizuli
Fizuli
Fizuli is a rayon of Azerbaijan. It was named after the Turkic poet Fuzûlî. Its capital is the town of Fizuli. The western half, including capital Fizuli, has been controlled by the breakway Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, as part of its Hadrut Province, since the Nagorno-Karabakh War...
, Habibi and Khatai
Ismail I
Ismail I , known in Persian as Shāh Ismāʿil , was a Shah of Iran and the founder of the Safavid dynasty which survived until 1736. Isma'il started his campaign in Azerbaijan in 1500 as the leader of the Safaviyya, an extremist heterodox Twelver Shi'i militant religious order and unified all of Iran...
. The music events were held in most regions of Azerbaijan in the 19th century and mugam was performed at these events. In the 19th century famous French scientist Alexandre Dumas
Alexandre Dumas, père
Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...
who attended the ceremony in Shamakhy, wrote in his works about his trip saying he was greatly impressed by mugam that sounded there. Such events held in Azerbaijan were attended by khanendes from Karabakh
Karabakh
The Karabakh horse , also known as Karabakh, is a mountain-steppe racing and riding horse. It is named after the geographic region where the horse was originally developed, Karabakh in the Southern Caucasus, an area that is de jure part of Azerbaijan but the highland part of which is currently...
, Baku
Baku
Baku , sometimes spelled as Baki or Bakou, is the capital and largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and of the Caucasus region. It is located on the southern shore of the Absheron Peninsula, which projects into the Caspian Sea. The city consists of two principal...
and Tabriz
Tabriz
Tabriz is the fourth largest city and one of the historical capitals of Iran and the capital of East Azerbaijan Province. Situated at an altitude of 1,350 meters at the junction of the Quri River and Aji River, it was the second largest city in Iran until the late 1960s, one of its former...
which in turn caused the blending of singing traditions of different regions.
In the early decades of the twentieth century, a member of native intelligentisa, Uzeyir Hajibeyov, the author of the first national opera Leili and Majnun, also formulated the theoretical basis of Azerbaijani mugham in his work The Principles of Azerbaijani Folk Music. Famous Azerbaijani composer Gara Garayev
Gara Garayev
Gara Abulfaz oghlu Garayev , also spelled as Qara Qarayev or Kara [Abulfazovich] Karayev, was a prominent Azerbaijani composer of the Soviet period...
and Fikrat Amirov also made a great contribution to the development of the art of mugam through creating the mugam symphony.
According to the New York Times, mugham is a symphonic-length suite, full of contrasting sections: unmetered and rhythmic, vocal and instrumental, lingering around a single sustained note or taking up a refrain that could be a dance tune.
The seven main frets
In recent years, Azerbaijan folk music existed within the scope of folk art. The vocal-instrumental forms of folklore contain the elements of polyphony. The peculiarity of folk music clarifies itself firstly with the development of a fret system. It contains seven main frets - rast, shur, segyakh (are especially spread), shushter, bayati-shiraz, chargyakh, khumayun and three collateral kinds - shakhnaz, sarendj, chargyakh in some other form. Before, it was considered that each of the frets has its special vivid emotional meaning. Every fret represents a strongly organized scale, possessing a firm tonic prop (maye), and each step of the fret has its melodic function. These include:- Rast mode is the first mode of main modes which kept its base and root, unchanged its function during the historical period of development. So, rast mugam based on this mode is called “mother of mugams”. Rast mode consists of 1+1+0.5 tone, which is created in three tetra-chords in the result of amalgamation of reach method of the first main tetra-chord. Literaryly, Rast creates courage and cheerfulness at listener. Subgenres of Rast are: Bardasht (with Novruzu-Ravanda), Maye, Ushshag, Huseyni, Vilayati, Dilkesh, Kurdu, Shikasteyi-fars (Khojasta), Erag, Penjgah, Rak-Khorasani, Gerai, space for Rast. Other mugams relating to the Rast are: Mahur, Mahur-Hindi, Orta Mahur, Bayaty-Gajar, Gatar.
- Shur is the second mode and consists of 1-0.5-1 tone, which is created in the result of amalgamation of three tetra-chords with reach method of the first tetra-chord. Shur mode is the most used mode in AshikAshikAn Ashik is a mystic troubadour or traveling bard, in Turkey, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia, and Iran who sings and plays the saz, a form of lute. Ashiks' songs are semi-improvised around common bases....
art. Shur creates joyful lyrical mood at listener. Subgenres of Shur includes: Bardasht, Maye, Salmak, Shur-Shahnaz, Busalik, Bayaty-Turk, Shikasteyi-Fars, Mubarriga, Ashiran, Semai-Shams, Hijaz, Shakh Khatai, Sarenj, Gemengiz, Nishibi-Feraz, space for Shur. Mugams relating to the Shur are: Shahnaz, Sarenj, Arazbary, Osmani, Rahab, Neva. - Segah is the third mode and consists of 0.5-1-1 tone which is created in amalgamation of three tetra-chords with the reach method. Segah mugam associated with love, romantic feelings at listener. Subgenres of Segah includes: egah Zabul-Segah-Bardasht, Maye, Muya, Manandi-Mukhalif, Segah, high-pitched tone Zabul, Manandi-Hisar (in high-pitched tone), Manandi-Mukhalif (in high-pitched tone), Ashig-Kush, Mubarriga, Zabul, space for Segah, Kharij Segah-Bardasht, Maye, Takhtigah, Mubarriga, Manandi-Hisar, Manandi-Mukhalif, high-pitched tone Segah, space for Kharij Segah. Other mugams relating to the Segah are: Hashym Segah-sol, Kharij Segah-si, Mirza-Huseyn-lya, Orta Segah-mi, Zabul Segah.
- Shushtar is the fourth and the smallest mode according to its amount of sounds. Sound line is created in amalgamation of two tetra-chords with different method. It has eight membranes and consists of 0.5-1-0.5 tone. In Shushtar mode the third membrane is the completive tone, the fourth membrane is Maye. It creates deeply sad feelings at listener. Subgenres of Segah includes: Amiri, Shushtar, Masnavi, Movlavi, Tarkib, space for Shushtar. Other mugams relating to the Mugham are: Ovshary, Heydari.
- Chahargah is the fifth and the longest mode according to the amount of sounds. It consists of eleven membranes. Three tetra-chords are amalgamated with two methods. The first and the second tetra-chords are amalgamated with the first method. The second and the third tetra-chords are amalgamated with different method. Tetra-chords are 0.5+1.5+0.5 tone structural. Chahargah mode is represented in two kinds in Uzeyir Hajibeyov’s composition. It creates at listener excitement and passion. Subgenres of Chahargah are: Bardasht, Maye, Bali-Kabutar, Djovhari, Basta-Nigar, Hisar, Mualif, Garra, Mukhalif, Ouj Mukhalif, Maghlub, Mansuriyya, Uzzal, space for Chahargah.
- Bayaty-Shiraz is the sixth mode and consists of 1-1-0.5 tone, which is created in amalgamation of two tetra-chords with the third method. It consists of nine membranes. There passes membrane among the tetra-chords. It creates melancholic feelings at listener. Subgenres of Bayaty-Shiraz are: Bardasht, Isfahanak, Maye, Gardaniyye, Nishibi-Faraz, Bayaty-Isfahan, Khums-Ravan, high-ptched tone Bayaty-Shiraz, Abulchap, Khaveran, Uzzal, Shikasteyi-Fars, Dilruba, space.
- Humayun is the seventh mode and consists of 0.5+1.5+0.5 tone, which is created in amalgamation of two tetra-chords with the fourth method. It is able to get sound line of Shushtar mode by changing the tetra-chords’ places in Humayun mode. So, these two modes’ structures are close to each other. It creates deeply mournful feelings at listener. Subgenres of Humayun are: Bardasht, Humayun, Baxtiyari, Feili, Boyuk Masnavi, Movlavi, Shushtar, Tarkib, Uzzal or Bidad, Kichik Masnavi, space.
Analysis
Part of the confusion arises from the fact that the term itself can have two different, if related meanings. The famous Azeri composer Gara GarayevGara Garayev
Gara Abulfaz oghlu Garayev , also spelled as Qara Qarayev or Kara [Abulfazovich] Karayev, was a prominent Azerbaijani composer of the Soviet period...
has the following explanation: “The expression mugham is used in two senses in the folk music of Azerbaijan. On the one hand the word mugham describes the same thing as the term lad [Russian for key, mode, scale]. An analysis of Azeri songs, dances and other folk-music forms show that they are always constructed according to one [of these] modes. On the other hand the term mugham refers to an individual, multi-movement form. This form combines elements of a suite and a rhapsody, is symphonic in nature, and has its own set of structural rules. In particular one should observe that the suite-rhapsody-mugham is constructed according to one particular mode-mugham and is subject to all of the particular requirements of this mode.” (Sovetskaya Muzyka 1949:3). Azerbaijani conservatory throughout the twentieth century produced significant scholars and scholarship. Among them, Rena Mamedova explored the philosophical content of mugham, as an Azeri "formula of creative thinking". Elkhan Babayev wrote extensively on rhtyhmic aspect of mugham performance. The native scholars continued and expanded Hajibeyov's analysis of mugham.
Mugham describes a specific type of musical composition and performance, which is hard to grasp with western concepts of music in another respect: for one, mugham composition is improvisational in nature. At the same time it follows exact rules. Furthermore, in the case of a suite-rhapsody-mugham the concept of improvisation is not really an accurate one, since the artistic imagination of the performers is based on a strict foundation of principles determined by the respective mode. The performance of mugams does therefore not present an amorphous and spontaneous, impulsive improvisation.
With respect to the concept of improvisation, mugham music is often put in relation to jazz, a comparison that is accurate to a certain point only. Although mugham does allow for a wide margin of interpretation, an equation with jazz is oversimplified, since it fails to account for the different kinds of improvisation for different Mugam modes. The performance of a certain mugham may last for hours. (For the uninitiated listener it is close to impossible to know whether a musician is actually improvising or playing a prearranged composition.) Furthermore, as Garayev stresses, mugham music has a symphonic character.
The songs are often based on the medieval and modern poetry of Azerbaijan, and although love is a common topic in these poems, to the uninitiated ear many of the intricacies and allusions are lost. For one, the poems do not primarily deal with worldly love but with the mystical love for god. Yet, strictly speaking, this is still secular music/poetry, as opposed to, say, Sufism. Nevertheless, mugham composition is designed very similarly to Sufism in that it seeks to achieve ascension from a lower level of awareness to a transcendental union with god. It is a spiritual search for god.
Jazz mugham
The famous Azerbaijani jazz musician Vagif MustafazadehVagif Mustafazadeh
Vagif Mustafazadeh , also known as Vagif Mustafa Zadeh, was an Azerbaijani jazz pianist and composer, acclaimed for fusing jazz and traditional Azerbaijani folk music known as mugham...
, who died in 1979, is credited with fusing jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
with mugham. Mugham jazz is jazz based on the modal forms or scales of mugams, just as a mugam symphonies are symphonies based on mugams. Ordinary jazz is marked by metered rhythm. But mugam jazz does not follow a metered system. Both rhythm and scales are improvised.
In recent years, jazz mugham has seen rise in many western countries, particularly in the United States and Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
.
Cultural signficance
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
has acknowledged the authenticity, richness and cultural significance of mugham both national and global culture, and in 2003 announced it as a “Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity”.
Considered to be the classical music of Azerbaijan, the Mugam is a traditional musical form characterized by a large degree of improvisation and draws upon popular stories and local melodies. The recent evolution of the cultural industry has threatened the improvisational nature and the ear-to-ear transmission of this art form. During his official visit to the country in August 2005, the Director-General of UNESCO, in the company of President Ilham Aliyev
Ilham Aliyev
Ilham Heydar oglu Aliyev is the President of Azerbaijan since 2003. He also functions as the Chairman of the New Azerbaijan Party and the head of the National Olympic Committee...
and several Goodwill Ambassadors, attended a foundation stone-laying ceremony of a Mugam Centre. In 2004, Mehriban Aliyeva
Mehriban Aliyeva
Mehriban Arif qizi Aliyeva is the head of Azerbaijan's Heydar Aliyev Foundation and the wife of its current president Ilham Aliyev. The Sunday Times, writing in 2005 about Mrs...
, the First Lady of Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan , officially the Republic of Azerbaijan is the largest country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia to the west, and Iran to...
, was named as a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for the oral and musical traditions.
During week of 18-25 March, 2009, Baku hosted International Festival "Space of Mugham." The program included academic symposium that brought together Azerbaijani scholars with their German, French, American, Sand yrian counterparts exploring theoretical, social, gender, and aesthetic aspects of "mugham" and related musical traditions. Dozens of groups from the "Mugham belt" took part in Contests -- group of Iranian musicians from Europe and America, Iraqi performers, guests from Central Asia and Uighurs of China. Each day of the festival was also marked by a rich concert program ranging from performancse of "mugham", attendance at a "mugham" opera in the State Opera House, concert of "mugham"-jazz and symphonic orchestra.
International Center of Mugham
In 2005, International Center of MughamInternational Mugam Center of Azerbaijan
International Mugam Center of Azerbaijan is the center of Azerbaijani arts and music aimed to promote, preserve and popularize specific genre of Azerbaijani music Mugam. It is located in Baku Boulevard, downtown Baku.-Overview of the center:...
created under the decree of Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev
Ilham Aliyev
Ilham Heydar oglu Aliyev is the President of Azerbaijan since 2003. He also functions as the Chairman of the New Azerbaijan Party and the head of the National Olympic Committee...
. In August of same year, on the territory of the Baku Boulevard
Baku Boulevard
Baku Boulevard is a promenade that runs parallel to Baku's seafront. Its history goes back more than 100 years, to a time when Baku oil barons built their mansions along the Caspian shore and when the seafront was artificially built up inch by inch.-Location:...
, Ilham Aliyev with his spouse, the Goodwill Ambassador of UNESCO Mehriban Aliyeva
Mehriban Aliyeva
Mehriban Arif qizi Aliyeva is the head of Azerbaijan's Heydar Aliyev Foundation and the wife of its current president Ilham Aliyev. The Sunday Times, writing in 2005 about Mrs...
and UNESCO Director General Koichiro Matsuura
Koichiro Matsuura
is a Japanese diplomat. He is the former Director-General of UNESCO. He was first elected in 1999 to a six-year term and reelected on 12 October 2005 for four years, following a reform instituted by the 29th session of the General Conference...
, laid the first stone at the base of the complex.
Opening of the complex took place on December 27, 2008. The total area of center is 7500 meters squared, which also includes concert saloon of 350 people, recording studio, rooms for rehearsals. In the foyer, visitors can find busts
Bust (sculpture)
A bust is a sculpted or cast representation of the upper part of the human figure, depicting a person's head and neck, as well as a variable portion of the chest and shoulders. The piece is normally supported by a plinth. These forms recreate the likeness of an individual...
of famous mugham performers, also a rich collection of musical instruments.
Social impact
The massive popularity of mugam resulted in a powerful impact on worldwide society. Many of mugam khanandaKhananda
A khananda is a name generally given to singers of mugham, an Azeri folk music genre. The word is of Persian origin and means "singer"...
s were known as country-loving, powerful, respectful characters, and mugam was popularly associated with sign of pain and hope during Nagorno-Karabakh war
Nagorno-Karabakh War
The Nagorno-Karabakh War was an armed conflict that took place from February 1988 to May 1994, in the small enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in southwestern Azerbaijan, between the majority ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh backed by the Republic of Armenia, and the Republic of Azerbaijan...
.
Mugam has lived and sounded in Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan , officially the Republic of Azerbaijan is the largest country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia to the west, and Iran to...
in all periods, independently on political, public and economic situation and reserved its place in Azerbaijani culture
Culture of Azerbaijan
Following their ambiguous geographic location, the Azerbaijani culture has developed under influence under both Islamic and European cultures, including its Persian, Caucasus and Turkic heritage as well as Russian influences due to its former status as a Soviet republic...
. The mugam masters play tremendous role in transition of mugam from generations to generations.
See also
- Abdulbagi ZulalovAbdulbagi ZulalovBulbuljan , born Abdulbagi Ali oglu Zulalov was an Azerbaijani singer of folk music and mugam...
- Alim QasimovAlim QasimovAlim Qasimov is an Azerbaijani musician, and one of the foremost mugam singers in Azerbaijan. He was awarded the International Music Council-UNESCO Music Prize in 1999, one of the highest international accolades for music. His music is characterised by his vocal improvisation and represents a move...
- Franghiz Ali-ZadehFranghiz Ali-ZadehFranghiz Ali-Zadeh is an Azerbaijani composer and pianist, currently living in Germany. She is best known for her works which combine the musical tradition of the Azerbaijani mugam and 20th century Western compositional techniques, especially those of Arnold Schönberg and Gara Garayev...
- Vagif MustafazadehVagif MustafazadehVagif Mustafazadeh , also known as Vagif Mustafa Zadeh, was an Azerbaijani jazz pianist and composer, acclaimed for fusing jazz and traditional Azerbaijani folk music known as mugham...
- Aziza MustafazadehAziza MustafazadehAziza Mustafa Zadeh also known as The Princess of Jazz, or Die Prinzessin des Jazz or as Jazziza is an Azerbaijani singer, pianist and composer who plays a fusion of jazz and mugam with classical and Avant-garde influences...
- MeykhanaMeykhanaMeykhana is a distinctive Azerbaijani literary and folk rap tradition, consisting of an unaccompanied song performed by one or more people improvising on a particular subject...
- List of Mugham artists
- Music of AzerbaijanMusic of AzerbaijanMusic of Azerbaijan builds on folk traditions that reach back nearly 1,000 years. For centuries Azerbaijani music has evolved under the badge of monody, producing rhythmically diverse melodies. Azerbaijani music has a branchy mode system, where chromatisation of major and minor scales is of great...
- Culture of AzerbaijanCulture of AzerbaijanFollowing their ambiguous geographic location, the Azerbaijani culture has developed under influence under both Islamic and European cultures, including its Persian, Caucasus and Turkic heritage as well as Russian influences due to its former status as a Soviet republic...
- History of AzerbaijanHistory of AzerbaijanAzerbaijan or Azarbaijan is a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. It's bounded by Caspian Sea to the east, Russia's Daghestan region to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia and Turkey to the southwest, and Iran to the south...
External links
- Mugham Radio Channel
- UNESCO proclaimes Mugham of Azerbaijan a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity
- Mugham Society of America
- Declared Masterpiece of Oral World Heritage by UNESCO
- Azerbaijani refugees entertaining themselves with Mugham
- azer.com on Mugham
- Louis Werner about Mugham
- Discography of Azerbaijan (with audio samples)
- e-book "Principles of Azerbaijani Folk Music"