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MUSIC OF THE MIDDLE EAST Lecturer: Dr Martin Stokes

HILARY TERMS 2008
AND

2009

This course develops a critical approach to the Middle Easts music that encompasses both well-established and more contemporary fields of inquiry. The first lecture considers the core problems of representation in the wake of the Orientalism polemics of the 1980s. The next three concern some traditional areas of ethnographic inquiry: tribalism, music in religious experience, modal knowledge in art music practice. The final three develop some more contemporary problematics: recent work on (the relatively rare) notations of repertory from the eighteenth century and questions of interpretation and historical reconstruction; music and political sentiment; music, migrancy and Diaspora. Aims and objectives Students will become familiar with the major repertories and performance traditions, and the key instrumentalists and vocalists of the region and its Diasporas; they will also, particularly in the latter part of the course, develop ways of thinking about voice, emotion and political power that will be of use elsewhere in their music studies. At a more general level, the course serves to deepen and extend students ability to read and think ethnographically about music, with reference to a major world music region. Students will be required to attend the seven lectures, do the reading and listening for each lecture, and work through the supplementary reading list. 1. Cairo Soundscape Reading: Bohlman, Philip V 2006. Middle East, New Grove Online, http://proxy.uchicago.edu/ Stokes, Martin 2002. Silver Sounds in the Inner Citadel: Reflections on Musicology and Islam. In H. Donnan (ed.) Interpreting Islam. London: Sage, 167-189. 2. Tribes and their music. Listening: Ahwash n-ayt mgun from Maroc: Musique Berbere du Haut-Atlas et de lAnti-Atlas. Le Chant du Monde (CNRS/Musee de lHomme) LDX 274 991, 1994. Narink 1 from Eyhok: Muzika Geleri ya Hekariye/Traditional Music of Hakkari, Kalan 317/318, 2004. Reading: Abu-Lughod, Lila 1986. Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society. Berkeley: University of California Press. Lortat-Jacob, Bernard 1994. Musiques en Fete: Maroc, Sardaigne, Roumanie. Nanterre: Societe dethnologie.

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Chapter 3. Religion and Music in the Middle East. Listening: Sura al-Hujurat, from Al Koran al Karim: Cheikh Abdel Bassed Mohamed Abdel Samad. Union Records CDUM 9, 1993. Ya Rabbi, Ma Li fil Wujudi Siwaka, from Chants Soufis du Caire, Egypte, Institut du Monde Arabe 321023, 1999. Reading: Frishkopf, Michael 2000. Inshad Dini and Aghani Diniyya in Twentieth Century Egypt: A Review of Styles, Genres, and Available Recordings, Bulletin of the Middle East Studies Association 34 (http://fp.arizona.edu/messsoc/Bulletin/34-2/34-2%Frishkopf.htm) Nelson, Kristina 2001. The Art of Reciting the Quran. Cairo: American University of Cairo Press. 4. Arts of improvisation, arts of maqam: Tanburi Cemil Bey and Mesut Cemil. Listening: Nihavent Taksimi (tanbur), track 5, on Tanburi Cemil Bey. Traditional Crossroads, B0000031FP, 1994. Nihavent taksim (tanbur), track 6c on Mesut Cemil, Volumes 2 and 3, Instrumental and Vocal Recordings. Golden Horn Records, 2000. Reading: Racy, Ali Jihad 1998. Improvisation, Ecstasy, and Performance Dynamics in Arabic Music, in In the Course of Performance: Studies in the World of Musical Improvisation (ed. Bruno Nettle with Melinda Russell), Chicago: Chicago University Press, 95-112. Nettl, Bruno and Roland Riddle 1998. Taqsim Nahawand Revisited: The Musicianship of Jihad Racy in Bruno Nettl with Melinda Russell (eds.) In the Course of Performance: Studies in the World of Musical Improvisation, Chicago: Chicago University Press, 369-394. 5. Historical Dimensions: The Kantemir File. Listening: Krdi Pesrev, Sultan Korkut, track 1, Sultan Bestekarlar: Turkish Classical Music Composed by Ottoman Sultans. Kalan 130, 131. 1999. Krdi Pesrev, Sultan Korkut, track 8, Kantemiroglu Edvarndan, Seme Eserler 2. Yap Kredi Kltr Sanat Yaynclk. CD attached to Kantemiroglu, Kitabu Ilmil-Musiki ala vechil-Hurufat, ed. Yaln Tura, Istanbul: Yap Kredi Kltr Sanat Yaynclk 2001. Reading: Feldman, Walter 1996. Music of the Ottoman Court: Makam, Composition and the Early Ottoman Instrumental Repertoire, Berlin: Verlag 6. Vocal Enchantment, Revolutionary Melodrama. Listening: Enta Omry, Om Kolthom, Sono Cairo, Sono 102, n.d. Ittihad, final track from Sepideh, Shajarian. 1980

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Reading: Danielson, Virginia 1997. The Voice of Egypt: Umm Kulthum, Arabic Song, And Egyptian Society in the Twentieth Century, Chicago: Chicago University Press. Stokes, Martin (forthcoming) Abd al-Halims Microphone in L. Nooshin (ed.), Music and the Play of Power: Music, Politics and Ideology in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia, Ashgate Press, London 7. Migrancy, diaspora, cosmoplitanism. Listening: Didi, track 1 on Khaled. Barclay, 5118152, 1992 Foug il-Nakhl, track 7 on Safaafir: Maqams of Baghdad, Safaafir, 2006. Reading: Swedenberg, Ted 2000. Saida Sultan/Danna International: Transgendered Pop and the Polysemiotics of Sex, Nation, and Ethnicity on the Israeli-Egyptian Border in W. Armbrust (ed.) Mass Mediations: New Approaches to Popular Culture in the Middle East and Beyond, Berkeley, University of California Press, 88-119. Virolle, Marie 2003. Representations and Female Roles in Rai Song in T. Magrini (ed.) Music and Gender: Perspectives from the Mediterranean. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 215-231. Further Reading: Students should make good use of the Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Vol;. 6 (The Middle East), edited by V. Danielson, S. Marcus and D. Reynolds (2003), noting carefully chapters by: Blum, Danielson and Fischer, Marcus, Feldman, Frishkopf, During, Seroussi, Armbrust, Sawa, Al-Shawan Costello-Branco, Reynolds, Hassan, Guettat, Touma, Racy, Campbell, OConnell, Shay, Levin, Rasmussen, and develop at least two areas of expertise with reference to the following list of books (e.g., focusing on historical aspects, specific regions, or specific topics poetics, popular music, urbanization, music and politics, etc.) Armbrust, Walter 1996. Mass Culture and Modernism in the Middle East. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Baily, John 1988. Music of Afghanistan: Professional Musicians in the City of Herat. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bohlman, Philip V. 1989. The Land Where Two Streams Flow: Music in the GermanJewish Community of Israel. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Caton, Steven 1990. Peaks of Yemen I Summon: Poetry as Cultural Practice in a North Yemeni Tribe. Berkeley: University of California Press. Davies, Ruth. 2004. Maluf: Reflections on the Arab Andalusian Music of Tunisia. Lanham: Scarecrow. Levin, Ted. 1996. The Hundred Thousand Fools of God: Musical Travels in Central Asia (and Queens, New York). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

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Marcus, Scott 2007. Music in Egypt: Experiencing Music: Expressing Culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nettl, B. 1992 The Radif of Persian Music: Studies of Structure and Cultural Context. Champaign: Elephant and Cat. Nieuwkerk, Karin van 1995. A Trade Like Any Other: Female Singers and Dancers in Egypt. Austin: University of Texas Press. Racy, Ali Jihad 2003. Making Music in the Arab World: The Culture and Artistry of Tarab, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Regev, Motti, and Edwin Seroussi. 2004. Popular Music and National Culture in Israel. Berkeley: University of California Press. Sawa, George 1989. Music Performance Practice in the Early Abbasid Era. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies. Schade-Poulsen, Marc 1999 Men and Popular Music in Algeria: The Social Significance of Rai, Austin: University of Texas Press Simms, Robert 2004 The Repertoire of Iraqi Maqam. Lanham: Scarecrow. Shannon, Jonathan, 2006. Among the Jasmine Trees: Music and Modernity in Contemporary Syria, Middletown CT, Wesleyan University Press Signell, Karl 1977. Makam: Modal Practice in Turkish Art Music. Seattle: Asian Music Publications. Shelemay, Kay. 1998. Let Jasmine Rain Down: Song and Remembrance among Syrian Jews. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Stokes, Martin, forthcoming. The Republic of Love: Transformations of Intimacy in Turkish Popular Music. Stone, Christopher, 2007. Popular Culture and Nationalism in Lebanon: Fairuz and the Rahbani Nation. London: Routledge. Wright, Owen 1978 The Modal System of Arab and Persian Music. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wright, Owen 1992. Words Without Songs: A Musicological Study of an Early Ottoman Anthology and its Precursors. London: SOAS. 1992. Wright, Owen 2000. Demetrius Cantemir: The Collection of Notations, Volume 2: Commentary, Aldershot, Ashgate. Zuhur, Sherifa 2000. Asmahans Secrets: Woman, War, and Song. Austin: University of Texas Press.

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Some sample tutorial essay questions: 1. How might one understand the significance of popular social dance in the Middle East (or, amongst Middle Eastern communities here in the UK?) How does it shape musical practice, and vice versa? What ends does it serve? How is changing? What are its politics? 2. Consider the film oevre of one of Umm Kulthum, Muhammed Abd al-Wahhab, Abd al-Halim Hafiz, Zeki Muren, Orhan Gencebay. Watch some films carefully no less than two. What dramatic ends does the music serve? How do the plots serve as vehicles for the musicians? How does it make a difference watching these films knowing something about Arab or Turkish music? What does it mean to listen to a film? What did these films mean in their particular historical moments? Why do you think people are nostalgic about them? 3. Write an essay on one of the early western historians and ethnographers of Middle Eastern music, with particular reference to their recordings: Bela Bartok, Robert Lachmann, Abraham Zvi Idelsohn, Benjamin Gilman (the recordings made at the Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1893), the recordings made at the Cairo Congress in 1932, etc. What kind of recording projects were these? To what extent did they relate to broader projects? What survives (and circulates) today, and how does that relate to the broader project? Are their ideas still alive? What can we learn from them today? 4. Consider the periods. 1000-1300 or c. 1600-1700. Your job is to consider either Abbasid or Ottoman musical developments in their broader, global music historical context as, lets say, a consultant on a new encyclopedia project. How do we start thinking these periods as part of a more inclusive, global music history and theory? 5) Consider efforts to reform Middle Eastern musical practice under the general rubric of modernity. What have their effects been? What have their politics been? How does one evaluate their success or failure?