Re: Arabic music half flat accidental shape

[josephHarfouch]

Hans Aberg wrote:
> 
> Is this what they use on
>    http://www.maqamworld.com/
> They also use some accidentals with up-/down-arrows.
>  

Yes, that's it. You can see it in Maqam Bayatti for example, and I can now
plot it for the occasional accidental using the function Valentin gave me in
his reply. Here's another link that shows some of the more common maqams
that are used in Arabic music. 

http://www.turath.org/ProfilesMenu.htm

I haven't noticed the up/down usage in maqamworld, but probably I just
missed it. I've seen other notations such as the use of series of + and -
used against notes to alter the pitch. The use of the flat, sharp, half flat
and half sharp, three quarter sharp  (I don't see the three quarter flat
being used much in arabic pieces) is fairly standard in Arabic music
notation, and the same as the LilyPond display except for the half-flat.  


Hans Aberg wrote:
> 
> The name "tonic" usually implies harmony, so I think a word like  
> "final", "finalis", might be better.
>  

Thanks. The arabic word is "qarar" which means literally a decision but in
the music context it means roughly the resting or the settling point, and
there is no implication of harmony.  


Hans Aberg wrote:
> 
> If I look at Maqamworld <http://www.maqamworld.com/>, the Bayati in D  
> has a flat on B. How is this written in notation? Is the Bb written  
> as a key signature, or is it always written as a temporary accidental  
> within the piece? Of it is Bayati in G, what is the key signature.
> 

The short answer is that it is written in the key signature, and the key
signature would modulate if you shift the finalis, but there is a long
answer as well -). Here it is : 

I have been trying to work out the rules on this for the last few days, but
I don't think there are any that are set in stone,  so I've been going
through example pieces and theory books that I have and looking for
patterns. There are some inconsistencies even within the same book, but
there are also some patterns. I guess in the end, it doesn't matter much how
accidentals are marked if the composer or even the editor wishes to change
it, but here's what I found so far. 

A key signature reflects a group or family of modes, so the family of
Bayatti modes that have the same default finalis (re or e) would all have
the same key signature of mi half-flat  and si flat (e half-flat and b
flat). So , if we take for example a Husseini maqam which is close enough to
Bayatti to be considered as a member of the same group, it would usualy
written with the key signature of Bayatti, and the  accidentals where it
differs from Bayatti are written in the body of the piece. Even Saba that is
sometimes considered in a different group from Bayatti is still considered
similar enough to have the same signature of Bayatti, and the fourth note
(sol) that is almost always flat is written as a flat throughout the piece
rather than in the key signature. This is in some way good news, because it
means that I only need to define few additional key signatures for Arabic
music, but can lead to somewhat  strange results, where sometimes a note in
the key signature is actually never played that way, and another that is
always an accidental is not in the key signature. It seems that in the books
I have seen at least, the key signature is used to indicate the group or
family. 

If we then take a family key signature such as Bayatti, and want another
finalis such as sol rather than re, then the key signature would be
modulated, so it will be la half-flat, si flat, mi flat (a half-flat, b
flat, e flat), and husseini on sol if there is such a thing, or saba on sol
would have the same key signature. 

Even though the key signature indicates the group or the more maqam in the
group, rather than necessarily the particular maqam, the particular mode or
maqam is often indicated in the title of the piece, as well as the form, so
one piece for example would have a title of "Longa Saba" and a key signature
of bayatti. Here Longa indicates the form, and Saba the maqam.  

I think that most of  these pieces that I'm looking at in Oud instruction
books, have a Turkish origin, given  the names of the forms and the authors.
It is not usual in Arabic culture, to adopt forms from other cultures, and
then change them drastically, so I would just guess, but I'm not sure, that
the practices in writing Arabic music, the names of maqams, and so on, are
not very different from what is used in Turkish music, although there is
usually no attempt  in Arabic music, as I mentioned previously, to indicate
microtones precisely.         


Hans Aberg wrote:
> 
> Otherwise, have you looked at the church modes? If you take the C  
> major scale, there is a church mode with a final for each of the  
> scale degrees, indicating the final(is).
> 
 
The finalis problem is not such a big deal now that I understand the
grouping of key signatures, 
so now I can say 

\key re \bayatti 

and 

\key sol \bayatti 

ideally, I should be able to omit the re, since it is the default
NOTENAME_PITCH but it is not a big deal.  


Hans Aberg wrote:
> 
> And in Persian music, one uses koron and sori pasted into the Western  
> key signatures. So if this would be used with Bayati in D, it would  
> have a key signature consisting of Bb plus a E-halfflat.
> 

Yes, that's right, but I don't quit understand how korons and sori's come
into it, but I'll look into Persian music sometime. btw, I enjoyed your
reference to turkish maqam theory, although it is quite complex, and there
is as always a background of theory to learn, before I can understand this
too.    

Thanks
Joseph 




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