Arabic Sheet Music circa 1900

Quote: Originally posted by jdowning

I came across this colourful 'musical postcard' for sale by 'Krul Antiquarian Books', Holland, price 5.50 (Euros?), dated circa 1900, that I thought may be of general interest. Does it mean anything to forum members? http://renekrul.nvva.nl/catalogs/arabic.sheetmusic.postcard.cc.jpg [url]http://renekrul.nvva.nl/catalogs/0000music.htm

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it is not arabic! it is turkish

Lysander thanks for looking in to that! How cool to see a vintage postcard of a piece from Tatyos Efendi. He died in 1913 so if this was manufactured before his death, that's very intriguing.

I'm going to give myself a little pat on the back for sensing that the usul for this sarki is 10/8 rather than 6/8 though I didn't mention it in my first post but then shame on me for not recognizing the melody as something I've played before

adam

Quote: Originally posted by Jack_Campin

The seller's dating is haywire. They have a photo of Bartok which they date at around 1900 - he was born in 1882 and looks about 50 in the picture. So I wouldn't trust their dating of this one either.

Very cool!

Quote: Originally posted by jdowning

Here is the text of the song in modern day Turkish. How does it translate into English?

This page, although who knows how authoritative it is, mention's Tatyos' knowledge of Hamparsum notation but not of Western: http://greek-turkish-music.blogspot.com/2009/05/kemani-tatyos-ekser...

The article also mentions variations coming from different people transcribing the music, showing that people were not necessarily looking at Tatyos' original transcriptions when notating these songs.

Also, I don't know a lot about the history of Western music notation being introduced to Turkey but just from googling the names of people you mentioned Rauf Yekta wrote his first article involving this in 1913, while Tatyos himself died in 1913.

I know it's not a folk song, and the examples I brought up were in relation to folk songs notated by Armenian music "experts". But just as the Armenians doing research on folk music incorrectly notated 10/8 songs in 6/8, some random Armenian (or Turkish, or Arab, or Greek) music fan who was learned in Western music could have notated Cektim Elimi by ear and did so in 6/8 for the same reasons I stated.

Adam, onto your next question, about Armenian curcuna. I was going to write about this but I didn't think anyone was interested in hearing me "pontificate" on Armenian music. But here goes:

Is curcuna an "Armenian rhythm"?...well, obviously it doesn't solely belong to Armenians, no one can tell who invented it...but just in the same way as musicians think of a 3/4 waltz as "Viennese", Armenians and now others think of curcuna as "Armenian".

As for why it became associated with Armenian music: very simply, the early Armenians who came to the US mostly immigrated from Kharpert (Harput/Elazig), Dikranagerd (Diyarbakir), and Sepastia (Sivas), and nearby areas. Kharpert was the largest source of Armenian immigration to the US in the 1880-1924 period. And due to the immigration quotas in place until the 60s, there was very little immigration after that until the Lebanese Civil War of 1975. So the people of those regions had a formative influence on the Armenian music scene of the US, in addition to the inevitable Istanbul influence. Anyway, in the folk music of Kharpert, Diyarbakir, and nearby regions - whether sung in Armenian, Turkish, Assyrian, or even Arabic (in the Arabic speaking city of Mardin where most people were actually Assyrian/Syriac by ethnicity/religion), in this folk music the most common rhythm was the Curcuna. It was also used by Armenians in other areas, like Van, Erzurum, Erzincan, Sivas, but not as heavily as in Harput and Diyarbakir.

A glance at the recorded output of Harput born Armenian immigrant Vartan Margosian shows most of his songs are in 10/8. It should also be said that most of them are in Turkish. The same will be seen if we look at Republican era Turkish musicians from Elazig (Harput) such as Enver Demirbag we will see the same phenomenon.

The Armenians from these regions loved this rhythm and did many of their well known folk dances with this rhythm.

For some reason, Armenians from Ottoman Turkey often took slow 6/8 songs that had been written or collected from villagers in Russian Armenia, and popularized by the Armenian elite, and played these songs in 10/8. This phenomenon started early on as I have a recording from apparently 1913 Bulgaria of obviously Ottoman Armenian musicians playing the folk song "Hoy Nazan Im Nazan Im" collected by Gomidas Vartabed, most likely in Russian Armenia, and published in 12/8 time, and these Ottoman Armenians are playing it in 10/8. But examples of this are not that common until you get to the late 1940s.

It's true, the rhythm 10/8 probably didn't exist in the country now known as Armenia (at the time, "Russian Armenia") but it certainly existed in Turkish Armenia (Eastern Anatolia)- not just in Constantinople.

Now as I was saying about the 1940s - as the Armenian immigrants from different parts of Anatolia came together and formed one Armenian community, the influence of the music culture of Kharpert and nearby regions seems to have become mainstream among all Armenian-Americans. In the 40s the first American-born Armenian bands were formed starting with the Vosbikians in Philadelphia. On their heels came Souren and Chick Ganimian's group, the Nor-Ikes in NY and Artie Barsamian's Orchestra in Boston. These groups would typically take slow 6/8 "Russian Armenian" songs, often times even recent songs that had been written in Soviet Era Armenia, and play them in 10/8. The reason being that Armenians typically did their line dances in the 10/8 rhythm, but running out of songs due to loss of material after 1915, or perhaps because most of the old material was in Turkish, or perhaps just because they wanted new and different songs, and the only source for new Armenian language songs was Soviet Armenia so they had to adapt those songs to the dance rhythm that they were used to. Armenians with origin in Turkey occassionally dance to a fast 6/8 but they almost never dance to a slow 6/8.

In circa 1952, the new Armenian line dance known as the "Armenian Shuffle" was created in Massachusetts. This was specifically made to be danced to a 10/8 (although today some also dance it to a medium-slow 4/4) and it swept the Armenian community. To this day it is the most popular line dance in the Armenian community for social events.

When Richard Hagopian and Hachig Kazarian play a dance, they almost always, always, always start off the music with a 10/8. And they're considered the traditionalists.

It's not true that all the Armenian songs in 10/8 were originally in 6/8. Many of them such as "Hussenig", "Zungalo", "Hars oo Pesa", "Gamavor Zinvor", "Sheg Mazerov" and a multitude of Dikranagerd dialect folk songs sung by Onnik Dinkjian were always played in 10/8. (See Onnik's new album "Diyarbekiri Hokin") However, as Armenians in America loved to dance to the 10/8 beat the need for more and more newer songs in this meter was felt, and the only way to get them, if they were going to be in the Armenian language was to take them from the Soviet Armenian repertoire. This is why today we hear songs like "Yerevani Siroon Aghchig", a Soviet Armenian film number from 1958, which was certainly never intended to be a 10/8 Western Armenian line dance .... played as a 10/8 Western Armenian line dance. The other meters Armenians like are 4/4 and 2/4 and there are abundance of songs in those meters in Armenian so that wasn't an issue. Alternatively, Armenians may have heard Soviet Armenian slow tempo 6/8 songs, liked the song, and wanted to incorporate them into their dance repertoire. Again, the only way to do this is to convert them into 10/8 because Anatolian Armenians aren't accustomed to dance to slow 6/8. A good example of this is "Seghann E Arad" which was popular among Armenians in this country as a 6/8 toasting song (written in 1940s Soviet Armenia) before it became a 10/8 line dance number.

Why did the Armenians think that this whole 10/8 thing was an "Armenian thing"? Well, probably because outside of the Harput/Diyarbakir region (whose folk music, even if sung in Turkish, was probably thought of by Armenians as "Armenian" or "Armenian influenced" anyway), we just don't run into 10/8 very often. True it's common in sarkis, but when Armenians talk about curcuna being an Armenian rhythm, they're talking about curcuna when used as a dance rhythm. They aren't talking about Udi Hrant singing "Srdis Vra Kar Me Ga". They aren't talking about Turkish sarkis written in 10/8. How many sarkis did they know anyway? And which ones did they know in 10/8? Maybe "Acaba Sen Misin"? Maybe "Srdis Vra" if you consider that essentially an Armenian language sarki. Sure there are Assyrian folk dance songs in 10/8, but Armenians didn't know many of those either. Aside from sarkis and Harput/Diyarbakir folk songs, I can only think of a few Turkish folk songs that are in 10/8. I can think of: Aman Memo, Fincani Tastan Oyarlar, and Nane Suyu. That's 3, I can't think of any others. I mean I'm sure they exist, but they aren't well known, at least to Armenians.

And Aman Memo has a ballad-like feel to it, it certainly isn't a dance song. And "Fincan" always comes off as a little weird. When it's played right, it's rhythm is a little more raggedy - Armenians don't play it the way they play the Armenian 10/8s. And they NEVER line dance to Fincan. They always dance....I don't know what you call it, we call it a "tak bar". Like dancing a "chifte telli". Two people dancing with each other, snapping their fingers. Like a Greek karsilamas dance. Anyway, that leaves Nane Suyu.

Of course the multitude of "new" 10/8s Armenians introduced in the 20th century by converting them from 6/8 only added to the vast amount of 10/8s in the repertoire and the perception that 10/8 was somehow tied to Armenia. For instance, you can find 60s/70s recordings by Armenians, where most of the songs will be in Turkish, and the only Armenian songs will be "Soode Soode" and a few 10/8s. Armenians consider it their "special" rhythm that's used a lot in our music but not often in that of other ethnicities. Of course, if you go to modern Armenia this is not the case at all. But if you went to Kharpert in 1900, which is what many/most Armenian Americans are really thinking about when they think about Armenia, they would be playing 10/8 after 10/8, whether in Armenian or Turkish language, it was the music of those lands which the Armenians considered their motherland, not the music of Istanbul which of course, was not "truly" the motherland.

But Souren is right. Most of the 10/8s Armenian bands play today, were originally in 6/8. Other than Richard Hagopian, you don't get a lot of guys playing "Hussenig" and the like. "Sheg Mazerov" is pretty popular and that's undeniably a 10/8 (having been written in NJ in the 1920s!!!!) but otherwise, Souren is right. They play songs like:

Voch Mi Dzaghig (Ashoogh Em)
Askharhoom Sirel Em Kez (Hazar Dari Gespasem)
Yerevani Siroon Aghchig
Seghanne Arad
Sari Siroon Yar (Hazar Nazov Yar)
Khntsori Dzari Dagin (not to be confused with Mer Khntzorin Dzar)
Hayastani Garmir Kini
Hampartzoum Yayla
Hey Jan (has to be the most popular Armenian-American song of all time, after Soode Soode - but ironically a Soviet propaganda piece)
Enzeli
Bar Dasnachors

and these are just the ones that are undeniably 6/8s that were written that way...there are a plethora of songs with deep folk roots that may or may not have been played in Anatolia at one time, but that in general, Armenians in the US learned from Soviet Armenia, songs like:

Aghchig Horom
Adzetsek Tara
Maro Jan
Nubar
Yes Bujur
Yerevan Bagh Em Arel (Sari Gelin).

Sari Gelin...I could write a whole other post just on that song....

Remember, so much was lost in 1915 that Armenian music, especially Anatolian Armenian folk music was impoverished. That's why there are so few Armenian authentic 10/8s left. I mean, how many folk musicians from Anatolia survived? Half of the Anatolian Armenians died, and that included most adult men. And most folk musicians were adult men. Well, women sang a lot too, maybe more. I guess I should say "professional folk musicians". Then a lot of the music just didn't make the transition to life in the US. I've got four books full of songs collected from immigrants in the US in the 1930s. Despite the very strong Armenian music tradition here, very few of these songs made it onto record or got passed on to the next generation. A lot of, most of, the music the Armenians play now in the US probably originated from recordings from Soviet Armenia or Republican Turkey. I'm guessing!!! Ask Souren where they learned their stuff. He'll say "our parents." But think about it, those immigrants were in their late 30s early 40s when the record industry started to boom in Turkey in the 1930s. You know damn well they bought all those records and listened to them. It wasn't Souren as a child buying those records. When and how did Udi Hrant become popular? Among the Armenian immigrants in the United States, who had come from Turkey, and were longing for the sounds of home. So they bought records coming out of Turkey. Then their childrens generation (Souren, Chick, Richard Hagopian, etc etc) played those songs they heard from their parents' record collection. Yeah a lot of them are traditional folk songs. But did the immigrants remember those songs from their hometowns or from Turkish made recordings in the 30s? Some of it was filtered through Garbis and Melkon. But for example, "Ekinim Harmanim Yok", it sounds like a folk song. But that song came from a Turkish movie from the late 40s. Marko heard the record and cut his own record of it. And there are dozens of similar songs. You do come across Turkish songs that only the Armenians seemed to know. "Kaslarin Ince Ince" is one of those. Never heard a Turk record it. If you search on youtube you will find a song with a similar name, but completely different melody. So it goes both ways.

I should note here that not all Armenians claimed curcuna was Armenian. John Bilezikjian in his liner notes to "Music of the Armenian Diaspora" calls it an Iraqi rhythm which became popular in Armenian folk music and Turkish classical music. That could explain why it's so popular in Upper Mesopotamia (Southeast Turkey), which Kharpert is the next major town north of. But why does everyone else buy the idea that curcuna is Armenian? Simple, most of the musicians playing Turkish music in the US are Armenian. Syrian and Egyptian Arabs don't generally use it, so when Armenians said it was theirs, the rest of the Middle Eastern music community in the US bought it. Although like I said, I think it was more innocent than nationalistic. The average Armenian guy who just knows how to play a dumbeg, only knows Armenian 10/8 songs. He's rarely heard songs in other languages in 10/8. So of course he says 10/8 is Armenian. Then a more learned guy would say, yeah a lot of cultures use it but it's especially used by Armenians - which is true. I mean, there could be some latent Armenian pride in the claim but hardcore nationalism....doesn't seem like it, since nationalist Armenians mostly reject the Armenian-American music style.

By the way, Souren's parents were from Palu, which isn't far from Kharpert. It's my understanding that there are many Palu folk songs in 10/8. Maybe Souren knows some? A famous one is called "Zartar Kooroog" aka "Zambooreh". It made it to the next generation in the Middle East, but the Armenians there took it and changed it back into a 6/8. Again with the Westernization! But I have a live recording of an old lady from Syria singing the song. The musicologist who interviewed her transcribed the song as a 6/8, but I'll be damned if she isn't singing a curcuna....

certainly i can understand your being moved by a performance of this song to take up bowed instruments. it's a very good and moving melody which contributes to its ongoing popularity among all the peoples of the region.

Quote: Originally posted by hartun

@Divan Makam Do you mean, do I think it is of Armenian or Turkish origin? Or what is my opinion of the fact that this is, for many people, controversial?

Hi Hartun-

Thanks for the link to the Cemisgezek info. Just coming off of jetlag from a couple long flights. Looking forward to perusing the site in the next few days.....