Mike's Oud Forums

the Hijaz mode

wahid soltani - 1-3-2009 at 08:05 AM

hello, you all
I hear different things on the maqam "hijaz"like
_the MIhalf slightly higher and the FA* lower
or _the mi is a real MIb but the FA* is lower

others say when playing in an orchestra, everybody is tuned precisely MIb and exactly FA*

others say it depends on the piece played, on the region, ara world, turkey, Armenia,...
Can anybody help me have a clear idea on ths once and for all, thanks to all

Jassim - 1-3-2009 at 11:26 AM

there are the real hejaz and the arabic hejaz
if you play the arabic you must play Mi ( b) and Fa ( # )
but if you play the turkish hejaz you must play Mi halph Bemol and the Fa lower than #

Reda Aouad - 1-3-2009 at 12:22 PM

Well.. In fact the intonation of the Hijaz maqam slighlty varies from a culture to another. But what I'm sure of is that the Mib is played slightly higher (but not half-flat) and the Fa# slightly lower in order to reduce the 1.5 tone gap between the two notes and smoothen that rough edge.. this is why some pieces on Hijaz appear to be a bit off on equally-tempered instruments.. I'm talking about the Arabic music.. have no idea about the Turkish style. But surely within a band including equally-tempered instruments you will have to play exactly Mib and Fa#. But at the end, it all comes with a lot of listening to music to learn how to play it correctly.

As an additional note, you can find a similar issue between Rast and Bayati, since in Rast, the Mi half-flat is slightly higher than that of the Bayati.

wahid soltani - 1-5-2009 at 05:19 AM

thanks, Reda and Aouad
Now things are much clearer for me, I can now measure the distance travelled and what we can learn when we ask musician for help, thanks again, the lesson is understood§