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Musa
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Hi al-Halabi,
That's quite a different tuning! I wonder if the name "Kwitra" is derived from the Spanish "cuatro," being that is has four courses. There is a Puerto
Rican instrument called a "cuatro," but there the name might refer to the size or tuning, since it has ten strings.
Thanks again!
Salamat,
Musa
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al-Halabi
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Hi Musa,
The name kwitra is believed to come from quwaytara, the Arabic diminutive form for qitara. The qitara (or qithara) was a lute played in Islamic Spain
from around the 10th century. Like the kwitra it had four strings, although descriptions of it indicate that it had a flat rather than rounded back.
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Musa
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Hi al-Halabi,
I recall that there are those who theorize that the guitar (guitara) was derived, at least in part, from the qitara. The flat back might be some
additional evidence for that. There are others who claim that the Arabic word "qitara" was influenced by the Persian "tar" (string), as used in the
tar and dutar.
Salamat,
Musa
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Musa
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Hi al-Halabi, etc.:
On the Oud Page's message board, Phillippe wrote,
"Hello Musa,I was is Europe recently and I saw an oud with fret, it was made by Luis de la Failla, 1885,Valleta-Malta.The player told me that they are
not unsusual in Malta.
(gut string tie on frets)"
Have you seen Maltese ouds? Are they similar to the oud arbi? How are they tuned and played?
Also interesting is an oud on today's posts ("Egyptian Oud"). It has simulated frets to indicate playing positions on the face leading up to the
rosette.
Salamat,
Musa
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billkilpatrick
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learned something new today ... thanks for the thread!
there's another interesting oud/lute instrument without frets in hungary called a cobsa or kobsa. i've only seen it in pictures but it seems to have
a very short neck:
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billkilpatrick
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here's an earlier looking example:
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al-Halabi
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I was not aware that ouds were in use in Malta these days. An article I read recently on music in Malta, written by an ethnomusicologist, reviews the
common instruments played on the island but makes no mention of the oud. Guitars, including a local variety with a smaller body and a tuning different
from the standard guitar tuning, are the common string instruments. But it is not surprising that ouds would be present in Malta. Not only was it
ruled by Arabs for some two hundred years in the medieval period, but it has had since then continuing trade and migration contacts with North Africa
and the Middle East. Maltese workers and merchants migrated throughout the Mediterranean, some even spending time in places as far as Aleppo. The
Maltese language itself is a peculiar variety of Arabic. A picture of the Maltese oud mentioned would tell us if it is in the style of the fretted oud
arbi, which would make sense.
I have seen one kobza made in Romania. Kobzas were found in many parts of eastern Europe, and were often the typical accompaniment instrument of
minstrel singers. There is an amazing variety of kobzas, differing in appearance, construction, number of strings (some had as many as thirty),
tunings, etc. The two photos posted here are typical examples of this variety. Even within countries or national groups in eastern Europe different
kinds of kobzas co-exist. This instrument originated from the Anatolian kopuz, a folk lute that became diffused into the Balkans and Eastern Europe
from around the late fifteenth century, when the area was under Ottoman rule.
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kasos
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Thanks, Al Halabi, Musa, et al., for an extremely informative thread. Al Halabi, is there anything you could tell me about the spread of Persian
instruments and musical styles into North India in the early period of the Mughal empire? Would the oud, fretted or not, have appeared there in any
significant way?
Mark
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Musa
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Hi Bill, al-Halabi, etc:
It would be great if someone could attach a picture of a Maltese oud. I have also heard about kobzas. I believe that the previous pictures that I saw
showed frets, but I can't tell from the above pictures whether they are fretted or not. Do kobzas come in both fretted and unfretted varieties?
Another interesting interesting fact that al-Halabi mentioned was the extent of influence of the Ottoman empire on Eastern Europe. The Ottoman empire
extended into present day Rumania, Russia, Poland, Bessarabia, Hungary, etc. and had a great deal of influence on music, foods, etc. The Ottomans were
in Romania until the late 1800s. I have family that migrated from Northern Turkey (Black Sea area) to Romania in the 1800s, when it was still under
Turkey.
Does anybody have pictures showing how kobzas are played? The varieties shown above seem to resemble types of European lutes in the old paintings.
Salamat,
Musa
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billkilpatrick
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do an on-site search for "The COBZA." there are some wonderful sound clips and photos.
- bill
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peppeo77
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billkillpatrick, I sent you a u2u messsage. see you.
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al-Halabi
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Mark,
The Empire of the Persian-speaking Mughals which dominated large parts of the Indian subcontinent from the early 1500s was very much indebted
culturally to Persian influences. This showed in art, literature, architecture, and music. Several musical instruments arrived in India from Iran and
were adapted over time to the Indian musical tradition. In the Mughal period they included the qanun, which was then replaced by the Persian santur;
the tambura, which originated in the Persian/Middle Eastern tanbur and was transformed in Mughal India from a melody to a drone instrument; the sitar,
which is believed to have originated in the Persian setar in the 18th century; the rabab, a long-necked lute with gut strings which originated in Iran
and became highly regarded in the Mughal court (it is now extinct); the sehnai, a shawm which came from the Persian surnay; and folk instruments like
the setar, dotara, and dambura, which had their origins in Iranian lutes of similar names. I have seen no mention, though, of the oud being played in
Mughal India.
At least at the level of court music an Indo-Persian musical style was common in the early Mughal period. (At the same time, the court music of the
other great Islamic Empire - the Ottoman - was likewise heavily influenced by Persian music, and most of the musicians were in fact imported Persians
playing on Persian instruments.)
All these Persian influences on the Indian musical scene need to be put in perspective. South Asian music did not become a subset of Middle Eastern
music; it remained a distinct music culture with its own identity, aesthetic, instruments, repertoires, tone systems, etc. It absorbed and adapted
instruments and other aspects from Iran, but incorporated them into its own musical tradition. Something similar happened in the Balkans under Ottoman
rule - the musical traditions of that area remained separate from those of the Middle East, despite certain shared characteristics that developed in
the course of long periods of contact. The Middle East sits on the crossroads of three continents, and it influenced and was in turn influenced by
regions on its periphery such as South Asia, the Balkans, sub-Saharan Africa, and Spain. These regions remain distinct in their music cultures despite
their extended intercourse with the Middle East.
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kasos
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Thanks so much, Al-Halabi. Your scholarship is a blessing and an inspiration, as well as a practical help. Just one more question: what about the
earlier period of the Delhi Sultanate, and the so-called "Slave Dynasty" [Mamluk]? Do any special comments or considerations apply to that period, or
is it very much the same sort of thing as what happened later in the Mughal period - I'm curious in particular about what is now known as the Afghan
rebab - it seems to have a lot in common with the modern Indian sarod, but I have read elsewhere that the modern sarod is a comparatively recent
innovation, dating to the 19th century. Might either the Afghan rabab or the Sarod be related to the extinct rabab you mentioned in your reply?
Mark
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al-Halabi
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Mark,
The Delhi Sultanate beginning in the thirteenth century drew early on on Persian models in its definition of political authority, the establishment of
Islamic institutions, and cultural life in general. In the early phases of the spread of Islam in the subcontinent there was a tendency on the part of
the new Muslim elites to push out Hindu elements and replace them with Islamic ones, but that zeal relaxed over time, and a new synthesis of Hindu and
Islamic elements evolved, becoming established in the Mughal state. Persian and Middle Eastern instruments were used in India before the Mughals, but
over time were adapted to regional Indian musics in ways that changed them significantly from their Middle Eastern inspirations. In the fifteenth
century the city of Herat, which was the capital of the Timurid empire and the cultural center of the Persian-speaking world, used in its court music
Middle Eastern instruments like the oud, ney, and qanun, and the music was based on Middle Eastern maqams. Things changed after that, not least in
Iran itself, where the oud and qanun disappeared as core art music instruments by the 17th-18th centuries.
You are right about the connection between the modern sarod and the Afghan rabab. The sarod developed in India in the nineteenth century as a
modification of the Afghan rabab. It was equipped with metal strings, unlike the gut strings of the rabab, and with the metal plate that define the
modern instrument. The extinct rabab was the Indian dhrupad rabab, whose predecessor was the Persian court rabab. It was played in India until its
disappearance at the beginning of the twentieth century, but its repertoire and techniques were transferred to the sarod and other instruments.
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Peyman
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Hi al-Habibi,
I got my copy of "great music" (Farsi translation) today after a month of waiting. I had a glance over it and read some of the parts about the oud.
The oud Farabi describes indeed had frets. Other interesting instruments (to me) are the tanbur of Baghdad and tanbur of Harazan (Khorasan), which you
mentioned too. I already had heard about these but now I have a chance to find out the differences. By the way, apparently this book was written in
two volumes but only the first has survived.
Also, as I told Mark before, one of the people of interest in Indian music is Amir Khosro Dehlavi, a sufi poet who travelled to North India around the
time of the Moghul invasion.
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al-Halabi
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Hi Peyman,
Enjoy the "Grand Book of Music." It gives the most comprehensive picture of the musical system of the Middle East as it had developed a thousand years
ago. It is from al-Farabi that we learn about the entry of microtonal intervals, apparently from Iran, into Arab music. It is these intervals
(primarily what we call the half-flats) that until today define the uniqueness of the tone systems of the region, whether Arab, Persian, or Turkish.
The poet and court musician Amir Khosro was indeed a major figure in medieval Indian music (he actually died in 1325, about two centuries before the
beginning of Mughal rule). His role was so exaggerated over the centuries, though, that he was mistakenly believed to have introduced the sitar and
invented the tabla, both of which actually appeared in India several centuries later. But he may have helped introduce a new style into Indian music
that included Middle Eastern instruments and accents.
With the discussion of India we have somehow drifted far from the Middle East. My own knowledge of the music history of India is very limited,
although I find it interesting to observe how the Middle East influenced and was influenced by the neighboring regions. The boundaries of the Middle
East have been porous all along. In the medieval period the oud found its way into Spain, Afghanistan, the Balkans, and western Europe. Today the oud
has reached us here in America, and the Middle East itself is awash in western instruments and influences on its music.
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Musa
Oud Addict
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Philippe wrote on the Home Page Message Board:
"Hello Musa again,I'm from Oakland California,but at the moment I'm in Indonesia and I just bough a CD,"le blues de Khartoum,Abdel Gadir Salim",inside
the CD there is a little pamplet with photos of the Oud player (Abdel)...his oud has7 frets (juging from the photo)...just taugh I let you
know....Have a Happy new year, PHILIPPE"
It would be great if someone could post at least one of those photos.
Salamat,
Musa
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Koya
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Old Hungarian imaginry of lutes...
Hi Folk,
There is some contemporary representation of an instument
between oud and modern cobza.
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Koya
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Sebestyén Tinódi Lantos (the lute player, songwriter and singer 1510?-1556): Hungary's most famous bard, narrator of many heroic songs about battles
against the Turks. Texts and authentic melodies of his songs have been preserved.
here is his crest.:
http://mek.oszk.hu/01800/01885/html/index1091.html
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Koya
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Al- Harabi wrote about the cobza:
"This instrument originated from the Anatolian kopuz, a folk lute that became diffused into the Balkans and Eastern Europe from around the late
fifteenth century, when the area was under Ottoman rule. "
I think we hungarians use cobza and their relatives form many year ago, berofe a Ottoman conguest.
Our tradition save the memory of King Atilla, when he died one thousands of cobzas mourned him.
others:
We Hungarians are a nation who camed from Asia, we are some descendent of Huns. This type of instrument we can find all over Middle- East.
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Koya
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al-Halabi wrote.
Sorry...
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