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hamed
Oud Junkie
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Samir, the floating bridge oud was popularized by Munir Bashir. Most of Munir Bashir's students were using floating bridge ouds by the 1980s, this
group would include Nasseer Shamma, ALi Hassan, Ahmed Mukhtar, Rahim al haj, and even Khazem al Saher. I believe that these students were ordering
ouds from Fadel during this time who also played a great part in popularizing these instuments. I personally prefer floating bridge ouds, they
generally have a cleaner, crisper sound, are louder, and can sustain higher pitch tuning; perhaps this is the reason they caught on with Bashirs
students.
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dandana
Oud Addict
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Registered: 6-21-2007
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Hi every one; this is my first post in this forum.
I've been a "silent reader" for months, and having sometimes liked to say my opinion on some subjects and threads I decided to join the discussion.
I Find the question highly relevant and interesting, because it reflects to which extent we try to "understand" this music we listen to or paly.
The question brings us back to the fact how to classify the oud players! A big question and the answer is certaily as complxe as the question. Many of
u have given some part of it. In fact I think that the Oud players could be differenciated in some well recognised schools:
1/ the egyptian school caracterised by the "tarabism" and the live audience pleasure
2/ the shami school which has its own style of popular music background
3/ the turkish-kurdish oud music reflecting an instant joyfull and dance-adapted musical mood
4/ the iranian musical school with all its rich structural balance and forms
5/ the classical iraqui school reflecting a sad pop music besides a traditional tarab music (the iraqui maquam stands)
6/ the mediterranean turkish-like music of greece for example
7/ the andalousi oud playing which is (behalf the one played by those who have been in direct contact with the east, like Lotfi Boushnak) totally
different in mood, technique and playing
8/ and at last the new-age (if I could call it like that) oud music played by the young musicians like Shamma, based on and brought forward for the
1st time by the great Bashir. This last one is a blend of Soufi-Iraqui traditional-Kurd music trying to use some world-wide well-known maquams (I'm
not saying that it has no specificity or that its players don't use some difficult maquams to the western ear). This Universality made it more easily
spreading music than all the others (U can see it with Bashir: how many Duo's he has performed with foreign music players!).
This is my personal opinion, it is neither an academic analysis nor a scientific piece of information. But I wanted to share it with you anyway 
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arsene
Oud Junkie
Posts: 366
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Location: Rotterdam, NL
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hey Dandana, welcome to the forum then. Where are you based in Europe?
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MatthewW
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after all the interesting comments in this thread, I decided to go back and watch and listen to some clips of Naseer on youtube to remind me what he
is all about. To my ear the floating bridge seems to add a touch of the sound of the classical guitar; the combined sound of a traditional oud with
its double courses and the classical nylon string guitar. Whether or not Naseer plays in the Iraqi style is open to debate, but I think whatever syle
he is playing in has to be admired. Needless to say he is an amazing and I believe sincere player; with an interplay of tarab and technique (T n'T ) ,
as I think this clip demonstrates. enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_dQCSUa4jU&mode=related&sea...
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dandana
Oud Addict
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Hi Arsene;
I'm situated in Belgium.
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arsene
Oud Junkie
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Location: Rotterdam, NL
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MatthewW, although I agree with you that his sound really resembles that of a spanish guitar, do you think that's due to the floating bridge? Because
a guitar never has a floating bridge... Couldn't it be the wood or construction rather than the bridge?
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aldokhi
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Tarab
this is a great discussion. here is my simple take on the issue at hand (tarab, Shamma etc).
1. Tarab: you can only experience tarab when you are listening to a live performance, this experience is more intense (extereme tarab) if you are
actually there in person. to me it's almost impossible to appreciate tarab in studio recordings (unless you're high!!). I think this is what was
eluded to before, that tarab is a relationship between performer and live audience. The King (Fareed) was a master of this art. he usually starts with
a taqseem to warm up his audience then moves on with his song (ultimate tarab).
2. Naseer Shamma and tarab: I think Naseer has some tarab in his compositions, but I heard him speak alot about trying to paint a visual scene/picture
with his musical style. this is great and is considered new in Arabic music (Jameel and Munir Bashir were also similar). But this is not pure tarab in
my books.
3. Now this is going to sound a bit heavy, but I think it's hard to appreciate tarab and it's even harder to teach tarab. you need to have a broad
knowlege of Arabic/middle eastern culture, history, massive injustice, suffering and pain (you can't learn it from watching FOX News!!). I could be
sitting with people from the gulf, lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Iraq, Algeria and even Turkey and be listening to Farid and all have the same tarab
experience, despite differences in individual culture. and to me tarab is mainly a sad experience.
aldokhi
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MatthewW
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| Quote: | Originally posted by arsene
MatthewW, although I agree with you that his sound really resembles that of a spanish guitar, do you think that's due to the floating bridge? Because
a guitar never has a floating bridge... Couldn't it be the wood or construction rather than the bridge? |
arsene- that's a good point of discussion - although the spanish/classical guitar does not have the same type of floating bridge as found on some
ouds, what it does have is a 'saddle', a strip of plastic or bone which the strings go over and rest upon. This strip is inserted into a slot in the
bridge, and so what we end up with is that the strings are actually raised a couple of mm as they pass over over the centre of the bridge, then come
down and are tied to the bridge in the same manner as with the oud. It seems to me that this slight raising of the strings over the bridge produces a
similiar effect to the floating bridge; in both the guitar and floating bridge oud the strings are putting pressure downwards onto the soundboard but
using two different methods to achieve this. In fact I was wondering if any oud maker has tried (or will attempt one day) to build an oud that uses
the saddle/bridge construction technique. that might be interesting!
Aldokhi- thanks for your insights into tarab, Arabic music and Naseer. May I ask, you said that to you tarab was mainly a sad experience. For a
'westerner' trying to understand how tarab (in the general Arabic usage of the word) is understood, can tarab start out being played within a sad
emotional framework, then through the performer/listener interaction this feeling of sadness gradually change to an emotional state more serene, not
as sad, maybe even a little happy? Can the definition of tarab include this type of emotional transformation between performer/listener, changing
sadness to more 'happy'? thanks.
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amtaha
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Mood: beginner's frustration ...
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I'm not completely satisfied with associating the specific sense of "tarab" with sadness. For one reason, it's maniaclly depressive. For another, it
forgoes many instances where "happy" was appreciated. If you take, for example, Om Kalthoum's (Hathehy Laylaty) (This night is mine) or (Seeret el
Hob) (Love's mentioning), you'd find happy songs. The song El Atlal (The ruins) in the part (hal ra'a el hobbo sokara) (has there even been such
drunkards in love), though nostalgic, but it is nostalgic of "happy".
And there are plenty of other examples.
There's, of course, the aspect of Saba being popular (and some take this as indicative of an affinity for expressions of "sad"), but even Saba is not
an entirely sad maqam. (I forget which of Zakareyya Ahmad's song have used Saba with this regard - I have to look it up.)
Regards,
Hamid
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arsene
Oud Junkie
Posts: 366
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Location: Rotterdam, NL
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MatthewW - I see your point. In fact, the cobzã (Romanian oud) is built that way: it has it's bridge glued to the face and it has a saddle, just like
a mandolin, that comes before the bridge. It would be very interesting to try that with an oud as well. In fact, I AM going to try that with an oud!
I'll let you know.
A little something on tarab:
About tarab being a sad experience: we must first ask ourselves what we define by sad. There are many instances where one can be "happy" (or at least
comforted) in one's sadness. I think this is the case with tarab as well: you can be sad/depressed, whatever, but the music(al experience) can lift
you up, in a way.
You don't even have to be sad yourself: you experience the sadness (the suffering) of the performer.
So both amtaha and aldokhi are right, in this sense.
I'd like to very carefully put all this together in one word:
"Passion".
Although it may sound like a cliche, we might want to consider the original meaning of the word passion.
So please join me on a little historical journey of language!
When we say Passion, we almost immediately start to think about a number of positive things - (Romantic) love mainly, but we also say we have a
passion for music (we mean we love music and probably play one or more instruments or compose, etc etc).
But what is passion?
Passion comes from Latin "passio", which means... Suffering! (actually, the verb is Patire. In the Romanian language, the meaning
of "patzire" or "a patzi" is still "being acted upon", "suffering", and "something bad that happnes to you").
How come we see passion as something positive, when it in fact means "suffering", or even "being acted upon"? How come we say, "that music has no
passion in it" when we mean it's a bad peice of music? How come lovers complain there's no passion in their relationship? You would think nobody likes
to suffer!
Still, it seems to be a vital ingredient of our lives - of every element in our lives: love, music, even work... Can the beauty of life be found in
suffering, perhaps?
This may sound weird, but personally, I think people are the most humane when they experience feelings of passion. To really feel alive, you have to
actually FEEL.
This is, as someone already said, not a subject that can easily be discussed in book, let alone in a forum where space and words are limited. So
excuse me if this didn't make much sense... 
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MatthewW
Oud Junkie
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| Quote: | Originally posted by arsene
MatthewW - I see your point. In fact, the cobzã (Romanian oud) is built that way: it has it's bridge glued to the face and it has a saddle, just like
a mandolin, that comes before the bridge. It would be very interesting to try that with an oud as well. In fact, I AM going to try that with an oud!
I'll let you know.
Hey good luck arsene with building that oud with a saddle, I wonder if you'll be the first to try this? I think it might catch on! It would be
interesting to hear from some of the other professional oud makers on this. keep us posted on the progress.  |
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arsene
Oud Junkie
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I'm not going to build an oud from scratch, I'm just going to add a saddle to a normal-bridged oud...
I'll post pics & sound clips (with & without saddle). I'll let you know.
Maybe we should start a new thread about tarab by the way?
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dandana
Oud Addict
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Registered: 6-21-2007
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Just to say this:
I see your point on Passion, arsene.
Yes, to feel the joy of what you live (or what you are listening to in our case!), you have to be able to feel and to understand sadness! You can't
reach the highest extent of delight (referred to as Tarab!) unless you feel the others, and you feel them in sadness not in joy!
Joy is selfish contrary to sadness!
That's why I believe that Tarab is as universal as human beings, and that's what aldokhi says in his 3d point of view (no, aldokhi?); it's not
necessarily feeling sad but it's the transformation/transition from one spiritual state (mood) to another.
Now Tarab or not in Naseer Shamma's compositions?
If we take this "enlarged" version of Tarab, for me he has it, but differently: the introductions to his Tarab are not classical, and that's the whole
difference between his Tarab and that of Farid for example. Naseer's musical drowing and drama plays in a different background.
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Ararat66
Oud Junkie
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Wow what a thread - literally gets to the heart of things. Well here's my little contribution.
I am not arabic or a scholar so cannot intellectually understand or explain tarab ... but I am sure I feel it. From a very early age I was profoundly
'moved' by music and that feeling is not easily expressed by conventional words such as happiness and sadness - sure I sometimes feel happy and sad
when listening to music but for me it is the loosening of one's conditioned response to moods (or suffering in its broadest spiritual sense) that
creates this feeling of rapture or (for the Buddhist minded) even bliss. It creates a space for feelings to be fully felt and expressed and is
ultimately an 'energetic' experience. To feel really alive and to really 'feel' openly without jugement is intesely moving, liberating and one of
the most tangible yet linguistically elusive qualities of musical experience (and life).
Maybe tarab is one of those words that attempt to fulfill this gap and why it is so hard to define its meaning.
Phew got there in the end
Cheers
Leon
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arsene
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Ararat66
Maybe tarab is one of those words that attempt to fulfill this gap and why it is so hard to define its meaning.
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I think so too. Language has gotten too poor and too simple to truly express our lives, our passions. Music can bridge that gap perfectly, but that's
why it;s so hard to "talk" about music, and yet so easy because kindred spirits understand anyway.
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ALAMI
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I agree with Al Dokhi on the importance of "Live performance" in tarab, a thing that is also common in jazz and flamenco but it is even more
important in tarab.
A lot of interesting things have been said in this thread, may be it is time to hear something, I am posting an extract of a great artist: Adib Al
Dayekh singing Bayati (12 min out of 39), it is a live performance singing old poems with oud only and "sami'as", in the pure Aleppo tradition,
"sami'as" is a word reserved exclusively to tarab spectators and this is linguistic sign of the importance of the spectators in the process of tarab,
an importance rooted in the soufi tradition (or extrapolated out of the soufi Zikr where the performers and the spectators are supposed to become
"one" within the "one").
It is not an "easy" form of tarab, lay back and take the time to be taken away.
Bayyati - Adib Al Dayekh
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MatthewW
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hello Alami- I'm having trouble bringing anything up from your Bayati link; is it me or a 'missing link'? cheers!
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ALAMI
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Thanks Mat for notifying,
I have a problem in getting this permissions thing straight.
Now it is fixed I tested it, and sorry guys
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arsene
Oud Junkie
Posts: 366
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Location: Rotterdam, NL
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To continue the original topic, there are at least two Iraqi oudists that I know of who play on ouds with fixed bridge: Fawzy al-Aiedy and Rahim
al-Haj. Al Haj even studied under Bashir and plays in high F-tuning, but I never saw him playing or holding a floating bridge oud.
Although I must admit I really like the floating bridge sound, now that I've got one myself!
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Ronny Andersson
Oud Junkie
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Fawzy has a floating bridge oud since many years made by Yaroub Fadel which he is using in concerts.
| Quote: | Originally posted by arsene
To continue the original topic, there are at least two Iraqi oudists that I know of who play on ouds with fixed bridge: Fawzy al-Aiedy and Rahim
al-Haj. Al Haj even studied under Bashir and plays in high F-tuning, but I never saw him playing or holding a floating bridge oud.
Although I must admit I really like the floating bridge sound, now that I've got one myself! |
Best wishes
Ronny
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MatthewW
Oud Junkie
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| Quote: | Originally posted by ALAMI
I agree with Al Dokhi on the importance of "Live performance" in tarab, a thing that is also common in jazz and flamenco but it is even more
important in tarab.
A lot of interesting things have been said in this thread, may be it is time to hear something, I am posting an extract of a great artist: Adib Al
Dayekh singing Bayati (12 min out of 39), it is a live performance singing old poems with oud only and "sami'as", in the pure Aleppo tradition,
"sami'as" is a word reserved exclusively to tarab spectators and this is linguistic sign of the importance of the spectators in the process of tarab,
an importance rooted in the soufi tradition (or extrapolated out of the soufi Zikr where the performers and the spectators are supposed to become
"one" within the "one").
It is not an "easy" form of tarab, lay back and take the time to be taken away.
Bayyati - Adib Al Dayekh |
The Bayati sung by Adib Al Dayekh is simply beautiful, straight from the heart and soul, the oud playing is superb, and the audience reaction is an
obvious part of the event. Wish I was there! I could see the similarites between this performance and the deeper aspect of flamenco, what they call
'cante jondo', most notably the collaborations between the great flamenco guitartist Paco de Lucia and the singing of the late Cameron de Isla. Anyone
else familiar with these two flamenco artists feel any similarities? Thanks Alami for posting the Bayati as an insight into tarab.
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arsene
Oud Junkie
Posts: 366
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Ronny Andersson
Fawzy has a floating bridge oud since many years made by Yaroub Fadel which he is using in concerts.
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Ah, thanks for rectifying that - I was under the impression he was using a customized version of yaroub's "classic" model!
Ok, then there;s just one, Al-Haj.
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Ronny Andersson
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Also Rahim al-Haj has a floating bridge oud but as main oud.
Yaroubs classical models are based on early Iraqi tradition and Turkish oud building tradition which means smaller bodies and shorter string length.
Fawzys oud with the blond bowl, neck and pegbox is made of plane wood and is a very nice instrument for accompanying a singer.
| Quote: | Originally posted by arsene
| Quote: | Originally posted by Ronny Andersson
Fawzy has a floating bridge oud since many years made by Yaroub Fadel which he is using in concerts.
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Ah, thanks for rectifying that - I was under the impression he was using a customized version of yaroub's "classic" model!
Ok, then there;s just one, Al-Haj. |
Best wishes
Ronny
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MatthewW
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here is a clip of the Iraqi player Ahmed Muhktar mentioned in this thread who plays on a floating bridge oud.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bb5r2Q-0ePw
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arsene
Oud Junkie
Posts: 366
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Location: Rotterdam, NL
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OK! so Al-Haj floats as well... Well, so do I, I must admit I'm only playing on my floating bridge oud now.
But, check this out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbUq8A0ihhM
Kadhim al Saher who plays on a normal bridge oud. I never thought of him as an oudist, but apparently he can play
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