Tetrachords of Turkish makams: how to make sense of makam theory Jim Garrett April 19, 2019 Contents 1 Introduction 2 2 Tetrachords: What are they, how do they t in? 3 3 Specic tetrachords 4 3.1 3 tetrachords with which we're already familiar . 4 3.2 Three microtonal tetrachords . 6 3.3 Hicaz and Nikriz . 7 3.4 Additional tetrachords based on U³³ak . 8 3.4.1 Hüseyni . 8 3.4.2 Saba . 9 3.5 Additional tetrachords based on Segâh . 9 3.5.1 Müstear . 9 3.5.2 Hüzzam . 10 3.5.3 Eksik Segâh . 10 3.6 Pençgâh . 10 3.7 Summary of tetrachords . 10 3.7.1 Modulations . 11 4 What is a makam? 12 5 Additional resources 12 1 6 Additional context 13 6.1 Cultural context . 13 6.2 A plea for attention to tonality . 14 6.3 Makam theory is not really theory . 16 7 Acknowledgements 16 1 Introduction You're probably reading this because you're wondering what makam theory is all about. Probably you've visited several web sites, but it hasn't quite clicked. You've gotten information but you're not sure what it means, or how it ts together. You've seen musical snippets that look like scales, but then you've read that makams are not scales. Maybe you're wondering if this body of knowledge is accessible at all. If this describes your experience, then this essay is written just for you! I believe most introductory resources try to make analogies to scales, because scales are what Western musicians are familiar with. I think this is pedagogical a mistake. Makams are not scales, and using scales as a crutch actually takes us farther from the goal of understanding the thinking and expression of a makam musician. Paradoxically, the makam is not really the fundamental entity in the makam system; the tetrachord is. Once you know tetrachords, you'll be prepared to listen and understand what's happening in a makam. While there are roughly 200 makams that have been actively used, there are 14 distinct tetrachords (depending on what you consider dis- tinct). 14 is not a small number but it's smaller than 200! Also, there are relationships among them, so there aren't 14 completely distinct ideas. I'm basing this essay on the Ottoman system, but I'm also very interested in the Arabic maqam system. In fact they are closely related and have informed each other. So if you're interested in Arabic music, I think this essay will still be useful to you if you're starting out. I've added a section to discuss cultural context more deeply in Section 6.1. Some comments about terminology: I've used Turkish in the title of this essay so that people can nd it, but this confounds Turkish folk 2 traditions with the Ottoman art music tradition, and I will use distinct terms for these. Also, it's common to refer to makam theory but I argue in Sec- tion 6.3 that theory is a misleading term, and suggest grammar. I will say at the outset, and again and again later: let your ears be your guide! Your ears don't lie, and trump any written reference. It's always valuable to understand the cultural context of music, so please do read Section 6 even though it's deferred towards the end. 2 Tetrachords: What are they, how do they t in? Let me illustrate the nature and function of tetrachords with a thought experiment. What is major? What is its essential sound quality? Consider playing the C major scale starting from the tonic. C, D, E, F, . Wait there (on F) a moment. Do you need to play any more? The remaining notes are G, A, B, and the octave C. Do they add anything to the expression of major? Well, G is the fth, which can be useful. But note: the Western C major scale, from G, actually recapitulates the intervals we've already seen: whole step, whole step, whole step, half, just like C, D, E, and F. There's nothing new here. The atom of major here is the rst 4, or perhaps 5, notes. If you want to ll your space with majorness in melody (not chords), these are your notes. Additional notes add feet to a snake as a Chinese saying goes. These four sequential notes are called a tetrachord. Five sequen- tial notes will also show up frequently, and this would be a penta- chord. Tetrachord also refers to tetrachords and pentachords gen- erally. The makam musician seeks melodic snippets and associated styles or patterns that express the nature or feeling of the tetrachord, without playing any chords. (Simple chords do show up occasionally; nothing is absolute.) If I asked a Western musician to express major, she would play a major chord and say, Okay, done, what's next? But if I said, No; express major, but without chords; melody only, we have begun a dierent project entirely. A makam musician always knows what tetrachord she is in at any given moment, and is working to express it most eectively. 3 Let's continue the experiment to think about minor. To utilize the white keys of the keyboard, let's root it on D, so minor would be D, E, F, and G. This expresses the essence of minor. Interestingly, we in the West acknowledge three avors of minor scale, which share the rst ve notes. The three minor scales can be seen as a minor tetrachord (or pentachord, to be precise) with dierent tetrachords stacked on the fth: A minor tetrachord on the fth gives us melodic minor. A Phrygian tetrachord (half step followed by whole steps) on the fth gives us natural minor. A Hicaz tetrachord (half step, 1.5 step, half step) on the fth gives us harmonic minor. The harmonic minor is the last refuge of Hicaz in Western music, at least where it resides without being considered a foreign reference. Having three avors of minor spun out as dierent tetrachords stacked on a common base tetrachord is very much in the spirit of the makam system, as we'll see. 3 Specic tetrachords We've seen the major and minor tetrachords, and we're beginning to see what tetrachords mean to makam musicians. Let's dive in to see the rest of them. 3.1 3 tetrachords with which we're already familiar My daughters learned music using the Kodály method, and this cur- riculum stressed that the Greek modes can be constructed from the white notes on the piano keyboard, simply by adopting a dierent note as tonic for the mode (while staying on white notes). Start on C and you get the C major or diatonic scale. Start on G instead and you get Mixolydian, which is just like the diatonic but the 7th is a whole step below octave, rather than a half-step. Let's apply this same-notes- dierent-tonic principle to tetrachords. By the way, C is an uncommon root for most tetrachords in practice. I'm just using C to use the keyboard as an illustrative device. 4 Figure 1: The keyboard, with 3 tetrachords that have no non-Western micro- tones indicated; they can be played on the white notes with dierent starting notes, and they overlap substantially. Figure 1 below shows a piano keyboard. Starting on C, we get the major tetrachord, as described above; this is called Çargâh. Starting instead on D, we get the minor tetrachord, called Buselik. Starting on E, we get the Phrygian tetrachord, which has fallen out of fashion in Western music for the last millenium or so, but does show up in Klezmer and other Eastern European folk music. In the Middle East this is called Kurdi. To me Kurdi evokes a sense of broad but austere space, such as sunset in the desert. The same-note-dierent-tonic principle is not just an interesting happenstance; makam musicians often leverage this, stepping from one to another by changing the tonal center. How to change tonal cen- ter is part of the makam craft, and part psychology of human music perception. 5 Figure 2: The keyboard, but now the E is atted slightly, indicated by shading. We nd 3 new tetrachords analogous to the previous three, now found on this retuned keyboard. The B is also slightly attened in case a Rast tetrachord is placed on G, but that wouldn't apply to U³³ak, and for Segâh the A would also be microtonally attened. 3.2 Three microtonal tetrachords Consider the same system, only atten the E a bit, as indicated in Figure 2. Flatten it less than a half step. Exactly how much is a mat- ter of tradition, taste, geography, and artistic expression. Let listening and experimenting be your guide. (And your teacher!) Some Ottoman classical music attens just enough to be perceived, but perhaps not noticed. Byzantine and Eastern Orthodox liturgical music does simi- larly. Anatolian folk music tends to have it atter, as does most Arabic. The Arabic music notation system gives this note as halfway between at and natural, but this is a construct; players vary it, and I think they rarely play true quarter tones. To my own ears, a slightly at third harmonizes with the tonic more sweetly than the Western third. But if I want it to stand out a bit, I atten more, when exibility is possible. In some situations musicians 6 vary the at depending on context, within the same piece.