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Dec. 9th, 2004 03:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
merchimerchHere's what I did today, for those not really interested in conservatory stuff, move on down the friends page
I sat in on my first whole lecture at the conservatory today – it went pretty well. I get the feeling that the disjuncture between theory and practice seems even wider than in the US. The class I sat in on was the class that all non-traditional music majors have to take. In 8 weeks they cover everything having to do with the maqom and are tested on it. The atmosphere in the class is very similar to the atmosphere in non-applied music classes at Peabody while I was there – the kids don’t seem to really value the material, they are in class to get the material that they will be tested on at the end of the month. The class ran like a very straightforward lecture. The one question I asked was the only question that got voiced during the entire one hour class. Rustam aka talked slowly and carefully so that the 4 original students and the 8 from a different class, whose professor was out today, could write down everything that he said. As far as I could tell from watching the students around me, all the students were taking notes by copying down the lecture word for word.
Rustam aka’s lecture consited mostly of exposition about Namuds and Usuls in the Shashmaqom.
Namuds are what happen when at the climax of a piece the performer combines material from the mode of the piece they are playing and material from a different mode. Rustam aka went through all the possible Namuds and then quickly covered the 15 Usuls, or set rhythms that occur in maqom. The lecture wasn’t as dry as it could be though, since he added two major anecdotal interjections. Rustam aka explained the reason that the highest part of the ouge (climax) is called “Zebo Pari,” apparently at some point in history the Emir of Buhara had a competition for maqom performers and the best vocalist with the highest most impressive voice was Zebo Pari. There was a scandal because the Emir thought that perhaps Zebo Pari was actually a woman because he insited in performing behind a curtain. The Emir demanded to see his face and when they drew back the curtain he was shocked and dismayed because Zebo Pari was so disfigured (but he was male). From that point on, the Emir couldn’t listen to the ouge portion without seeing images of Zebo Pari’s hideous visage.
Rustam aka’s other anecdote was a little more directly relevant to my research. He mentioned that when he was in the conservatory that they didn’t teach or even mention maqom. People got a completely European education. He claimed it was very professional, but that maqom was something for people to study outside of conservatory. In fact the man whose work he uses to build his lecture, Issak Rajabov, was one of his teachers at conservatory. Now they teach maqom even in schools, apparently the program to teach traditional music in music school began two years ago.
After class I asked Rustam aka about the class and why pianists, Estrada majors, and violinists would need to know about maqom. He came up with an answer that I hadn’t thought of. I of course tie it into a sense of nationalism and pride in traditional Uzbek music which has been growing since Glasnost. He mentioned nothing about independence. Instead, the reason he says that they now require non-majors to take a course on maqom is because so many composers are incorporating maqom into their compositions. The students should be able to recognize the maqom when it occurs in contemporary compositions.
I sat in on my first whole lecture at the conservatory today – it went pretty well. I get the feeling that the disjuncture between theory and practice seems even wider than in the US. The class I sat in on was the class that all non-traditional music majors have to take. In 8 weeks they cover everything having to do with the maqom and are tested on it. The atmosphere in the class is very similar to the atmosphere in non-applied music classes at Peabody while I was there – the kids don’t seem to really value the material, they are in class to get the material that they will be tested on at the end of the month. The class ran like a very straightforward lecture. The one question I asked was the only question that got voiced during the entire one hour class. Rustam aka talked slowly and carefully so that the 4 original students and the 8 from a different class, whose professor was out today, could write down everything that he said. As far as I could tell from watching the students around me, all the students were taking notes by copying down the lecture word for word.
Rustam aka’s lecture consited mostly of exposition about Namuds and Usuls in the Shashmaqom.
Namuds are what happen when at the climax of a piece the performer combines material from the mode of the piece they are playing and material from a different mode. Rustam aka went through all the possible Namuds and then quickly covered the 15 Usuls, or set rhythms that occur in maqom. The lecture wasn’t as dry as it could be though, since he added two major anecdotal interjections. Rustam aka explained the reason that the highest part of the ouge (climax) is called “Zebo Pari,” apparently at some point in history the Emir of Buhara had a competition for maqom performers and the best vocalist with the highest most impressive voice was Zebo Pari. There was a scandal because the Emir thought that perhaps Zebo Pari was actually a woman because he insited in performing behind a curtain. The Emir demanded to see his face and when they drew back the curtain he was shocked and dismayed because Zebo Pari was so disfigured (but he was male). From that point on, the Emir couldn’t listen to the ouge portion without seeing images of Zebo Pari’s hideous visage.
Rustam aka’s other anecdote was a little more directly relevant to my research. He mentioned that when he was in the conservatory that they didn’t teach or even mention maqom. People got a completely European education. He claimed it was very professional, but that maqom was something for people to study outside of conservatory. In fact the man whose work he uses to build his lecture, Issak Rajabov, was one of his teachers at conservatory. Now they teach maqom even in schools, apparently the program to teach traditional music in music school began two years ago.
After class I asked Rustam aka about the class and why pianists, Estrada majors, and violinists would need to know about maqom. He came up with an answer that I hadn’t thought of. I of course tie it into a sense of nationalism and pride in traditional Uzbek music which has been growing since Glasnost. He mentioned nothing about independence. Instead, the reason he says that they now require non-majors to take a course on maqom is because so many composers are incorporating maqom into their compositions. The students should be able to recognize the maqom when it occurs in contemporary compositions.
