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Heritage
On The Methodology of the Investigation:
Author:
City
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Baku
Country :
Azerbaijan
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Philosophical background and theoretical branches in the musical science of past ages
The science of music has a long and multilateral development route. Like other fields of science and art (philosophy, poetry and fine arts) its development did not, as it is sometimes wrongfully deemed to have, follow one single course, but had different branches which followed different paths.
Identification of the type, with respect to the musical theory, is very important for the interpretation of the essence of a treatise to be studied. It helps to determine particular aspects of any work and its place in the history of music. The type of theoretical trend depends to a large extent on the philosophical background of the treatise and philosophical view of its author.
Philosophy has been related to music since ancient times, when music was deemed to be within the framework of sciences like geometry, astronomy and mathematics.
The philosophical roots of the work on musical theory influence its content and distinctive qualities. Ignorance of the philosophical aspects of the analyzed work, especially, during efforts to determine the influence of Farabi and Urmavi, makes the wrong conclusions unavoidable. Prior to focusing on exact examples, let us dwell on basic philosophic approaches related to the theory of music.
The philosophers and musical theoreticians belonging to the Pythagorean school and their followers in the East – al-Kindi (9th century), “Ihvanus-Safa ” (10th century), Ottoman authors of “Advar” treatises (since 15th century), authors from Iran and Middle Asia (since 16th century) – considered the origin of music to be cosmologic. In their opinion, music was a reflection of the harmony of the spheres and related to the movement of planets, the constellations of the Zodiac, and the cycle of day and night.
The followers of Aristotle – Farabi, Ibn-Sina, Urmavi and Maraghi thought quite the opposite. For example Abu Nasr Farabi, in his famous work "Kitabul-Musiqi al-Kebir" clearly and directly named the cosmological philosophy of Pythagoras ridiculous and far from reality (Farabi:89). He writes that the origin of music is not connected to the reflection of the heavens. Urmavi and Maraghi shared the same opinion. And it is at least surprising that some modern authors claim that the above-mentioned great scientists based their works on the philosophy of Pythagoras and caused these ideas to be developed in the Turkic treatises "Advar"! Certainly, knowledge by those authors of the philosophical views of Farabi, Ibn Sina, Urmavi and Maraghi could have prevented the spread of the erroneous ideas that often appear in modern publications.
The some features of the science of music of the 15th century.
The 15th century is one of the brightest periods, when musical theories, differing from each other by their philosophical and esthetic routes, existed simultaneously. Among these theories there was the "classical" theory (“systematical”), which was coming to the end of its “life” and was based on the mathematical calculations of musical intervals (Maraghi, Husayni, Djami), and the so-called “practical theory” (I name it “post-classical”) which was leaving its “golden age” and was related to the cosmological stream (Kirshehri, Bedri Dilshad, Hizir bin Abdullah, Seydi) (Agayeva 1997). These works, the majority of which were written in Turkic language, were named “Advar” by analogy with the famous “Kitabul-Advar” of Safiuddin Urmavi and became more popular in the 15th century in Anatolia (Ottoman Turkey).
As is known, the 15th century was the period of strengthening of a political role of Turkic people and the increase in quantity of scientific and the literary works written in the Turkic language. At this time, according to the order of Ottoman Sultans, some of the musical treatises were written or translated into Turkic languages. The important factor in promoting the development of musical art and science in this region was the rapid spread of Sufism. Many dervish "tekke" (especially Mevlevi) were some kind of academic institutions, where much attention was given to music and musical theory (Uzuncarsili 1972: 516-545; 1975: 591-635). The specifications of the ideology of the followers of Sufi "tekke" were reflected in their musical and esthetical views. Research of this period has revealed that many authorities of Sufism devoted much of their time to music and some of them were authors of treatises on music.
The analysis of the 15th century theoretical works showed different types of influence on the authors by Urmavis "Kitabul-Advar": 1) direct and 2) indirect.
1) One of the significant descendants of Urmavi was a prominent scientist and musician Abdulqadir Maraghi (14-15centuries). He disclosed the essence of Urmavis theory in his book “Sharh al-Advar”. Being a real follower of Urmavi, Maraghi was not a “blind” imitator of his books. Basing his work on the theory of his genius predecessor, he developed and completed the system of 6 avazes and 12 makams by adding another modes group – 24 shubes. In his treatises Maraghi “disputes” with Qutbaddin Shirazi (13 century) and supports the ideas of Urmavi on some theoretical issues. At the same time, he stated his disagreement with Urmavi, who considered the avaze Salmak to be similar to the maqam Zangule (Agayeva 1979).
The following scientists also might be called the direct followers of Urmavi: the son and the grandson of Maraghi Abdulaziz and Mahmud Chelebi, Mahmud Shirvani, scientists of Middle Asia: Zeynalabdin Husayni, Abdurrahman Djami, an Iranian scientist Isfahani. The important peculiarity of these scientists was their close acquaintance with the works of Urmavi and of his predecessor Abdulqadir Maraghi. For example, Djami (1414-1492), in the 6th and 7th parts of his treatise on music, wrote about the usage of the 17-degree scale by performers of music (ashab-e amal) and by specialists of this art/science (maharet der in fenn) (Djami: 439b). He analyses two types of maqam Isfahan: one of them which was used by both Urmavi and Maraghi and the other type which was used by his contemporary musicians. As to the performance maqam Hijaz, Djami preferred Urmavis version (Djami: 442a).
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