Music and Instruments

Arab music is built on the maqam, a system of melodic modes far larger than the Western major and minor scales. It uses intervals smaller than the semitone, and each maqam carries its own expected phrases, resting notes and emotional character. A performer does not simply play in a maqam; they travel through it.

The classical ensemble, the takht, is small: the oud, a fretless short-necked lute and the ancestor of the European lute; the qanun, a plucked zither of seventy-odd strings with levers for microtonal adjustment; the ney, an end-blown reed flute; the riqq or frame drum; and often a violin.

Beyond the classical tradition, regional forms are enormously varied — the sawt and fijiri of the Gulf, the andalusi nuba of Morocco and Algeria, Egyptian tarab, the Sufi repertoires of Syria and Sudan, and the Amazigh and Tuareg musics of North Africa and the Sahara.

Rhythm is treated with the same precision as melody. The iqa cycles that underlie the music can run to dozens of beats, and the drummer's control of them is what allows a singer to stretch a phrase almost indefinitely.