href="#fb3_img_img_9c684278-756d-52b4-9242-5e475420f48d.jpg" alt="ilang"/>bī), folkloric (fūlklūrī), bedouin (badawī), classical (klāsīkī), and the now ubiquitous contemporary pop song. “Classical” implies music commonly thought of as deriving from the Arab heritage and therefore of anonymous or very ancient composition; contemporary compositions by known artists in the same or similar styles might also be labeled “classical,” such as the works of The “classical” repertoire derives most of its authority and authenticity from its opposition to the contemporary pop song, which is considered by defenders of tradition to symbolize inauthenticity. These songs, which borrow extensively from the instrumentation and style of Western music, commonly are heard on radios and in taxis and buses around Syria. As the new songs overwhelm the airwaves and cassette shops, they provoke strong emotional responses among critics (see also Danielson 1996). Antagonists refer to the contemporary songs variously as vulgar (hābiṭa), banal (mubtadhala), cheap (rakhīṣa), or—less judgmentally—youthful (shabābiyya). One publisher asserted that they are not only bad, they are dangerous to one’s health (qātila, lit. killer); “they might cause you to have a heart attack due to their quick, repetitive tempos,” he claimed. In many regards, the contemporary pop song has become the foremost symbol of cultural decline and decay for Syrian and other Arab intellectuals; it also has come to serve rhetorically as a negative pole in their aesthetic evaluations of authenticity as the prime exemplar of inauthentic culture—although in practice many intellectuals do in fact listen to and enjoy this music.
Closely related to the “classical” repertoire is that of sacred music. Aleppo has served as an important religious center for Sunni Islam as well as for a variety of Sufi brotherhoods (ṭuruq, sing. ṭarīqa), and it is home to number of Syria’s leading religious singers (munshid-s), who perform varieties of religious song (inshād) at weddings and other celebrations in Aleppo. They also perform at weekly dhikr rituals at Aleppo’s numerous Sufi lodges (zāwiya-s) and in private homes throughout the city.23 The repertoire of the waṣla and dhikr overlap to an extent, and indeed many munshid-s perform “sacred” music in the dhikr as well as “secular” music in concerts of the waṣla. The close relationship between the two musical domains suggests that the distinction between “sacred” and “secular” is not clear-cut in Aleppo (see Shannon 2003b). Moreover, the majority of Aleppo’s major vocalists and musicians have had strong training in religious song; it is commonly argued that training in the dhikr and other varieties of inshād is the best preparation for singing the “secular” repertoire (Danielson 1997: 21–27; Frishkopf 1999). This observation holds true for Aleppo’s large Christian population as well, which has produced a number of fine vocalists and musicians who are skilled in the “classical” repertoire as well as the liturgies of their various congregations. Some Christian artists also have studied Islamic inshād to further their musical training (though I have found little evidence of Muslims attending Christian liturgies to learn their modal practices).
Aleppine musicians claim that the contemporary musical scene is far less active than it was even fifteen or twenty years ago. Yet, many are proud that at least some groups still preserve the tradition through performances and teaching of the older repertoires. Damascus has a far richer cultural scene in terms of overall numbers of concerts, shows, recitals, and exhibitions. Most of the major recording studios are located in Damascus, as well as numerous night clubs and performance venues. However, most musical activity in the capital tends not to be associated with the Arab tradition, as in Aleppo. Many of the concerts and recitals are of European music, for example the annual concerts of the Syrian National Symphony and the numerous recitals at foreign cultural centers, which draw large audiences. Much of the music produced, performed, and recorded in Damascus follows the modern pop styles. One is far more likely to hear a concert in Damascus by the pop icon George Wasoof than by Ṣabāḥ Fakhrī.24
However, Aleppo hosts far more concerts and recitals of the “classical” Arab repertoire. The city has its fair share of night clubs, the cabarets of old that were once respectable performance venues but have now declined into less desirable places, if not down right seedy; they tend to feature renditions of contemporary pop songs and favorite songs from the 1950s though 1970s. Many musicians who used to earn a good living performing in these cabarets attribute their decline to the influx of wealthy “Arab” tourists (usually wealthy Arabs from the Arabian Gulf). With rising conservatism in the 1970s and 1980s, many of Aleppo’s mercantile and religious elite shied away from the once-famous cabarets and many musicians gave up performing in them. Now considered off-limits for “respectable” people—mostly meaning the middle classes and elite but also the pious in general—these establishments tend to attract denizens from the lower classes, migrant workers, and foreigners, though higher-class cabarets in Damascus are patronized by the wealthy.
Local musicians such as Muḥhammad Qadrī Dalāl, the master oud player, give seasonal performances of “classical” music at some of Aleppo’s ancient caravansaries and heritage buildings that date from between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries. The annual Syrian Song Festival, although held in a dreary sports arena during the period of my research, is now held in the Citadel. In addition to the Citadel, Aleppo’s numerous private clubs host summer evening concerts for local and regional artists. Concerts of European music also are held from time to time in Aleppo, though less frequently than in Damascus, and they garner only modest audiences. Occasionally, foreign cultural centers will sponsor jazz festivals or concerts of European and “World” music (non-European and non-Arab, in this context). More common are concerts of contemporary Arab pop music at Aleppo’s clubs featuring pan-Arab superstars like Syrian George Wasoof, Lebanese Diana Haddad, and Egyptian
Despite the importance of Aleppo in modern Arab music, almost no research has been done on the contributions of Syrian artists to Arab music (see Belleface 1992; Saadé 1993). In contrast, studies abound of Arab music in Egypt (e.g., Danielson 1997; Frishkopf 1999; S. Marcus 1989; Racy 1981; Reynolds 1995; Van Nieuwkerk 1995), and to a lesser extent Iraq, Yemen, Tunisia, Morocco, and the countries of the Arabian Gulf (Lambert 1997; Schuyler 1990/1991; Touma 1996). The focus on Arab music in Egypt reflects both the common sentiment that Egypt is the cultural leader of the Arab world and the relatively greater openness of Egypt to foreign researchers.25 In terms of Egypt’s role, many Arabs and non-Arabs make the implicit identification of “Egyptian” music with “Arab” music. The Egyptian styles flood the contemporary markets and the past masters of Egypt have gained significant audiences outside of Egypt through the influence of the Egyptian mass media (Armbrust 1996; Danielson 1997; Racy 1977).
Syria, whose media and broadcast centers opened later than Egypt’s and remained on a smaller scale, does not have the same pan-regional effect that Egypt enjoys. Non-Arabs as well as Arabs resident outside of the Arab lands perpetuate the identification of “Egyptian” with “Arab” music through concerts featuring Egyptian tunes and through their memories that draw on a time when Egyptian artists were ascendant.26 Texts that treat “Arab music” as a whole often specialize in one region with only brief information about musical practices in others; this is the case, for example, with Touma’s The Music of the Arabs (1996), which has rich information about music in Iraq, Morocco, and the Arabian Gulf (where the author had done research) but little information on music in Egypt and the Levant. Racy’s Making Music in the Arab World: The Culture and Artistry of Ṭarab (2003) provides rich detail about music performance practices in the Levant, and especially the concept of ṭarab, but does not treat North African music cultures for whom the concept of ṭarab is also important, for example in the music known as ṭarab andalusī and ṭarab gharnāṭī (though North African understandings of ṭarab are distinct in many ways from those of the Levant). Moreover, his work does not address the wider concerns
