By GEORGE DIMITRI SELIM
An Arab anthology of musical suites was presented in May to the Library as a gift from the Moroccan government by H.E. Mohamed Benaïssa, the ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco.
Although the works came to the Library in the latest format, compact disk, the origin of the nawbah, or suite, dates to the time before the first millennium.
After the Arabs had secured their rule in the Iberian Peninsula after invading it in 712, life resumed a more peaceful pace. Arab centers of learning and culture slowly began to emerge in the territory now renamed al-Andalus (Andalucia). According to Ibn Khaldun (1322-1406), in his Muqaddimah (Prolegomena), there were two main cultural centers, Seville and Cordoba, the capital:
"When a learned man died in Seville and his books were to be sold at a high price, the books were sent to Cordoba. But when a musician died in the capital of al-Andalus, they sent his musical instruments and manuscripts to Seville, where music flourished and where its inhabitants were passionately caught up in its enchantment."
Indeed, during Arab rule, Seville became the greatest center for music, poetry and the manufacture of musical instruments.
The Umayyad caliphs in Spain wanted to compete with the 'Abbasid caliphs of the East and to make Cordoba the Baghdad of the West. When the musician Abu al-Hasan 'Ali ibn Nafi' (d. 852), nicknamed Ziryab, came to Cordoba in 822, caliph 'Abd al-Rahman II (792-852) "rode out of his capital in person to welcome the young minstrel. Ziryab was one of the musicians who graced the court of Harun al- Rashid (766?-809) and his sons, where he distinguished himself not only as an artist but also as a man of science and letters." Ziryab, whose Persian nickname means "dilution of gold" or "gold water," was born and educated in Baghdad. He studied music under Ishaq ibn Ibrahim al-Mawsili (767- 850), the dean of musicians of his time, who soon became jealous of his brilliant disciple and threatened him with bodily harm. Fearing for his life, Ziryab left Baghdad and settled in Cordoba.
An innovator and a musician of great refinement, Ziryab is credited with introducing the eagle's feather as a plectrum, reshaping the lute's structure, and adding the fifth chord to the instrument. In Cordoba he founded the first musical academy, where music and chant were taught. He also employed an original method of closely tying poetic text to melodic structure.
It was during the time of Ziryab that the nawbah or suite (suite is the literal and technical meaning of the Arabic word) became the most important musical form in al-Andalus. The nawbah, as the Spanish Orientalist Fernando Valderrama Martínez defines it, is "a complete musical work, composed of various airs and melodies. It also appears like an ensemble of independent songs, though all relate to a single theme. They are songs gathered by the threads of time to give us an anonymous composition, like the great cathedrals which required the efforts of generations, a heritage bequeathed to our times by unknown great geniuses."
Each nawbah is divided into five separate movements. These movements are at times only music, at times a combination of music and singing. The themes of the songs vary. The verses of the songs deal with love, nature, wine and other topics. In the 19th century, however, many of the profane texts were replaced by religious and mystical poems while the music itself remained unchanged. In fact, the first nawbah, which serves as the overture to al-Hayik's anthology, is in praise of the Prophet Muhammad. The performance of one nawbah may last five to nine hours. The instruments used are the rabab (a two-chord instrument that is usually the instrument of the leader of the orchestra), the lute, the violin, the violoncello, the alto, the tar (a tambourine) and the dirbakkah (a one-handed drum); the first four are stringed instruments, the latter two, percussion.
It took the anthologist Muhammad bin al-Husayn al-Hayik (18th century) of Tétouan many years to collect and classify 11 nawbahs, which are available to us today.
Recently these nawbahs were produced and published in 72 compact discs with three libretti by a joint collaboration of the Moroccan Ministry of Culture and the Maison des Cultures du Monde (Paris) under the title Anthologie al-Âla: musique andaluci-marocaine-Textes de pré-sentation en français et en arabe. The world today can hear the songs and music which have been transmitted through the centuries and have survived in the sonorous memory of the Arabs, works which, in the words of English Orientalist Henry G. Farmer, represent "the most sublime artistic image of Arab music."
Works Consulted
Benabdjlil, Abdelwahad. "La musique andalouse." In La grande encyclopédie du Maroc: culture, arts et traditions. Rabat: GEM, 1986-1989. vol. 2, pp. 7-17.
Bin 'Abd al-Jalil, 'Abd al-'Aziz. al-Musiqa al-Andalusiyah al-Maghribiyah: funun al-ada'. Kuwait: al-Majlis al-Watani lil-Thaqafah wa-al-Funun wa-al-Adab, 1988.
Cherki, Salah. Musique marocaine: bilingue = Moroccan music. Mohammedia, Morocco: Imprimerie de Fedala, 1981.
Farmer, Henry G. A history of Arabian music to the XIIIth century. London: Louzac & Co., 1929.
Guettat, Mahmoud. La musique classique du Maghreb. Paris: Sindbad, 1980.
al-Hanafi, Mahmud Ahmad. "'Asr al-Andalus." In Muhit al- Funun. Cairo: Dar al-Ma'arif, 1971. vol. 2: al-Musiqá, pp. 72-77.
Hitti, Philip K. History of the Arabs: from the earliest times to the present. London: Macmillan & Co. 1961.
Morocco. Services des arts indigènes. Corpus de musique marocaine: nouba de ochchâk. Paris: Heugel, 1931.
Pareja, Félix M. Islamologie. Beirut: Imprimerie catholique, 1957-1963.
Valderrama Martínez, Fernando. Kunnash al-Ha'ik: aw majmu'at aghani Maghribiyah min al-qarn al-thani 'ashar al- Hijri = Kunnas al-Ha'ik: un cancionero marroquí del siglo XII de la Hégira. Tétouan: Dar al-Tiba'ah al-Maghribiyah, 1953.
George Dimitri Selim is an Arab Area Specialist in the African and Middle Eastern Division.