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The modern Arab tone system, or system of 
By contrast, in the European equally tempered scale the octave is divided into twelve equal divisions, or exactly half as many as the Arab system. Thus, when Arabic music is written in European
musical tuning
In music, there are two common meanings for tuning:
* #Tuning practice, Tuning practice, the act of tuning an instrument or voice.
* #Tuning systems, Tuning systems, the various systems of Pitch (music), pitches used to tune an instrument, and ...
, is based upon the theoretical division of the octave
In music, an octave (: eighth) or perfect octave (sometimes called the diapason) is an interval between two notes, one having twice the frequency of vibration of the other. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referr ...
into twenty-four equal divisions or 24-tone equal temperament, the distance between each successive note
Note, notes, or NOTE may refer to:
Music and entertainment
* Musical note, a pitched sound (or a symbol for a sound) in music
* ''Notes'' (album), a 1987 album by Paul Bley and Paul Motian
* ''Notes'', a common (yet unofficial) shortened versi ...
being a quarter tone
A quarter tone is a pitch halfway between the usual notes of a chromatic scale or an interval about half as wide (orally, or logarithmically) as a semitone, which itself is half a whole tone. Quarter tones divide the octave by 50 cents each, a ...
(50 cents). Each tone
Tone may refer to:
Visual arts and color-related
* Tone (color theory), a mix of tint and shade, in painting and color theory
* Tone (color), the lightness or brightness (as well as darkness) of a color
* Toning (coin), color change in coins
* ...
has its own name not repeated in different octaves, unlike systems featuring octave equivalency. The lowest tone is named ''yakah'' and is determined by the lowest pitch in the range
Range may refer to:
Geography
* Range (geographic), a chain of hills or mountains; a somewhat linear, complex mountainous or hilly area (cordillera, sierra)
** Mountain range, a group of mountains bordered by lowlands
* Range, a term used to i ...
of the singer. The next higher octave is ''nawa'' and the second ''tuti''. However, from these twenty-four tones, seven are selected to produce a scale and thus the interval of a quarter tone is never used and the three-quarter tone or neutral second should be considered the characteristic interval.
By contrast, in the European equally tempered scale the octave is divided into twelve equal divisions, or exactly half as many as the Arab system. Thus, when Arabic music is written in European musical notation
Musical notation is any system used to visually represent music. Systems of notation generally represent the elements of a piece of music that are considered important for its performance in the context of a given musical tradition. The proce ...
, a slashed or reversed flat sign is used to indicate a quarter-tone flat, a standard flat symbol for a half-tone flat, and a flat sign combined with a slashed or reversed flat sign for a three-quarter-tone flat, sharp with one vertical line for quarter sharps, standard sharp symbol (♯) for a half-step sharp, and a sharp with three vertical lines for a three-quarter-tone sharp. A two octave range starting with ''yakah'' arbitrarily on the G below middle C is used.
In practice much fewer than twenty-four tones are used in a single performance. All twenty-four tones are individual pitches differentiated into a hierarchy
A hierarchy (from Ancient Greek, Greek: , from , 'president of sacred rites') is an arrangement of items (objects, names, values, categories, etc.) that are represented as being "above", "below", or "at the same level as" one another. Hierarchy ...
of important pitches—pillars—which occur more frequently in the tone row
In music, a tone row or note row ( or '), also series or set, is a non-repetitive ordering of a set of pitch-classes, typically of the twelve notes in musical set theory of the chromatic scale, though both larger and smaller sets are sometime ...
s of traditional music and most often begin tone rows, and scattered less important or seldom occurring pitches (see tonality
Tonality is the arrangement of pitch (music), pitches and / or chord (music), chords of a musical work in a hierarchy of perceived ''relations'', ''stabilities'', ''attractions'', and ''directionality''.
In this hierarchy, the single pitch or ...
).
The specific notes used in a piece will be part of one of more than seventy modes or maqam
Maqam, makam, maqaam or maqām (plural maqāmāt) may refer to:
Musical structures
* Arabic maqam, melodic modes in traditional Arabic music
** Iraqi maqam, a genre of Arabic maqam music found in Iraq
* Persian maqam, a notion in Persian clas ...
rows named after characteristic tones that are rarely the first tone (unlike in European-influenced music theory where the tonic is listed first). The rows are heptatonic
A heptatonic scale is a musical scale that has seven pitches, or tones, per octave. Examples include:
* the diatonic scale; including the major scale and its modes (notably the natural minor scale, or Aeolian mode)
* the melodic minor scale, l ...
and constructed from augmented, major
Major most commonly refers to:
* Major (rank), a military rank
* Academic major, an academic discipline to which an undergraduate student formally commits
* People named Major, including given names, surnames, nicknames
* Major and minor in musi ...
, neutral, and minor seconds. Many different but similar ratios are proposed for the frequency ratios of the tones of each row and performance practice, as of 1996, has not been investigated using electronic measurements.
The current tone system is derived from the work of Farabi (d. 950 CE) (heptatonic scales constructed from seconds), who used a 25-tone unequal scale (see tetrachord
In music theory, a tetrachord (; ) is a series of four notes separated by three interval (music), intervals. In traditional music theory, a tetrachord always spanned the interval of a perfect fourth, a 4:3 frequency proportion (approx. 498 cent (m ...
), and Mikha'il Mishaqah (1800–1888) who first presented the 24-tone equal-tempered division. Some strict traditionalists and musicians also use a 17-tone set, rejecting the 24-tone division as commercial.
See also
* Jins *Arabic maqam
In traditional Arabic music, maqam (, literally "ascent"; ') is the system of melodic modes, which is mainly melodic. The word ''maqam'' in Arabic means place, location or position. The Arabic ''maqam'' is a melody type. It is "a technique ...
References
{{reflist T Equal temperaments Microtonality