Iraqi Maqam () is a

genre Genre () is any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other fo ...

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 ...

music found in

Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...

. The roots of modern Iraqi maqam can be traced as far back as the

Abbasid Caliphate The Abbasid Caliphate or Abbasid Empire (; ) was the third caliphate to succeed the Islamic prophet Muhammad. It was founded by a dynasty descended from Muhammad's uncle, Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib (566–653 CE), from whom the dynasty takes ...

(8th–13th centuries AD), when that large empire was controlled from

Baghdad Baghdad ( or ; , ) is the capital and List of largest cities of Iraq, largest city of Iraq, located along the Tigris in the central part of the country. With a population exceeding 7 million, it ranks among the List of largest cities in the A ...

. The ensemble of instruments used in this genre, called ''Al Chalghi al Baghdadi'', includes a ''qari' ''(singer), ''

santur The santur ( ; ) is a hammered dulcimer of Iranian origin.--- Rashid, Subhi Anwar (1989). ''Al-ʼĀlāt al-musīqīyya al-muṣāhiba lil-Maqām al-ʻIrāqī''. Baghdad: Matbaʻat al-ʻUmmāl al-Markazīyya. History The santur was invented ...

'',

goblet drum The goblet drum (also chalice drum, tarabuka, tarabaki, darbuka, darabuka, derbake, debuka, doumbek, dumbec, dumbeg, dumbelek, toumperleki, tumbak, or zerbaghali; / Romanized: ) is a single-head membranophone with a goblet-shaped body. It is ...

, joza, ''cello,'' and sometimes '' oud'' and naqqarat. The focus is on the poem sung in classical Arabic or an Iraqi dialect (then called ''zuhayri''). A complete maqam concert is known as ''fasl'' (plural ''fusul'') and is named after the first maqam: Bayat, Hijaz, Rast, Nawa, or Husayni. A typical performance includes the following sections: *''tahrir'', sometimes ''badwah'' *''taslum'' *''finalis''

Maqama The ''maqāma'' (Arabic: مقامة aˈqaːma literally "assembly"; plural ''maqāmāt'', مقامات aqaːˈmaːt is an (originally) Arabic prosimetric literary genre of picaresque short stories originating in the tenth century C.E.Qian, ...

texts are often derived from classical

Arabic poetry Arabic poetry ( ''ash-shi‘r al-‘arabīyy'') is one of the earliest forms of Arabic literature. Pre-Islamic Arabic poetry contains the bulk of the oldest poetic material in Arabic, but Old Arabic inscriptions reveal the art of poetry existe ...

, such as by

al-Mutanabbi Abū al-Ṭayyib Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Mutanabbī al-Kindī ( – 965 AD), commonly known as Al-Mutanabbi (), was an Abbasid-era Arab poet at the court of the Hamdanid emir Sayf al-Dawla in Aleppo, and for whom he composed 300 folios of ...

and

Abu Nuwas Abu Nuwas () (756-8) was a classical Arabic poet, and the foremost representative of the modern (''muhdath'') poetry that developed during the first years of the Abbasid Caliphate. He also entered the folkloric tradition, appearing several ...

. Some performers used traditional sources translated into the dialect of Baghdad, and still others use Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Armenian, Hebrew, Turkmen, Aramaic lyrics. Due to Iraq's diversity, different ethnic groups use this genre in their own language.

Famous maqam singers

There are many Iraqi maqam singers including: * Ahmed al-Zaidan * Rashid al-Qundarchi * Muhammad al-Qubanchi * Hussein al-A'dhami * Najm al-Shaykhli * Hassan Khaiwka * Hashim al-Rejab * Yousuf Omar * Farida Mohammad Ali * Abd al-Rahman Khader *

Hamed al-Sa‘di Hamid refers to two different but related Arabic given names, both of which come from the Arabic triconsonantal root of Ḥ-M-D (): # (Arabic: ''ḥāmed'') also spelled Haamed, Hamid or Hamed, and in Turkish Hamit; it means "lauder" or "one wh ...

Nazem Al-Ghazali Nazem al-Ghazali (, given name also spelled ''Nazim'', ''Nadhim'', ''Nadhem'' or ''Nathem''; 1921 – 23 October 1963) was an Iraqi singer, considered one of the most important figures in Iraqi music. Life Nazem al-Ghazali was born in the Hayda ...

* Filfel Gourgy * Affifa Iskandar * Mulla Hasan al-Babujachi * Rahmat Allah Shiltagh * Khalil Rabbaz * Rahmain Niftar * Rubin Rajwan * Mulla Uthman al-Mawsili * Jamil al-Baghdadi * Salman Moshe * Yusuf Huresh * Abbas Kambir * Farida al-A‘dhami * Maeda Nazhat

External links

Famous Iraqi Maqam SingersIraqi Maqam

References

{{UNESCO Oral and Intangible music Music of Iraq Arabic music Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity Maqam-based music tradition

Famous maqam singers

See also

External links

References