Parviz Yahaghi
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Parviz Yahaghi (; September 23, 1935 – February 2, 2007) was a distinguished
Iranian Iranian () may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Iran ** Iranian diaspora, Iranians living outside Iran ** Iranian architecture, architecture of Iran and parts of the rest of West Asia ** Iranian cuisine, cooking traditions and practic ...
composer and violinist. He resided in
Tehran Tehran (; , ''Tehrân'') is the capital and largest city of Iran. It is the capital of Tehran province, and the administrative center for Tehran County and its Central District (Tehran County), Central District. With a population of around 9. ...
for practically his whole life, and was born and died there.


Biography

His birth name was Parviz Sedighi Parsi. He was musically educated primarily by his uncle Hossein Yahaghi, a violinist and violin teacher, from whom Parviz adopted the Yahaghi name. During his youth Parviz was exposed to many highly professional musicians in Tehran who were friends of his uncle. A notable visitor at his uncle's house was the violin teacher, composer, and
musicologist Musicology is the academic, research-based study of music, as opposed to musical composition or performance. Musicology research combines and intersects with many fields, including psychology, sociology, acoustics, neurology, natural sciences, f ...
Abolhasan Saba Abolhasan Saba (; April 15, 1902 – December 19, 1957) was a renowned Iranian composer, violinist, and setar player. Biography He was born in Tehran to Abul Qasim Khan ''Kamal ol-Saltaneh'', son of Mohammad Jafar Khan ''Sadr ol-Hekma'', son of ...
, who is credited with making improvements in violin playing technique in the Persian tradition. Saba published a two-volume training manual for the violin in 1944-45.


Works

Starting from about 20 years, Parviz Yahaghi was employed for a little over two decades as a musician with the Iranian government-financed radio station. In the 1960s and 1970s at the radio station he composed hundreds of pieces both for violin and for celebrated singers in Iran such as Banan, Marzieh, Delkash, Pouran, Elahe, Homeyra, Mahasti, Dariush Rafei, Homayoonpour and Iraj ( Hossein Khajeh Amiri). These compositions were often produced in connection with the long-running radio program Golha. Yahaghi's ability in playing violin, his compositions, and his musical director's role made him a central figure in Persian music during the 1970s. Yahaghi's violin is tuned in a way that gives different
resonances Resonance is a phenomenon that occurs when an object or system is subjected to an external force or vibration whose frequency matches a resonant frequency (or resonance frequency) of the system, defined as a frequency that generates a maximu ...
and drones to the sound, compared to standard European tuning, and he uses a number of different tuning schemes. Before the arrival of the 1979 political revolution in Iran, Yahaghi had already resigned from the government radio station and set up a recording studio of his own in Tehran. In the wake of the revolution, many of Yahaghi's friends and associates departed from Iran and did not return. But Yahaghi stayed. His wife, Homeyra, one of Iran's most famous singers, moved permanently to the USA without him. (The revolutionaries outlawed female solo singing, though women were free to continue to play musical instruments and to sing in choruses.) Yahaghi was arrested, interrogated, and released by the new regime. During the 1980s with the war between Iran and Iraq going on, he was invited by the regime to compose music, particularly patriotic music. He declined. But the official authorities came around to viewing him with such esteem that after his death some of his musical instruments, recording equipment and other items were appropriated as national and historic property.


Discography

Parviz Yahaghi's most widely distributed recordings outside Iran is probably the five-volume "''Persian Melodies''" collection (five compact discs); the four-volume "''Violin Melodies''" collection is the same thing as the first four volumes of "''Persian Melodies''".


Albums

Other albums by Yahaghi currently in print include: * "''Toreh''" in two volumes (i.e. two compact discs); * "''Tooba''" (a.k.a. ''Tobi'') in two volumes; * "''Taravat''" in two volumes; * the three-volume set headlined "''Iranian Classical Music''" whose three volumes are called ''Ashk & Tulu'', ''Yad'', and ''Faryad''; * other albums by Yahaghi in print include "''Kimia''", "''Saz-e Del''", "''Mehr''", "''Mahtab''", and "''Raaz & Niyaz''". These albums don't contain any overlap in recorded material with themselves or with the ''Violin Melodies'' collection, although at times one hears some recurring themes being reworked and replayed. All these albums are instrumental only (no singing) and
monophonic Monaural sound or monophonic sound (often shortened to mono) is sound intended to be heard as if it were emanating from one position. This contrasts with stereophonic sound or ''stereo'', which uses two separate audio channels to reproduce sou ...
only. (The many early recordings of Yahaghi playing with a singer are published under the singer's name).


Taknavazan Collection

Additional instrumental music featuring Yahaghi is available from the Taknavazan Collection. This collection consists of forty compact discs of Persian traditional instrumental music, featuring the violin on the majority of the tracks. Yahaghi plays violin on at least one track on at least 25 of the 40 compact discs. Each disc has approximately four track

Other violinists in the Persian tradition who are present in this Taknavazan Collection are Ali Tajvidi (علی تجویدی), Habibollah Badiei (حبیب الله بدیعی),
Homayoun Khorram Ostad Homayoun Khorram (), (June 30, 1930 – January 17, 2013) was an Iranian musician, composer, violinist, and a member of the high council of Iran's house of music. Khorram began his music career as a violinist at the age of 10 by participa ...
(همايون خرم), and Asadollah Malek (اسدالله ملک). They were all students of Abolhasan Saba in Tehran. They had also similar aesthetics and technique of Yahaghi.


References


External links

* A five-minute sample of Parviz Yahaghi playing violin
Taknavazan #221 (mokhalef segah)
This piece was recorded by and for the government-owned radio station in Iran in the early 1970s when Yahaghi was an employee at the station. Apparently, the ultimate copyright holder is the government of Iran, which today does not seek to restrict the free distribution of it. But an authoritative legal statement on its copyright status does not exist, it seems. The same is true for all the rest of the Golha Radio Programmes of pre-revolution Iran. * Photograph of the graveside Parviz Yahaghi in ''
Behesht-e Zahra Behesht-e Zahra ( ; ) is the largest cemetery in Iran. Located in the southern part of metropolitan Tehran, it is connected to the city by Tehran Metro Line 1. History In the early 1950s, all the cemeteries in Tehran were supposed to be replac ...
'', Tehran

* Some photographs of the funeral of Parviz Yahaghi: (1
''Cultural Heritage News Agency''
(2

* Shahāb Āzādeh, ''Yahaghi, an artist without successor'', in Persian, Jadid Online, 21 February 2007

With an audiovisual slideshow

(2 min 33 sec). * Alirezā Vāsefi, Remembering the Life of Bizhan Taraqqi (and Parviz Yahaghi), in Persian, Jadid Online, 28 April 2009

With an audiovisual slideshow

(8 min 48 sec). {{DEFAULTSORT:Yahaghi, Parviz 1935 births 2007 deaths Burials at artist's block of Behesht-e Zahra Iranian composers 20th-century Iranian male singers Iranian violinists Musicians from Tehran 20th-century violinists