BALLADS TO IDIL-URAL

BALLADS TO IDIL-URAL

“TATARISTAN-BASKURDISTAN-CUVASISTAN”

REGION

MetinEke

ITUTurkMusikisiDevletKonservatuari МаскаKampusu,Маска,Istanbul,Turkey

Abstract:As westudy thepentatonic characteristicsinthemelodies ofballadsofdifferent cultureswe may encountersome similaritiesinthe melodiesofIdil-Ural andErzincan Central Townballadsofwhichpeopleshareacommonbackgroundinthepast.SomeballadsfromErzincan regionaresimilarfromtheviewofpentatonicform toIdil-Uralregion. But, wecannoticethat therearedifferencesinthepentatonicscaleofthetworegions.

Keyword:ballads,pentatonicism,melodies

Erzincan hasbeen one ofthe oldest settlements and tradecenters throughout history.TheareacalledIdil-UrallocatedintheRussianFederationisanoldTurkic state.The regionincludes threeTurkicRepublics“Tataristan-Baskurdistan-Cuvas- istan”.

Variousscientific researchesconcerning Idil-Uralwere carriedout, butunfor- tunatelythereisnomajorscientificresearch concerningmusicintheTurkicRepub- lics.Pentatonicmusicisbasedon afive-notescale that containsnosemi-tones. Itis foundinAnatolianfolksongs,HungarianandRomanianfolkmusic.

Thefirstwritteninformationon thepentatonicscalecanbefoundin theMusic Encyclopaedia ofMaurice Curan Leviniacin which he referred to the research of MahmutRagypGazimihal.LaviniacalsoreferredtotheoldChinesesourcesforthis informationinthisarticle.Inaddition,Turkishresearchersandmusicologistssuchas Ahmet Adnan Saygun, Ferruh Arsunar, Senel Onaldi and the western researcher Edward Chavannes, Hungarian researcher Béla Bartók, Hungarian musicologist Bence Szabolcsi have found pentatonicism in Turkish music repertory. The wide- spread influence ofTurkish pentatonicism is stressed by musicologists and their research from the Idil-Ural region to Hungary. Wolfram Eberhard, the German born Chinese historian alsoconfirms thishypothesis inhis work,The Chinese His- tory.Hediscussestheoriginofpentatonicism andelaboratesitintwopoints.Penta- tonicismgoesbacktoearlyagesandis ofAsianorigin, neverthelessthereisnoclue as towhere in Asia pentatonicismcomes from. Today, the pentatonic structure of TurkishmusicalsoconfirmsthatthemotherlandofpentatonicismisCentralAsia.

Pentatonicism is an important issue from the point ofTurkish music history.

Mahmut Ragip Gazimihal claims that pentatonicism belongs to the contemporary Turkishworld.Butsomemusicologistsdonotacceptthisidea. Weknowthatpenta-

tonicism existseven amongtheJapanese, Scottish, Tuvarek and East Coast Native Americans. Some philosophersclaimed that pentatonicism expanded by means of past migrations and were used by mankind in the earlystages of human develop- ment.Alltheseprovethatpentatonicismmayexistanywhereintheworld.

The main concernofthese researchers was tostudydifferent pentatonic styles anddeterminewhichonecouldbetheUral-Altaitype.TheHungariansdiscovered oneofthepentatonictypes.BélaBartókmentionedthatthesametypewascommon inAnatolia,basedontheresearchesmadeinAdana.Thestylethatiscommonwith the Anatolian Turks is the fundamental form, which descends from high to low pitchesformingacompleteminorscale.ThiswasalsoconfirmedbyMahmutRagip Gazimihal’s and Ferruh Arsunar’s researches carried out in Elazg. A few notes, which do notfit to thistheory,canbeseen inArsunar’s realpentatonic folksongs.

WecanfindallofthesesoundsonTurkishmusicalinstruments.

These writers discuss the underlying structure of pentatonicism. The same structureispresentinahiddenforminAsianMusic.Arsunar’ssamplesdemonstrate thispoint. Huseyni, thatisa makam(mode) thathas itsown repertory. Features of this makamcan be listed asits “zemin,meyan and karar”, and its ambitus isbased onapentatonicstructure.

Researchesconcerningtheexistence ofpentatonicisminTurkishfolkmusicbe- gan in 1936 in our country with Mahmut Ragyp Gazimihal, Ferruh Arsunar and AhmetAdnanSaygun.ThistopicwasalsodiscussedinthewritingsofAhmetAdnan Saygun’s“TurkHalkMusikisindePentatonism”,MahmutRagipGazimihal’s“Turk Halk Muziklerinin Kokeni Meselesi, Turk Halk Muziklerinin Tonal Hususiyetleri Meselesi” and Ferruh Arsunar’s “Anadolunun Pentatonik Melodileri Hakkynda BirkacNot”.

In theseworks and inthe researchconductedbythese writersindicated above, the pentatonic characterofTurkish melodies wasconfirmed and thusprovided the basisforresearchto follow.However,researchofthissubjecthasnotbeen pursued subsequenttotheabovementionedworks.

Folksongswithpentatoniccharacteristicswere found in Tunceli-Pertek, Erzu- rum, Elazyg, Kutahya, Canakkale, Rize, Trabzon, Erzincan-Egin and Balykesir re- gions. The sum ofthese constitutes a completely differentstyle fromothers. Ifwe hadafewpentatonicsampleswewouldhavethoughtthistobeanexception.

The number ofthe pentatonic songs proves the linktoAsian musical culture.

The pentatonic found in therepertory ofKazan and Siberian Turksconfirms that they share a commonAsianculture. In Hungarian music, pentatonic scales have a descending character. From this point of view the connection between Asian- Anatolian andEuropeanpentatonicismisimportantforTurkishmusichistory.

Inthisthesis Isearched forTurkishfolksongs fromTurkey, Idil-Ural, and the

“Tataristan-Baskurdistan-Cuvasistan” regions. The songs of Erzincan-Center dis- trict are compared from the perspectiveofhistory, artand science. Until now,this subjecthas beenresearchedinliteratureand languagestudies,butnotwithina mu- sicalframework. Ihaveprepared thisthesisfor thisreasonto contributeto musical studiesandreinstatelostculturalvaluesoftheTurkishworld.

In our research, we find the pentatonic scale as (1+1+1 V2+I+I+I Vi) and (1 У2+1+1+1 У2+1) formulas. Although it may be possible to create a five-note scaleby removingtwonotesfrom aheptatonicscale, thisdoesnotconstitutea true pentatonicscale.Itisbettertodefinepentatonicismasafive-notescalethatcontains nosemi-tones.

IhaveprovedthatsomeballadshavepentatonicscalesintheErzincanregionby usingthereductionmethod.Theanalysisofballadmelodyis madebythereduction method, whichisappliedbyignoringtheunimportantnotesbyreplacing themwith essentialnotes.Thismethodisappliedwith:

a) Melody,

b) ReducedMelody, c) EssentialMelody.

Essential melodyisformedbyconsideringtheimportanceofnotes.Twoballads fromeachregionErzincan-CentralTownandIdil-Uralhavebeenanalysedbyapply- ing reduction method. Sound scales are asfollows, and unitvalue per note in the balladisestimatedVie(£,)•

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Erzincan-Central Town

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Erzincan-Cenlral Town

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Don Béri Hey Ademoglu Sound Scale 6. degree missing Half pentatonic

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