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Muwashshah or muwaššah (Arabic: ?????, literally "girdled"; plural muwashshahat ???????? or tawashih ??????) is an Arabic poetic
Arabic poetry

Arabic poetry is the earliest form of Arabic literature. Our present knowledge of poetry in Arabic dates from the 6th century, but oral poetry is believed to predate that....
 form, as well as a secular musical genre in the eastern part
Mashriq

Mashriq or Mashreq is derived from the Arabic consonantal root sh-r-q relating to the east or the sunrise, and essentially means "east" ....
 of the Arab world
Arab world

The Arab World refers to Arabic-speaking countries stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the east, and from the Mediterranean Sea in the north to the Horn of Africa and the Indian Ocean in the southeast....
 using muwaššah texts as lyrics. The poetic form is also used in Andalusi nubah
Andalusi nubah

Andalusi nubah is a musical musical genre found in the North African Maghreb states of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya but, as the name indicates, of Spanish origin....
 which similarly originates in Al-Andalus
Al-Andalus

Al-Andalus was the Arabic name given to the parts of the Iberian Peninsula governed by Arab Muslims, at various times in the period between 711 and 1492....
 (Muslim Spain). It is a multi-lined strophic verse poem written in classical Arabic
Classical Arabic

Classical Arabic , also known as Qur'anic or Koranic Arabic, is the form of the Arabic language used in literary texts from Umayyad Caliphate and Abbasid Caliphate times ....
, usually consisting of five stanzas.






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Muwashshah or muwaššah (Arabic: ?????, literally "girdled"; plural muwashshahat ???????? or tawashih ??????) is an Arabic poetic
Arabic poetry

Arabic poetry is the earliest form of Arabic literature. Our present knowledge of poetry in Arabic dates from the 6th century, but oral poetry is believed to predate that....
 form, as well as a secular musical genre in the eastern part
Mashriq

Mashriq or Mashreq is derived from the Arabic consonantal root sh-r-q relating to the east or the sunrise, and essentially means "east" ....
 of the Arab world
Arab world

The Arab World refers to Arabic-speaking countries stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the east, and from the Mediterranean Sea in the north to the Horn of Africa and the Indian Ocean in the southeast....
 using muwaššah texts as lyrics. The poetic form is also used in Andalusi nubah
Andalusi nubah

Andalusi nubah is a musical musical genre found in the North African Maghreb states of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya but, as the name indicates, of Spanish origin....
 which similarly originates in Al-Andalus
Al-Andalus

Al-Andalus was the Arabic name given to the parts of the Iberian Peninsula governed by Arab Muslims, at various times in the period between 711 and 1492....
 (Muslim Spain). It is a multi-lined strophic verse poem written in classical Arabic
Classical Arabic

Classical Arabic , also known as Qur'anic or Koranic Arabic, is the form of the Arabic language used in literary texts from Umayyad Caliphate and Abbasid Caliphate times ....
, usually consisting of five stanzas. It was customary to open with one or two lines which matched the second part of the poem in rhyme and meter. In North Africa poets ignore the strict rules of Arabic meter while the poets in the East follow them.

Musical genre

Musically, the ensemble consists of ud
UD

Nissan Diesel Motor Co., Ltd. or UD is a Japanese company whose principal business is the manufacture and sales of diesel engines , light, medium and heavy duty diesel trucks, buses, bus chassis and special-purpose vehicles....
 (lute
Lute

Lute can refer generally to any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back, or more specifically to an instrument from the family of European lutes....
), kamanja (spike fiddle), qanun
Kanun (Instrument)

The qan?n or kanun is a string instrument found in Near Eastern traditional music based on Maqamat. It is basically a zither with a narrow trapezoidal soundboard....
 (box zither), darabukkah (goblet drum
Goblet drum

The goblet drum is a goblet shaped hand drum used mostly in Israeli music, Arabic music, Assyrian music, Persian music, Balkan music, Culture of Greece, Armenian music, Azeri music and Turkish music....
), and daf
DAF

DAF may refer to:* Daf, a percussive instrument* D.A.F. , a song by Powderfinger* DAF Bus, a Netherlands-based bus builder now known as VDL Bus International...
 (tambourine
Tambourine

The tambourine or Marine is a musical instrument of the Percussion instrument family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zils"....
), all of which often perform as the choir. The soloist performs only a few chosen lines of the selected text. In Aleppo
Aleppo

Aleppo is a city in northern Syria, capital of the Aleppo Governorate; the Governorate extends around the city for over 16,000 km? and has a population of 4,393,000, making it the largest Governorate in Syria by population....
 multiple maqam
Arabic maqam

Arabic maqam is the system of mode used in traditional Arabic music, which is mainly melodic music. The word maqam in Arabic means place, location or rank....
 rows and up to three awzan
Wazn

In Arab music a wazn is a rhythmic pattern or cycle, literally translated as "measure " .A wazn is only used in musical genres with a fixed rhythmic-temporal organization including recurring measures, motif , and metre or pulse ....
 are used and modulation to neighboring maqamat was possible during the B section. Until modernization it was typical to present a complete waslah
Waslah

A waslah is a suite in Arabic music. It comprises eight or more movements such as muwashshah, taqsim, layali, mawwal, qasida, dawr, sama'i, Pesrev, dulab, and popular songs....
, or up to eight successive muwaššah including an instrumental introduction (sama'i
Sama'i

Sama'i is a genre of instrumental Ottoman classical music. Along with the pesrev , it was introduced into Arabic music in the 19th century, and became particularly popular in Egypt....
 or bashraf
Pesrev

Pesrev , Pisrev , peshrev, or pishrev is an instrumental form in Turkish classical music. It is the name of the first piece of music played during a group performance called a fasil ....
). It may end with a longa
Longa (Middle Eastern music)

A longa is a genre in Turkish music that was adapted from the Romani music of Eastern Europe in the late 1800s. It was later adopted in Arabic music and is often performed at the end of a muwashshah....
.

History

Examples of muwaššah start to appear as early as the ninth or tenth century CE. The full sense of the word is not clear, though it appears to be related to the word for a type of double-banded ornamental belt, the wišah. Interpretations differ, and according to one authority, "Since it was held together by the concluding line as by a belt, and written down the visual effect was of a chain belt, it was called muwaššah 'girdled' poem."

Bibliography

  • Corriente, Federico (1997). Poesía dialectal árabe y romance en Alandalús: cejeles y xarajat de muwassahat. Madrid: Gredos. ISBN 8424918878.
  • Emery, Ed (2006). Muwashshah: proceedings of the Conference on Arabic and Hebrew Strophic Poetry and its Romance Parallels, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), London, 8-10 October 2004. London: RN Books.
  • Jones, Alan (1987). Romance Kharjas in Andalusian Arabic Muwassah poetry: a palaeographic analysis. London: Ithaca. ISBN 0863720854.
  • Jones, Alan & Hitchcock, Richard (1991). Studies on the Muwassah and the Kharja: proceedings of the Exeter international colloquium. Reading: Published by Ithaca for the Board of the Faculty of Oriental Studies, Oxford University. ISBN 0863721508.
  • Zwartjes, Otto (1997). Love songs from al-Andalus: history, structure, and meaning of the kharja. Leiden: Brill. ISBN 9004106944.
  • Zwartjes, Otto & Heijkoop, Henk (2004). Muwassah, zajal, kharja: bibliography of eleven centuries of strophic poetry and music from al-Andalus and their influence on East and West. Leiden-Boston: Brill. ISBN 9004138226.


Source

  • Touma, Habib Hassan (1996). The Music of the Arabs, trans. Laurie Schwartz. Portland, Oregon: Amadeus Press. ISBN 0931340888.


See also

  • Aljamiado
    Aljamiado

    Aljamiado texts are manuscripts which utilize the Arabic alphabet for transcribing Romance languages such as Mozarabic language or Ladino language....
  • The kharja
    Kharja

    The kharja , also known as jarcha in Spanish language, is the final refrain of a muwashshah, a lyric genre of Al-Andalus written in Classical Arabic or Hebrew languages....
     is the final stanza of a muwaššah, of which a few are in the Mozarabic language
    Mozarabic language

    Mozarabic was a dialect continuum of closely related Romance languages spoken in Al-Andalus during the early stages of the Iberian Romance languages....
     and therefore the first attesting of an Iberian Romance language and first written examples of the Castilian
    Castilian

    Castilian is a noun and adjective that refers to the region and former kingdom of Castile in Spain; in particular, it may refer to a Castilian people of Castile or to the language of this region, and is therefore considered by many to be a synonym of Spanish language, though with different nuances....
     language.
  • Emilio García Gómez
    Emilio García Gómez

    Emilio Garc?a G?mez was a Spain Arabist, literary historian and critic, whose talent as a poet enriched his many translations from Arabic language....
  • James T. Monroe
    James T. Monroe

    James T. Monroe is an USA scholar. He is emeritus professor of Arabic and Comparative Literature at the University of California, Berkeley, focusing on Classical Arabic Literature and Al-Andalus Literature....
  • Waslah
    Waslah

    A waslah is a suite in Arabic music. It comprises eight or more movements such as muwashshah, taqsim, layali, mawwal, qasida, dawr, sama'i, Pesrev, dulab, and popular songs....
  • Fasil
    Fasil

    The fasil is a suite in Ottoman classical music. It is similar to the Arabic Andalusi nawba and waslah.A fasil generally includes movements such as taqsim, pesrev, sarki, Beste , Kar , agir sem?'?, y?r?k sem?'?, gazel and saz sem?'?, played continuously without interludes and interconnecte...