Inside Arabic Music: Arabic Maqam

Performance and Theory in the 20th

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Inside Arabic Music
Inside Arabic Music

A R A B I C M A QA M P E R F O R M A N C E A N D T H E O R Y

I N T H E 2 0 T H C E N T U RY

Johnny Farraj and Sami Abu Shumays

1
1
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Paperback printed by WebCom, Inc., Canada

Hardback printed by Bridgeport National Bindery, Inc., United States of America
This book is dedicated to our wives, Maria Hantzopoulos and Robin Shumays.
Contents

Preface xix
Acknowledgments xxv
Approach to Music Theory xxix
A Note on Transliteration and Spelling xxxi

Introduction 1
The Golden Age of Arabic Music 2
The Arabic Maqam 4
The Wider Maqam Phenomenon 5
Oral Transmission 6
A Vocal Tradition 6
A Communal Character 7
Listening and Readiness 8
Standards of Formality 9

1. Melodic Instruments 12
The Two Clans: Melodic and Percussion 12
The Melodic Families: Sahb and Naqr 14
Intonation Precision 15
Traditional Arabic Instruments 16
The ʻUd 16
The Qanun 19
The Nay 22
The Arabic Violin 25
The Buzuq 27
Folk Melodic Instruments 29

vii
viii Contents
2. Arabized Instruments 32
The Selective 24-​Tone ET Scale 33
The Arabic Accordion 34
The Arabic Org 36
The Arabic Keyboard 38
The Arabic Piano 40
The Arabic Electric Guitar 41
The Arabic Trumpet 43
The Arabic Saxophone 45

3. Percussion Instruments 47
Skin Tuning 47
The Daff 49
The Egyptian Mazhar 51
The Riqq 51
The Tabla 54
The Tabl Baladi 56
The Katim 57
The Sajat 58
The Drum Set 59
Electronic Percussion 60
Combining Percussion Instruments 61

4. Ensembles 63
The Takht 63
The Midsize Ensemble 64
The Arabic Orchestra 66
The Raqs Sharqi Orchestra 67
The Arabic Pop Ensemble 67
Hybrid Songs and Ensembles 68
Backing Vocalists 69
Arabic Choirs 70
Signaling 70
The Conductor 72
Tuning an Ensemble 74

5. Ornamentation 76
Ornamentation Techniques 77
Variation Among Regions and Time Periods 79
Learning Ornamentation 79
 Contents ix
Establishing New Ornamentation Traditions 80
Vocal Ornamentation 81
Repetition 82
Heterophony 84
Notating Ornamentation 85

6. Rhythm 87
Building Blocks 88
Clapping and Vocalizing 89
Vocalizing Rests 90
Shorthand Notation 90
Notating Iqa‘at 91
Interpreting Iqa‘at 93
Ornamenting Iqa‘at 95
Timing Subtleties 96
Managing Tempo 97
Rhythmic Modulation 98
Rhythmic Heterophony 99
Melody and Iqa‘ 100
Percussion Solos 101
Contemporary Issues 102

7. A Sampling of Arabic Iqa‘at 104

Cataloging Iqa‘at 104
Iqa‘ Ayyub () 105
Iqa‘ Malfuf () 106
Iqa‘ Karachi () 106
Iqa‘ Fox () 106
Iqa‘ Wahda Saghira () 107
Iqa‘ Fallahi () 107
Iqa‘ Maqsum () 107
Iqa‘ Baladi (Masmudi Saghir) () 108
Iqa‘ Sa‘idi () 108
Iqa‘ Katakufti (Nawari) () 109
Iqa‘ Zaffa () 109
Iqa‘ Hacha‘ (, ,  , or ) 109
Iqa‘ Wahda () 111
Iqa‘ Wahda wi Nuss () 111
Iqa‘ Rumba () 112
x Contents

Iqa‘ Ciftetelli ( or ) 112

Iqa‘ Wahda Sunbati (Wahda Tawila) () 113
Iqa‘ Masmudi Kabir () 113
Iqa‘ Bambi () 114
Iqa‘ Sama‘i Darij () 114
Iqa‘ Sama‘i Saraband (Sama‘i Ta’ir) ( ) 115
Iqa‘ Aqsaq Turki (Thurayya) () 115
Iqa‘ Yuruk Semai () 115
Iqa‘ Sudasi () 116
Iqa‘ Dawr Hindi () 116
Iqa‘ Nawakht () 117
Iqa‘ Aqsaq () 117
Iqa‘ Sama‘i Thaqil () 118
Iqa‘ Jurjina ( ) 118
Iqa‘ ‘Awis ( ) 119
Iqa‘ Mudawwar (  ) 119

Iqa‘ Dharafat () 119
Iqa‘ Murabba‘ ( )
 120
Iqa‘ Muhajjar () 120
Iqa‘ Mukhammas ( ) 121
Iqa‘ Khosh Rang () 121
Iqa‘ Fakhit (  ) 121
Iqa‘ Sittatu ‘Ashar Masri (  ) 122
8. Song Forms 123
The Composed Qasida 123
The Muwashshah 125
The Qadd 129
The Dawr 130
The Taqtuqa 133
The Ughniya (Long-​Song) 134
The Monologue 136
The Duet 136
The Wasla 137
The Maqam in Composed Forms 139

9. Instrumental Forms 141

Ottoman Instrumental Composed Forms 141
The Sama‘i 142
The Bashraf 143
 Contents xi
The Longa 144
Arabic Instrumental Composed Forms 145
The Sama‘i Darij 145
The Dulab 146
The Tahmila 147
The Maqtu‘a 148
The Muqaddima 149

10. Arrangement 150

Arrangers 150
Arrangement Approaches 151
Instrumentation 152
Droning 153
Melodic Iqa‘at 154
Harmony 156
Ornamenting Using Harmony 156
Harmony on Traditional Instruments 157
Counterpoint in the Dawr 158
Harmonic Arabic Music 159
Polyphony with Maqam-​Based Music 160

11. Tuning System 161

The Arbitrariness of the Scale 161
Arabic Scales 165
The Prototypal Maqam Rast Scale 166
Level of Detail 166
The Historic 24-​Tone Arabic Scale 168
Documenting the 24-​Tone Arabic Scale 169
The Gap Between Theory and Practice 170
Regional Variations 172
Period Variations 173
Variations Among Maqamat 173
Phrasing Variations 174
Defining Correct Intonation 174
Microtonality 176
Modern Arabic Tuning 176

12. Notation 179

Adopting Western Notation 180
Extending Western Notation 181
Obsolete Symbols 182
xii Contents
The Quartertone 182
Fine-​Tuning Symbols 183
Tonal Interval Symbols 183
Key Signatures 184
Reading Arabic Notation 185
Notating for Multiple Instruments 186
Notating Arabic Lyrics 186
Sheet Music 187
Transcribing Arabic Music 188
Notation Versus Memorization 189
The Impact of Adopting Western Notation 190

13. The Jins 192

The Basic Melodic Unit 192
Interval Structure 194
The Tonic 195
The Leading Tone 195
The Ghammaz 196
Size of a Jins 197
Extended Jins Scale 198
Ajnas and Tetrachords 199
The Standard Tonic 201
Transposition 201
Identity of a Jins 202

14. The Most Common Ajnas 204

The Nine Most Common Ajnas 205
Characteristics of a Jins 206
Jins Rast 207
Jins Nahawand 209
Jins Nikriz 211
Jins ‘Ajam 213
Jins Bayati 215
Jins Hijaz 217
Jins Kurd 219
Jins Saba 221
Jins Sikah 223

15. Less Common Ajnas 226

Jins Jiharkah 227
Jins Sazkar 230
 Contents xiii
Jins Musta‘ar 232
Jins Nahawand Murassa‘ 234
Jins Athar Kurd 236
Jins Saba Zamzam 238
Jins Lami 239

16. Newly Classified Ajnas 241

Tonicization 241
Jins Versus Accidental Modification 242
Jins Upper Rast 243
Jins Upper ‘Ajam 245
Jins Saba Dalanshin 248
Jins Hijazkar 250
Jins Sikah Baladi 252
Jins Mukhalif Sharqi 255
Jins Hijaz Murassa‘ 257
Jins ‘Ajam Murassa‘ 258
Jins Semitonal Sikah 260
Other Melodic Entities 263
Saba Buselik 263
Husayni 263
The 5th Scale Degree of Sikah 263
Hijaz Gharib 264
Athar Bayati 264
Nahawand on the 5th Degree of Rast 264
Raised 3rd Degree in Nahawand 265

17. The Maqam 266

What Is a Maqam? 267
Jins-​to-​Jins Motions 269
Finding the Right Metaphor 276
The Staircase 277
The Chain 277
The Tree with Branches 277
The Subway Map 278
The House with Rooms 278
The Network 279
Modulation 282
Sayr 283
xiv Contents
18. The Maqam Scale 286
The Maqam Scale 286
The Standard Tonic 287
Transposition 287
Chaining Ajnas 288
Octave Equivalence 291
Maqam Families 293

19. Modulation 297

A Modulation Analogy 298
Jins Modulation Techniques 300
First Technique: Altering Intervals 300
Second Technique: Changing the Tonic 301
Combining Jins Modulation Techniques 303
The Mid-​Jins Switch 303
Exploiting Overlapping Ajnas 304
Accidentals and Modulation Hints 305
Jins Pairs 305
Transitional Melodies 306
Jins Versus Maqam Modulation 307
Modulating to a New Maqam 309
Maqam Modulations in the Long-​Song Genre 310
Tradition Versus Innovation 312

20. Sayr 314

Documented Sayr 316
Problems in Documenting Sayr 317
Sayr in the Oral Tradition 319
Notes of Melodic Emphasis 320
The Tonic 320
The Octave 320
The Leading Tone 320
The Ghammaz 321
Other Notes 321
Intonation and Jins Alterations 322
Melodic Phrasing 323
A New Understanding of Sayr 324
Sayr as a Subnetwork 326
Interpolation 328
 Contents xv
Sayr of a Jins 328
Sayr and Maqam Family 330

21. The Taqsim 334

A Modal Improvisation 335
The Fashion of a Time and Place 335
Virtuosity 336
Finding One’s Voice 337
Uses of a Taqsim 338
The Solo Instrumental Taqsim 338
As an Introduction to a Piece 339
In the Middle of a Piece 339
As a Transition Between Pieces 340
Anatomy of a Taqsim 341
Tashwiq 343
The Qafla 344
Taqasim on the Beat 345

22. Vocal Improvisation 348

The Layali 349
The Mawwal 350
Mawwal Recordings 351
The Improvised Qasida 353
Getting in the Mood 354
Improvising a Cappella 354
The Short Mawwal During a Song 356
Iqa‘at Used in the Mawwal and Qasida 357
Tarjama: The Art of Translation 357
Tarjama Instrumentation 359
Tarjama, Sayr, and Saltana 360
Translation as a Metaphor 361

23. Tarab 362

The Tarab Genre of Music 363
Tarab and the Maqam 364
The Tarab Arc 365
Tarab in the Maqam Structure 366
Performers and Listeners 367
Expressing Tarab 368
Saltana 368
xvi Contents
24. Maqam Index 371
Classification 371
Maqamat in Use 373
Maqam Rast Family 377
Maqam Rast 377
Maqam Kirdan/​Maqam Sazkar 380
Maqam Suznak 381
Maqam Nairuz (Yakah) 381
Maqam Dalanshin 382
Maqam Suzdalara 383
Maqam Mahur 384
Maqam Bayati Family 385
Maqam Bayati 385
Maqam Bayati Shuri 386
Maqam Husayni 387
Maqam Sikah Family 388
Maqam Huzam/​Maqam Rahat al-​Arwah 388
Maqam Sikah 389
Maqam ‘Iraq 389
Maqam Bastanikar 390
Maqam Awj ‘Iraq 391
Maqam Musta‘ar 392
Maqam Hijaz Family 393
Maqam Hijaz 393
Maqam Hijazkar (and Its Transpositions) 394
Maqam Zanjaran 395
Maqam Nahawand Family 396
Maqam Nahawand 396
Maqam Nahawand Murassa‘ 397
Maqam ‘Ushshaq Masri 398
Maqam Nikriz Family 399
Maqam Nikriz 399
Maqam Nawa Athar 400
Maqam Athar Kurd 401
Maqam Kurd Family 401
Maqam Kurd 401
Maqam Hijazkar Kurd 403
Maqam Kurd (1950s Expansion) 404
Maqam ‘Ajam Family 405
 Contents xvii
Maqam ‘Ajam (Egyptian Version) 405
Maqam Shawq Afza 406
Maqam ‘Ajam ‘Ushayran 406
Maqam Saba 407
Other Maqamat 409
Maqam Saba Zamzam 409
Maqam Lami 410
Maqam Jiharkah 411
Maqam Sikah Baladi 411

Afterword : A Word of Caution 413

Glossary 419
References 427
Index 433
Preface

I have been listening to Arabic music all my life. Ironically, I only started passion-
ately studying and performing it after I left my native Lebanon to live in the United
States. When I began my journey as an Arab musician in 1998, I searched hard for
a good introductory book on Arabic music theory and performance. Although
I found quite a few books covering various aspects of Arabic music both in Arabic
and English, none of them met my needs, for multiple reasons.
The books I found in English were by and large academic, and while they serve
an important purpose in that realm, they were written in a formal style and lan-
guage that made that rich and complex subject difficult for nonacademics to digest.
Some academic books were thorough to a fault with their research—​listing all pos-
sible (and sometimes contradictory, inconsistent, or out-​of-​date) narratives side by
side before drawing their conclusions—​and some relied more on written references
and less on personal performance/​learning experience. Finally, many of the English
books only covered a narrow subtopic in Arabic music (e.g., singer Umm Kulthum,
tarab) or one region (e.g., the music of Egypt, Syria, or Palestine), and even those
with wider coverage still did not include the broad range of topics that I needed to
learn as a beginner musician.
Books in Arabic had their shortcomings, too, as they were either too focused on
a narrow topic (e.g., the Arabic maqam or the muwashshah genre), too theoretical,
too focused on history rather than performance, or too out of date in their con-
tent. Many were out of print or were extremely hard to find in a bookstore. Another
xix
xx Preface
problem with the Arabic books is that although written by Arab music practitioners
and subject matter experts, they were published in different parts of the Arab world
at different periods, and as a result they did not all agree when it came to theory (a
state of affairs that unavoidably trickled back into the English references previously
mentioned).
In order to immerse myself in Arabic music, I started studying the oud with
Palestinian ‘ud virtuoso Simon Shaheen, then attended the Arabic Music Retreat’s
intensive summer program for six consecutive years and studied the riqq, the ‘ud,
voice, and maqam theory. At the same time, I started performing regularly with
other Arab musicians in commercial venues, theaters, museums, and universities,
as well as in private jam sessions. By then, most of the practical knowledge I had ac-
quired was handed down orally from more experienced musicians, and only a small
portion was acquired from written sources. In parallel, I collected a huge archive of
Arabic music recordings and spent many years extensively and attentively listening
to the rich repertoire of traditional Arabic music from the mid-​20th century.
My first attempt to fill the gap for an introductory Arabic music reference in
English was made in the early 2000s, by building MaqamWorld.com, a website that
covers Arabic music theory and performance and focuses on the Arabic maqam (the
system of scales that traditional/​classical Arabic music is based on). While it was
relatively concise, it was rich in audio samples and explained the material in English
using simple language and a very down-​to-​earth pedagogical approach. The web-
site proved to be hugely popular and filled an obvious gap in online Arabic music
resources. MaqamWorld quickly became the de facto Internet reference for Arabic
music and maqam theory. In 2016, MaqamWorld was the recipient of a grant from
the Arab Fund for Arts and Culture (AFAC) in the research, training, and regional
(RTR) events category.
During that period, I frequently performed with my friend, violinist Sami Abu
Shumays, with whom I also engaged in many discussions on Arabic maqam theory
and musical practice. Abu Shumays was also one of the contributors to MaqamWorld
as a music theory consultant and the performer of the violin maqam scale audio
samples.
On a parallel track, Abu Shumays started developing his MaqamLessons.com web-
site in 2006–​2007, then published two papers on Arabic music theory: “Intonation
in Maqam: Using Arabic Music as a Lens for Music and Language Cognition,” pre-
sented at the 2009 Annual Conference of the Society for Ethnomusicology, and
“Maqam Analysis: A Primer” (Music Theory Spectrum 35, no. 2 [Fall 2013]). At his
website and in his papers, Abu Shumays introduced a new approach to describing
Arabic music theory by starting from the aural repertoire and analyzing it in order
 Preface xxi
to arrive at the best-​suited theory, rather than relying on existing theory(ies) to ret-
roactively explain the behavior in the repertoire.
Having seen the wide appeal that MaqamWorld had among Arabic musicians,
I decided to turn it into an introductory book that covers Arabic music theory
and performance in much more detail. I set out to write a general readership book
that could become the definitive Arabic music primer for musicians and listeners
alike—​in short, the book that I wish had existed when I started learning Arabic
music almost twenty years ago. I started working on this book project in 2008,
in my spare time. But while the performance chapters (dealing with instruments,
forms, ornamentation, arrangement, improvisation, and tarab) flowed effortlessly
by drawing from my own performance experience, the theory chapters (dealing with
jins, maqam, intonation, modulation, and sayr) were more difficult to write because
I had to reconcile a lot of existing inconsistent and archaic material, both in written
references and in the oral body of knowledge.
Meanwhile, Abu Shumays’s work was gaining momentum among the music
theory community as it brought a much-​needed modernizing view to specific topics
that have long been inconsistently defined. Among them, for example, is the size of a
jins (maqam scale fragment) and its corollary issues: chaining of ajnas, octave equiv-
alence, and the size of a maqam scale. His approach also challenged the widespread
Greek tetrachord model and introduced a new view of jins and maqam that is much
more consistent with the way Arabic music is performed in practice.
Abu Shumays and I had engaged in ongoing conversations about the gap between
traditional Arabic music theory and musical performance practice, and he frequently
introduced his new ideas to me and asked for my feedback as a practitioner and the-
orist. As an example of this gap, one of our pet peeves was the obsession in Arabic
music theory with measuring the precise intonation of every note in every maqam
scale, a feat that had been attempted at the 1932 Cairo Arabic Music Congress and
had failed miserably. To highlight how misguided that idea was, Abu Shumays and
I recorded a podcast in 2007 in which we demonstrated the wide range of possible
intonations for some notes.
Given that background, I felt that Abu Shumays was the obvious choice for a col-
laborator on the book, and I invited him to work on the project, initially as a music
content editor, and later as a coauthor for the theory chapters, as well as a reviewer/​
content editor for the performance chapters. His role continued to expand as we
worked together; he is in fact the lead author for the content in the maqam theory
chapters, which by and large reflect his own innovations in understanding maqam,
and he provided numerous important insights and wrote additional sections in
other chapters as well. He partnered with me in figuring out the overall structure,
content, and tone of the book. But more than any specific contribution, this book
xxii Preface
reflects in many ways the nearly two-​decades-​long dialogue the two of us have had
about Arabic music.
In order to maintain the emphasis on the oral performance tradition as a primary
source for the book’s material, I invited my friend, Syrian violinist Dr. Samer Ali, to
contribute with research, fact checking, and musical content editing on the perfor-
mance chapters. Dr. Ali brought a vast knowledge of traditional Arabic music (espe-
cially the Aleppan tradition), poetry, and language, acquired in Syria through years
of study, listening, and performance.
The result is a book that draws heavily on the body of knowledge learned and
transmitted orally among musicians and relies only minimally on references. In most
cases where references are cited/​quoted, this is done to illustrate issues with the tra-
ditional understanding of Arabic music theory and to present an alternative view.
This is consistent with the fact that most Arabic musicians acquire most of their
knowledge orally, through years of communal experience, not by reading about it.
This book’s pedagogy aims to put complex and detailed subjects within reach of
a general readership, and the book’s language and style are tailored accordingly. For
this reason, only a handful of Arabic terms are used as is (without translation), while
remaining terms and concepts are bridged to the realm of the Western reader using
appropriate translations, metaphors, examples, and anecdotes.
Given how rich and diverse Arabic music is, this book is certainly not compre-
hensive. It does not cover every genre of Arabic music; every single instrument used;
or every famous singer, composer, or instrumentalist, and it certainly doesn’t cover
every maqam from the many regions of the Arab world. The primary bias of this
book is maqam-​based music that was practiced in the Eastern Mediterranean region
(Syria though Egypt) from the 1930s to the 1960s (a period referred to as the Golden
Age of Arabic Music). This is the repertoire that we the authors are experts in and
have listened to and performed extensively over decades, and as such the material
presented here is based on our firsthand expertise, rather than on researching mate-
rial that we are less familiar with.
In recognition of the book project’s cultural dimension and potential impact,
it was awarded a grant in 2012 from AFAC in the RTR category, which includes
studies in cultural and artistic fields, and cultural documentation.
Among authors who have covered the subject of Arabic music in great depth,
Dr. Scott L. Marcus’s scholarship deserves an extra mention here. Based on our sub-
sequent review of his work, we find that he has documented thoroughly and clearly
the whole scope of oral concepts of maqam theory, matching what we learned from
our teachers over the years. As he points out repeatedly, he found an enormous gap
between theory and practice, and his scholarship is predicated on filling that gap
 Preface xxiii
with the theoretical knowledge and concepts known to musicians, most of which
have not made it into formal theory.
In that regard, we are in agreement with his conclusions, and his review of this
book’s proposal and manuscript has helped us to clarify the ways our conclusions are
distinct from or additional to those. Fundamentally, we find that the rich oral theory
of maqam he successfully presents nevertheless contains contradictions and incon-
sistencies and lacks a comprehensive rationale or explanation for why the music
is as it is. This is where our project has been to expand upon that knowledge, by
attempting to reconcile contradictions, and to provide a comprehensive new theory
accounting for the maqam system as a whole. It is not that we find the oral concepts
of maqam theory to be fundamentally wrong—​either as learned from our teachers
or as documented by Marcus since 1989—​but that we find the theory incomplete.
We have made an attempt to add to what we inherited in the pages that follow.
Johnny Farraj
New York, February 2018
Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to Dr. Anne K. Rasmussen for reading the manuscript,
providing feedback and encouragement, and introducing us to Oxford University
Press; Dr. Samer Ali for his research, fact checking, and musical content editing;
Kay Campbell, director of the Arabic Music Retreat, for reading the manuscript
and providing detailed, honest feedback, support, and guidance; Dr. Taoufiq Ben
Amor and Dr. Omar Dewachi for reading various parts of the manuscript and pro-
viding valuable feedback; Dr. Jonathan H. Shannon for his help with the Aleppan
repertoire and for lending us a beautiful Syrian qanun; Dr. Virginia Danielson for
her help with the Umm Kulthum discography; Dr. George Dimitri Sawa for helping
with translation and historical questions; Dr. Sean Williams for her invaluable help
with the book publishing process; Muhammad Qadri Dalal for his help with the
Aleppan repertoire; Kareem Roustom for answering many questions about Arabic
music theory, history, and performance, reviewing the manuscript, and lending us a
rare hard copy of Mikhail Allah Wirdi’s book; Bassel Kassem for supplying the au-
thor with an extensive archive of traditional Arabic music, including rare recordings;
Nicole Lecorgne for proofreading the rhythm and percussion instrument chapters
and providing tremendously helpful feedback; and Dennis Demakos for being an
important sounding board, over more than a decade, for the ideas on maqam pre-
sented here, and for educating us on the similarities and differences between the
maqamat practiced in Greek repertoires and those in our tradition.
We wish to thank Najib Shaheen for sharing his vast knowledge of the traditional
repertoire and practice; Dimitri Mikelis for contributing his wide experience in ar-
rangement and Byzantine music; George Ziadeh for sharing his insights on Arabic

xxv
xxvi Acknowledgments
music performance and notation; Amir Elsaffar for his expertise on the Arabic
trumpet; Karam Tannous for helping with Arabic terms and transliteration; Adel
Shams el-​Din and Faisal Zedan for their help with the definition of some Arabic
rhythmic cycles; Bridget Robbins and Dr. Fadi Bardawil for answering many ques-
tions about the nay and buzuq; Dr. Gaurav Shah for his vast knowledge of Indian
Ragas; Simon Moushabeck for his help with the Arabic accordion section; Zayid
el-​Baghdadi for his help with the nay section and the Arabized instruments chapter;
Zakaria al-​Khalil for providing an original copy of Salim al-​Hilu’s muwashshahat
book; Saed Muhssin for writing the maqam scale cheat sheet that became the nucleus
for MaqamWorld.com; Brian Prunka for answering questions about ‘ud tuning; and
Karim Nagi for his expert insight on the beautiful world of Arabic rhythms.
We are very grateful to Fouad Salloum for photographing his rich collection
of beautiful Arabic musical instruments for this book; Hanna Madbak, Esq., and
Hassan al-​Bakri, Esq., for their help with various legal aspects of the book publishing
contract; Josh Farrar for helping rewrite the OUP book proposal; Dr. Kamran
Rastegar for offering his insight into the book publishing world and helping with
translation of Persian words; Phaedon Sinis for his help with Greek music and lan-
guage specifics; Dr. Leyla Amzi for her help with Turkish/​Persian translations and
word origins; Karin Van der Tak for her help with copy editing questions and Arabic
transliteration standards; Dr. Dalia Basiouny, Ahmed Amer, and Sherif Sadek for
their help with the translations from colloquial Egyptian; Hossein Sharifi for his
help with translating Persian expressions; Ranya Renee Fleysher for helping with
belly dance–​related questions; and ‘ud maker Ibrahim Sukkar for being our gracious
host and guide in Aleppo and introducing us to musicians, teachers, and traditional
instrument craftsmen.
We wish to thank Simon Shaheen, along with his collaborators Dr. Ali Jihad Racy
and Kay Campbell, for creating the Arabic Music Retreat, which has sparked a re-
surgence of interest in Arabic music over the last two decades in the United States.
Simon was the first to expose both of us to the wonders of maqam, through the
retreat and private lessons. We would also like to thank Dr. Alfred Gamil, Dr. Ali
Jihad Racy, Dr. George Dimitri Sawa, Youssef Kassab, Bassam Saba, Rima Khcheich,
Michel Merhej Baklouk, Muhammad Qassas, Abd al-​Basit Bakkar, and Abd al-​
Min‘im Sinkary for all the lessons and instruction they gave us in this beautiful
art form.
We are grateful to have had the opportunity to perform this music with Zafer
Tawil, George Ziadeh, Amir ElSaffar, Tareq Abboushi, Rami El-​Aasser, Faisal Zedan,
Nezih Antakli, Ramzi El-​Edliby, Karim Nagi, Dr. Taoufiq Ben Amor, Dr. Marina
Rustow, Butrus Bishara, Brian Prunka, Bridget Robbins, Ghaida Hinnawi, Eden
Zane, Salma Habib, Ahmad Gamal, Lubana Al-​Quntar, Umut Yasmut, Dimitri
 Acknowledgments xxvii
Mikelis, Apostolos Sideris, John Murchison, Michael Ibrahim, Dena ElSaffar, Anne
Elise Thomas, Laura Harada, Beth Cohen, Nicole Lecorgne, Souren Baronian, Haig
Manoukian, Sinan Erdemsel, Wael Kakish, and many others. We are grateful to
Alwan For the Arts for having provided a space, an audience, and a community in
New York City for the appreciation of live Arabic music.
We are especially grateful to Rasha Salah, Cathy Khattar, and the 2012 grants
committee at AFAC, who believed in this project and decided to fund it. The AFAC
grant paid for essential editorial tasks like research, fact checking, indexing, jacket
design, and instrument photography.
We are also especially grateful to Dr. Scott Marcus for his thorough review of the
book proposal and manuscript and the dialogue he engaged in with us. Dr. Marcus
has done the most of any English-​language scholar to document the musical con-
cepts of practitioners of Arabic music, and as such was able to provide an incisive
and detailed critique of numerous points throughout the book. Most important,
he helped us to fill in many of the gaps in our review of the scholarly literature,
pointing out numerous instances where others had previously arrived at some of our
conclusions.
In this regard, we must all acknowledge Dr. Ali Jihad Racy, who laid the funda-
mental groundwork for modern scholarship on Arabic music in the United States.
We also wish to recognize the lifelong work and scholarship of Dr. George Dimitri
Sawa, Dr. Virginia Danielson, and Dr. Anne Rasmussen. Even though their direct
involvement in this book was limited in scope, their presence is felt throughout,
both through the defining contributions they have made to the field and through
their personal mentorship of the authors, which have helped us on our journeys.
Sami also wishes to acknowledge John Stewart, Ivan Tcherepnin, and Stephen Blum,
who contributed the most to his musical development and understanding before he
embarked on his journey with Arabic music.
We are grateful to Suzanne Ryan, our editor at Oxford University Press, as well as
Victoria Kouznetsov, Jamie Kim, Eden Piacitelli, Dorian Mueller, and the rest of the
OUP editorial team for believing in this book project from the start and for their
expertise, help, and support to make it a reality.
And last but not least, we are grateful to our wives, Dr. Maria Hantzopoulos and
Robin Shumays, for being totally patient and supportive in what ended up being an
all-​consuming, multi-​year labor of love. They made sure we stayed friends!
Approach to Music Theory

Inside Arabic Music is, in part, a book about music theory. Since our approach to
music theory is unconventional in a number of ways, it is useful to start with an
explanation of our perspective. As we view it, music theory is really two different
things: (1) the explicit conventions underlying a musical genre (descriptions of scales
and rhythmic cycles, rules of harmony or melodic motion, typical structures of var-
ious musical forms, etc.); and (2) the implicit structures as understood, often un-
consciously, by practicing musicians and listeners. This is as true of Arabic music
as it is of any other genre; it is also helpful to compare it with spoken language
here: there are explicit grammatical rules learned in the classroom, and there is im-
plicit grammar that exists in the language of speakers, whether or not they have ever
been in a classroom.
In the field of linguistics, it has long been recognized that the implicit grammar
of speakers is the actual object of study, because it is far richer, deeper, and broader
than explicit grammar (which is only the “tip of the iceberg” of language). We do not
find the analogous recognition to be tremendously widespread in the field of music
theory, however, and it is for that reason that we have taken a different path.
The approach taken in Inside Arabic Music is to articulate what we have under-
stood from the implicit structures of maqam-​based music, learned through decades
of immersion in the oral tradition and practice of the music we love so much. In
many cases, these observations contradict, or differ significantly from, the tradi-
tional conventions of Arabic music theory—​and we have not shied away from cri-
tiquing that theory where our practical observations point in a different direction.

xxix
xxx Approach to Music Theory
But in articulating the implicit structures underlying this music, we do not seek
to replace oral tradition. We recognize that none of the content that follows can
compare with the knowledge gained by musicians through practice and learning
repertoire by ear. Rather, we provide an outline of what that practice looks like. One
might reasonably ask: If we feel that practice is so much richer than explicit theory,
why publish a book at all?
The answer is that we do so in part to correct misconceptions that have arisen from
the misunderstandings within explicit theory, many of which have even infected what
remains of the community of practitioners. The contemporary understandings of
Arabic music theory have drawn from two significant sources: (1) the writings of an-
cient Greek music theorists, as (mis)understood and (mis)applied by medieval Arab
theorists and then passed down over the last millennium; and (2) the misconceptions
of Europeans, as forced upon modern Arabs in the colonial period and then adopted
by Arabs ourselves in our attempts to modernize and assimilate to Western culture.1
These misconceptions and misunderstandings range from issues of intonation, to
the rigid conception of the scale and the tetrachord, to the differences in types of for-
mality mentioned in the Introduction. We find that even master practicing musicians
repeat false descriptions of the music, which don’t even match what they themselves
are doing. So we have followed this principle: “Learn what they do, not what they say.”
These misconceptions obviously don’t get in the way of developing a deeper un-
derstanding of the music through oral tradition for those able to be immersed in it;
however, due to the decline of these traditions in their home countries (including
especially a decline in learning aurally), the spread of Arab musicians in a wider
diaspora, and the interest among non-​Arabs, these misconceptions are more dan-
gerous. In Western contexts in particular, where most musicians are used to learning
through notation and interpreting musical information through particular Western
frameworks, misunderstandings about what is really going on in the music can lead
the unfamiliar student down the wrong path. We are attempting to clear the bram-
bles from the beginning of the correct path, as it were.
This book promises to lead you “inside” Arabic music—​we take you under the
hood for a closer look at the engine and transmission and provide a practical guide
to how the parts fit together. In this analogy, the maqam theory we inherited is anal-
ogous to Newton’s Laws of Motion: having some truth to it, but not very useful in
terms of getting your hands dirty with the mechanics of automobiles. It is our hope
that by providing this more realistic “operation manual,” the reader will be moti-
vated to get behind the wheel and start driving!

1
Maalouf (2002) and Marcus (1989b).
A Note on Transliteration and Spelling

This book follows the Arabic transliteration system of the International Journal of
Middle East Studies (IJMES). As such, the Arabic letters ʻayn and hamza (the glottal
stop) are represented with the [ʻ] and [’] symbols, respectively. However, in order to
make it accessible to a wider, nonacademic readership, diacritical markings above
and below letters are omitted. Transliterated Arabic musical terms are italicized
throughout the book and listed individually in the glossary, along with their Arabic
spellings.
Arabic plurals are used as much as possible (e.g., maqam pl. maqamat, jins pl.
ajnas, bashraf pl. basharif), except when they are awkward for the reader, in which
case the English plural is used by adding an unitalicized “-​s” to end the Arabic word
(e.g., sayr pl. sayr-​s not suyur, tabl baladi pl. tabl baladi-​s not tubul baladiyya, buzuq
pl. buzuq-​s not buzuqat). In the case of multiple Arabic plurals, one plural is chosen
and used consistently (e.g. lazima pl. lazimat not lawazim).
Some proper names deviate from the IJMES system in order to reflect the most
common spelling used for artists who are already well-​documented in the Latin al-
phabet. The common spellings selected here will prove to be the most useful when
readers conduct online searches using an artist’s name (e.g., Abdel Halim Hafez
not ‘Abd al-​Halim Hafidh, Muhammad Abdel Wahab not Muhammad ‘Abd al-​
Wahhab, and Marcel Khalife not Marsil Khalifa). This is especially true for Arab
artists who live in the West or have already chosen their transliterations (e.g., Simon
Shaheen, Lotfi Bouchnak). Non-​Arabic proper names (e.g., Marie [ Jubran], Laure
[Daccache], and George Michel) are not transliterated.

xxxi
xxxii A Note on Transliteration and Spelling

Maqam names, jins names, iqaʻ names, and historic note names are treated as
proper names and as such are not italicized (e.g., Maqam Rast not maqam rast,
Jins ʻAjam not jins ʻajam, Iqaʻ Maqsum not iqaʻ maqsum, and the note Nawa not
nawa). As proper names, some of these names follow the most common spelling in
English, especially when these words are not Arabic in origin (e.g., Dukah, Sikah,
and Jiharkah not Duka, Sika, and Jiharka).
Colloquial Arabic words such as song titles, lyrics, and expressions rely less on the
IJMES standard and more on the phonetics of the word, as a whole new category
of vowels exists in colloquial Arabic, like “o,” “ei,” and “eh” besides the “a,” “u,” and
“i” in fusha. Colloquial pronunciation (e.g., the “g” Egyptian colloquial pronunci-
ation of letter “j”) is transliterated as it was recorded in musical works. This is espe-
cially true for lyrics used in transcribed music samples, as each Arabic syllable must
be aligned with its corresponding note(s) in the staff (e.g., yalla-gmaʻu not yalla
ijmaʻu). Vowels at the end of Arabic words (harakat and tanwin) in lyrics are spelled
out to match what is actually sung, for example, bayna qasiyunin not bayn qasiyun,
rihu-​s-​saba not rih al-​saba, and ash-​shamsu wa-​l-​qamaru not al-​shams wa al-​qamar.
Inside Arabic Music
IN T RO D UC T I ON

“Arabic music” collectively describes the wide range of musical traditions

and genres that originated and are performed in the Arab world. Any vocal music
with Arabic lyrics, and any instrumental music played predominantly on traditional
Arabic instruments, is considered Arabic.
As Arab countries extend from Morocco to Iraq and include hundreds of millions
of people, they are home to many diverse local traditions in the folk, pop, classical,
and religious genres. The broad musical regions within the Arab world are Iraq; the
Arab Gulf (al-​khalij); the Near East (al-​sharq,1 literally the East, spanning Egypt,
Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria); and North Africa (Libya, Tunisia, Algeria,
and Morocco), referred to as al-​maghrib (the West, literally the direction of the
sunset). Of course within each of these broad regions are subregions and many local
genres particular to them. A case in point is that entire books2 have been devoted to
the music of Egypt alone.
Moreover, Arabic music was not conceived by Arabs in isolation, but evolved
over many centuries in a region where old civilizations interacted. The Arab re-
gion extending from Egypt through Syria to Iraq was at the center of the old world,
and as Arabic music developed locally, it also incorporated regional elements from

1
A less commonly used synonym for al-​sharq is al-​mashriq, literally the direction of the sunrise.
2
Lagrange (1996); Marcus (2007).

1
2 Inside Arabic Music
neighboring Turkish, Byzantine, Persian, and Indian music, as well as, among oth-
ers, sub-​Saharan African indigenous music. What constitutes Arabic music today is
a hybrid amalgamation that has come to be accepted as one “ethnic” tradition. This
cultural cross-​fertilization wasn’t limited to music, of course, and also manifested
itself in, for example, language, architecture, and cuisine.
Given that a book covering the entire breadth of Arabic music would have to be
more general, this book covers only one Arabic musical tradition in depth: the tra-
dition that flourished in the Near East from the beginning of the 20th century until
roughly the 1970s, especially during the period that began in the 1930s, often called
the Golden Age of Arabic Music.

The Golden Age of Arabic Music

The Golden Age of Arabic music flourished from 1930 to 1970, in what today is
called the Near East, the geographical region spanning Syria to Egypt, with Cairo
as its epicenter. That period witnessed unparalleled musical growth, proliferation,
and innovation, and its music achieved a wide reach across the Arab world, initially
propelled by phonographic technology in the first decade of the 20th century and
later by radio, cinema, and eventually television. As a result, music from the Golden
Age traveled extremely well and became universal in the Arab world. For better or
for worse, the music of the Golden Age is often used as the single or the most prom-
inent representative of Arabic music, both in the Arab world and abroad.
The Golden Age came at the end of a cultural renaissance called al-​nahda (lit-
erally, “the awakening”), during which the Arab world reclaimed its identity from
Ottoman control, and Arabic music experienced a revival3 alongside Turkish/​
Ottoman music. The nahda era music practiced at the beginning of the 20th century
was largely a remnant of 19th-​century music, but it laid the foundation and paved
the way for the Golden Age.
In The Seven Greats of Contemporary Arabic Music, historian and ethnomusicolo-
gist Victor Sahhab (1987) credits seven musical pioneers with ushering in a new mu-
sical era that started in the early 20th century, explaining that “before them Arabic
music was one thing, and with them it became something else.”4 These pioneers
were Sayed Darwish (1892–​1923), Muhammad al-​Qasabgi (1892–​1966), Zakariyya
Ahmad (1896–​1961), Muhammad Abdel Wahab (c. 1902–​1991), Umm Kulthum

3
Marcus discusses the revival of Arabic music in Egypt in the 1800s as evidenced by the popularity
of Shihab al-​Din’s 1840 book Safinat al-​Mulk (The Royal Ship), which included 365 muwashshahat
arranged in thirty waslat (Marcus, 2015b, p. 136).
4
Sahhab (1987, p. 6).
 Introduction 3
(born Fatima Ibrahim al-​Sayyid al-​Biltagi, c. 1904–​1975), Riyad al-​Sunbati (1906–​
1981), and Asmahan (born Amal al-​Atrash, 1917–​1944).
Several factors enabled the Arabic music of the Golden Age to reach a critical
mass; the numbers of composers, singers, instrumentalists, listeners, and produc-
ers all grew, and they all fed on each other. The most prominent singers, compos-
ers, and performers from the Near East reached unprecedented heights of stardom
throughout these years. Egypt’s beloved diva Umm Kulthum (nicknamed kawkab
al-​sharq—​the Star of the East); Leila Mourad (born Lillian Zaki Mordechai, 1918–​
1995); Muhammad Abdel Wahab (nicknamed musiqar al-​ajyal—​the Musician of
Generations); Abdel Halim Hafez (born ‘Abd al-​Halim ‘Ali Shabbana,1929–​1977;
nicknamed al-​‘andalib al-​asmar—​the Tan Nightingale); Warda5 (born Warda
Fatuki, 1939–​2012; nicknamed al-​jaza’iriyya—​the Algerian, after her father’s na-
tionality); Syria’s Farid al-​Atrash (1915–​1974); Asmahan, Muhammad Khayri (born
Muhammad Khayr Julaylati, 1935–​1981); Sabah Fakhri (born Subhi Abu Qaws,
1933); and Lebanon’s Wadih al-​Safi (born Wadi‘ Francis, 1921–​2013), Sabah (born
Jeanette Feghali, 1927–​2014; nicknamed al-​shahrura after her native mountain
village of Wadi Shahrur), and Fairouz (born Nuhad Haddad, 1935) represented
the very best this era had to offer, and they contributed to the impressive canon
of Arabic music from that period. Umm Kulthum, whose career spanned over five
decades, embodied the music of the Golden Age so much that one could consider
the year of her death, 1975, synonymous with the end of that era.
The influence of European classical music in the region was evident well before
the Golden Age, as many Arab musicians were already using the violin to replace
indigenous varieties of spike fiddles. The Golden Age saw the introduction of more
Western instruments like the piano, the electric organ, the electric guitar, and the
double bass, and the influence of Western music continued to manifest itself through
the gradual move toward the standardization of Arabic scale intonations across dif-
ferent Arab regions; the gradual shift toward equal-​tempered tuning; the adoption
of the Western staff notation system; the increased use of harmony; the growth of
the traditional Arabic chamber group (the takht) to the size of a large orchestra; and
last but not least, the use of a conductor.
Perhaps the “Seven Greats’ ” most important achievement was to negotiate the
tremendous influence exerted by European Western music while remaining faithful
to the principles that gave Arabic music its character and had distinguished it for
centuries: an emphasis on vocal music, improvisation, and the Arabic maqam tra-
dition as a modal music framework. As such, this book’s coverage of Arabic music
focuses primarily on maqam-​based Arabic music from the Golden Age.

5
Warda was married to composer Baligh Hamdi from 1972 to 1979.
4 Inside Arabic Music
The Arabic Maqam

Arabic music is founded on a centuries-​old melodic framework called the

Arabic maqam (pronounced “ma-​QAHM”). In short, the Arabic maqam is a
system of scales, habitual melodic phrases, modulation possibilities, ornamen-
tation norms, and aesthetic conventions that together form a very rich artistic
tradition. The maqam is used both in composed and improvised music and can
be performed as either vocal or instrumental music. Although maqam music is
very rich in rhythms, the Arabic maqam does not define a rhythmic component
as such.
The word maqam (pl. maqamat) in Arabic means place or position and shares
its root with the verb aqama (to dwell/​to reside). It came to be used in its cur-
rent musical context probably because each maqam is based on a hand position
and is the place where the melody occurs. Other words are used for maqam in
the Arab world, such as nagham (melody) in Syria and tab‘ (character or nature)
in Tunisia. Over time the word maqam acquired a second and related meaning;
it is used to describe the entire maqam system used to build Arabic music and
the general melodic and modal approach to music that is fundamental to this
system.
The Arabic maqam broadly fits the description of a “melodic mode,” which is
why the word maqam is sometimes translated that way in English. However, this
translation is not precise because the word “mode” in Western music is also used
in a simpler context to mean a scale or a set of tonal intervals (e.g., the major and
minor modes). For this reason, this book uses the Arabic word maqam rather than
an English translation.
Given the geographical span of the Arab world, many regional Arabic maqam
systems exist, each with its own history, aesthetics, forms, naming conventions,
and individual character. Maqamat prevalent in North African Arab countries
(Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia), for example, are different than maqamat in
the central part of the Arab world (Egypt to Syria), and these are quite different
than the Iraqi Maqam, which has a lot more in common with the Persian dast-
gah. Thus, there isn’t a single Arabic maqam, but rather several regional Arabic
maqamat.
This book primarily focuses on the sharqi Arabic maqam tradition that flour-
ished in the Near East/​Eastern Mediterranean (from Cairo to Aleppo) during the
early to middle 20th century. This regional tradition is the most well-​known among
local Arabic maqam traditions and is sometimes incorrectly assumed to be the only
Arabic Maqam tradition (and however unfair that may be, it is nonetheless the focus
of this book).
 Introduction 5
The Wider Maqam Phenomenon

The Arabic maqam tradition is part of a wider phenomenon that is prevalent in

the music of countries from North Africa all the way to Central Asia. These tradi-
tions include Byzantine music, the makam in Turkish music, the dastgah in Persian
music, the mugam in Azerbaijani music, the meqam in Kurdish music, the makam
in Assyrian music, the Shash Maqom in Tajik/​Uzbek music, and the muqam in
Uyghur music in China6. These traditions are all centuries old and have influenced
one another to the extent that their geography and history have allowed.
Over the centuries, the Arabic maqam has given and taken a great deal of material
from the two immediately neighboring local maqam traditions: earlier the Persian
dastgah and later the Turkish makam. While these have been gradually changing
over time, they have proven easier to standardize and document than Arabic music.7
One possible reason is that both traditions are rooted in a single country (Turkey
and Iran, respectively), whereas Arabic music spans many countries, creating local
maqam flavors in the same way that Arabic language has many dialects.
As most of the Arab world was part of the Ottoman Empire for four centuries, the
influence of Ottoman Turkish makam on the Arabic maqam is stronger than any
other. As a testament to this influence, Arab musicians still perform and compose
music in Ottoman instrumental forms, such as the sama‘i, bashraf, and longa, a cen-
tury after the end of the Ottoman Empire.
The commonality between the Arabic maqam and its Turkish and Persian
cousins goes beyond the modal approach to the music. Many of the commonly
used Arabic maqamat (e.g., Bayati, Rast, Sikah, Hijaz, Nahawand, and ‘Ajam) exist
in some form in all three traditions, although they may not necessarily have the
same exact names, intonation, or melodic pathways. The names of many Arabic
maqamat can be traced to the Persian language: for example, Farahfaza (from
Farah Faza); Suzidil, Dalanshin (from Dil Nishin); Suznak, Rast, Sikah (from Seh
Gah); Bastanikar (from Basta Nigar); Jiharkah (from Chehar Gah); and Nairuz
(from Nowruz). The reverse is also true, with Persian gusheh (scale fragment)
names taken from Arabic, such as Hejaz (from Hijaz), Hosseyni (from Husayni),
and Oshshagh (from ‘Ushshaq). Similarly, many Arabic maqam names come from
the Turkish makam system, such as Sultani Yakah and Buselik, while some Turkish
makam names, for example, Hiçāz, Irak, Huseyni, Sűnbűle, and Uşşak, trace their
origins to Arabic.

6
The 2018 Maqom Art International Forum held in Shahrisabz, Uzbekistan included performers from
Turkey, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan, as well as from many Arab countries.
7
A very mixed blessing for those traditions, in our view.
6 Inside Arabic Music
Oral Transmission

Prior to the 20th century, music in the Arab world was preserved and transmitted
orally (only lyrics were historically preserved in writing). Oral transmission of music
fits within a broader framework of oral transmission of other cultural forms in the
Arab world, including literature, poetry, and religious texts.
In music, oral transmission entails a student learning the fundamentals of music (a
repertoire of pieces, instrumental or vocal technique, and music theory, either formal or
informal) by ear—​either on his or her own, through immersion in the musical culture
and practice, or directly from a music teacher—​over a period of many years, without the
aid of music notation. During that process, the student is able to absorb many intricate
performance details that are extremely difficult to notate, such as intonation, ornamen-
tation, and phrasing. Thus, the student eventually inherits the body of knowledge and
aesthetics (some local only to that region) available in his or her tradition.
The modern-​day version of oral transmission is a hybrid approach in which a stu-
dent takes lessons with a teacher, privately or within an established curriculum in
a music conservatory, while also making use of notated music. Depending on how
much the student relies on sheet music, the hybrid approach may come close to
matching oral transmission’s benefits, although today the reliance on memory is de-
clining, and most contemporary musicians don’t have as prodigious memories as
their forebears.
One interesting feature of oral transmission is that some compositions mutate over
time into slightly different versions. This multiplicity of versions happens most often
with muwashshahat (a classical vocal form), which were passed on orally before the
advent of music notation or recording in the early 20th century. Information that is
retained and transmitted by human memory among large numbers of people over
long periods of time is prone to change. Culturally, these differences in versions are
not seen as a flaw, but are accepted as contributions to the richness of Arabic music.

A Vocal Tradition

Arabic music is overwhelmingly vocal. Indeed, a live performance is synonymous

with a vocal performance, and tarab (the type of musical pleasure that is particular
to Arabic music) is embodied by the presence of a mutrib/​mutriba (literally, “the
person who creates/​conveys tarab”). Although performances on traditional Arabic
instruments like the ʻud, violin, qanun, or nay can produce much tarab, no instru-
mentalist, no matter how virtuosic, is ever called a mutrib. For this reason, entirely
instrumental Arabic music recordings are very rare, unlike other musical traditions
 Introduction 7
such as jazz or classical, in which a sizable share of recordings and performances is
instrumental.
The vocal quality permeates many aspects of Arabic music, such as the traditional
instruments’ tonal range to their dynamic range (volume). Traditional phrasing,
even when used in instrumental compositions, mimics the possibilities of the human
voice and usually stays within a jins (a 3-​to 5-​note maqam scale fragment), avoiding
large jumps. This can be clearly seen8 in the taqasim (traditional instrumental impro-
visations) performed on the ‘ud by, for example, Muhammad Abdel Wahab, Riyad
al-​Sunbati, Sayed Makkawi, Muhammad al-​Qasabgi, and Wadih al-​Safi.
While Arabic music includes many instrumental forms like the taqsim, the dulab,
the muqaddima, and the maqtu‘a (as well as the borrowed Ottoman instrumental
forms sama‘i, bashraf, and longa), they rarely constitute a performance by them-
selves; instead they serve to complement the vocal pieces, which are the meat of any
wasla (suite) or concert.

A Communal Character

Traditional Arabic music has a communal character. It sounds best when performed
in a live setting for a relatively small, attentive, experienced, and responsive audience.
The ideal setting for traditional Arabic music is a jalsa (a sit-​down gathering), which
consists of half a dozen musicians in a large room or small hall with an audience
numbering in the dozens. In such a setting, musicians can play acoustically and still
hear themselves and each other and be heard by the audience.
Arabic music sounds much better when the musicians can see and hear their lis-
teners well. For this reason, recording Arabic music in a studio9 is challenging, and
even the best studio recordings lack a certain warmth felt by musicians when they
are encouraged by their audience. This is because recording separates the musician
from his or her audience, interrupting a connection called “audience feedback,”
which is indispensable for the artist’s creative process.10 Only live concert recordings
capture the full potential of Arabic music, especially when improvisations are in-
volved. Understandably, there is a difference between improvising for a microphone
and a sound engineer and improvising for an experienced, attentive, and ecstatic
crowd expressing a reaction after every little musical feat. As such, the audience plays
an essential role in Arabic music making.

8
El-​Mallah (1997, p. 24).
9
Racy (2003) covers in depth the issue of reaching and conveying tarab in a studio without any listeners
present.
10
Racy (1978).
8 Inside Arabic Music
Experienced listeners are called sammi‘a (literally, “people who listen attentively”).
The sammi‘ is any person who enjoys Arabic music and has heard it for many years,
to the point that he or she knows a decent chunk of a favorite repertoire by heart and
has a clear expectation of what good Arabic music should sound like.
The sammi‘a have one musical mission, to seek tarab (musical joy). In a concert,
they are the ones who follow a taqsim (traditional instrumental improvisation) like
hawks, note for note, and exclaim “Allah!” when an interesting modulation takes
place. Each sammi‘ feels like the musician is performing for him or her, and therefore
the sammi‘a feel that they have a right to respond personally and loudly to the per-
former. But their input is far from disruptive; it is what fuels the performer to excel.
The sammi‘a can be appreciative of a phrase or section even when it’s not impro-
vised. In that case, a beautiful delivery or ornamentation can move the eager lis-
teners. Many long songs have short composed solo lines, especially during a long
instrumental introduction. These lines can be on the violin, the qanun, the electric
guitar, or any instrument appropriate for a solo. Umm Kulthum’s violinist Ahmad
al-​Hifnawi and her qanun player Muhammad Abdo Saleh often get applause for
their composed short solo lines, even when they repeat them two or three times.

Listening and Readiness

Traditional Arabic music is improvisational and highly personalized. Although im-

provisation has been slowly disappearing from mainstream Arabic pop music in the
late 20th and early 21st centuries, when discussing Arabic music, this book’s em-
phasis is on the mid-​20th-​century period or the Golden Age, when music was ripe
with both vocal and instrumental improvisations. The abundance of improvisation
keeps the music from sounding too rigid and makes it much more personal. The
effect of improvisation is to constantly assert the presence of the performer and the
essential relationship between him or her and the listener.
Because of its richness in ornamentation, Arabic music is not required to faith-
fully follow a composition note for note and can therefore be highly personalized.
Heterophony (when different musicians simultaneously ornament the same melody
differently) is a dynamic exercise, one that cannot be composed or notated. It hap-
pens in a live performance and needs a type of musician who devotes more energy
to listening than to reading sheet music. Therefore, experienced Arabic musicians
develop a resilient disposition that allows them to be attentive and quick to react to
the other musicians’ playing.
In a well-​oiled ensemble, a singer and an attentive audience feed off each other,
and the musical tradition affords performers a fair amount of room (as far as the
 Introduction 9
official musical composition/​score is concerned) to interpret pieces according to the
mood of the performance. Singers in Arabic music are given a relatively wide license
to repeat sections or to insert a short mawwal (traditional vocal improvisation) at
convenient junctures in a long song. Although these additions may be planned, often
they depend on the mood of the performer and that of the audience; therefore, they
can be unpredictable and require the ensemble to be ready to act on short notice.
In a bootleg recording of the long song “hayyarti albi ma‘ak,” recorded live at the
Azbakiyya Gardens in Cairo, singer Umm Kulthum skipped a beat and started the
vocal line “hayyarti . . .” a quarter note too early. It took the orchestra—​made up of
dozens of musicians—​less than a measure to follow her and shift the entire perfor-
mance to her timing. Without an ensemble that is ready, a conductor, no matter
how capable and alert, could not have achieved that rapid adaptation. And this is
not something that the ensemble could have done either had its members all been
busy reading the song’s musical score or watching the conductor. That formidable
group reflex only succeeded because every individual musician was independently
listening carefully, ready to react.
The benefit of such readiness is not only the ability to cope with mistakes; these
are a rare occurrence. The real benefit is that the music that results is less rigid, and
the ensemble moves together, constantly adjusting and adapting to its members and
to the singer. It is a continuous negotiation, a live exercise in consensus building.
One downside of this spontaneous aspect of Arabic music is that it doesn’t easily
lend itself to being recorded using overdubbing (a recording technique in which
different instruments are recorded at different times, then later mixed together).
Overdubbing Arabic music takes away the ability of musicians to tailor their playing
(speed, dynamics, level of ornamentation, and especially solos) to each other in real
time. Unfortunately, today Arabic music is losing its spontaneous quality due to
modern studio recording techniques, and rigidity can be heard in most contempo-
rary Arabic recordings.

Standards of Formality

To a Western observer, Arabic music may appear “informal” in many respects: musi-
cians vary the composition with each performance, sometimes even simultaneously;
audience members react vocally—​sometimes loudly—​to things they like in the
music; and music is transmitted orally, with variation in versions and the addition of
individual or regional characteristics.
While these aspects of Arabic music (and others discussed here) may appear to be
informal compared with Western classical music, it is important to recognize that in
10 Inside Arabic Music
reality, they reflect different standards of formality than Western music does—​and
Arabic music adheres as closely to its standards as Western music does to its own.
As an example, one very obvious area in which the standard in Arabic music
is far stricter than in Western music is intonation. In Western music, numerous
compromises exist in intonation because of the development of harmony (see
­chapter 11: Tuning System), and as a result the intonation of performers tends to
be fuzzier and less precise than it is in Arabic music. There is a greater tolerance for
imprecise intonation in Western music than in Arabic music, even among the ranks
of the top professional classical musicians (though this tolerance is rarely explicitly
perceived by musicians or audiences, as glaring as it may appear to experienced Arab
musicians and listeners). In Arabic music, because the slightest difference in into-
nation can suggest an entirely different maqam (there are so many different notes
identified in between the notes of the Western equal-​tempered scale), and because
there is no harmony to confuse matters, the standard for intonation is much more
stringent. Thus, we could say that Western music is more informal than Arabic music
in terms of intonation—​or we could say that the two traditions have different stan-
dards of formality.
Another example of apparently “greater formality” in Arabic music has to do with
improvisation. In a traditional improvisation, the opening and closing phrases are
more or less completely set by tradition for each maqam and are completely familiar
to audiences, who expect to hear certain melodies (albeit with ornaments and var-
iations) open an improvisation in a given maqam. There is room for a great deal of
unique variation in the middle of the performance, but the ending is also standard.
This type of formality doesn’t exist in Western improvisation today, and not enough
is known about improvisation in the time of, for example, Mozart to know whether
there was that level of formalism in the past.11
There are also numerous ways in which Arabic music doesn’t adhere to Western
standards of formality. The main priority of Arabic music is to create tarab and to
please and entertain the audience. For this reason, the protocols governing the audi-
ence’s behavior during a live concert are informal and more accommodating than in
Western classical music. In live recordings with large orchestras and iconic singers
such as Umm Kulthum, Warda, or Abdel Halim Hafez, the cheering of the audi-
ence could stop a new section halfway and force the orchestra to restart the pre-
vious section, which the audience enjoyed greatly and didn’t get enough of. In one
video recording of an Umm Kulthum concert, the last song had actually ended and
the curtains were closed, but the audience started screaming “iftah! iftah!” (Open!

11
Though we suspect, based on Gjerdingen’s (2007) work on Galant-​period musical schema, that im-
provisation was more constrained at that time.
Another random document with
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semi-millionaires in a single week. I know a man who was a clerk
living in a seven-room house and keeping no servants who made a
clear profit of a quarter of a million within six weeks, and he made a
further hundred thousand in the same year. He’s just bought a pretty
estate in Devonshire. And now the slump has come and other
people are bearing the burden which the lucky ones unloaded on
them.”
He took a cigarette case from his pocket and offered me one. I took
it and for a further quarter of an hour we smoked.
“Yes,” he said. “This is a pretty comfortable place. I’ve known it for
twenty years—and it’s always been the same. Old Brimelow, who
used to be the landlord, was a queer old fellow. He’s dead now. He
used to make us some wonderful rum-punch in the commercial room
at Christmas-time. His father kept the place before him, and he could
remember the stage-coaches, the York coach, the Lincoln coach, the
Birmingham coach and the Edinburgh coach, and tell tales of all of
them.”
“Of highwaymen?” I asked laughing.
“No. Not exactly that,” he said merrily. “But sometimes he told us
tales of hold-ups that he had heard from his father. Why, King
George the Third once got snowed up at the Colly Weston cross-
roads and slept there. Oh! this is a very historic old place.”
After lighting another of his cigarettes I left my entertaining
companion and ascended the broad oak staircase to my room, which
was on the first floor.
It was a fine old apartment, three sides of which were paneled in
dark oak. The floor, on which a few rugs were strewn, was of
polished oak and creaked as I entered, while through the open
window the moon cast a long white beam.
After a glance out upon the silent courtyard I half closed the window,
drew down the blind and lit the gas. Then, having turned the key in
the door, I undressed and retired.
At first I could not sleep because I heard the scuttling of a mouse or
rat behind the paneling. I lay thinking of Thelma. A momentary wish,
wicked as a venomous snake, and swift as fire darted through my
thoughts. I wished that Stanley Audley were dead. With such
thoughts uppermost in my mind I suddenly experienced a heavy
drowsiness and I must have at last dozed off.
I was awakened by feeling something cold upon my mouth. I
struggled, only to find that I was breathless and helpless. I tried to
cry out, but could not. My breath came and went in short quick
gasps. Was it possible that I had left the gas turned on and was
being asphyxiated!
I struggled and fought for life, but the cold Thing, whatever it was,
pressed upon my mouth.
In the darkness I strove to shout for help, but no sound escaped my
lips, while my limbs were so paralyzed that I could not raise my
hands to my face.
I recollect struggling frantically to free myself from the horrible and
mysterious influence that was upon me. I tried frantically to extricate
myself from that deadly embrace, but was helpless as a babe. I
thought I heard the sound of heavy breathing, but was not quite sure.
Was I alone—or was someone in the room?
My lips seemed to burn, my brain was on fire, a wild madness seized
me and then the cold Thing left my lips.
I must have fainted, for all consciousness was suddenly blotted out.
When I came to myself I heard strange faint whisperings around me.
Before my eyes was a blood-red haze and I felt in my mouth and
throat a burning thirst.
I breathed heavily once or twice, I remember, and then I lapsed
again into unconsciousness. How long I remained, I know not. I must
have been inert and helpless through many hours. Then I became
half conscious of some liquid being wafted into my face, as though
by a scent-spray, and once I seemed to hear Thelma’s soft, sweet
voice. But it was faint and indistinct, sounding very far away.
I fell back into a dreamy stupor. Yet before my eyes was always that
scarf-pin like a tiny human eye which had been worn by my
commercial friend. It had attracted me as we had gossiped, and as is
so often the case its impression had remained upon my
subconscious mind.
I lay wondering. Things assumed fantastic shapes. I could still hear
that scuttling of rats behind the old paneling, and I recollected the
narrow streak of moonlight which fell across the room from between
the blind and the window-frame. I recollected too, the sharp brisk
voice of my commercial friend, and moreover I once more saw,
shining before me, that tiny gem like a human eye.
After a lapse of quiet I tried again to rouse myself. The room was still
dark, and I listened again for the scuttling of the rats behind the
paneling, but the only sounds I heard seemed to be faint
whisperings. Then suddenly I seemed to hear drowsy sounds of
bells, like the sweet beautiful carillon that I had heard from the tower
at Antwerp.
I lay there bewildered and alarmed. I thought of Thelma—thoughts of
her obsessed me. I did not know whether to believe in her or not.
Was I a fool? In those dreamy moments I remembered my last visit
to Bexhill when I had questioned her. She had trembled, I remember,
and her lustrous eyes had scanned me with what now seemed to my
tortured brain a remorseless and merciless scrutiny.
I recollected too, her words:—
“I am sorry, but I can’t tell you. I am under the promise of secrecy.”
The whole enigma was beyond me: in my half conscious state, the
pall of a great darkness upon me, I felt my sense strung to breaking
point.
 CHAPTER XV
MORE DISCLOSURES

Ten minutes later I grew conscious of unfamiliar surroundings.

I was no longer in that dark old room at the Cross Keys, but in a
bright airy little room enameled in white. I was lying upon a narrow
iron bedstead and my nostrils were full of the pungent odor of some
disinfectant—I think it was iodoform.
As I looked up I saw four faces peering anxiously down into mine.
The first was that of a grey-bearded man in gold-rimmed spectacles,
the second was that of an elderly nurse in uniform, the third I
recognized as old Feng—and the fourth—I could scarce believe my
eyes—was Thelma herself!
“Thelma!” I cried eagerly, raising my hand towards her.
“No! Keep quiet!” ordered the spectacled man who seemed to be a
doctor. “Listen! Can you understand me. Do you hear what I say?”
he asked in a harsh voice.
“Yes, I—I do,” I faltered.
“Then keep quiet. Sleep, and don’t worry about anything—if you
want to get well. You’re very ill—and you’ve been very foolish. But if
you obey me you will soon be all right again.”
“But—but Thelma—Mrs. Audley,” I asked eagerly.
“She’s here—by your side. Don’t worry, Mr. Yelverton, go to sleep
and you’ll be quite right again soon—quite right!”
I looked at his great gold-rimmed spectacles. They seemed to be
magnified in my abnormal sight.
“But,” I asked boldly. “Who are you?”
“My name is Denbury—Doctor Denbury,” was the old fellow’s reply.
“But why are you here with me in Cross Keys?”
“You’re not in the Cross Keys now. You are in the Burghley Hospital.
The police brought you here, and sent for me.”
“The police!” I gasped, staring at those large round spectacles, whilst
next moment I shifted my gaze upon Feng. “Look here Doctor Feng,”
I said addressing him. “What does all this mean?”
“Well, Yelverton, it is all a puzzle to us. Why did you come here to
Stamford and attempt to commit suicide?”
“What?” I cried in fierce indignation despite my weakness. “What are
you saying? Suicide—why, such a thing never entered my mind!”
Feng’s face wore a strange, cynical smile. Suddenly I felt he was not
my friend; for the moment I hated him.
“Well, the facts are all too apparent,” he said dubiously. “Whatever
could have possessed you? You’ve had a very near squeak of it, I
can tell you.”
“Yes, Mr. Yelverton,” said Thelma, bending over me till I saw her dear
face peering eagerly into mine. “Yes. They thought you were dead.
Why did you do it? Why? Tell us.”
“Do it?” I gasped astounded. “I did nothing. I—I only slept at the
Cross Keys before going out to Duddington to see a client.”
“But why did you come to Stamford,” asked the girl, bending over me
till I could feel her breath upon my cheek.
“No! I forbid any further questions,” exclaimed the bearded old doctor
in the gold spectacles. “Enough! He must rest, Mrs. Audley.”
Then I thought I caught sight of another man—a policeman in
uniform!
A few moments passed when suddenly the doctor pressed a glass to
my lips.
“Come. Take this,” he persuaded. “It will put you to sleep again, and
you’ll awake a new man.”
That strange cold pressure on my lips recalled the Thing which had
gripped me in the darkness, and I shut my mouth resolutely. But he
spoke so kindly, declaring that it would do me good, that inert and
almost helpless as I was, I obeyed him. The draught tasted of
cloves, but was terribly bitter.
“Water!” I gasped, and immediately he held some to my fevered lips.
I took a great gulp with avidity. Then I felt drowsy, and again lapsed
into unconsciousness.
When once more I opened my eyes my senses seemed quite
normal. I could see clearly, and I could think and reason.
I found Thelma and old Feng again bending over me, gazing very
earnestly into my face.
“Where am I,” I asked eagerly. “What has happened?”
“Surely you know what has happened,” replied Thelma, “why did you
attempt such a thing?”
“Attempt what?” I demanded.
“To take your life as we have already told you. You took poison, and
you’ve only been saved in the very nick of time!”
“It’s a lie,” I declared angrily. “I never took anything. What do you
mean?”
“Well,” said Feng. “You were found in the morning with your door
locked, and as you didn’t appear at noon they broke it open and you
were discovered insensible with the empty bottle beside you and a
note.”
“A note!” I cried utterly bewildered.
“Yes. You shall see it later on. It is addressed to the Coroner,
apologizing for your act!”
I held my breath.
“But, really,” I declared astounded, “you’re joking! I never wrote a
note, and I certainly did not attempt to commit suicide!”
“Well, there are the facts,” said Thelma. “The police brought you
here and they found your name on your cards, and in the letter you
left. The affair got into the papers, and I saw it. So I telegraphed to
Doctor Feng, and we both came here at once.”
“He must not be excited,” said the medical man in glasses.
“Keep quiet, Yelverton,” urged Feng. “You shall know all that has
happened in due course. You owe your life to Doctor Denbury’s
efforts. He gave you an antidote just in time!”
“But I did not write a letter, and I did not take any poison,” I protested
impatiently.
“Keep quiet,” old Feng urged. “It will all be explained in due course.”
“It is so utterly mysterious!” I cried, half raising myself.
“Yes, I agree,” said Feng. “The doctor has found that you are also
suffering from the after-effects of some drug.”
“Does your head pain you very much now?” inquired the doctor.
“Not so much,” was my reply. “But my throat is very bad.”
“I expect so,” he said, and he crossed the room, returning with a
draught which, on being swallowed, proved soothing. “Yes,” he went
on, “you’ve had a very narrow escape. I caught you just in time. I
presume that you must have swallowed the stuff about three o’clock
on the morning before last. When I first saw you I gave you up as
hopeless. But by sheer luck I was able to diagnose what you were
suffering from. Funnily enough it was the drug you took first that
saved you. But,” he added coaxingly, “go to sleep again, and when
you wake up tell us all about it. Your mind will then be quite clear.”
“Yes,” said Thelma, whose beautiful face peered anxiously into my
own. “Go to sleep now, Mr. Yelverton. You must not exert yourself too
much.” And her soft cool hand smoothed my brow.
I remained silent and a few minutes later I had again fallen asleep.
It was night when I found myself listening to an astounding story.
What Thelma told me was to the effect that, on the door of my room
being forced, it was found that I had swallowed something from a
bottle which was lying on the floor, while on the dressing-table lay a
note addressed to the Coroner and signed, “Rex Yelverton.”
Feng showed me the note. It was upon half a sheet of the hotel note-
paper, but written in an unfamiliar and rather uneducated hand.
“I never wrote that!” I protested, feeling now quite better, after I had
swallowed a glass of milk. “And I certainly did not take any poison.”
“I knew it was not in your handwriting!” Feng said, quietly. “As soon
as Mrs. Audley telegraphed to me I at once met her and we came on
here together. But, tell me, how did it come about that you swallowed
that stuff? It hasn’t been analyzed yet, so Doctor Denbury is not
quite certain what it is. He, however, has made a guess, because of
its smell. But apparently you were drugged also. Tell me exactly what
you recollect about it. I want to know everything, Yelverton.”
I tried to compose myself and reflect.
Presently, while he and Thelma sat side by side, I told them pretty
much as I have written here, exactly what had happened since my
arrival at the Cross Keys.
Feng listened very attentively without uttering a word. Now and then
he grunted, but whether owing to uncertainty or satisfaction I could
gain no idea. His attitude puzzled me sorely. I could not reconcile his
secret friendship with Thelma, with his pretended hostility. Even now,
in spite of the care he was taking of me, I wondered whether he was
my friend, and in summing up all the past circumstances I came to
the conclusion that he was not to be trusted.
The effort of thinking out all this proved too much for me, weakened
as I was by the poison—whatever it was—and, again feeling drowsy,
I once more closed my eyes, and slept.
I was conscious of a prick in my arm, and I know now that Doctor
Denbury gave me an injection.
Not until noon on the following day was I able to get up and dress,
and then, accompanied by Feng and Thelma, I managed to walk
round to the Cross Keys which was only a short distance from the
hospital.
The brisk, bald-headed manager invited me into his private room and
with many inquiries about my health and expression of amazement,
asked me to relate what had actually happened. But what could I tell
him? I did not myself know.
Up till that morning I had—I now discovered—been practically under
arrest as having attempted suicide, but now that it was clear that I
had been a victim of a plot, the red-faced constable whom I had
noticed idling about the room, had been withdrawn. The papers had
got hold of the story, and had made a “mystery” out of it, to
Hensman’s intense disgust. On seeing the newspaper reports he
had hurried from North Wales to see me.
“You’ve been an infernal fool, Rex!” he said. “I’ve telephoned to old
Pearson at Duddington. He is quite well. His son never rang you up,
and he doesn’t want to add a codicil to his will. You’ve been had—
my dear fellow! You ought to have heeded those warnings
concerning that little married lady!”
That was all the sympathy I got from him!
I told the bald-headed hotel-manager of my chat with the rugged-
faced commercial traveler from Bradford, who was a constant guest
at the hotel and who had worn that curious onyx tie-pin like a little
human eye—that pin that I had seen in my strange nightmare.
“Describe him again,” he said looking into my face rather puzzled.
I did so, whereupon he replied:—
“I recollect seeing him at dinner. He was in Number Thirty-Four, the
room immediately above yours. But he was a complete stranger. I’ve
never seen him here before. I don’t think he was a commercial. At
least he had no samples. The only commercial travelers we had
were Mr. Sharp from London, Mr. Watson from Manchester and Mr.
Evans from Thomas’s, the flannel manufacturers of Welshpool. I had
a long chat with Mr. Evans in the commercial room before we went to
bed. He remarked that there were only three travelers that night—for
it was unusual. We generally have eight or nine here, all of them
known to us—except at the week-end.”
“Then the man who told me about old Mr. Brimelow was evidently
not a commercial!” I remarked.
“Old Mr. Brimelow. Who is he?”
“The man from Bradford told me that he was once proprietor here a
few years ago.”
“Never,” laughed the manager. “This house has belonged to the
Yates family for the past seventy years. The man evidently told you
some fine fairy stories.”
“Evidently he did,” interposed old Feng. “You say that the man had a
room over Mr. Yelverton’s. That is interesting. May we see it?”
“Certainly,” was the reply, and all of us ascended to a small, stuffy
little single room on the second floor—the window of which was
exactly over that of the room I had occupied.
I told them of that cold thing that I had felt pressed to my lips, but I
could see that they were all incredulous—the hotel-manager most of
all. Everybody who runs a hotel has a horror of any untoward
happenings there, for, of course, they are apt seriously to prejudice
business. In this case I was supposed to have attempted suicide,
leaving a letter of apology to the Coroner. And I felt sure that the
hotel-manager believed that I had attempted my life, even though he
seemed to humor me and pretend to credit my story.
We had no police-officer with us. Feng had seen to it that we had
gone to the hotel unaccompanied.
The Doctor showed an inquisitive eagerness quite unusual with him.
He leaned out of the window in order to ascertain whether he could
see inside the room below. Then from his pocket he took a piece of
string and lowered it to the upper sash of the window of my room
and made a knot in it. Afterwards he examined the window-sill very
minutely.
“Has this window been cleaned since?” he asked the manager. “But
there,” he added. “I see it hasn’t by its condition. Not for a fortnight—
I should think—eh?”
“They were all cleaned about three weeks ago,” replied the bald-
headed man.
“Now we will go down to the room in which Mr. Yelverton was found,”
he said.
A few moments later we stood in the room wherein I had been
attacked. The manager pointed out the table upon which the letter
incriminating me had been found, and I gazed wonderingly around.
“The bottle was found on the floor beside the bed,” he said. “When I
first saw you I believed you were dead. Your mouth was discolored
and your face was as white as paper. Ada, the head chambermaid,
went into hysterics.”
“Yes. That’s all very well,” I answered. “But what could have really
happened? I only remember that funny sensation of breathlessness
and the cold thing pressed to my lips—a bottle I suppose it must
have been.”
“Well, to me, it is plain that your entertaining friend from Bradford
was not exactly what he represented himself to be,” said Feng,
busying himself, and examining the room with the closest attention to
every detail. Suddenly he seemed to bristle with excitement, and
turning to the manager he asked:—
“Did the man—what is his name—arrive here before Mr. Yelverton?”
“No,” was his reply. “He arrived just after. He gave his name as
Harwood and particularly asked for the room he occupied. He
seemed to know his way about the hotel quite well. He had no
luggage, except a small handbag, therefore he paid for his room on
arrival.”
“And when did he leave?”
“I cannot find out. The night-porter says that he did not see him. He
must have left very early, but there is no train leaving here in the
morning before the 7.49.”
“So he got away by car, no doubt—a car that was waiting for him
somewhere,” Feng remarked quickly with his gray brows knit. “Is his
bag still here?”
“No. He took it.”
“And none of the servants have ever seen him before?”
“No. I asked the three commercial gentlemen who were here that
night, and they all declared him to be a stranger. Commercial
travelers always know each other on the road.”
“Well,” I remarked. “It seems to me that my entertaining friend must
have known which room I occupied, got down from his window to
mine and entered this room while I was asleep.”
“I think so, Yelverton,” said the old Doctor. “It seems to me that
entering by the window that you left open, he first ascertained that
the cigarettes he gave you—which obviously were drugged—had
sent you to sleep. Then he pressed the little bottle to your lips,
forcing you to drink part of its contents—you recollect the cold thing
you felt upon your lips—and then, not knowing how much you had
swallowed, because in the darkness he could not distinguish, he
threw down the bottle and leaving everything to make it appear that
you had committed suicide, he clambered back to his own room and
afterwards escaped.”
“Do you think so?” asked Thelma.
“I do,” old Feng replied briskly. “Let us go upstairs again and see
what we can find.”
We did so. And on examining the outside woodwork of the window
which the affable man from Bradford had occupied, we found a large
freshly bored hole into which, no doubt, a stout hook had been
screwed. To this he must have attached a rope, which enabled him
easily to reach my window-sill.
Truly the plot of my enemies had been a well thought out and
ingenious one. The threat that if I continued my search for Stanley
Audley I should pay for my disobedience with my life, had not been
made without the full intention to carry it out!
 CHAPTER XVI
GROWING SUSPICIONS

I had been fortunate enough in my life to escape many of the

shadows that lie in wait for most men. No serious betrayal of
friendship had come to make me bitter or cynical: I did not—as even
my profession might have taught me to do—look upon men with
suspicion and distrust. I preferred to give them my confidence.
But in spite of this I found myself growing more and more distrustful
of old Feng, more suspicious of his motives, more convinced that, for
some reason I could not fathom, he was playing a double game.
I knew that he was on a footing with Thelma quite different from what
he allowed me to believe. So much their secret interview at Bexhill
had shown me. And his attitude towards the attempt made upon my
life went to increase my distrust.
Had it not been that the handwriting of the note left beside my bed
differed so completely from my own—why no attempt to imitate my
hand had been made completely puzzled me—I should undoubtedly
have been charged with attempted suicide. The local police if not
very brilliant, were keen enough on the affair. I wanted to give them a
detailed account of everything that had led up to the attack on me—
to tell them the whole amazing story. To have done this would have
shown them that there was far more behind the affair than they could
possibly imagine. They, of course, looked upon the matter as being
within a very narrow circle. I knew, as Feng knew, that much more
complicated issues were involved.
Feng, however, strenuously opposed my proposal to tell the police
anything more than the barest facts, which, indeed, could not be
concealed. I wondered why, and asked him.
“It will serve no good purpose,” he argued. “These local policemen
have already confessed their ignorance of the man from Bradford.
He was not seen to leave by train, and as, from your description of
him his appearance was rather striking, I think, we may assume he
did not go that way. Probably he had a car in readiness and escaped
unnoticed. If you tell the police more than they know already you
must inevitably drag Mrs. Audley and her husband’s affairs into a
very unpleasant publicity. No, let us keep our own counsel.”
I remained in hospital two days longer. Thelma and Feng visited me
each day and I could not help noticing the queer bond of
understanding that seemed to have grown up between them. Not a
word was said by either of them to indicate that they were more than
mere friends but—perhaps my growing suspicions were responsible
—I seemed to see or to imagine evidence that their association
implied very much more than I was intended to believe. Feng had
always opposed my association with Thelma—had seemed, indeed,
decidedly hostile to her. His hostility, at least, had apparently
evaporated. Yet I found he was as strongly as ever opposed to the
continuance of my intimacy with her.
Did he fear for me? Did he fear for her? Did he fear for both of us?
I could not tell. But there was no mistaking the advice he gave.
“Look here, Yelverton,” he said to me a few hours before I was to
leave the hospital, “you have had a very narrow escape. You owe
your life to the merest chance and you may not be so lucky in the
future.”
“In the future!” I echoed. “Surely you don’t think there will be another
attempt to get me out of the way?”
“Indeed, I do,” he replied very gravely. “I don’t pretend to understand
the reason, but I should think it must be perfectly clear that your
friendship with Mrs. Audley is involving someone in a danger so
grave that they will not stick at trifles to avert it.”
“But how on earth can my friendship with Thelma affect anyone else
to such a degree as that?” I demanded, with some heat. “Stanley
Audley might perhaps object, but even he could hardly imagine that
it was a cause for murder. And even if he did the rather elaborate
plot evolved by someone would hardly have been the line he would
have chosen.”
Feng shook his head. “You can rule Stanley Audley, as the husband,
out of your reckoning. But what about Stanley Audley, the bank-note
forger. Suppose he and his associates know that your constant
efforts to find him might mean bringing the whole gang to justice?
Desperate men would not hesitate at murder when the stakes
involved are so great. My own belief is they fear that by your
continued friendship with Mrs. Audley you will pick up a hint that will
set you—and the police—on the right track. Probably they think that
is your real motive. Take my advice—I mean it very seriously—and
cut yourself adrift from the whole thing. Go back to London, take up
your work afresh—and forget Thelma ever existed.”
“I can’t and I won’t,” I declared passionately. “I’m going to try to get
the man who attacked me, and I’m going to try to find Stanley
Audley. Thelma thinks he is dead. I’m going to leave no stone
unturned to find out the truth. If he is really alive and returns to her—
well, I should have to keep away. In the meantime I want to discover
the man who tried to murder me.”
“He will be discovered some day, you can be quite certain,” was
Feng’s reply.
His tone surprised me completely: there was in it a curious ring of
certainty entirely unexpected. It was as if he knew with certainty and
positive conviction.
I glanced at him sharply. “You seem very certain of it,” I said.
“Well, I am pretty certain,” was his reply, with a curious expression
on his usually inscrutable face. And once again came to my mind the
uncanny conviction that the old fellow really knew a great deal more
than he would tell me. My suspicions of him redoubled.
“Drop it, my boy,” he said kindly enough. “If you had taken my advice
at first this would never have happened.”
Then for the twentieth time he went over with me every detail of the
description of the mysterious stranger from Bradford. What motive
lay behind the ceaseless questioning I could not imagine. Feng was
not a policeman, he strongly opposed telling the police any more
than we could help, yet he discussed the man from Bradford as
though he expected to meet him in the street next day and arrest him
on the instant.
But for what I had seen myself, but for the unmistakable “human
eye” scarf-pin that I had unmistakably seen when in the throes of
what was so nearly my death agony, I should have hesitated to
believe that the mysterious man from Bradford could have been
concerned in the attack on me. Anyone less like a criminal it would
be difficult to conceive. His keen, cheery countenance, indelibly
stamped on my recollection; his frank, engaging manner; his open,
goodfellowship and gay-hearted discussion of any and every subject
of interest that cropped up, all tended to give the lie to the
suggestion that he would be a murderer in intent if not in fact. But
that scarf-pin! It could not be mistaken. There could not by any
stretch of coincidence be two such pins in that Stamford hotel on the
same night. And upon that pin I had undoubtedly looked during that
awful night when I so nearly lost my life.
Another thought had flashed upon my mind. Young Mr. Pearson had
driven from Duddington to see me. I had never spoken to him before
and instantly I knew that his was not the voice I had heard upon the
telephone. Then I knew whose voice had come to me over the wire.
It was that of the man from Bradford. I wondered I had not thought of
it before. But I was sure my recollection was right.
On that last afternoon, when the hospital doctor pronounced me fit to
travel back to London, I took a walk with Thelma through the town,
and out along the pretty road which leads to Great Casterton. We
soon left the road by a footpath which took us up the hillside and into
some delightful woods, part of the ancient far-reaching Rockingham
Forest. There we rested together on the trunk of a big fallen elm.
Around us the sun’s rays slanting through the foliage, fell upon the
gray lichen of the huge forest trees and the light green of the
bracken, while the damp sweet smell of the woods greeted our
nostrils—that delightful perfume which seems peculiar to rural
England in summer.
“Mr. Yelverton,” exclaimed my pretty companion, gazing suddenly
into my eyes. “I—I want to ask you to forgive me. This wretched
affair has happened all through me. I alone am to blame for it.”
“Blame!” I echoed, as I took her hand—“what do you mean? You are
certainly not to blame. It seems I have a secret enemy who tried to
kill me—I don’t know why; I have done no one any harm that I know
of. But to say you are to blame is absurd.”
“Doctor Feng says you should have taken heed of the warning that
was sent you concerning myself,” she replied. “He thinks, too, that
another attempt will probably be made upon you—so do be careful.”
“But why? Tell me why,” I demanded.
She spread out her hands in a little gesture of helplessness and
drew her cream-colored sports coat more closely around her. She
looked very sweet and dainty in a close fitting little pull-on hat of
cherry color in fine pliable straw, a summer frock of pale gray silk
striped with cherry to match her hat, and gray suede shoes and
stockings.
It never struck me at the time that if she really believed Stanley to be
dead she would have worn mourning.
“Doctor Feng is very concerned about you,” she declared. “Has he
told you anything?”
“No,” was my reply.
“Well, he seems very upset about something. I can’t make it out.”
“Neither can I!” I replied. “The whole affair of Stanley’s flight and the
subsequent happenings are beyond my comprehension, Thelma.”
“His flight!” she exclaimed in a startled voice. “You surely don’t think
that he has left me intentionally?”
“Then why doesn’t he write to you or return?” I asked pointedly.
“Perhaps,” she suggested gently, “there are circumstances that
prevent him doing either.” I had thought she would have been
offended.
“No,” I said, “he is your husband. His duty is clearly to tell you where
he is and why he has not returned. I am sure he would if he really
loved you,” I added recklessly.
She was plainly startled now. Whatever she knew—and I was sure
she knew more than she would tell me—the idea that her husband
did not really care for her was clearly new and overwhelming. She
gazed at me white-faced and wide-eyed.
“If he really cares for me!” she whispered, her eyes filling with tears.
I could not bear this. “Of course he cares for you,” I said with a laugh
meant to reassure her, “but he ought to write to you anyhow.
Perhaps he has done so.”
I gazed at her as she sat at my side on that glorious afternoon.
Above us a pair of wood doves were softly cooing, while a thrush
annoyed at our presence, uttered his clattering alarm-note to his
mate. Village chimes sounded somewhere across the Welland
valley, together with the shrill whistle of a railway engine.
“Thelma,” I whispered at last. “Do tell me the real and actual truth.” I
looked into her grey eyes. They were as unclouded, her cheeks as
cool, her candor and serenity as undisturbed as when, on that
winter’s day amid the high-up snows she had shyly thanked me for
offering to look after her during her husband’s absence. I, on the
other hand, felt like a fool. My heart, though I had done my best to
steel it to endurance, was torn by a thousand conflicting feelings.
Wild ideas rushed through my brain. Was it possible that in her
secret heart she was not altogether sorry to be rid of Stanley
Audley? Had she married him hastily in an outburst of girlish
passion, only to find out her mistake when desertion and solitude
brought her opportunity for reflection? Was this the real explanation
of her mysterious declaration that her husband would never return to
her? And if so was there still a chance for me?
“Thelma,” I said softly, taking her hand in mine. “I want to speak to
you, but—but I hardly know how to say it. Since you left Mürren you
have never been frank with me—never confided in me—never told
me the truth.” Then, after a pause I went on. “Remember I took upon
myself a sacred trust, to see after you. I have carried out my promise
to Stanley as any honest man should carry it out, but it seems that
by doing so, I have brought a deadly hatred upon myself. Why? I ask
you, Thelma—why?”
She drew a long breath, her hand trembled in mine and her eyes
grew troubled.
“Mr. Yelverton,” she said at last in a trembling voice. “The question
you ask me is very, very difficult for me to answer. There are, I
confess to you at once, some things which I am bound for my
husband’s sake to conceal, and therefore I know you will not ask me
to divulge them. I can’t tell you more. You nearly lost your life
because of me. I was to blame and I am very sorry.”
“But why?” I demanded. “Why ‘because of you?’ How do you come
into it? Neither of us has done any harm.”
“I—I don’t know. Dr. Feng says you have secret enemies and that it
is because of me. That is all I know.”
“But where is Stanley?”
“I don’t know; if I did he would be here. But I believe he is dead.”
“But have you any fresh evidence?” I asked, eagerly. “You know the
man who was killed in France was not Stanley.”
“I know only what I have been told.”
“But who told you?” I persisted.
“A friend. For certain reasons the strictest secrecy has been imposed
upon me. Please do not question me further. You have been my
dearest and kindest friend and it is very hard to have to prevaricate
with you.”
“Thelma,” I said. “I have all along striven to be your friend, though
circumstances have been so much against me. I made a promise to
Stanley, and I have endeavored to keep it.”
“And at what a cost!” she exclaimed. “Yes! I thank you awfully, for
you have been the best and dearest friend any girl has ever
possessed. Yet you have narrowly escaped losing your own life
because of your chivalry!” and her face flushed slightly.
For the second time my discretion went to the winds.
“Thelma!” I cried, “don’t talk of chivalry. Can’t you see the real
reason? Can’t you realize that I love you? Can’t you love me a little
in return.”
Her cheeks grew hot. “I—I don’t know,” she stammered. “It wouldn’t
be right. I am married already.”
The girl’s transparent innocence was amazing. Not a shadow of a
thought of wrong crossed her mind. She gazed at me as candidly
and sweetly as if she had been my sister.
“But Thelma,” I pleaded, “suppose Stanley is really dead; could you
care for me a little?”
For a few seconds she sat silent, then she answered in a low voice
broken by emotion. “Before I can answer that we must learn the
truth.”
My heart gave a great leap. There was hope for me.
“I will find out,” I declared, “whatever the cost.”
“But, Mr. Yelverton, please be careful,” she said. “Dr. Feng is terribly
apprehensive. He evidently thinks you are in great danger and
doesn’t want me to see you.”
“But why should he be?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I cannot make him out at all. Sometimes I think he
knows more than he will ever admit about Stanley.”
But I cared nothing for Feng. My heart was singing. Thelma’s words
acted as a spur to my decision to continue my investigations. I
determined once more and for all to play for the biggest stake. If I
lost I must accept my fate philosophically. If I won—!