Posts by admin
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Symposium in Baku April 2026
“Maqam Beyond Nation” is organizing an international symposium together with Azerbaijan National Conservatory, and the ICTMD Study Group on Maqām. This symposium will be focused on both historical and current connections between Azerbaijani mugham and cognate maqam branches in the Middle East, Central Asia, and beyond. The symposium will take place on April 29-30, 2026, at the Azerbaijan National Conservatory in Baku, and will function as the 12th Symposium of the ICTMD Study Group […]
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“Chegra Bilmas Maqom”A collaboration on Central Asian Maqām across Borders
by Rachel Harris On stage at Ala Space, Almaty. Photo by Mukaddas Mijit In October 2025, we brought together a group of musicians from Tashkent and Almaty for two concerts based on a creative exploration of maqām traditions from Central Asia. Abror Zufarov (vocals, sato), Guzal Muminova (dotar) and Sherzod Nazarov (doira), all teachers at the Yunus Rajabi Institute in Tashkent, have been working with Almaty-based independent musicians, Saniyam Ismail […]
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Visit to the Yunus Rajabi Institute
Photo: A first-year instrumental ensemble, directed by Shahmahmut In March 2025, Rachel Harris and Mukaddas Mijit visited the Uzbek National Institute of Musical Arts Named After Yunus Rajabi in Tashkent and were treated to a tour of the Institute’s departments as well as some outstanding performances by current students and teachers. Clip: Students of Malika Khanum perform an ensemble dotar piece (excerpt) Established in 2020, the primary purpose of the […]
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Visit to the Farg’ona Maqom School and the Marg’ilan Maqom Theatre
With members of the Marg’ilan Maqom Theatre In April 2025, Rachel Harris and Aziz Isa Elkun were generously hosted by the Maqom School led by Ulug’bek Mamadjanov, and the Maqom Theatre led by Fazil Ismailov. Both are recently established, on the foundation of existing music institutions, but with a new focus on maqom. The Maqom School holds several hundred students of school age, and several dozen talented teachers who are […]
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“They Took the Heart of Mugham!”
“They Took the Heart of Mugham!” Azerbaijani Musicians Finding Authenticity in Iranian Traditions by Polina Dessiatnitchenko The performance is remarkable for many reasons. On the centerstage of the Mugham Center in Baku, Azerbaijan, singer Fergana Gasimova is sitting cross-legged, and as she sings, her body sways sideways, her eyes close in ecstasy, her arms thrust upward, and her head moves poignantly to the well-defined poetical meters. Instead of the usual Azerbaijani instruments, […]
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Strand 7: Bastakor and maqām-based creativity in Uzbekistan
Eugene Leung This strand explores creativity in Tajik-Uzbek ‘national’ music through the figure of the bastakor, the creator of new works in traditional styles by drawing on the maqām traditions of Bukhara, Khorezm, and Ferghana-Tashkent, as well as more popular genres influenced by them. Although these maqām repertoires are viewed as closed, manybastakor compositions are recognised as extensions that sustain the tradition’s vitality. This practice of creative adaptation has endured from the […]
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Connecting through Nava
by Mukaddas Mijit Connecting through Nava: Documenting Shared Musical Heritage with Uzbek and Uyghur Musicians in Tashkent, March 2025 In March 2025, we embarked on a one-week field trip exploring the connections between Uzbek Maqam and Uyghur Muqam practices with few outstanding musicians. Our journey led us to the Yunus Rajabi Institute of Traditional Music in Tashkent- a landmark institution for Uzbek musical heritage. For this initial phase of our project, we […]
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Giovanni De Zorzi: Istanbul fieldwork 2024-25
From May to July 2024, and subsequently from April to June 2025, I conducted fieldwork in Istanbul, focusing on the current state of Ottoman-Turkish art music (makam). Given our project’s ‘beyond nation’ scope, I proposed that the concert scheduled for November 20, 2024, in Venice should feature compositions by ‘foreign’ composers—referred to as acemler, acemī, or acemīyūn, and generally regarded as ‘Persians’—found in 17th and 18th-century treatises by Bobowski, Cantemir, and Kevserī. Consequently, […]
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Masterclass with Ilyos Arabov
On 14 January 2025, SOAS Department of Music hosted Honoured Artist of Uzbekistan, Ilyos Arabov, to discuss and demonstrate his art. An outstanding singer, instrumentalist, and maqām master from Uzbekistan, Arabov has performed internationally and won prestigious prizes at festivals worldwide. He is recognised as one of the leading performers of Central Asian Shashmaqom and heads the instrumental performance department at the Yunus Rajabi Institute in Tashkent. In a wide-ranging […]
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Neva Mugham in post-Soviet Azerbaijan
The many meanings of Neva Mugham in post-Soviet Azerbaijan by Polina Dessiatnitchenko: Azerbaijani_Nava.pdf