The Integral System of Harmonic Drones, which offers „a new approach to understanding Persian music intonation,“ was the topic of a conference by Vahid Hosseini held in March 2024 at the IRCAM Forum Workshops.
What intrigued me the most was the complexity inherent in Persian and West Asian music, which is challenging to grasp and explain within the framework of Western music theory. As an Iranian musician trained in classical music and educated in Western music theory, I was particularly curious about this conference. I wanted to see how this presentation could assist non-Iranian audiences, providing insights into the workings of Persian music.
From the beginning of the conference, Vahid Hosseini showcased one of his pieces for a solo cellist called „Sguardi su Shur“. He began by addressing the challenge of simulating Persian intervals and capturing the general atmosphere of Persian music, emphasizing that both Western musicians and Persian masters who attempted to explain this music within Western theoretical frameworks have approached it differently from how it actually works on instruments.
In the following part of the presentation, the speaker elaborated on his new approach to Persian music. However, I personally believe that it would have been better if he had first provided a basic explanation of how Persian music works. This would have made it easier for non-Iranians, who are not familiar with Persian music, to understand his approach. Nonetheless, I am aware that time was very limited, and fitting everything into a 30-minute conference was almost impossible.
In this blog I’ll try to explain briefly how the Persian music works so that I can then put Vahid Hosseini’s point of view in the following of this blog.
In Persian music, a „Dastgah“ refers to a sophisticated system of melodic structures or modal frameworks, providing the foundation for improvisation and composition. Within each Dastgah, the „Radif“ encompasses a vast collection of melodic patterns known as „Gusheh,“ serving as individual motifs. Dastgahs offer a structured framework for musicians to explore and develop melodies within specific rules and traditions.
Understanding the conference also required knowledge of Persian music intervals, which differ from Western music. These intervals are smaller than Western semitones and include unique symbols like „Koron“ and „Sori,“ established by Iranian master musician Alinaghi Vaziri in the early 20th century. So, in simpler terms, the order of these symbols can be remembered as: Flat, Koron, Natural, Sori, Sharp.
The core idea of the conference was to challenge past theories that label Persian intervals as microtones or categorize them into specific and fixed ratios. The presenter posits that the harmonic series produced by the drone set serves as the original source of intervals within the Radif intonation system. This contradicts earlier theories based on equal divisions, such as the 24 edo by Alinaghi Vaziri, which is a system divides the octave into 24 equal parts, and ratios like 11:10 proposed by Hormoz Farhat, which do not align with the actual drone tuning, but the research proposes that the neutral interval can be attributed to the interval 13:12, almost precisely situated between minor and major third deviations from 12 edo.
While the author’s views on interval determination may not align perfectly with existing theories, the Integral System of Harmonic Drones offers a fresh perspective on Persian music construction. This exploration has the potential to deepen our understanding and inspire new musical creations, as demonstrated by his compositions.
Even though there was no time for him to explain how he reaches this assumption, he also mentioned a philosophical point of view regarding non-Western music. He suggested that it shouldn’t always be explainable within the framework of Western music theory. Rather, it should be appreciated as a distinct approach to music, or even as an alternative theory of music, without privileging Western music as the standard against which all others are judged.
