Sufi waltzes

[robinturner]

maggie_lucy has just sent me the strangest album I've heard in many years. It's a mixture of classical waltzes and sufi music, based on the theory that one influenced the other. Since my musicology is somewhat rusty, I have no idea whether this theory is true, but it's a nice idea. After all, they both involve turning around a lot.

Comments

[cf.livejournal.com]

name of album? are they using mercan dede? not that this would have anything to do with the theory?

[solri.livejournal.com]

The Watltz: ecstacy and mysticism by Conecerto Köln and Sarband. The neyzen is Arif Erdebil.

Errata

[solri.livejournal.com]

That should have been "waltz" of course, not "watltz". Incidentally, the Turkish side of things is not hard-core sema; it's pieces by people like Dede Effendi.

There may be something to it

[(Anonymous)]

After all near eastern art was widely known by the learned of Europe. Chaucer's "Parliament of Fowls" is simple plagiarism of Farid ud-Din Attar's "A Conference of Birds." The troubadours traveled far and wide and where near eastern troubadours could not travel, those who heard their music and their stories passed them along. Http://mentallyillobservations.blogspot.com

Here in the new world we are finding out that the aboriginal peoples had vast trade networks that covered many thousands of miles.