Journal of Fine Arts: Performing Arts and Music
Year:2019 | Volume:24 | Issue:3 |Papers Count:8

This article deals with the encounter of “ self” and “ the “ other” in the Iranian characters of the play Ja’ far Khan is back from Europe by Hassan Moghaddam. This play is one of the most important plays of the early 20th century in Iran, and expresses the generation gap and the cultural differences between a very traditional Iranian family and their young son (Ja’ far khan), who has recently come back to Iran after finishing his higher educations in Europe. The members of Ja’ far khan’ s family have made so many arrangements for the newcomer, and are extremely shocked to find out that Ja’ far khan has totally changed to a person with European life style, and does not care about the Iranian traditions at all. His type of dressing, together with his ideology about abstaining from superstitions, are all quite new and unacceptable to his family. It is held in this article that the “ self” and the “ other” are among the most important “ subject” s of the modern Iranian literature, which holds a bilateral relationship. This relationship creates an atmosphere in which the social and communicative forms are recreated as the sew “ self” and “ other” relations, and face each other in different arenas, of which the current play is an example. In other words, what this article focuses on, is the method of the arrangement of the characters of this play, according to some basic concepts such as language, dress and clothing, and the metaphoric and semiotic system of “ self” and the “ other” , which leads to the manifestation of the characters, and their different features. The ideologies of the characters of this play are studied with an analytic approach, and their discourse will be the major source of concern. Here, by discourse, we refer to the social approaches of each historical period during which the Iranian “ self” and the experience of “ the other” is created in this Iranian play. The results of the research show that the characters act as a type of subjectivity, and reveal their “ self” characters when they face the “ other” s. In the play Ja’ far khan is back from Europe, the characters of the house act as “ self” , and Ja’ far khan acts as the “ other” . As a matter of fact, the “ self” people gradually turn Ja’ far khan to an “ other” , and this takes place as a result of the specific discourse which is a result of the social patterns of Iran in the time this play was composed. In this play, all the members of the family arrange their powers in a way that the person who used to belong to that house turns out to be an “ other” . They first try to make this other similar to their own selves, and fail to compromise with Ja’ far khan. Then they try to make themselves similar with that “ other” , and they get no result other than surprise, carelessness, or anger, but they finally fail to make Ja’ far khan the person he used to be before his dispatch to Europe for his studies.

This research project aims to study Behzad Ranjbaran’ s “ SEVEN PASSAGES” , and investigate the techniques of musical cohesion and diversity. To achieve a thorough understanding of the piece, the harmonic structures, formal design, and the methods of motivic development have been studied. Although the formal structure does not lend itself to the common traditional forms, it is loosely connected to the sonata form. Triads and trichords in general, seventh chords, polychords, twelve-tone aggregate and their progressions are some of the elements that play prominent role in the creation of harmonic/melodic cohesion and diversity. In addition to the title and narrative of the piece which suggest inspirations from Persian literature and culture, the melodic content is also influenced by Persian traditional music. For instance, the second thematic group resembles the mode of Chahargah in a very light texture, alluding to the solo improvisation of traditional musicians of Persian instruments. In addition to modal elements, the composition also features many elements used in tonal music. For example, tertian chord structures are frequently used in the piece without references to tonal centers. The harmonic structures sometimes create a twelve-tone aggregate or quasi aggregate– – lacking one or two pitch classes. This particular approach may be seen as one of the modern aspects of the piece. SEVEN PASSAGES has a three-note-motive (B-A#-B) which appears in various forms and plays a pivotal role. Ranjbaran has used two techniques to shape the piece, namely: developing variation and motivic/thematic transformation. The transformation and development of the three-note-motive have been studied and categorized mainly based on rhythmic changes. The main motive has four fragments; each of the first three fragments consist of a single note, forming a lower neighbor motion. The fourth fragment may be added in three different ways: a note often a perfect fourth or a third lower, a neighbor tone often as a triplet, or simply a tied note to the third fragment. The accompanying harmony of the first and third fragments is always the same, and is often a minor or major triad, and less frequently a diminished chord. The second fragment is sometimes a part of the (026), (014), (015), or (016) trichords, and other times is harmonized by diminished, minor, major and augmented triads. (026), in particular, is a subset of the whole tone scale, which is found in some sections of the composition. The root or fifth of the main harmony of the motive almost always remains as a pedal point, functioning as a unifying element. The motivic cell is sometimes fragmented in the process of development in several ways. First, two of the four fragments may be eliminated to make the motive shorter. Second, each note may be presented by a different timbre, and finally, the fragments may be separated by a pause. The study shows how the four-fragment motive is repeated numerous times to create unity and, at the same time, it is transformed in various ways to sound fresh every time it appears.

Existentialists considered existence as a tragedy, and believed that humans could never escape this dilemma. They had a cold, bitter, and nihilistic look towards life; that humans are alone in this world and should take responsibility for everything by themselves. They believed that humans have no shelter and are in motion towards death from the moment of birth; and knowing this fact is horrific and puts them in crisis. "Existential tragedy" is formed in this situation. In fact, the "existential tragedy" is equal to the tragedy of a shelter-less lonely human that is pulled step by step towards nothingness, and the awareness of his position in the universe becomes subject to anxiety and stress. A century earlier, romantics also saw life as cynical, absurd and fanciful, and felt alienated to their surroundings. Because of this similar attitude, the scholars of existentialism are widely influenced by romanticism and believe that they have borrowed part of their discourse from them, so that one must search in works of romantics to find the root of the basic concepts of existentialism. The purpose of this comparative study is to investigate the similarities of existentialism and romanticism movements, centered on the concept of "existential tragedy". The present study examines the basic elements of this tragedy, "fear and anxiety, " "alienation and self-alienation, " and” nihilism and emptiness, " in the “ Manfred” play and the romanticism period with a historical-analytical approach. The “ Manfred” play is about a brilliant, intelligent, and powerful person who lives with a guilty conscience due to an unspeakable sin in his palace in the Alps. He seeks help from the six spirits who rule nature and also the spirit of fate to help him forget, but none can do it. Manfred is cursed forever. After he realizes that the Alpine wizard can’ t help him, he goes to infernal forces of the devil. The devil accepts his request, and summons Astarte; Manfred's dead beloved. Astartetells Manfred that his suffering will end soon. Then, Manfred awaits death calmly. Manfred is the story of an anxious and socially-alienated human that seeks freedom and peace disregarding religion. The result of the research shows that the elements of existential tragedy, namely anxiety, alienation and nihilism, clearly exist in the Manfred play and form the basis of this romantic-Byronic tragedy: Manfred's fear and anxiety come from an obscure and mysterious force and there is no way for him to escape from it. Like other romantics, he is lonely and self-alienated, and this loneliness indicates his awareness of the nature of life and its meaninglessness. Manfred's state represents the existential crisis of existentialists; a state of anxiety that is rooted in the awareness of the emptiness of existence and the shelter-less human. There are also some signs of nihilism in Manfred’ s behavior, since he does not receive help from the bishop and confronts the devil on his own. The relative nihilism of romanticism in its development evolves into the more obvious nihilism of existentialists.

The musical tradition of Turkmen bagshy (bagshychylyk) is the core of Turkmen culture in Turkmen-Sahra (Iran) and Turkmenistan. Since the last decades of the 19th century, this tradition has faced various degrees of transformation due to the Socio-political evolutions. In this paper, we focus on the musical culture in Turkmen-Sahra and explore the changes by juxtaposing its past with its present. Our study is based on several fieldworks in Turkmen-Sahra including hours of interviews with informants from Turkmen-Sahra and Turkmenistan from 2010 to 2015. Moreover, monographs, travelogues, and audio-visual materials are considered as well. To provide a basis for comparison we cast light on the Turkmen-Sahra case according to the concept of musical change. Taking various aspects of musical change into account the Turkmen-Sahra case seems to be a special one mostly through a particular type of acculturation which we refer to as indirect acculturation. While various cultural policies were followed in Turkmenistan since the Russian revolution to manipulate music, in Turkmen-Sahra, by contrast, the musical culture has been almost free from such governmental pressures. It is worth mentioning that the musical change in Turkmen-Sahra is not the result of the bagshys’ individual preferences and the changes in Turkmenistan play a major role here. In this process, the change does not occur simply by borrowing and modifying what bagshy receives from the other side of the border, but a complicated set of divergent and convergent responses should be considered in analyzing the process of musical change. The above-mentioned responses become significant in the duality of professional and non-professional bagshy. Non-professionals belong to the new social class of educated Turkmens emerged in the 1940s following the social changes in Turkmen-Sahra caused by the settlement of nomad Turkmens. They adopt a distinct approach to Turkmen musical tradition as a problem of identity, while the professionals consider it just a profession. Despite the professionals' tendency to maintain continuity and the non-professionals keen interest in change as the prevailing aspects of musical change in Turkmen-Sahra, the two group adopt either convergent or divergent responses depending on the situations. We study the duality of responses within the parameters of education, drawing distinctions with Turkmenistan, utilizing new musical instruments, individual/group performances, and reterritorialization. In conclusion, the musical change in Turkmen-Sahra grounded in the processes of imitation and adaptation while the continuity is based on rejecting the musical products of Turkmenistan. This demonstrates how the musical change in Turkmen-Sahra is defined as indirect acculturation rather than a model in which the changes in Turkmenistan are imported and accepted by bagshys of Turkmen-Sahra in a passive manner.

Patriarchy, in its diverse practices, such as public or private practices, is a key concept in feminism. Feminists believe that in a male-dominated society, men are in authority over women and women are subordinated. They believe that the masculine oriented tendencies in a male-dominated society are repeatedly reproduced. According to feminists, the causes of women’ s subversion in the patriarchal society are men’ s greater access to power structures, the unequal distribution of social privileges and inappropriate relations between men and women. The male-controlled society constructs women’ s subjugation, and makes it possible for men to turn to mischievousness in different practices. Patriarchy is an important issue in literary texts and many literary works, especially drama, have been written to depict this. In the beginning, women wrote about patriarchy, however, later, some male writers joined the movement and wrote about it. Bahram Beyzaie is one such author in our country. He is a highly praised Iranian dramatist, and theatre director, whose plays display women’ s subordinated position and the discriminating stance of male-dominated society against women. Bahram Beyzai is a playwright who is preoccupied with the condition of women in a patriarchal society. Protagonists of his plays are female characters. They rebel against the established norms of patriarchal society. They fight in their own ways to gain their own proper dignity. Two main issues of his plays are gender inequality and differences in women and men’ s social roles. Beyzai is a skilled playwright who has been cherished for his style of untainted Persian writing and for picking out Persian sagas and legendary figures. The purpose of this paper was to explore the position of female characters in Bahram Beyzai’ s selected plays. The selected plays of the paper-Parde-Khane, Pahlavan Akbar Dies, Death of Yazdgerd and Wail (Nodbeh) have been explored through a descriptive-analytical approach. The patriarchal system in Parde-Khane, makes women renounce their true identity by giving new names for them. In Pahlavan Akbar Dies, the life of Pahlavan Heidar’ s mother is the genuine saga of mothers in our society. Her life portrays the doom and spitting image of all mothers of the community. She lives only for her son. The story of Death of Yazdgerd is based on the slaying of Yazdgerd the Third, the last king of Sassanid Empire. Yazdgerd the Third who is severely pressured by the Arabs on the western border of Iran, escapes to Marv, shelving in disguise in a mill and eventually is slain by the miller. The story is expressed in the words of the miller, his wife and his daughter; all stories are different. In Wail (Nodbeh), Obidollah, a male character, is representative of a social system in which all ruthless features of the patriarchal system are gathered in his presence. The exploration of the selected plays reveals that Bahram Beyzai has depicted the components of patriarchy, its influencing factors, the expansion of patriarchy, and different means of women’ s struggle to emancipate them from the domination of patriarchal system.

“ Multiphonic” is an expression, defining “ many sounds” rather than a “ chord” . Multiphonic pitches are different from one another in degrees of sound intensity; from the most obvious and distinguishable pitch to ones that are barely audible. Multiphonic has come to be recognized as an extended technique since the 20th century for monophonic instruments. Unlike their natural behavior in which monophonic instruments can only produce a single note at any time, multiphonics allow multiple sounds to simultaneously be produced using this extended technique. Oboe multiphonics can be traced back to the fundamental acoustics of the instrument. Since the Oboe is a cone-shaped instrument, it has complex and irregular diagrams of resonances which leads to dissonant and unstable multiphonics. Finding precise fingerings-ones which can be applied and practiced on a wide variety of instruments-is a great challenge. On the other hand, multiphonics in conical instruments which are produced through a reed are not predictable. Recent scientific findings have shown instability in behavior of double reeds. Additionally, a significant interaction is present between the double reed, bore-shape, key-work, and design of holes in more complicated conical instruments such as the oboe. A succession of several and various multiphonics can be difficult and inconvenient to read and comprehend using familiar and conventional music notation systems. In the Oboe repertoire for instance, the indication of a multiphonic using only a chord is very ambiguous and hard to interpret for the performer. On the other hand, notating the key-work (fingering) of the Oboe which is the performer’ s preferable way of showing multiphonics is often incomprehensible or unknown for most composers. Since a great number of works are increasingly using multiphonics, this phenomenon has become a significant part of extended technique and an integral part of modern repertoire. It is crucial to develop the notation system in a manner which meets both the complexities of the composer’ s requirements while at the same time being practical for the performer. This article aims to challenge common and standard multiphonic notation systems, with regards to oboe repertoire and young Iranian composers who may be less familiar with practical and realistic approaches; attempting to write multiphonics merely based on theoretical knowledge without direct collaboration with the performer. Study, analysis and comparison of various multiphonic notation systems as well as evaluation of the possibilities shows that acoustical analysis results from identical multiphonics are not always similar, thus creating multiphonics with exact pitches is almost impossible. This concluded, the best method of multiphonic notation is the fingering system along with inscription of different pitch contents in the music score’ s appendix. Since many multiphonic notation systems are innovative and less documented in a categorized manner to aid young musicians in performing, this article classifies multiphonics and their symbols based on certain combination of fingerings, lip position, air pressure, and embouchure in the context of oboe performance techniques, thus aiming to present a “ standardized” notation system for composers to refer to when using this extended technique for oboe repertoire.

The clothing system as a semiotic structure, was developed by one of the most important theorists of semiotics; Roland Barthes (1915-1980) who discussed the importance of the components of the clothes to imply human moods and spirits. This system as a visual language in expressing the characterization especially in cinema has a distinct function. Most of the works of Barthes are in the field of semiotics, based on the functional symptoms; Barthes in one of his very famous and important theories, the theory of language system in accordance with its sub-theory, known as cloths system focuses on the rules of clothes which create continuity in component and also important counts. Barthes defines sociological and cultural perspectives such as the clothing system, food system, car system and housework system using the language / speech opposition. Since language is a social and also value institution that is by no means an act and cannot be created, and conversely, speech is basically an individual act related to the choice and thought of an individual subject. In the present study, two moving pictures, Anna Karenina and My Fair Lady will be investigated based on Roland Barthes thesis to show that the films’ clothing system functions as a sign system. Also the purpose of the selection of these two films in the research is to identify and compare the relationship between the colors, black and white in costume design of the actors and their personality contradictions as well as the analysis of their clothing in opposition to each other. Both films are adaptations of famous novels and are the narrating the main character as a woman who’ s social and cultural conditions have influenced her feelings and attitudes. Through creation of influential costumes, colors of the actor’ s costumes are in a significant correlation with other semiotic layers. The aim of selecting movies for comparative analyses in this research is identifying and comparing the conflicting relationship between two important actors and analysis of color of their clothing contrasting each other. Here the references of color languages as a language system play the vital roles. Since the meaning of each color is very wide and is beyond the scope of this article, only two black and white elements representing a complete personality conflict are discussed here. Also, the selection of films was solely due to the role of the elements, so the type of genre or other goals are not involved in the selection of works. This research attempts to illustrate and express the influence of color in designing costumes for the actors. An analysis of its visual impact on the viewer will be discussed. In the present study, signification of cloths are considered a cultural sub-code and the research is based on semiotics as its theoretical framework. The data collection is documental and its method is based on observation cards filled through various scenes captured from the films and examining the black and white elements in the actors' clothes. This research is an applied research, and the research plan is descriptive-analytical.

Kurdish people are Arian tribes living in the west of the Iranian Plateau along Zagros Mountains. They, despite the unity of origin and language, have formed some subcultures which are distinguished with regards to language, traditional music, clothes, folklore, and social life. These subcultures are part of the criteria through which the area is divided and recognized. One of the well-known subcultures in the area is those of Hurami’ s whose place of living is called Hawraman. Hawraman is spread both in Iran and Iraqi Kurdistan. In Iran, it is extended from western and southwestern of Kurdistan Province to northwestern Kermanshah province while it is located in a city of Iraq called Byara. Hurami language, despite its low number of speakers, is among one of the four original Kurdish Languages. Hawraman music, due to its unique and significant characteristics, is of great prestige which is closely associated with the following: The music is completely vocal which is not accompanied by any instruments. The range of the voices used is limited to two, three or at most four. The voice is associated with vibration and sound creation in the larynx, mouth, and sinus. The features mentioned above are all crystal clear in the production of vowels. Hawraman music and its examination is of great importance as it has influenced a numerous musical forms in both southern and western parts of Kurdistan province and north and west of Kermanshah province. The music has also had an impact on some musical forms of followers of the Yarsan ritual in the Goran region, and other major cities such as Sanandaj and Kermanshah. This study examines the Chapla which is a type of Hawraman music. The main purpose of the study is to examine the influence of poems, lyrics, and music on the form of Chapla. In other words, what is the relation between lyrics or words’ structure and music in Chapla and how does it influences the form. In pursuit of answering these questions, 118 unique Chapla were selected and then analyzed and transcribed so that the relation of the lyrics or words’ structure and the music be revealed. After transcription of Chaplas, units of words, rhythmic patterns, and melodic sentences were extracted as the basic vocal elements of Chapla. Then, the patterns of convergence and integration of these three elements were studied and classified. According to the results, each Chapla’ s hemistich, based on its stress, consists of twenty or twenty eight syllable which once being sung is divided into four parts of five-syllable units if totally twenty and seven-syllable if totally twenty eight. Each of these four units, being called “ khesht” in this article, is a quadruple. The inner rhythm of this quadruple is of 19 patterns. Each rhythm causes the Chaplas to be of 1, 2 or 4 “ khesht” . Hence, based on the relation of the lyrics and the music, the Chaplas are divided into four groups: one sentence on “ khesht” , one sentence two “ khesht” , one sentence four “ khesht” , and two sentences.