Middle Eastern Classical Music

Middle Eastern classical music is the family of modal art-music traditions cultivated across the Arab world, Turkey and Persia, in which composition and improvisation unfold within melodic mode systems, the Arabic and Turkish maqam and the Persian dastgah, and intricate rhythmic cycles. Repertoires are organised into suite forms such as the Arabic wasla, the Ottoman fasıl and the Andalusian nuba preserved in North Africa, and are performed by small takht ensembles or modern orchestras centred on the oud, qanun, ney and violin. Its canon joins medieval court theory, orally transmitted master repertoires and the long-form composed songs of the twentieth-century concert stage.