The meaning of the word Bayāt is uncertain. It may be an abbreviated form of Abyāt, meaning stanzas. The word Tork (Turk), on the other hand, is clear enough. Yet, in connection with this dastgāh, it does not refer to the Turks of Turkestan, Azerbaijan (i.e. both Soviet and Iranian Azerbaijan) or Turkey. It is believed that many of the songs of the Turkic tribes of Southern Persia, notably the Qašqāi, are in this mode, and that the reference is to them. In fact, this dastgāh is also known by the name of Bayāt-e Zand, which stands for the Zand tribe (also of Turkic stock) of the Fārs region. This title, however, is not commonly used today for the dastgāh.

As shown in the previous two chapters, there are some bases for considering Abuatā and Dašti as satellites of Šur. The connection between Bayāt-e Tork and Afšāri with Šur seems much more tenuous, even though the tradition identifies them as derivatives of Šur. It is true, however, that some pieces in the collection of these two dastgāhs are modally close to the mode of Šur.

In identifying both Bayāt-e Tork and Afšāri as independent dastgāhs, it is of far greater importance that both have modal schemes distinct from Šur. Furthermore, they have forud patterns of their own with notes of ist and finalis different from those of Šur. In this connection, therefore, it is difficult to reconcile tradition with analytical observation.

This book is mainly concerned with an investigation of the complexities of the dastgāh system and the analysis of the structure of each of the twelve dastgāhs. It is useful, however, to establish an understanding, at the outset, as to what is meant by a dastgāh. Also, in this chapter, other terms and concepts peculiar to Persian music are explained so that reference to them can be made henceforth without the need for scattered explanations and footnotes.

Dastgāh (organisation, system)

A dastgāh has been taken to be the counterpart of the Indian raga and the maqām of the Turko-Arabian musical traditions. It has also been translated as a mode in western musical terminology. None of these describes a dastgāh adequately.

Two separate ideas are, in fact, addressed by the dastgāh concept. It identifies a set of pieces, traditionally grouped together, most of which have their own individual modes. It also stands for the modal identity of the initial piece in the group. This mode has a position of dominance as it is brought back frequently, throughout the performance of the group of pieces, in the guise of cadential melodic patterns.

Accordingly, a dastgāh signifies both the title of a grouping of modes, of which there are twelve, and the initial mode presented in each group. When we say, for example, dastgāh-e Homāyun, we mean a group of pieces under the collective name Homāyun; as a mode, however, Homāyun only identifies the initial piece of that collection.

Of the musical arts of the earliest civilisations on the Iranian plateau, no tangible trace has remained. The Persian Empire of the Achaemenian dynasty (550–331 BC), with all its grandeur and glory, has left us nothing to reveal the nature of its musical culture. In the writings of the Greek historians, we find but a faint glimmer of the musical life of this period. Herodotus mentions the religious rituals of the Zoroastrians, which involved the chanting of sacred hymns. Xenophon, in his Cyropedia, speaks of the martial and ceremonial musics of the Persian Empire.

The first document of any extent on Persian music comes to us from the Sassanian period (AD 226–642). At the Sassanian court, musicians had an exalted status. Emperor Chosroes II (Xosrō Parviz), ruler from AD 590 to 628, the splendour of whose court is told in many legends, was patron to numerous musicians. Rāmtin, Bāmšād, Nakisā, Āzād, Sarkaš and Bārbod were among the musicians of this period whose names have survived.

Bārbod was the most illustrious musician of the court of Chosroes II. Numerous stories about this musician and his remarkable skills as performer and composer have been told by later writers and poets. Bārbod is credited with the organisation of a musical system containing seven modal structures, known as the Royal Modes (Xosrovāni); thirty derivative modes (Lahn); and three hundred and sixty melodies (Dastān).

In the course of the twentieth century, three separate theories on intervals and scales of Persian music have been proposed. The first of these, put forward in the 1920s by Ali Naqi Vaziri, identifies a 24-quarter-tone scale as the basis for Persian music. A second theory was formulated in the 1940s by Mehdi Barkešli according to which Persian music is defined within a 22-tone scale. The third view, arrived at by the present writer, isolates five intervals with which all modes are constructed and no longer recognises a ‘basic scale’ concept. In the following each of these three theories is explained and examined.

The 24-quarter-tone scale

The notion of the division of the scale into intervals of equal size has been the outcome of a western musical orientation. The fact that the European classical tradition, in its pursuit of a versatile technique of harmony, had developed the equal temperament, captured the imagination of those Middle Eastern musicians who came in contact with it. These musicians viewed the absence of harmony in their own music as a sign of its inferiority to western music. The desired musical advancement was thought possible only through the adoption of western harmonic practice. That, in turn, required equidistant tones.

There was a general awareness that the whole-tone and the semi-tone alone were not able to represent eastern music, which contained intervals unmistakably different from these two.

Study of the twelve dastgāhs has shown that the radif of each dastgāh includes pieces that are exclusive to it, and also some that are taken from the radif of other dastgāhs. There is still another group of pieces that are performed, or can be performed, in all of the dastgāhs. The pieces in this group have relatively stable melodic and rhythmic structures and are not subject to extensive change through improvisation. More important is the fact that they have no modal stability. They adopt the mode of the dastgāh in which they are placed, or even the mode of gušes which have preceded them. As such, while the melodic and the rhythmic identities of these pieces are preserved, their modes change according to where they are placed. The word tekke (small or short piece) will be used here to identify this genre of guše. Writers on Persian music have generally failed to recognise that, due to their instability and adaptability, these pieces must necessarily be placed in a separate category. At times they are identified simply as zarbi or rhythmic pieces.

There are two types of tekke: those that have a more or less clear and stable metric structure and are exclusively instrumental (we shall call this group rhythmic tekkes); and those that do not have a stable metric basis and can be performed vocally as well as on instruments (we shall call this group non-rhythmic tekkes).

The least performed of the twelve dastgāhs is Rāst-Panjgāh. This neglect is due to the fact that the greater portion of the radif of this dastgāh is taken from the repertoire of other dastgāhs. Some Persian musicians are of the opinion that this dastgāh has evolved for pedagogic purposes, in the study of which the skill of modulation to many diverse modes is cultivated.

In our present discussion, the word Panjgāh is omitted from the title of this dastgāh. This is not done for convenience alone. The curious fact is that one of the gušes of this dastgāh is named Panjgāh, and that this guše is not in the mode of Rāst, but is the mode of Šur. It would seem unreasonable, therefore, to be discussing the mode of Rāst-Panjgāh, when Panjgāh as a guše in the dastgāh, has a different mode. The name of this dastgāh is one more example of the irregularities one encounters in the dastgāh system.

It is of some significance that Rāst is the title of a mode (maqām) mentioned in all medieval treatises. Also, in the related musical traditions of Turkey and the Arabic-speaking countries, one invariably finds a mode by the name Rāst. But the medieval sources do not give us a Panjgāh mode and rarely does the name appear in musical systems outside today's Persia.

In its intervallic structure, the mode of Rāst is identical with that of Māhur. In this respect also, this dastgāh lacks independence of identity.