In a Masterclass, Zreik Played the Kanun and Shared More About its History, Touching on Themes of Improvisation and Linearity
Palestine-born and now New York-based musician and composer Firas Zreik brought music from the Arabic maqam traidtion to BYU as part of the BRAVO! Professional Performing Arts Series. In an Encore lecture the day before his campus performance, Zreik gave additional insight on the history and versatility of his instrument.
The kanun has origins in multiple cultures; it is a descendant of the old Egyptian harp and has been a key part of Arabic music since the 10th century. The instrument has 81 strings and levers on the side called mandals which can sharpen or flatten the pitch. “Many people say this was the forefather to the classical harp,” Zreik said, “but unlike the classical harp, it’s played horizontally as a lap harp rather than vertically.”
In its most traditional context, the kanun is used to accompany a singer. Zreik invited the audience to sing a few different scales as he played to demonstrate the nuances of the pitches of the instrument — the kanun utilizes what he called “half flats,” or intervals between notes that are more subtle and narrowly measured than the intervals that people more familiar with Western music are accustomed to.
“An untrained ear has no issue singing the absolute pitch when the context is tonal, when the context is a major scale,” Zreik said. “But when you change the notes around it, that’s when it becomes a little more tricky — it’s the interval you have trouble with rather than the pitch.”
The maqam music tradition draws from scales which function in a harmonic context. “Each note has a function — you have the tonic, dominant and subdominant and each one relates to a different chord,” Zreik said. “You are writing music that corresponds to that chord at the moment, and the beauty and linearity is in how you connect them.”
Upon graduating high school, Zreik attended Berklee College of Music on a full scholarship. Arabic music, which Zreik studied growing up, didn’t have a strong presence at Berklee, so he forayed into new musical territory by studying jazz, which helped him craft his own sound.
Zreik shared that Arabic music helped him gain a deeper understanding of jazz, and that both genres lean into improvisation. Zreik played a wide variety of musical styles in the masterclass, from traditional Arabic music to bluesy melodies. “You’d be surprised at how versatile this instrument can be,” he said.
Zreik shared that musical improvisation draws from an artistic vocabulary that the musician is already familiar with rather than an entirely new creation. “Whatever kinds of music you listen to are going to be reflected in your improvisation and general musicianship,” Zreik said. “Improvisation is not the creation of something new, it is the contextualization of things that you know.”
