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TOWARDS PROFESSIONALISM IN TRADITIONAL MUSIC:
AN EXAMPLE OF UZBEK WOMEN Dadadjanova I.A. Email: [email protected]
Dadadjanova Iroda Abdulazizovna - Winner of the National Prizes "Oltin Qalam" ("Golden Pen "), "Shuhrat" ("Glory") and "O'zbegim Ayoli" ("Woman of Uzbekistan"), PhD in Art criticism, Vice-rector for scientific and innovative activities, UZBEK INSTITUTE OF NATIONAL MUSIC NAMED AFTER YUNUS RAJABI,
Editor-in-chief,
"YOSH KUCH" JOURNAL, TASHKENT, REPUBLIC OF UZBEKISTAN
Abstract: the article examines the path of three generations of Uzbek female musicians, bearers and transmitters of traditions. Each of them with their own fate, which reflects different phases in the "female" history of nearly half a century of musical life in Uzbekistan. Author reveals that Uzbek traditions are not at all only a heritage which has been crystallised somewhere in the past, but a high-grade art still functioning and developing today, in which female musicians like Zamira, Makhfuza and Klara have and will have their place and significance.
Keywords: women and music, female musician, Uzbek music, traditional music, gender identity, performing arts, music education, Uzbekistan.
НА ПУТИ К ПРОФЕССИОНАЛИЗМУ В ТРАДИЦИОННОЙ МУЗЫКЕ: ПРИМЕР УЗБЕКСКИХ ЖЕНЩИН Дададжанова И.А.
Дададжанова Ирода Абдулазизовна - обладатель Национальных премий "Oltin Qalam" ("Золотое Перо"), "Shuhrat" ("Слава") и "O'zbegim Ayoli" ("Женщина Узбекистана"), кандидат
искусствоведения, проректор по научной и инновационной деятельности, Узбекский институт национальной музыки им. Юнуса Раджаби, главный редактор, журнал "Yosh kuch", г. Ташкент, Республика Узбекистан
Аннотация: в статье исследуется творческая судьба трех поколений узбекских певиц, носителей традиций. У каждого из них своя судьба, отражающая разные этапы «женской» истории полувековой музыкальной жизни Узбекистана. Автор убеждает, что узбекские традиции - это не просто наследие, кристаллизовавшееся где-то в прошлом, а полноценное искусство, функционирующее и развивающееся до сих пор, в котором такие женщины-музыканты, как Замира, Махфуза и Клара, имеют и будут иметь свое место и значимость.
Ключевые слова: женщины и музыка, женщина-музыкант, узбекская музыка, традиционная музыка, гендерная идентичность, исполнительское искусство, музыкальное образование, Узбекистан.
DOI: 10.24411/2304-2338-2021-10303
Traditional music, in particular the art of singing - from simple folk-ritual songs to complex genres like Ashula and Katta Ashula -, has, over the centuries, accumulated and passed on the spiritual experiences of generations. Our history recognizes a number of bright women that have made a great contribution to the preservation and further development of the traditional layers of Uzbek musical culture. Important names here are, for example, Tamara-Honim, Lutfi Sarymsakova, Halima Nosirova, Nazira Akhmedova, Hadja Yusupova, Fotima Borukhova, Zaynab Polvonova, Saodat Qobulova, Berta Davidova, Mekhri Abdullaeva, Communa Ismoilova, Habiba Okhunova and Etibor Djalilova. They and other masters are truly the pride and treasure of Uzbek performing arts.
Having mastered a rich, centuries old heritage they managed to transmit the specific experience of female musical performance to coming generations.
In the second half of the twentieth century, a new wave of singers in the field of traditional music has risen after them. They are: Matluba Dadabaeva, Munodjot Yulchieva, Zamira Suyunova, Marjam Sattarova, Nasiba Sattarova, Hurriat Israilova and others. Their creativity has substantially shaped modern developments in Uzbek traditional music. Now it is a pleasure for me to observe, that the twenty-first century has its own generation of professional female musicians who study and perform the prestigious traditions of the past.
My heroines - Uzbek female musicians of three generations, bearers and transmitters of Uzbek traditions. Each of them with their own fate, which reflects different phases in the "female" history of nearly half a century of musical life in Uzbekistan. These three women now live and work in one space and one time. But what they are now, has been shaped in different historical times, under different geographical and political, economic and cultural conditions: The representative of the senior generation was born and raised during Soviet times, the representative of the middle generation can be linked to the phase of "post-Soviet" Uzbekistan, and the representative of the younger generation is a full product of independent Uzbekistan.
I will begin with the representative of the senior generation, because she was the reason for the other two women to become involved in music as a profession. Her activity as a female singer motivated them to become her followers in the performing arts.
The first generation: Zamira Suynova
Zamira Suynova is 62 and a well known and beloved singer in the country. Already thirty years Zamira shines brightly among the stars of the Uzbek professional arts and has her own place in the vocal tradition. For her achievements she has been endowed with the prestigious honorary state title of People's Artist of Uzbekistan.
She was born in the southwest of Uzbekistan, in a village named Shatri, which is part of the Kitab district in the region Kashkadarya. Already in her early childhood she fell in love with music and started to sing together with her elder sister who played the Dutar. Her father was a musically talented person. He was a history teacher at the local school, but because of a shortage of teachers for music, he sometimes had to teach this subject, too. Recognizing the talent of his daughters he did not object to their wish to become musicians. He was a well educated man who was not afraid of public gossip doubting the morality of this decision with questions like «Is it true that your daughter is becoming an artist?!»
The father himself brought his daughters to Tashkent, to the so-called Glier School; this is a school with a special focus on music for talented pupils from all over the republic. So as a modest girl from a village far from Tashkent, together with her sister, Zamira began to study at a prestigious music school in the capital.
Specializing in choir conducting, Zamira received an academic education in European music and acquired practical skills in the vocal traditions of European classical music. There were choral compositions, arias and romances of composers from within and outside the Soviet Union in her study repertoire. Because at that time in all the fifteen republics of the Soviet Union there was a unitary education system. Hence, in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Uzbekistan in those years, there was no public music school where it would have been possible to learn traditional Uzbek music. Therefore, after leaving school, Zamira entered the Tashkent state conservatory to continue her studies in the same specialization - as a choir conductor.
Socialism had a huge impact on all aspects of life in Uzbek society in the twentieth century, and most of all, on the status and position of women. In the nineteen-seventies, when Zamira just began her own career as a singer, women were already actively involved in culture and the art sphere. A number of female groups appeared, professional and folk, such as the dancing ensembles "Bakhof' and "Tanovar", ensembles of girls singing and playing Dutar or pop groups like "Sado". In 1979 a girl ensemble of dutarists was
established, which was linked to the National TV and Radio Company of Uzbekistan. Still studying at the conservatory, Zamira Suyunova successfully passed the audition. The head of the ensemble was Ganidjon Toshmatov, a Ghidjak player and traditional composer or so-called bastakor.
Under the guidance of Ganidjan Toshmatov, a great expert on the Uzbek musical heritage, the girl ensemble of dutarists soon became recognized and loved by the wider Uzbek public. In a masterful way, Ganidjan Toshmatov chose for this exclusively female ensemble a repertoire of folklore material. He collected, restored and gave a modern sound as well as a new form to a body of songs and melodies, which was on the verge of disappearance. The girl dutarists could creatively revive scenes from female parties - the favorite form of cultural life in the women's part of the house with its own musical traditions - and for many Uzbek women the interpretations of the girl dutarists became the yardstick for real parties. Watching their performance on TV, Uzbek mothers dreamt of their daughters being like those fine girl musicians who so sincerely performed their favorite melodies and songs. It is important to note that this ensemble of girl dutarists at the National TV and Radio Company helped to revive love for a centuries-old national heritage and was a great stimulus for many Uzbek girls to decide for a career in music.
Soon after entering the ensemble as its soloist, Zamira Suyunova became the central figure of the ensemble. Being an admirer of her talent, Ganidjan Toshmatov became an important instructor and also the main co-ordinator of her singing career. He skillfully selected a solo repertoire for Zamira and sometimes even specially composed songs for her, which made her widely popular and successful. To find such a teacher was a happy coincidence for the young singer and a gift of fate. For 20 years master and pupil worked together side by side. When Zamira graduated from the conservatory, she became the "right hand" to Ganidjan Toshmatov and then, in 1984, the musical director of the ensemble. Thus she started her pedagogical career, teaching young girls the mastership of traditional singing.
For ten years she was the main soloist and musical director of the ensemble of girl dutarists, and after the death of Ganidjan Toshmatov, in 1995 she became its artistic director. In the course of time, the line-up of the ensemble had changed, for as an ensemble of girls, the age of the musicians was limited to 30 years. Many members of the ensemble, already mature singers, went further in music and followed a career as soloists. Zamira did not have time to relax. Apart from the repertoire, inherited from Ganidjan Toshmatov, she started to compose new music especially for female performers. More than thirty compositions, which she composed together with the well-known composer and Ghidzak virtuoso Abdukhoshim Ismailov, found their place next to the national heritage.
Finding a worthy replacement for herself, in 2002 Zamira left the ensemble and became a pedagogue at the Uzbek state conservatory, which had already invited her to join the staff several times in the years before. Although by academic training she was a choir conductor, Zamira was invited to the department of "Traditional performance" in the faculty for Eastern music, because she had acquired such extensive experience in this area through her work in the ensemble of dutarists. In just a few years she has taught quite a large number of students - her followers - to become performers of traditional Uzbek music. One of them is Klara Turaeva, whom I will present to you later and who has been studying with Zamira Suyunova some years.
Still today, Zamira gives her energy and strength to her dream and her hopes and does not stop her artistic search. She became the paragon of a female Uzbek musician by being able to keep balance between her artistic and her personal life. The help of her parents and wise consultants was important for that, but decisive was the support from her husband, Abdurakhmon Xoltadjiev. Himself a famous musician on Chang and Qonun, he has been teaching at the conservatory for many years. Their children also chose a career in the arts: Their daughter Zilola works at the same ensemble, where for many years her mother worked.
Second generation: Makhfuza Karimova
The representative of the second generation, Makhfuza Karimova, received her secondary education as a Soviet pupil, but her studies continued under totally different conditions: She started her career as an artist in a sovereign Uzbekistan. This refers to the nineteen-nineties, which were marked by the processes of renewal, that means, the search for new spiritual and aesthetic reference points. At that time, characteristic tendencies of these processes involved a systematic historic-philosophical and artistic analysis of the traditional musical heritage. Basic spiritual structures became apparent, very original in their form, and artistic interests turned to Uzbekistan's own, ethnocultural traditions, which had been formed in antiquity. Interest in topics like spirituality and religion increased.
Makhfuza Karimova was born in 1971, in the east of Uzbekistan, in the city Margilan in the Fergana valley. Her mother sang very beautifully, but her parents had not allowed their daughter to become a singer. Consequently she very much wanted her daughter to achieve what she had not been able to achieve herself and she did everything for Makhfuza to become a singer. So she drove her daughter to a musical circle at the Pioneers' House, where the pioneers as members of these circles regularly participated in various gatherings, festivals, and other art festivities. Makhfuza was a big fan of the girl dutarists, especially Zamira Suyunova, who in the eighties and nineties had the peak of her creativity. She knew by heart all her repertoire, imitated her, and sang together with her when she appeared on television or radio. When she was fourteen, she won the first place at the "Festival of Arts". Having finished her secondary education in Margelan, in 1988 Makhfuza left for the capital to enrol at the conservatory. But without a basic music education she was not accepted. She had to take preliminary courses at the conservatory and after successfully completing them, in nineteen-ninety she became a student ate the department for «Traditional performance» at the faculty of Eastern music. In 1995 she participated in the Yunus Radjabi competition, an international competition for maqam performers, and was awared the first prize. Makhfuza often participates in concerts of classical Uzbek music in the musical centres of Uzbekistan and is a regular guest in tv programmes like "Tarannum", "Nazm va Navo", "An'ana", "Okhanrabo" which promote the old traditions and live performance of classical music. Her repertoire is taken from the so-called "Shashmakom", a complex cycle of classical Uzbek music, which demands specific vocal abilities and a high level of performance mastership ("Talqini Ushshoq", "Nasri Ushshoq", "Sarakhbori Navo", "Sarakhbori Dugoh", «Chorgoh I - IV », «Bayot I - III», «Savti Chorgoh I - V», etc.)
At the moment, Makhfuza works as a associated professor at the same department, where she used to study herself. She already has almost 50 students - young women who love and value the rich musical traditions of the Uzbeks.
Third generation: Klara Turaeva
Klara Turaeva is a representative of the younger generation of performers in the field of traditional music. She was raised in a country with its own ideology and cultural politics, in which the national, traditional layer of culture is promoted and the prestige of its national, traditional forms of making music is increasing. Klara finds herself as a singer at a moment, when the sociocultural context has deprived Uzbek traditional music of earlier forms of existence, instead immerses it in the sphere of modern mass culture and submits it to its laws. It is worth mentioning, that as a simultaneous counter process the intonation and patterns of traditional art enrich mass genres.
Klara Turaeva was born in the southwest of Uzbekistan, in the Kitab district of the region Kashkadarya. An important role in the development of her musical abilities played her mother, who had won various music competitions in her school days. So, at the same time as starting ordinary school, Klara began to take Dutar lessons in a children's music school. Another important reason for Klara's family to set her up for a career in music, was that Zamira Suyunova, the idol of the whole family, originated from the same region.
After finishing school, in 2003 Klara came to the Euro-Asian megacity Tashkent and enroled at the academic lyceum, linked to the conservatory to study in the class of Zamira Suyunova. Later she became a student at the conservatory itself. Over the years of her studies, she has acquired the repertoire of her instructor and has learned the secrets of traditional singing. Klara successfully graduated the conservatory and was accepted as a singer for the legendary Maqom ensemble named after Yunus Rajabi. She performs at the honorable concerts and participates on tv programmes which propagate respect for old spiritual traditions.
The continuity of generations
In the traditional culture of the Uzbeks long since there have been certain layers of particularly female culture and even special local female performing schools. But this is a topic for a different research project. Here, I have tried to make a small digression in the form of «back to the future», in order to present, in fragments, a picture of music in Uzbekistan. Through living examples, that is, the careers of three contemporary singers, I have tried to present in how far Uzbek music has managed to keep its classical tradition and to find in it a role for female musicians. I have not spoken, though, about the losses which traditional creativity suffered in the past century, when many ceremonial genres ceased to exist, including those linked to religion and cults, if not the deepest and most reliable keepers of the collective memory of the people.
I found it more pleasant to speak about something else: about independent Uzbekistan, which has with redoubled energy set itself the task to revive the old national art in all its completeness and colourfulness. Traditional art became one of the stimuli in the search for new value parameters. Interest in the revived music with a live sound, particularly in the genres of traditional music, bears testimony to the expansion of the musical aesthetic horizon of contemporary listeners. This very clear tendency, that is, to perceive music of the past and the present in its authentic form also includes the understanding of future society.
To finish, I would like to stress that Uzbek traditions are not at all only a heritage which has been crystallised somewhere in the past, but a high-grade art still functioning and developing today, in which female musicians like Zamira, Makhfuza and Klara have and will have their place and significance. One can be sure that each of their performances on stage will open up the new modern charm of Uzbek traditional music. Female voices will sound on, proving to all the world that the modern beauty of the East is not limited to the old and legendary, but that it keeps its secrets and transmits it to the next generation.
References / Список литературы
1. Ganieva L.M. Muzykal'noe iskusstvo uzbekskogo bastakora Ganijana Tashmatova // Problemy sovremennoj nauki i obrazovaniya, 2020/4-1 (149). Pp. 73-75.
2. Dadadjanova I.A. Pop-muzyka, kul'tura i gendernaya identichnost': Uzbekistan // Vestnik nauki i obrazovaniya, 2021/5-1 (108). Pp. 92-98.
3. Mannopov S., Sulejmanova D.K. Muzykal'noe nasledie uzbekskogo naroda // Problemy sovremennoj nauki i obrazovaniya, 2019/10 (143). Pp. 82-84.
