It's no secret that I'm pretty passionate about exploring Old World styles of music and how they relate to our fiddles. 😊 

I've been lucky enough to run across a few musicians who try to keep much of this music alive, by promoting these lesser known traditional styles and making it more accessible to us fiddlers. 

I've been very impressed with the Beth Bahia Cohen workshops I attended at the last 3 Fiddle Hell Festivals! 

"A Life Story Through Strings" - Beth Bahia Cohen.

Beth Bahia Cohen is a violinist of Syrian Jewish and Russian Jewish heritage. Inspired at a young age by the sounds she heard at family gatherings, she went on to study with master musicians from Hungary, Greece, Turkey, and the Middle East. She plays the violin, viola, Greek lyras, Turkish bowed tanbur and kabak kemane, Norwegian hardingfele, and Egyptian rababa. 

Beth is a founding member of the Greek ensemble Ziyiá, a frequent teacher with the Eastern European Folklife Center, and an Assistant Professor at Berklee College of Music, where she leads the Berklee Greek Ensemble and the Berklee Global Strings Ensemble.

Beth also plays some beautiful Yayli Tanbur (Turkish bowed long-neck lute) music.  

"Şehnaz Saz Semai" by Kemençeci Nikolai.

https://youtu.be/E19ui9oBmzg 

@ABitRusty -

The "Yayli Tanbur" is like a BOWED BANJO! 

- Emily

A little more on Turkish Folk Music (Türkü) from wiki. 

...Türkü refers to folk songs originated from music traditions within Turkey whereas şarkı refers to all other songs, including foreign music.

Classically, Türküs can be grouped into two categories according to their melodies:

• Kırık havalar: These have regularly rhythmic melodies. [subtypes...]
• Uzun havalar: These have non-rhythmic or irregularly rhythmic melodies. [subtypes...] 

Though sometimes referred to as makams by exponents of Turkish Classical Music, the scales of Turkish Folk Music are more properly called 'ayak' (foot) and are simply scales, with no rules of progression, thus bearing closer comparison with the concept of medieval church modes than do makams. Furthermore, in many Turkish folk songs only part of the scale is used. Both forms of music are diatonic, but use notes that are additional to the 12 semitones of western music. In Turkish folk music, for example, some scales include a note roughly halfway between B and B flat. 

A wide variety of time signatures are used in Turkish folk music... Combinations of several basic rhythms often results in longer, complex rhythms that fit into time signatures such as 8/8, 10/8, and 12/8.

What is Taqsim and How Do I Dance To It?

A Taqsim is a piece of music, which usually precedes the performance of classical and traditional Middle Eastern, Arabic and Turkish compositions and it is improvised.

A typical Egyptian Baladi piece, for example, starts with a taksim.

A taqsim is performed using either one instrument only or one main instrument with another one in the background.

The instrument in the background supports the main instrument by playing a drone (a note sounded continually). 

Keman (Violin) Taqsim In Maqam Hijaz. 

https://youtu.be/PiAcPQ0eG28

Examples of Violin Taqsim in the 8 most common Maqamat (plural of maqam) - from A Max Gambus TV. 

Maqamat: Saba, Nahawand, Ajam, Bayātī, Sikāh, Hijaz, Rāst, and Kurd.

@ABitRusty -

Check these out!

Found an amazing array of backing rhythms for Taqsim practice - or ANY improv! 

TAQS.IM Rhythm Practice Backing Tracks - Video Playlist

Sorry, when I first started this thread I think I was looking for certain types of answers - which I finally got & shared in my post #11. (lol)

What I missed was not so much WHAT to learn... but HOW THESE ARE LEARNED!   

With PHRASES!

• The building blocks (ajnas) have a tonic and numbered scale degrees - but it's more than just a partial 'Western-type scale'.  It's about learning to listen & feel the family of phrases that use these notes, which include rhythm! 

So, becoming familiar with each little family of 'phrases' IS KEY - and learning this way is not only excellent ear training, but you also learn all about Music Theory... at the same time!  IT MAKES SO MUCH SENSE!

Now, if you can simply hear a tune/song in your head, and tell when you play a wrong note in a Western scale, or feel when a note seems out of place - then you can easily learn about this music! 

Sami Abu Shumays has set up EXCELLENT video lessons to start learning, to help become familiar with, these little families of phrases & notes (ajnas).  Like everything in music, it takes time & practice.  I believe he has grouped these lessons this way to help in learning, but you can just follow the original lessons number order if you want.  First: The Ajnas Lessons Playlist.  Second: The Maqamat Lessons Playlist.

Try his FIRST lesson - Jins Rast. 

I learned how to think differently about music with this lesson! 

@ABitRusty -

FABULOUS!!! 

You Hit the Jackpot! 

Glad he was able to reference the Maqam Husayni (this link is to definition with audio example of a Violin 'Taqsim' using this maqam)!  'Taqsim' = an improvised melodic solo that follows traditional progressions - used at the beginning of a performance. 

What's not to LOVE about his FREE Decent Sampler Plugin?  I'm SUPER geeked that he added microtuning support for the FREE Çifteli Sampler!  AND see other great links in the video description!

This video has such a broad scope - obviously beyond Albanian folk music, right in line with what I've been learning about some Spanish Folk music recently! 

Albania is part of the Balkan Penninsula.  Found that basically, because of early history, ALL the Mediterranean Basin has folk music influenced by the centuries of different ruling Empires - Greek, Roman/Byzantine, Persian, Ottoman, Arab, etc... so, microtones & maqams!

 Thanks, glad you shared this!