Uzbek classic music

        Research into the semantic basis of makoms is directly connected with the study of the origins of this art form. The music of makoms is first of all characterized as "sacred" melodies, passed down to us from our ancestors. This can be supplements by the following:
        - the feeling-listening reception of the makom form;
        - the musical sense significance of those terms which historically preceded the term makom, and the semantics of which is connected with "path", "road" (rolch, tarika, ravish, ravashin and others);
        - the contents-of written sources (legends).
        The feeling-listening reception is the most important factor, though it is very individual from the point of view of the genesis of the makom melodies, based on the subject reception of the listener. This can be seen as an objective fact, however. The condition is the existence of the necessary skills to understand the makom melodies, relating to them as to something sacred, a gift of the Great Creator. It is this feeling of sacredness of these melodies that gives birth to a special excited reeling to them by different peoples.
        Thanks to this, makoms have been passed down from generation to generation to our day.
The first people to hear these sacred melodies are thought to be the prophets - the mediators between the Creator and people. In this connection, the sacred melodies are organic, an inseparable part of the ceremonial practice, the form for the reception of the sacred, the way of revelation (vakhii).
        Connecting these sacred melodies with the term "path" leads to the following conclusion: with their help, the prophets showed people the path of truth, the true path of attaining true happiness. In the Koran, in the Bee Sura, we read "We sent each people a message: "Bow down to Allah, and turn away from paganism." Allah led some on a straight path, and others were fated to be lost. Go over the land and see what was the end of those considered false.*
        Important sources in the study of makoms are medieval literature and legends. Special interest is raised by the Traktat on music of the Bukhara musician at the end of the 16th c and early 17th c Darvish Alt Changi (1,2). Referring to such famous musicians as Khodja Abdulkadyr ibn Abdurrakhman Marogii, Khodja Safiuddin ibn Abdulmumin and Sultan Uyais Djalair, Darvish Ali shows that oat first there were seven makoms from the seven prophets." The rest were later "products" of creative masters of this art form.
        On the basis of legends, we can get a general impression of the character of ancient makom melodies. The significance of the intonation of the cry as the melodic substance of the majority of makoms may be seen. Thus the makom Rost, after the legend, "offers itself as a cry of the first man (Adam) for the lost paradise and wasted bliss. The makom Ushshak came down from the grandfather of Noah (Nukh), whose name comes from the word noukha (navkha) - cry, as he cried and his cry was the melody of the Ushshak." (1)
        Generalizing about the characteristic attribute of the intonation of the cry, we come to the conclusion that cries have their basis in an underlying intonational-melodic structure. The tendency here has a universal character, which explains their unified genetic basis.
        Contemporary ethno-music history classifies the underlying intonations as one of the first forms of structure of musical (melodic) thought. As sources verify in the world music, underlying musical-international thought ruled for a long historical period. (3) Even today, we can see specific forms in ritual songs of various peoples. Thus in Uzbek music the structural property is clearest in those genres of national music which such specialists as V. Beliaev, I. Radjabov, F. Karomatov, T. Vyzgo have traced to ancient musical folklore - the wedding yor-yor, marsiia (cry) children's songs and others.
        Elements of the structure are heard in makoms such as Tasnifi Dugokh, Sarakhbori Navo, Savti Ushshok, Mushkiloti Dugokh. However, unlike folk music, the structure in makoms is transformed, achieving a rising character. It would be more accurate to speak of the submission of elements of the structure to the new melodic style, the basis of which consists of the rising quality of melodic movement. The aim of this is to achieve a cumulative zone (audj) and the consequent return to the starting point. Thus, a new style, in our understanding, is connected not with the underlying movement of international-melodic structure, but with the processes, contrary to it, when the entire flow of musical sound has a clear expressive rising character, formulated over centuries.
        In our opinion, the basic international sources of the new style are the forms of reading the Koran on the canons of tadjvid and tartil, and the principles of formation of melodies of the; Turkic peoples - the kui.
        Professional reading of the Koran (by kori, khafiz) accompany the creation of form-structure of the rising plan. This process, achieving a unique reflection in the melodies of makoms, is universal and the basic principle of the new style. We can suppose that it flows from an assimilation of local musical traditions, including kui, and has a general form-structure of a rising character." Precisely this ancient Turkic substrata ... to a large extent determines the uniqueness of the makom in the system of the makoms."
        (4,pl91)
        The new, style full of details appeared in the ideal conceptions of Sufism, the main goal of which was the esoteric comprehension of the Absolute Truth, the spiritual unity with the Creator in a state of ecstasy (vajd). This goal was achieved by moral self-perfection by a step-by-step movement on the path called tarikat (way, suluk (road)). On this path there are seven stops which in Arabic are called makoms. Thus the makom, according to Sufis, signifies the seven basic stops achieved by the traveler (salik, miurid), going on the path of moral self-perfection (5, p36). Thus the semantics of the new style in music is a unique project of spiritual uplift to the Absolute.
        The form of spiritual rising to the Absolute is objectified through the idea of pilgrimage to holy cities, and finds a secret expression (batin) in specially named circles.