The Instrument: Zaramela

      The idea of instrumentation is clearly dynamic. There are so many factors associated with instrumentation that are integral to a musicians knowledge and skill. However, this vital concept is often hard to grasp to those that do not practice music and are not exposed to instrument experimentation. So, I want to personalize this concept by showing the intricacies of instruments through a story of a local band.

Inho Park, Jameson Brenner, Malcolm Engel, Kris Hansen, Mike Jang, Aaron Gamalinda, Josh Schwartz-Dodek

      This is Zaramela. This band was fully formed around three years ago when my brother Inho (yes, I guess you can consider this blog post a shameless plug for my brother's band) joined Zaramela. He had known a few guys in the band from Maple middle school, but they had gone separate ways, funneled into the separate sister high schools Glenbrook North and Glenbrook South. They all ended up being incredibly musically inclined, formed a band, and when Zaramela needed a full time bassist, they asked my brother to join even though he had no prior experience with the instrument. Although my brother has long surpassed my level of skill due to his incredible musical aptitude, as a bassist myself I can claim that I was the first person to teach my brother the ways of the bass guitar.

     My personal affiliation to the band aside, why is Zaramela a big deal? Why does this band embody the importance of instrumentation? Well, because of the instruments, of course. Count the number of people in the band. Seven members is much more than your standard four or five man crew, where someone plays the drums, rhythm and lead guitars, the bass, and vocals. That's because Zaramela has what your average band does not: a horn section. In fact, most of the musicians of Zaramela met each other through the Glenbrook South's high school band program, so the importance of the brass was known amongst the band. Therefore, the between all members of the band, they are able to utilize the trumpet, the alto saxophone, the baritone saxophone, the keyboard, the bass guitar, the drums, and the electric guitar in their musical performances. That's a whole lot of variety. This instrumental depth enables Zaramela to foray into a variety of musical genres, so the band considers themselves to be jazz/hip-hop/rap/funk fusion. Just take a listen. I implore you to watch the whole thing.

     That was Zaramela's live perfomance at the Metro in April of this year, playing an incredible rendition of Louis Armstrong's "St. James Infirmary". Zaramela's sound is distinct yet fluid, unique yet familiar. As you can see, this is accomplished through the bands incredible instrumentation. Not only are the musicians of Zaramela independently talented, they realize the importance of cooperative instrumentation as well. Especially in a band setting, musicians are at their best when they play off cohesively with their bandmates. From the raw, blaring trombone to the phenomenal voice of Kris Hansen, the sounds of the band complement one another in a very balanced way. The instruments are coordinated extremely well, as the band weaves in and out of different tempos and time signatures as one cohesive unit. Ultimately, Zaramela's music is interesting, and entertaining to listen to.

     The style and foundation of Zaramela is just one face of instrumentation. It is just one way that instrumentation works, and I hope that this story inspires you to be more curious about music and instrumentation. After all, music is a never-ending learning process. 

The Instrument: The Qanun

      If you walked around the streets of Chicago and asked anyone what they thought or knew about the Middle East, you would probably hear the following answers: violence, terrorism, and political instability. Now, you cannot blame the ordinary citizen for associating the Middle East with these ideas, as the Middle East is arguably the most tumultuous region in the world as of recent years. Alongside a very one-sided media coverage of the events unfolding in the Middle East, it is only natural for people to associate the region with violence and unrest.

     I have a feeling that people would perceive the Middle East very differently if they knew about the true intricacies of Islamic culture. Islam and the Middle East does not derive its importance from perpetual political unrest. In fact, Islamic society is considered to be one of the most important civilizations to have ever graced planet Earth, making incredible headway in the arts and sciences during a relatively chaotic and bellicose period in human history. This era of cultural revelations was known as the Islamic Golden Age, and it was defined as such due to the emphasis of amassing knowledge by various Islamic leaders. During this golden age, the numerous caliphates of the Islamic Empire sent scholars throughout the known world in order to collect all books and to translate them into Arabic. As a result of this efforts, intellectuals of the Islamic realm made leaps and bounds in mathematics, physics, medicine, architecture, and other schools of thought. Islam was undoubtedly the cultural center of the world during this time period, and with any cultural center, there was a bounty of music.

     Now, I consider myself to be relatively unknowledgeable in the realm of Islamic music simply because I had not been exposed to much of it before. However, after some research, it was clear to me that Islamic music was defined by a variety of unique instruments and theories that could not be found anywhere else in the world. There are many instruments that play an important role in traditional Islamic music, and I would not be doing Islam justice if I neglected to talk about all of these instruments, but for the sake of brevity I must focus on one specific one. This instrument is the qanun, a peculiar string instrument of the Middle East.

Drawing of the qanun in action

     The qanun belongs to the family of zither instruments, with a trapezoidal soundboard with parallel strings running at different lengths in order to produce different notes. This instrument is played with both hands, as all fingers are used to pluck at the numerous strings that line the soundboard. The best way to truly understand an instrument is the hear it in action, so here is a short video of a qanun solo.

     As you can see, the qanun produces a flurry of notes and tones as a result of a rapid plucking action by the musician. Undeniably, the qanun has a very unique and foreign sound. However, this intriguing sound is not only the result of the instrument itself. Remember that the instrument is only the tool. The musicality and theory that goes into playing every instrument distinguishes the almost infinite number of styles that the listener can recognize.

     The tune that the musician in the video is playing sounds very, well, Islamic, is because the musician is implementing the maqamat mode in his playing. To a person that is unfamiliar with music and modes, that probably made no sense whatsoever. However, modes are not a hard concept to grasp. Essentially, modes are alterations to basic scales that we all know and love, such as the basic major scale of do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do. These alterations take of the form of flat and sharp notes in specific parts of the scale depending on the mode. Each mode has unique melodic aspects due to these changes, and numerous historical cultures have implemented a specific mode in their traditional music. For example, everyone can imagine the tune of the traditional "Asian-sounding" song. All of these songs use the pentatonic or asian-pentatonic mode, and the prevalence of this mode in the traditional music of certain Asian cultures has created this association between the specific sounds of the mode and the culture. The maqamat mode is no different; it is most often found in the traditional Islamic musical context.

      The qanun played in the maqamat mode is just one aspect of the immense realm of Islamic music. Even after much research, I have only barely scratched the surface of the musicality of the Middle East. I hope that this depth of Islamic culture is recognized by more people, and I hope that people think about the beautiful sounds of the qanun when they think about the complex region that is the Middle East.