Music and Power in Iran: An instrument of propaganda and control

In her essay, Maria Koomen examines the important role played by music in the history of Iran, in particular since the Islamic revolution of 1979

Mohammad Reza Shajarian, middle, performs with Mojgan Shajarian, 2nd left, and Majid Derakhshani composer, 2nd right, during a concert with Shahnaz Ensemble band in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Thursday, Feb. 17, 2011. The concert ends with about 2500 audience chanting anti Iran's government slogans. (AP Photo/Kamran Jebreili). Courtesy Qantara.

by Maria Koomen, Qantara

The permissibility of music has been contested in Iran since the onset of Islam in the seventh century AD when Muhammad passed and his companions sought to keep men's minds away from malahi (forbidden pleasures): wine, women and song. While the Koran doesn't condemn music per se, it claims that music can lead to a loss of reason resulting in "uncontrollable behaviour" and an "inflammation of passions".

After the Prophet's death, Islamic purists began to collect his sayings, or hadith. One ancient hadith says: "Listening to music leads to discord, just as water leads to the growth of vegetation." Hadith were then used by legists to effectively forbid music, save that tolerated by Muhammad. Music in Iran was to uphold these Islamic standards and abide by the Islamic moral code established by the Koran and the hadith.

However (in)compatible it may be with Islam, music is deeply rooted in the country's rich and diverse history. In addition to the practice of halal (compatible) music, Iranians have historically maintained the practices of makruh (blameworthy yet tolerated) and haram (incompatible) music.

Before the advent of music reproduction and other information communication technologies (ICT), music – underground or not, halal or haram – was confined to physical locations in real-time, historically controllable by authorities with centralised power in a physically and temporally confined country.

The Persian nightingale and the flowers of hope

Shahram Nazeri is the undisputed master of setting Rumi's poetry to music. At a recent concert in Tehran, the renowned musician sang his audience into a state of ecstasy and gave voice to the Iranians' hopes for a brighter cultural future. After several barren years, the cultural scene is indeed showing tentative signs of change.

Iranian musician Shahram Nazeri. Courtesy Qantara.

by Massoud Schirazi, Qantara

It is midwinter in Tehran, and the concert season is underway. For two long months there were no large concerts – or at least no joyful ones – anywhere in the country. In the month of Moharram, during which Shia Muslims mourn the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, happy occasions and music for entertainment purposes are not deemed appropriate. Traditional restaurants refrain from live performances and teahouses turn the background music down. The month after that, Safar, is the time of Arba'een, the fortieth day after Hussein's passing, and the anniversary of Mohammed's death, which makes such musical events equally taboo.

Among the big names in Iranian music who have started announcing their concerts again in newspaper ads and on posters is Shahram Nazeri. Alongside Mohammad Reza Shajarian and Ali Reza Ghorbani, Nazeri is one of the most popular classical singers in Iran. The "New York Times" once called him "the Persian nightingale".

The cultural face of Iran

Shahram Nazeri's benefit concert for victims of leprosy in the festival hall of the Milad tower is soon sold out. Audience numbers at performances by popular singers like Nazeri are very high in Tehran. For the size of the city, Tehran's concert scene is rather meagre, as most of the artists left the country after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Others – like Shahram Nazeri – stayed and continued to lend Iran a cultural face, even under the difficult conditions of censorship.

Exiled From Iran, A Singer Makes The Case For Beauty

Strict laws made it impossible for the Iranian singer Hani to pursue her dream in her home country. Courtesy of the artist

by Roxana Saberi, NPR

A petite woman prances across the stage at Kurdistan TV in Erbil, northern Iraq, with her long, brown hair bouncing behind her.

A band begins to play, the studio audience falls quiet, and the woman starts to sing. Her voice is powerful and her message is personal: It's about fleeing to a foreign land to find freedom.

"Hani," as she calls herself, grew up in next-door Iran, where she learned to sing traditional Iranian music. Eventually, she formed a group with other Iranian women and they started singing in shows. Iran's Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance allowed them to perform, but only if no men were in the audience.

"Every time we did our work, it was only for women," Hani says. "We didn't even have permission to take pictures, to take photos to keep for ourselves."

One Small Suitcase, Many Big Dreams

In the Islamic Republic, a woman is typically not allowed to sing solos in public unless she performs for an all-female audience and is accompanied by an all-female band. Strict rules are in place for women singing to mixed-gender audiences. The reason, some conservative Muslims say, is that a woman's voice can arouse improper sexual thoughts in men.