Music
About the music
Editor's note: To give our show themes an Arabic sound, we turned to Ben Harbert for the arrangements. Harbert is currently an artist in residence at the Los Angeles Music Center, and he's pursuing a doctorate in ethnomusicology at the University of California, Los Angeles. In addition to playing the ud (lute) on the Marketplace recordings, he is a classical guitarist, an Indian tabla player, a music historian, an educator, and an avant-garde composer.
Marketplace's Middle East music project
By Ben Harbert
As I arranged the Marketplace themes, I tried to remain tethered to traditional Arab innovation in a few ways. There is plenty of inspiration from forward-looking Arab musicians. In fact, there have been centuries of collaborative East-West musical projects from 15th century Cordova to Omar Khorshid's virtuosic electric guitar in Farid El Attrash's 1960s orchestra. It is in this spirit of Arab interest in other music that I adapted the Marketplace themes.
The Marketplace adaptations were a ripe opportunity to show off the spirit of innovation while highlighting some of the charms of Arab music. In practice, Arab musicians perform much like jazz musicians. Rather than being faithful to the exact notes, Arab musicians play endless variations and ornamentation of the melodies — taking liberties that would be unacceptable, for instance, to a cellist performing Bach. Good Arab musicians always make the old seem new. Add five more musicians and it's even more surprising — in essence, each instrument engaged in a musical conversation with the other musicians that is part improvisation and part familiar melody. This practice, called "heterophony" in the West, often yields surprising individual interpretations of classic melodies and performances that can fall in-between a song and collective improvisation. I decided that this was the Near Eastern musical style that I wanted to retain for the Marketplace themes. I envisioned an Arab takht ensemble (small chamber group) playing the familiar Marketplace theme in the spirit of Arab ornamented improvisation. That said, I realized that this was for a radio program and not the concert stage, so I was fairly conservative with the melodic ornamentation.
I transcribed each of the themes and spread out the melodies to see what could work and what would not work. Rather than "exotifying" them by simply changing the musical scale — as a Hollywood producer might request — I kept the melodies. Our major scale is also practiced in the Near East. It is known as maqam Ajam. We don't hear it that much because Western ears are usually seeking out the unusual scales of the Arab world. That said, the tuning of Arab instruments is slightly different than European instruments (Europe adjusted its tuning to fit keyboard instruments a few hundred years ago). For the arrangements some harmonies simply had to go, as they seemed too ill-fitting for the Arab tuning of maqam Ajam. Other harmonies worked well. In fact, it is not unusual for musicians in an Arab ensemble to add harmonies where there had been none before.
Next came the process of assigning each melody to an instrument. The nay (reed flute) is a very intimate instrument in character while the 'ud is more, for lack of a better term, salt-of-the-earth. With parts assigned, I looked for opportunities to pull the original melody into a more typical Arab figure. In some cases a repeated melodic pattern seemed right at home on the qanun (zither) or the 'ud. In other cases, a keyboard melody seemed perfect for a violin or nay solo. In other cases, it seemed appropriate to add a nay-free improvisation on top of a rhythmic pattern.
It was interesting to see how each instrument offered new possibilities for interpreting and ornamenting the original melody. The rhythms in the original Marketplace themes come from a rock sensibility. It didn't take much to syncopate them, thus giving them a characteristic Arab feel. For some rhythmic patterns, I substituted the traditional maqsum or baladi (country) rhythm. For others, I added or subtracted a beat to a traditional rhythm, striking a compromise between the original and Arab styles. With those added elements I put the parts together in the hopes that the retooled melodies and rhythms would inspire the musicians to interpret and ornament in a typical Arab music fashion. The spirit of traditional innovation allows us to be ourselves as we try new possibilities.
"The Numbers" music
The traditional pieces we performed are all well-known in the region. "Darij Saba" is one of the more dour pieces I know. It seemed perfect for imagining a tanked economy. All the notes seem to want to sink into the ground. "Darij" is a musical form, like minuet or waltz. and "Saba" is the name of the maqam, a melodic concept similar to a key. For the status quo music, we chose the Egyptian folk melody "Ah Ya Zayn." By its title, the song is in praise of beauty and grace (zayn). For the final one, the Lebanese folk song "Hala Lala Layya" is certainly upbeat and fit the celebration of a good market.
Marketplace opening theme
Listen to the Marketplace opening theme
Marketplace closing theme
Listen to the Marketplace closing theme
Marketplace Morning Report opening theme
Listen to the Marketplace Morning Report opening theme
Marketplace Morning Report closing theme
Listen to the Marketplace Morning Report closing theme
Marketplace Money opening theme
Listen to the Marketplace Money opening theme
Marketplace Money closing theme
Listen to the Marketplace Money closing theme
