Tarab

Classical Arabic song and the maqam repertoire, the tradition most modern Arab music grew out of.

Tarab names an effect before it names a genre: the state a listener reaches when a singer, a mode and an audience lock together. That is why a single song can run forty minutes on record, and why the audience is audible all the way through it, calling back and pushing the singer on.

The repertoire is largely Egyptian and Levantine, built on the maqam modal system and played by a takht ensemble of oud, qanun, nay, violin and riqq, with long improvised passages where the singer and the players answer each other in real time.

Artists under this term range from musicians who perform the classical repertoire as written to ones who carry maqam phrasing into contemporary settings. If the work belongs to the tradition rather than quoting it, it is here.