What is the major difference between Eastern and Western musical systems?

A major difference between Western music and Middle Eastern music is that Western music tends to be based on a scale (sometimes called a key), while Oriental music is based on a maqam. In the words of the late San Francisco musician Mimi Spencer, a maqam is “something more than a scale, something less than a tune.”

How is Western music different?

Western classical music is composed, Indian classical music is improvised. All Western classical music compositions are formally written using the staff notation, and performers have virtually no latitude for improvisation.

Does Eastern music use different notes?

Intra-scale intervals Some scales use a different number of pitches. A common scale in Eastern music is the pentatonic scale, which consists of five notes that span an octave.

What is the basic difference between Indian music and Western music?

The Indian music is based on melody or single notes played in a specific order. The Western music, on the contrary, is based on harmony that uses tonic progression and counterpoint abundantly. Western music has a standardized written notation meaning you have to play exactly as it is written.

Why is Eastern music so different?

“Eastern music” is not homogenous at all and you have to split it into at least 5 different groups of traditions: Arabic, Turkish and Persian music. They use 7-tone scales like European music, but they don’t use chords. Instead, they tend to rely on a wide variety of modes and lots of melodic ornamentation.

What’s Eastern music called?

Middle Eastern music, music of the Arabic-, Turkish-, and Persian-speaking world. Both types of music also include characteristic nonmetric improvisations. The melodic and tonal construction of performances, which is based on a system of modes called maqām in Arabic, also is the same in folk and art-music traditions.

What is the difference between Western and non-Western music?

Unlike Western music, Non-Western music grew out of environments or cultures that did not require the development of commonly accepted standards for tuning. The sound is the result of using different tuning systems, different scales, different, performance practices, and different approaches to melody and harmony (1).

What is Eastern classical music?

Eastern classical music is essentially homophonic meaning that it focuses on melodies created by using an arrangement of notes. Its magic is experienced through the use of different melodies created within the structure of ragas.

Why does Middle Eastern music sound different?

This means that Eastern music uses notes that don’t fit into the Western scale of twelve tones, so they don’t even sound like notes to us. This makes Eastern music sound really unusual to our ears as Westerners. Hope this makes sense and is helpful.

What are the characteristics of Western music?

Western music is one of several separate, highly developed musical cultures, each of which has its own specific theoretical base that encompasses, among other things, its own system of tunings and scales, its preferred timbres (tone colors), its particular approach to musical form, and its characteristic musical …

Which Arab country has the best music?

Egyptian music is, by far, the most popular type of music among Egyptians (98\%), and music from Egypt is also enjoyed by a majority of listeners in Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and Tunisia (75\%, 61\%, and 61\%).

What are the distinguishing characteristics of Middle Eastern music?

Further distinguishing characteristics of Middle Eastern and North African music include very complex rhythmic structures, generally tense vocal tone, and a monophonic texture. Traditional Middle Eastern music does not use chords, or harmony in the Western sense.