ABSTRACT
Between approximately 1950 and 1965, the long-necked lute typical of the Herat province of western Afghanistan underwent a series of structural modifications that transformed it from a two-stringed instrument of rural music-making to a 14-stringed instrument typical of urban music. The added strings were long drones and sympathetic strings. Various dutâr players had a role in this transformation, which can be regarded as a collective innovation, but perfecting the new instrument was the work of Mohammad Karim Herawi, a Herati musician who worked at Radio Kabul for 17 years.
The dutâr's transformation was a manifestation of modernity and Westernization in Afghanistan during the benign reign of the progressive monarch Zahir Shah (ruled 1933–1973), an era of press freedom, attempted parliamentary democracy and peace, when music became increasingly accepted as a fact of everyday life. The new dutâr greatly increased the repertoire of the instrument and was also associated with changes in the status of musicians. Hitherto, there was a crucial distinction between amateurs and professionals, the latter closely connected with the occupation of barber. Urban bands operated by hereditary professional musicians in Herat started to add a 14-stringed dutâr player to their lineup. This led to the rise of the amateur-turned-professional dutâr player who made a living from music but who was derided by hereditary professional colleagues for being somewhat ignorant of music theory and terminology and was thus the butt of jokes and given menial tasks to perform.
This chapter will examine both the evolving morphology of the Afghan dutâr during this period and the changing working practices and social status of the musicians who played it.
