ABSTRACT
In contrast to that of its neighboring countries Iran, Pakistan, and Uzbekistan, the history of music in Afghanistan remains largely undocumented. Alexander the Great conquered the region c. 330 b.c., and pockets of Greek culture survived for several centuries thereafter, but nothing is known of music in that epoch. Similarly, little is known about the music of the Ghaznavid (tenth to twelfth centuries) and Ghorid empires (twelfth and thirteenth centuries), which encompassed Afghanistan and parts of northern India and were largely responsible for the spread of Islamic culture over the Indian subcontinent. In the fifteenth century the city of Herat, in western Afghanistan, became the capital of the Timurid empire and was the cultural center of the Persian-speaking world. Some records exist of the court music of this era (Baily 1988:12–13). The musical instruments in use were those associated with the Middle East, such as the lute (ūd), end-blown flute (ney), spike fiddle (ghīchak), plucked zither (qānūn), and long-necked lute (tambūrā); the music was a sophisticated vocal and instrumental art based on Middle Eastern melodic modes (maqām). After the Timurids, there is another long gap in the musical record. With a dearth of written records, our understanding of the history of music in Afghanistan must draw largely on oral sources. These, together with extrapolation from contemporary performance practice, provide information dating back to the mid-nineteenth century.
