Czech modal music enthusiasts promote understanding via music fusion

Originally published on Global Voices

Screenshot of the main page of the website modalmusic.cz, presenting their work. Fair use.

Music enthusiasts from the Czech collective Modal Music CZ include performers, artists, and organizers who are trying to go beyond mere performance and provide a platform for music lovers to open a dialogue in a “universal language” between representatives of nations that have been in historical conflict.

In this conversation with Global Voices, Modal Music CZ's co-founders Mikuláš Mrva, Silva Morasten, and Alice Bauer talk about why they chose this music genre and the impact of their work in the Czech Republic, which they promote online through Facebook and Instagram, creating an offline society of people with similar interests through jams and open mic nights.

The term “modal music” as used by Modal Music CZ includes wide-ranging fusions of traditional music styles from Jewish to Greek folk music and Rebetiko; as well as Byzantine, Ottoman, Persian, and Indian classical music; and modern music with Alevi, Anatolian, Arabic, Kurdish, North African, Caucasus, and Central Asian roots.

From the strictly musical perspective, Modal Music CZ stands for modal microtonal music. They exclude the pentatonic scales, which are also typical for Turkic peoples of Central Asia, including the Volga Tatars, as well as China and Japan.

Historically, the Czech Republic had limited exposure to Turkic cultural influences: the Ottomans did not reach further than Vienna, while the Mongol-Tatars reached Olomouc. While there are few people of Turkic origin in the modern Czech Republic compared to other communities, there are several civic organizations that promote their cultures, such as KITAP, Elim Aj, Small Asian Museum, and Česko-Turecko.

Mikuláš Mrva, one of three co-founders of Modal Music CZ, wanted to spread knowledge about modal music among the Czech population as a way to overcome widespread prejudices against minority groups. He added:

Another, possibly major, influence was the refugee crisis of 2015. It caused a major wave of islamophobia and xenophobia, which pushed me to start learning more about Islam, and especially Sufism and its poetry and music.

While Mrva is a self-taught music performer who has experimented and improvised across genres, the two other co-founders come from different musical backgrounds. Silva Morasten is a trained classical singer, while Alice Bauer is a jazz singer and pianist who graduated from Prague’s Conservatory of Jaroslav Ježek. She explained:

All Eastern classical, folk music or complex hybrids like the Greek rebetiko have a lot to offer to seekers like us (much like jazz does to me). These systems tend to be very intricate, be it the Iranian/Azerbaijani dastgah, the Turkish maqams or the Tajik/Uzbek Shashmaqam, or Hindustani music.

The establishment of the association resulted from their shared interest in diverse music genres, including the fusion of jazz and Middle-Eastern music, like the work of Azerbaijani musician Aziza Mustafazade. Group members combined a range of experiences and music styles to develop their common approach.

For instance, Mrva explained that he started his musical journey with lessons on the traditional Ottoman instrument saz, and was influenced by the work of Marios Christou with the Byzantine music choir “Ananes,” as well as Alevi and Aşık music, and the work of Turkish musician Erkan Oğur, a lute master famous for combining the sounds of Turkish folk music and classical music with the ancient traditional music.

The following video presents an interpretation of the song “Derdim Çoktur Hangisine Yanim” (“I have many hardships”), often performed by Erkan Oğur with Ismail Hakkı Demircioğlu. It is performed by Mrva and Anıl Akgül, the permanent Turkish member of the Modal Music CZ association.

Mrva discovered like-minded musicians through the Qaraba music and Labyrinth music workshops and started organizing modal music jam sessions. The three cofounders finally met during a session and agreed to develop the Modal Music community.

In the picture all three co-founders of Modal Music CZ are second from the right – Alice Bauer, third from the right Silva Morasten, and third from the left Mikulas Mrva. Picture provided by the association, used with permission.

Morasten explained one of the main challenges is singing each piece in its original language.

[A] big challenge in this music is definitely the languages, especially when I am mainly a singer and need to read and understand what I am singing, [and] this is a sort of a fuel for composing my own modal songs with Czech lyrics, mostly poems, which is nicely consistent with the beautiful tradition of singing verses of old poets across many geographical regions of modal music traditions […] Thus it is an exciting challenge of combining Czech prosody within modal traditions/theories.”

While modal music jams in Prague attract local representatives of the communities whose music is played, the audiences also include many Czechs. Being Czech themselves, Modal Music CZ founders talked about the various attitudes they encounter. Morasten shared:

Maybe it is a very pessimistic overstatement, but I think Czechs are not much interested in modal music (and according to my experience, they associate stereotypically its sounds mostly with muezzins or Hare Krishna mantras). Except for a few jazz musicians or people who play and listen to Balkan music, who like variability in rhythms, scales and feeling. I wish there were more musicians who would like to study this.

Alice Bauer was more optimistic:

I constantly meet Czechs who are searching for new music and that brings them to us, among other places… There are many parallels, and probably for historical reasons also, between Eastern music and Moravian folklore.

A Modal Music jam in Prague, featuring performers Anıl Akgül, Silva Morasten, and Mikuláš Mrva. Photo by Elmira Lyapina, used with permission.

Contrary to the stereotypes that portray the peoples from Southeastern Europe, the Caucasus, and the Middle East in constant conflict with each other (for example, the strife between Turks, Kurds, Armenians, Azerbaijani, Greeks, Jews, and Arabs) Bauer says that performing a blend of their cultural heritages for mixed audiences contributes to peacebuilding:

Contrary [to prejudices present in Western and Central Europe]… we even witness a willingness to combine two cultures that were historically in conflict, like rebetiko gets sung in both Turkish and Greek, joyfully initiated by members of the two respective nations. The kind of thing that happens during the jam is singing of the same Sari Gelin genre songs in Azerbaijani, Turkish, Persian and in Armenian…

Mikuláš Mrva noted that their jams, usually performed in the Punctum cultural center, are open to professional musicians and amateurs alike.

If someone is curious, the best thing to do is to come and listen or talk to us. If you’re unsure, bring your instrument and listen before taking it out of the case. And most importantly: if you know any musicians that we haven’t found yet, please send them our way!

Alice Bauer added this invitation:

Join us, present what you know, play, learn, be open, and enjoy the Prague Babylon!

To listen to Modal Music jams, visit their YouTube channel.

Originally published in Global Voices.