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In music, the term Arabic scale refers to:
- The double harmonic major scale[1], a scale whose gaps evoking "exotic" music to Western listeners, though in actual Arabic music many scales are used. This is also known as the gypsy scale and the Byzantine scale.
- Not a scale but the musical temperament or tuning system used in Arabic music and theory. This has been primarily the quarter tone scale since the eighteenth century.
- Alexander J. Ellis refers to a temperament of seventeen tones based on perfect fourths and fifths as the Arabic scale[2]. This is presumably Safi al-Din Urmawi's seventeen tone temperament developed in the thirteenth century and the primary system till the development of the quarter tone scale.
- Arabian scale may refer to a major scale with lowered fifth, sixth, and seventh[3].
- Rast (maqam), the maqam, or mode, considered "basic" to Arabic music (as the major scale is to Western music) but is not properly referred to as "the" Arabic scale.
[edit] Sources
- ^ Stetina, Troy (1999). The Ultimate Scale Book, p.59. ISBN 0793597889.
- ^ Ellis, Alexander J. (1863). "On the Temperament of Musical Instruments with Fixed Tones", Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Vol. 13. (1863 - 1864), pp. 404-422.
- ^ Christiansen, Mike (2003). Mel Bay Complete Guitar Scale Dictionary, p.41. ISBN 0786669942.
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