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SAIDA DAUKEYEVA
The Kazakh qobyz: between tradition and modernity
by Saida Daukeyeva
[SOAS]
SUMMARY: The two-stringed fiddle qobyz has acquired a special
status and dignity among the Kazakhs as the instrument of mediation with
ancestral spirits invented by a legendary hero Korkyt to overcome death.
Originally used by Kazakh shamans and epic bards for healing and soothsaying
purposes, it retained its sacred significance outside the ritual domain in the
art music of the 19th–early 20th centuries. During the Soviet ideological and
cultural campaigns, the qobyz, as ‘a remnant of the dark past’, became
an object of persecution and transformation resulting in an abrupt decline of
former practices and a near discontinuity of performance traditions and
repertoire, paralleled by the imposition of European-modelled music-making and
training of qobyzshy. Recent years, however, have seen a revival of the qobyz
through study, restoration and promotion of its image,
causing musicians to search after ‘tradition’ and giving rise to new
perceptions of the instrument and its musical language.
This paper presents an excursion into the history of the qobyz through
the 20th century up to the present day, discussing the implications of social
and ideological change for the identity and interpretation of the instrument.
It will also explore the meanings and values attached to the instrument in
contemporary society and performance practice in
CV: Saida
D. Daukeyeva, PhD Musicology (Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, 2000), is a PhD
candidate in Ethnomusicology at the