Review of the degree of acceptance of various standpoints on the modernization of music in Iranian society
This section examines how far the different standpoints on the modernization of Iranian music, represented by Vaziri and Minbashiyan, were accepted in Iranian society. This question becomes important only when music is viewed not as an isolated and abstract subject but as a social category through which human beings establish an interaction between themselves: an interaction between the makers, performers, and providers of music in general, and the audience. In fact, those involved in the making of music enter into an interaction with the audience through the music they present. Music, too, like other social interactions taking place among human beings, takes shape under particular social conditions. An examination of such conditions plays a very important role in understanding music. Based on this standpoint, to understand music it is not sufficient to only pay attention to its technical features; rather, the real meaning of music lies not in its component parts but in the reaction it provokes from the audience.
in this place, with these participants? ... [T]he nature of that work is part of the nature of the performance, and whatever meanings it may in itself posses are part of the meaning of the event - an important part but only a part.70
The response to Vaziri’s and Minbashiyan’s approaches to the modernization of Iranian music can be studied on different levels. One aspect of this review might constitute an analysis of Iranian musicians’ reception of these viewpoints. For instance, Mehdiqoli Hedayat points out that ‘Alinaqi Vaziri’s approach to Iranian music was not acceptable to the majority of Iranian musicians.
‘Alinaqi Vaziri wants to introduce changes in our music and compose new tones based on radif and imitate European science of music, but this is a very difficult job, and I can imagine that it will lead to anxiety initially for unfamiliar ears . . In any case, there is no clear future ahead: some people have begun to disagree with him and the older musicians are not that much content with his method. Furthermore, ‘Alinaqi Vaziri does not consult other musicians and goes his own way, and this can be disappointing for those who have been the prides of the nation in this field.71
However, another approach would focus on Iranian society at large by studying the production and consumption of music during those years. As was said earlier, several companies began to produce gramophone records from 1926 to 1933. Whereas those companies were following their own business objectives,72 the type and number of musical works selected for recording are an indication of the social acceptability of those works: the greater the acceptance the wider the scope of sale. A study of the catalogues of the recorded works will show which group of musical works were produced in greater numbers. Regretfully, some catalogues, particularly those of the German companies such as Polyphon and Odeon, are not available as a whole. Fortunately, the catalogues of the Gramophone Recording Company, constituting a greater portion of the musical works recorded during the reign of Reza Shah, are fully available. This company, using the His Master’s Voice label, produced nearly 800 tracks in Tehran within a period of five years from 1926 to 1933.73 There is no indication of the music of ‘Alinaqi Vaziri and Gholamhoseyn Minbashiyan among these recorded works. Nearly 74 tracks have been recorded from ‘Alinaqi Vaziri by German companies such as Polyphon (1929), Baidaphon (1930), and Parlophon (1932).74 The number of works recorded from Gholamhoseyn Minbashiyan amounts to nearly 40 tracks by the Odeon Company.75 A study of the catalogues of these companies makes it clear that most of these recorded works belong to the category of works that have remained mainly faithful to the structure of Iranian music. Iranian classical music, however, had its own trend of development during this historical period, the study of which is far beyond the scope of the present study. An understandably outstanding fact is that compared to the works falling within the sphere of Iranian classical music, the musical ideas of ‘Alinaqi
Vaziri and Gholamhoseyn Minbashiyan were not reflected in the production and publication processes of music in the country.
Considering this, it can be concluded that modern musical thoughts set forth during the reign of Reza Shah were not accepted by Iranian society at that particular historical juncture. This seems quite natural, because those ideas had taken shape very recently and needed a longer period of time for further development in society. This judgment is applicable to that specific historical juncture only, because conditions changed during the time lapse accompanied by the appearance of trainees skilled in this school of thought, requiring a separate study in itself.
