Kazakh Music in Xinjiang

Kazakh music in Xinjiang joins dombra playing, improvised aytys duels and pastoral narrative.

Related

DombraThe kobyz

Time and place

Kazakh communities live in Ili, Altay, Tacheng, Bortala and Changji in Xinjiang, and in Urumqi. The Ili valley and Altay grasslands form the core. Kazakh belongs to the Kipchak branch of Turkic, written in Arabic script and mutually intelligible with Kazakh in Kazakhstan. Weddings, Nauryz, hair-cutting rites, horse racing and kokpar are the main occasions. Aytys takes place at festivals and gatherings, with two singers exchanging improvised verses.

What happened

Kazakh music centres on plucked-song performance and improvised duelling. The dombra is a two-string plucked instrument used for solo, accompaniment and narrative. Aytys is a contest between two singers, improvised on themes from love to social issues, won by verbal edge and melodic continuity. Terme is a short narrative song, dastan a long epic. From the late twentieth century the music entered troupes and recordings, with dombra ensembles and staged aytys becoming common. Published detail on local aytys schools and lineages in Xinjiang is limited, so this entry describes the general form.

Musical features

Melodies are mostly pentatonic, sometimes heptatonic, wide in range with fine ornament. The dombra's tuning and plucking set the rhythmic frame; fast sections use tremolo and strumming. Aytys singing is high, with rising phrase ends and quick question-and-answer, the melody adjusting to the words. Terme is close to chant with even phrases. Instruments include dombra, qobyz, sybyzgy flute and hand drum; the qobyz is bowed with horsehair and has a rough tone.

What to listen for

Hear how the dombra pins the pulse, then how the voice and strings offset each other. Essen-008754 is the Kazakh song A Rose for You, with phrase endings and syncopation; essen-008759 is The Tamed Young Bay, often grouped with Kazakh songs though the attribution is uncertain, with fast passages; essen-008753 is the Uyghur song Alamuhan, a reference for Xinjiang song and dance only, not a Kazakh recording.

Common misunderstandings

Kazakh music is often equated with dombra solo, or aytys is assumed to be memorised. Aytys is improvised, its words changing with the opponent and occasion; besides the dombra there are qobyz, sybyzgy and voice. Kazakh music in Xinjiang shares roots with Kazakhstan, but the singers and repertoires are local, not one institutional version.

Sources

• 《中国音乐词典》编辑部编，中国音乐词典（人民音乐出版社）— 哈萨克音乐与冬不拉条目核对，未引用
• The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd ed., entry "China" — framework checked, not quoted

Used for fact-checking only; all prose is original.