Sinatra's Artist-in-Residence Experience

         This past Friday, I attended the online webcast in which Francesco Turrisi talked about the music of North Africa. As I have been learning the Tabla (Indian drum) for the past ten years, a drum which is centered in the Hindustani Classical music tradition (originating in India thousands of years ago), I found it interesting to listen to a new kind of music and see how North African music developed through the influence of its Arabic inhabitants. 

        As Arabic music originated and diverged from the same musical shell as Hindustani music in the general area of South Asia, I saw some similar elements related to rhythm and tone that carry over between both styles of music. The explanation of different kinds of rhythms that are present in North African music was also appealing. Overall it was very interesting to learn about a different kind of music than the one I had grown up learning.

        In addition to the purely musical element of this webcast, I found it interesting how Ancient Greece was connected to Western Europe through the Arabic world, leading to many interesting cultural exchanges such as the prevalence of modes in Ancient Greek music, as well as scientific texts being primarily written in Arabic. I thought it was fascinating that the Arabic world had an influence on the development of the Western world in such subtle ways.