The music of Arabic poetry and moving beyond the prosodic measures

Abstract

    The music of poetry is one of the most prominent particularities which distinguishes the poetry from other types of speech. It also has been considered under different titles, by many literaties, just because the poetry would always need the music. A question would arise in here: is it possible to restrict the music of Arabic poetry only to prosodic rhythms and limit it to prosody, or could the poet just compose a poetry beyond the prosodic measures while still has its own music? This article tries to answer this question through inspecting some instances of poets works. These instances include: elegy or qasida_ muwashshah - zajal-band  and blank verse. We can find the fact that the musical diversity can be achieved both inside and outside of the prosodic circles. It is also possible to synthesize prosodic meters with each other in an elegy to reach the purpose and experience novel meters called new-found meters. As the result of these experiences we can rely on the music of Taf’ilah (the formative basis of a verse) and by transforming the music of the poetry enrich the poetry songs. We shall notice this musical transformation in Arabic poetry which has passed through many changes from past times up to now. This is an important and necessary matter for any researcher who deals with any aspects of the poetry research and poetic cases.