the most chaotic, dark, and artistically challenging parts of our musical design was expressed by the cellist's (a male musician) highly skilled improvisational interpretations. He was not attempting to become the narrator's voice or appropriate her situation to any cultural events, simply creating the setting for her story. He volunteered for the project and wanted to help raise awareness about this subject. He used his advanced musical skills in a compassionate way to perform chaos, sadness, and desperation in his music. Our work on the issue of child marriage aimed to provide a platform for voices silenced by traditional and patriarchal social structures. Previously, anonymous songs circulated in Turkish culture were the only form of expression for these individuals. By integrating these songs into my project, I wanted these victims to be heard in a much broader context.

In terms of musical outcomes, the musicians deferred to my expertise in Turkish *makam* music. At this point, I would like to again oppose considerations of this study using Western ideals of "composer-performer-researcher" or attempting to define the musical outcome with any cultural form. Traditional Turkish folk and *makam* music encourage composers to become highly skilled performers and researchers. Tanburi Cemil Bey, Ali Ufki, Kantemiroğlu, Neşet Ertaş, Aşık Veysel were masters of their craft. However, within the Western classical music tradition, the roles of composers, performers, and researchers remain separate. The method I designed combined *meşk yöntemi* with the musical libraries that each performer brought to the ensemble. Rather than simply imitating the teacher, musicians created their own music in an interactive environment. By opening the practice of the ensemble to a diverse range of stylistic content, we transcended boundaries between traditional Turkish music and Western art music.Thus, we presented a framework for female leadership connected to women's voices of the past in an intercultural context.

Our creative process ended with two public concerts in 2019 at the University of Calgary Women's Resource Center. Performing our music to make a positive change for our community and to create equality for young girls became the priority aim of the concerts. Our performance focused on empowering the voice of young woman as a narrator in the song. This work had far-reaching impacts, using online streaming platforms to engage with a broader audience.Thus,it was an enriching experience for the musicians involved, and, to this day, I receive comments and emails from the public and academicians.

Healing from intergenerational trauma is a process. I believe my research was an essential first step. From a cultural and social point of view, performing this song in a privileged space was eye-opening for many who had not engaged with this subject/or experienced trauma on that scale. 'Ağ Elime Mor Kınalar Yaktılar' thus helped the musicians and the audience connect to women's voicesin the past and brought diverse communities together.

### Bibliography

pect of Culture and Music Education]. Ph.D. Diss., Necmettin Erbakan University, Konya.

### **Women's Actions to Revitalize the Practice of Kaval Playing in Serbia1**

*Mirjana Zakić (University of Arts in Belgrade)*

Abstract: *The kaval (end-blown flute) deserves particular attention in research as a traditional shepherd instrument associated with the Kosovo and Metohija region (the territory of southern Serbia), whose visibility survived with efforts of only a handful of performers from the second half of the 20th century. The kaval achieved greater visibility throughout the 1990s, as this instrument became recognized as one of several symbols ofthe collective and national identity,thereby becoming a component of many neo-traditional ensembles in Serbia. Its newly established popularity is accompanied by the interest of performers in the workmanship, behind making the kaval which, with the exception of potential uses of the new materials, continues to be based on traditional crafting principles. The female populations' interest in playing the kaval has risen noticeably since the beginning of the 21st century. They overwhelmingly belong to younger generations of performers, who were acquiring their skills mostly within the state music school system and/or during the organized professional workshops. Given the growing role of women in sustaining the practice of kaval in our region, this paper focuses on analyzing their repertoire, the performance-style characteristics of the female performers, with higher visibility in given geocultural framework, as well as interpreting their present-day positioning in the dissemination of the kaval.*

Keywords: *kaval, female performers, repertoire, visibility and dissemination, contemporary practice.*

The process of sustaining and revitalizing traditional folk instruments in Serbia, as well as a possibility to transform their constructive features and implement them in different and new musical genres is one of the key issues in contemporary ethno-organology. Such an issue pertains to those instruments that lost their primary function of a shepherd's instrument during the second half of the 20th century, and consequently, to the visibility of performers of this music practice locally, nationally and regionally. In that regard, the

1 This chapter is based on the research conducted through the project Female leadership in music (FLIM), grant no. 6066876, supported by the Science Fund of the Republic of Serbia, PROMIS program.

kaval2 as a traditional shepherd's instrument deserves special attention. Considering the endangerment of the kaval during the last decades in the folk music practice of Serbia, this paper focuses on the ways of its renewal observed through contemporary activity and the role of women in the process of revitalization of this instrument.

The kaval belongs to a group of semi-transversal, long, cylindrical, end-blown flutes, fully open at both ends, whose upper part ends in a sharp circle edge. It has eight playing holes (seven on the front and one on the backside for the thumb) and four holes (*glasnice*) on the lower part that have an acoustic function. (Figure 1) During playing, the kaval is held with both hands, at an angle of approximately 45° from the body. The chromatic scale is composed of a combination of whole tones and semitones and the range obtained by overblowing amounts to two octaves plus a sixth in total. The kaval is played solo or in a duo of two *kavals*: in unison or with the differentiation of a melodic and a supporting (drone) section.

2 The origin of the word *kaval* is generally interpreted in two ways: most often as a word of Turkish or Turkish-Turkmen origin (*kaval, qavâl, caval*), or as a word of Arabic origin whose meaning is *to say, talk* (see more in: Jovanović 2012:186; Zakić and Jovanović 2013:13).

### **Research on Kaval Music Practice and the Revivalist Initiatives**

Written sources on the use of kaval among the Serbs and Albanians in Kosovo and Metohija, as the originary space of kaval playing in Serbia, dating from the early decades of the 20th century, were left by folklorists and composers, geographers, ethnologists, ethnomusicologists and ethno-choreologists (see more in: Zakić and Jovanović 2013, 2014; Zakić 2014: 269–270).3 The largest number of field recordings of Serbs playing the kaval wasmadein Štrpce,a settlementin the Sirinić parishin Šarplanina region at various time periods, starting from the mid-20th century.The continuity of live practice on the kaval in this locality was confirmed by the recent systematic research of Serbian musical folklore in Sirinić (2002–2005), conducted by members of the Serbian Ethnomusicological Society (SED) Mirjana Zakić, Jasminka Dokmanović and Svetlana Azanjac.4 In the years that followed until 2010, a practice of kaval in Štrpce was confirmed by field observations and recordings made by clarinetist and kavalist Miloš Nikolić and the ethnomusicologist Mirjana Zakić (Miloš Nikolić and Borisav Miljković, interview, Belgrade, March-May 2021). The recently deceased performers Veselin Bošković (1931–2016) and Miladin Boškoćević (1935–2018) contributed the most to the sustainability of kaval practice in Štrpce. Both of them were recognized by the local community as representative performers of music from the Sirinić parish. According to their testimony, women did not play the kaval*,* because that was the practice of men and their pastoral activities. Their performances of shepherd's melodies, solo or in a duo – in unison or with accompanying drone – as well as folk songs, especially in combination with the excellent singing of Slavica Redžić from Štrpce (Zakić 2018: 161–162), became a model for the reinterpretation of many neotraditional groups throughout Serbia.5

3 Please note that these studies contain references to the extensive literature on medieval painting, ethnographic, literary and ethnomusicological sources on the *kaval* in Serbia and Macedonia, as well as its position in the broader intercultural and multicultural context.

4 A part of the extensive collected field material (preserved at the archive of the Serbian Ethnomusicological Society) is documented with the film "Cross under Shara" ("Krst pod Šarom"), directed by Slobodan Simojlović (Belgrade, production: 2005–2008). The documentary is available at: htt ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHrPD9qZBIQ

5 The first public performances of *kaval* melodies from Štrpce, starting in 2000, took place in Belgrade at the concerts of the neo-traditional ensembles "Moba" and "Belo platno" (see more in: Jovanović 2012a).

*Figure 2: Participants in the kaval playing workshop with Professor Miloš Nikolić in Štrpce. Photo by Mirjana Zakić, 2017.*

Regarding the former wide presence of this instrument in the tradition of Sirinić parish, during the latest field research (conducted since the first decade of the 20th century by Mirjana Zakić and Miloš Nikolić) we have been witnessing an accelerated disappearance of kaval from folk practice in this region, which was the central area of the activity of Serbian kavalists.6 Regarding this instrument's precarious status, kaval playing in Sirinićka župa has been registered into National List of Protection of the Endangered Element of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of the Republic of Serbia in 2012 (inventory number 20), due to the cooperation of the Serbian Ethnomusicological Society with the Centre for Preservation of Heritage of Kosovo and Metohija –Mnemosyne, together with local communities and cultural-artistic societies (KUD). The inscription of this element on the National list for the protection of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Serbia is certainly an important and long-term model for preserving the musical practice of Kosovo and Metohija (Zakić 2018a). As Marija Dumnić points out,in regard to the engagement of the Serbian Ethnomusicological Societyin the protection of this and otherintangible cultural elements, "ethnomusicological knowledge is recognized as extremely important for

6 In this regard, it should be noted that the new research in other areas of Kosovo and Metohija, the central part – from Vučitrn to Uroševac (Ranković and Zakić 2019:31), as well as the area of Kosovo Pomoravlje, conducted by ethnomusicologists Sanja Ranković and Mirjana Zakić in continuity since 2015, confirmed the absence of the practice of playing the kaval among the Serbian population, but at the same time pointed out the interest of the younger population to continue this practice.

the affirmation of Serbian cultural resources that are representative, extremely endangered or sustainable. Engagement involves investing not only knowledge and research, but also superior coordination with practitioners, whereby the ethnomusicologist becomes the representative of his contributors on the field, and later an advisor in the longterm process of heritage preservation and maintenance" (Dumnić 2012: 93–94).

The kaval*-*playing and singing with its accompaniment workshops, held in Štrpce since 2017, and in Gračanica since 2020, are the result of the activities of Serbian Ethnomusicological Society.7 The goals of the workshops have been the following: combining practical and theoretical educational activities related to the element of intangible cultural heritage – the kaval; transferring the knowledge by experts to young generations (Miloš Nikolić,Mirjana Zakić and Sanja Ranković); connecting with the local community; providing greater visibility of this endangered musical-cultural element; evaluating the immediate results of workshops and planning long-term results (as an incentive for the better sustainability of music practice).

This kind of applied engagement, based on networking of experts, local communities and carriers of practice, corresponds to the notion of the "epistemic community" (developed from Peter Haas), which "refers to a collective of people (…) who work together toward solving and analyzing a particular problem or issue-area whose terms are epistemologically defined" (Harrison 2012: 506).The immediate effects of the workshops could be seen through the public appearances of participants, their media promotion and involvement in various cultural contents, as well as through potential long-term results of interaction of motivated, involved subjects in historical and cultural circumstances, thus reflecting "how knowledge operates as a principle of social organization" (according to Steve Fuller; ibid.).

Previous workshops for playing the kaval and singing with the kaval, held at the gate of the church of St. Nicholas in in Štrpce and in the House of Culture in Gračanica, gathered more than 70 participants from the younger generation (Figure 2). Among the participants, the larger number were girls from primary schools, who expressed great interest in reviving this practice and a talent for producing the initial sound on the kaval, which can be very demanding in the early stages of learning. Although they didn't play on the instrument before, their desire and perseverance resulted, as professor of kaval Miloš Nikolić pointed out, in the surprisingly quick mastery of the kaval playing technique. We donated plastic kavals to a large number of participants, so that they could continue their practice after the workshops. Professional practical and theoretical training (which included mastering the technique of playing and basic elements of vocal style, popular lectures on the historical significance of kaval in folk life, its repertoire, and valuesof musical-cultural heritage) was coupled with the cooperation with members of cultural-artistic association "Cvetko Grbić" from Štrpce and the Ensemble of Folk Dances and Songs of Kosovo and Metohija "Venac" from Gračanica. The workshops ended with concerts where the participants presented their newly acquired skills to the audience, thus supporting their motivation for a continuous and more successful work in the field

7 Such projects, while also an important model of sustainability and revitalization of musical-cultural heritage from this area, are financially supported by the Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia

of sustainability of kaval practice. Such motivation was especially important for girls – kaval players, who, without previous examples of female players of this instrument in the tradition, could feel visible at public presentations.

The revival of kaval across Serbia, bearing in mind the reduction of the kavalists in Sirinić, started in the 1990s and has been related to the establishing of national consciousness during the crisis as a consequence of the wars in Serbia. That was primarily a result of initially individual endeavor of a group of artists in their practical approach to folk and ecclesiasticalmusic (Jovanović 2012).Theinterest aimed towards kaval was based on the fascination with its specific sound, its sonority, "the manner in which the tone is produced and coincidence of the structural elements of Byzantine chanting and Macedonian kaval ezgijas" (Jovanović 2012: 197). According to the words of Jelena Jovanović, a member of this revivalist movement, such joint action was a part of a larger search for religious, national, collective and personal identity in Serbia, and also an artistic expression reflecting of one's own identity and creation of collective identities (ibid.).

For the media promotion of this instrument as a representative of the musical tradition of Serbia, the performance of Miloš Nikolić with a solo kaval as a part of the Serbian entry "Lane moje" (author Željko Joksimović) at the Eurovision Song Contest in Istanbul in 2004 is of the greatest importance. "The kaval symbolises pastoral sonority, which is paralleled in the styled shepherd clothing of the kavalist Miloš Nikolić. This song was envisioned by the artistic and production team of Serbian national broadcaster as a Serbian fairytale, a modern pastorale in which the kaval is perceived through its dominantly pastoral semantic and sound value. Thus, the sound of kaval is represented as something pastoral and primordial, both in traditional culture and within modern intercultural framing, thus serving as a bridge between the two" (Zakić 2014: 273).

Thanks to the growing popularity, in the same year (2004) the kaval was introduced as one of the main study subjects at the Department of Ethnomusicology at the Music School "Mokranjac"in Belgrade,wherebyMiloš Nikolić became the first kaval professorin the Serbian education system. Later on, the kaval was also introduced at the Department in the school "Mokranjac" in Kraljevo, where the professor Borisav Miljković teaches it, among other instruments.The introduction of kaval in the education system has been of great importance for the further dissemination of this instrument in Serbia.

### **Activities of Women Musicians in the Revitalization of the Kaval**

Such projects, while also animportant model of sustainability and revitalization of musical-cultural heritage from this area, are financially supported by the Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia, resulted in the number of students interested in playing the kaval constantly growing.Their basic motive and ambition to play the kaval is the love for this instrument, encouraged primarily by its specific sound color. It is particularly noteworthy that interest for kaval is expressed (almost) equally by young men and girls, who thereby continue a tradition that was previously culturally shaped by the activity of men. Professors point out that girls/young women master the skill of playing with (almost) the same success as boys. Noting that from their experience it could be somewhat generalized that girls produce a slightly finer, gentler tone on the kaval, due to the specifics of female nature and their breathing apparatus, my interlocutors agree that the way of playing is not gender-determined, but that individual characteristics depend on talent, dedication and experience of performers of both genders. Nikolić underlines that his previous teaching experience has shown that girls are more persistent in finalizing their primary and secondary music education.8 Appropriate methodical approaches which include combining learning by ear and by notation with insistence on adequate stylistic interpretation, ensure that students are capable of playing in different ensembles and perform various music genres, apart from the dominant repertoire of melodies from Kosovo and Metohija.

Among the most prominent female performers in the chronological course of education, my interlocutors point special attention to Dragana Tomić (born in 1985, from Belgrade), Neda Nikolić (born in 1998, from Kovin, near Smederevo), Saška Stefanović (born in 2001, from Lešak, northern part of Kosovo and Metohija), with whom I conducted interviews on several occasions during 2021 in Belgrade and in Kosovska Mitrovica (Figures 3, 4, 5).9

According to theinterviewed femalemusicians, their choice of kavalisinspired by the sound of this instrument, which they qualify as gentle, warm, pastoral,melancholic (also reminiscent of female voice), and at the same time seductive, rustling,mysterious. In addition to the specific and seductive sound of the kaval, my female interlocutors also state the personal need to master the extremely demanding technique of playing this instrument.They also highlight the following motivations: establishing contact with other musicians; weaker representation of this instrument in Serbia; organizing traditional playing workshops; introduction of kaval playing in primary and secondary music schools.

In terms of repertoire, the interlocutors primarily choose to listen to and interpret pastoral original kaval melodies from Kosovo and Metohija, as well as "ezgija" –improvisation on the kaval, where the naturalness and beauty of this instrument are mostly heard. Neda Nikolić is expanding her repertoire of playing the kaval, publicly performing new works composed for kaval and orchestra.10 Her interpretations of wider musical genres on the kaval are certainly related to her wider repertoire performances (traditional, popular and authorial melodies) on other instruments, primarily the *frula* (folk flute).

8 This seems to be a global reality; for example, the data of the National Center for Education Statistics in the USA (from 2003) indicate that a higher percentage of women complete undergraduate studies, and that almost the same percentage of women and men obtain degrees in most vocational schools. (Northouse 2008:187).

9 Dragana Tomić, interview, Belgrade, 17 March 2021; Neda Nikolić, interview, Belgrade, 13, 14 March and 30 May; Saška Stefanović, interview, Belgrade; 13 March 2021, and Kosovska Mitrovica, 7 May 2021.

10 It is a composition by Slobodan Trkulja, Serbian prominent musician, composer and multi-instrumentalist, titled "Eleven for My Father". Neda Nikolić performed this piece with the pianist and composer Veljko Nenadić, *kahon* player Igor Petrović, and percussionist Denis Mahmutović, at the concert in Grocka, in 2017 (the recording is in her personal archive). This composition exemplifies how the *kaval* becomes an inspiration for new artistic music endeavors in Serbia. According to Neda's statement, the melody is based on musical motifs from Southeastern Serbia and Northern Macedonia.

Interlocutors also agree that, based on their knowledge, generally there are no differences in female or male kaval playing, because the essence of performing is in technique and proper practicing. In other words, each individual brings sound on kaval in a different way and expresses the emotion in his/her own way. Neda Nikolić also points out that although the musical and technical performances of both genders do not have to differ, this comparison is more difficult to report, because there are not many women who play the kaval in Serbia.

Speaking of possible role models, the respondents opt for their teachers, older colleagues from schools who have already made themselves famous for kaval playing, or for the most prominent media multi-instrumentalists, like Slobodan Trkulja.

*Figure 3: Dragana Tomić. Photo by Marta Janković, 2021.*

In the sense of female leaders transferring the know-how of kaval playing who exemplify the model of informal leadership (Northouse 2008: 4–10), Katarina (Filipov) Lukman, with whom I also conducted an online interview, singles out Dragana Tomić, as the first female performer on the kaval with a formal music education (Katarina (Filipov) Lukman, interview, online, May 15 2021). As an excellent singer and kavalist, Dragana Tomić has had public performances with *Pjevačka družina* (Singers' Group) of Svetlana Spajić in the country and abroad, participated in projects with world artists and actors, performed at foreign festivals, and was active as a lecturer and moderator of workshops for Serbian traditional singing and kaval playing – she also made plastic kavals for the

workshop during 2016.11 When asked to identify female kaval players being seen as leaders, the younger kavalist Saška Stefanović chose Neda Nikolić, a multi-instrumentalist (a performer of *frula* /folk flute/*,* kaval, bagpipes, flute, saxophone), who has been very active in the media in recent years and gained popularity in the Serbian music scene, in the region and around the world, by performing different musical genres.12 For the interlocutors, a leader is a person who has great talent, many years of experience, strong character,integrity, self-confidence, desire for innovation, willingness to cooperate, who is communicative, authoritative and publicly visible, and who, due to his/her technical and musical qualities, is a role model for younger generations. Unlike Dragana Tomić, who does not talk about herself as ῾a female kaval player῾ although she is being called "a lady kavalist" / "kavaldžinika", "kavaldžinica" in her performances, Neda Nikolić gave the following answer on seeing herself in the role of the leader:

Ever since primary school, I have liked to ῾manage῾ various things, projects and groups. So it remained the same in secondary school, as well as at the college now. With my attitude and public appearance (probably without even being aware of it) I demonstrate my dominance and a wish for ῾control῾. So, many people openly call me lady-boss, lady-professor in the context of managing certain projects [...] As a *frula* soloist, I have been organizing my own performances for several years now, i.e. participating in the organization, delivery and performance itself. I facilitate *frula* workshops, spread the sound of the *frula* and words about this instrument, as ways to preserve it. I pass on knowledge to younger generations and improve my work, and thus the name of the *frula* in our area. I have realized that in addition to love, desire, effort and work, all the opportunities that the environment provides are needed. These things are crucial, but if you do not find the necessary support and some kind of help from other people and institutions, this job is difficult [...] I personally schedule all my public appearances, because I am most confident in myself. My expectations from the performance are reduced to the implemented agreement, but there are also situations when it is not respected. In these cases, any inconvenience is avoided, but the course of the situation and problem solving is discussed with the organizer (transcript of the interview with Neda Nikolić, Belgrade, 14 March 2021).

Neda's words point to theimportant role of women's entrepreneurship,as one of themost significant changes and features of today's general framework in which women initiate work,manage it tactically and independently, guided by intuition, perception and skill in interpersonal relationships that greatly contribute to their professional achievements.13

11 The following links document Tomić's music activities: https://dortjolfestival.com/dragana-tomi c/ and http://www.nymbusagencija.co.rs/ser\_vesti\_2016.html (accessed 8 August 2022).

12 https://nedanikolic.rs/#biography (accessed 8 August 2022).

13 Regarding the development of women's entrepreneurship globally, the theoretical approach to it in various business domains, with a special focus on the characteristics of successful women in the creative and cultural industry in the Republic of Croatia, see: Martić Kuran and Mečev 2018.

*Figure 4: Neda Nikolić. Photo by Marta Janković, 2021.*

Being asked whether and to what extent their families and local communities accept them as performers on the traditional "male" instrument, all interlocutors answered that their families supported them from the very beginning, and that local communities are very proud of their public appearances. Such a positive and supportive attitude is especially pronounced in connection to their media presence. Achieving ever-increasing results over time implies an increase in their expectations. They become new personalities on the scene, their name becomes a "brand" and thusit gainsimportance.The path to success of female musicians on traditional instruments is accompanied by various sacrifices and concessions that change the usual functioning and presentation of the instrument itself. However, just understanding that they are representing a certain genre, instrument, direction, grows into a wonderful feeling that prevails over all possible "difficult" moments in the process of maturing of a musical personality. In addition, as they jointly point out, people also cherish female kaval performers as they see them actively supporting the traditional culture, instead of taking part in the kitschy mainstream music that "rules" within the contemporary popular music scene.

Neda Nikolić explains about the former and current social path of women who play traditional instruments in the following way:

There were situations in which being a woman as a player on traditional instruments was poorly accepted or belittled. There are differences due to the influence of society, economy and many other things that have changed over time. The music scene has always been, in a way, ῾a sponge῾ that is actually a reflection of everything that is happening around us. That is how the performers used to perform differently on the stage than today. What is noticeable today is that the performers have more media attention and visual advantages with the audience. (Neda Nikolić, interview, Belgrade, 14 March 2021)

In this sense, I also refer to the words of Karin Klenke and Peter Northouse, that since each context has its own recognizable characteristics, they are often in interaction with assumptions related to female competences and stereotypes about gender roles (Klenke 2018: 6–3414; Northouse 2008: 188–196). Or, to quote Ellen Koskoff, "Recent suspicions of female folklore and culture suggest that in many societies women and men seem to occupy separate and independent musical cultures, rather than two differentiated but complementary and overlapping halves of culture" (Koskoff 2014: 32). In that context, it should be pointed out that the respondents are fully aware of the facts about the former poor visibility or (almost) invisibility of women performers on traditional folk instruments in our area. Iva Nenić's extensive scientific study is dedicated to this problem, as well as to other issues discussed in a wide range of topics, from the status of female performance in cultural and scientific discourses, through the genealogy of female instrumental performance in Serbia (and the Balkans), to contemporary music practices of female players (Nenić 2019). In this first and long-awaited study in Serbian ethnomusicology, which deals with the issue of gender and music in regard to traditional folk instruments, specifically historical and contemporary women's playing activities, Iva Nenić analyses two social practices: singing with the bowed lute (*gusle*) and tradition of playing the folk flute (*frula*), in which the participation of female musicians has managed to remain relatively visible in various scientific and ideological discourses, arguing that the participation of women is also important for the sustainability of these practices both in history and modern times. Consideration of this issue involved a well elaborated apparatus of analysis and critique, raised in order to deconstruct the dichotomous models of gender-specific behaviors in traditional instrumental music – the latter until recently understood and presented as part of almost exclusively male performance (ibid.). It can be argued that the same model could be applied to the role of women in kaval practice as well – although there weren't many historical cases, the contemporary female participation in kaval playing challenges the discourses of male supremacy in the representational discourses of this music culture, by actively taking part in learning, carrying the tradition further, introducing the instrument to new contexts and forging the new model of female musical entrepreneurship.

14 Karin Klenke paid special attention to the issue of criticality of different contexts in women's leadership (at the level of nation, religion, political systems, corporations and business organizations, information technology, media, sports, army, education, art and science and global scene). "Each context has its distinguishing characteristics and features which interact with assumptions regarding women's leadership competencies and sex role stereotypes which, in turn, are subject to temporal and cultural fluctuations" (Klenke 2018: 20).

*Figure 5: Saška Stefanović. Photo by Marta Janković, 2021.*

### **Conclusion**

Based on written sources, recorded material and narratives of insiders in Kosovo and Metohija, dating from the early decades of the 20th century, it is clear that the kaval in folk practice, with its predominant role of shepherd's instrument, belonged exclusively to the population of male musicians. However, it should be noted that the performance of the melodies of the songs on one (or more often on two kavals) was accompanied by female singing (which is still the case in Štrpce / Sirinićka župa). The reduction and subsequent almost complete disappearance of Serbian performers on the kaval in this territory resulted in the need for its revitalization, that had started in the 1990s, first by neotraditional music ensembles in Belgrade, and then later on by soloists and groups from other parts of Serbia.The popularity of kaval among the girls and women during the last decade has been contributed to by their participation in organized workshops in Kosovo and Metohija, as well as the introduction of this instrument in the school education system. According to the female respondents, their motivation to play the kaval is crucial in relation to the specific sound of the kaval (timbre), as an iconic sign, presentation of the traditional Kosovo-Metohija repertoire as indexical sign relations, and preservation of cultural and national identity through symbolic signification of this instrumental practice.15 By acting primarily within the field of culture, women's kaval players also act in the social sphere, raising awareness of the importance of social engagement in nurturing traditional music and in introducing the instrument in new music settings and scene.

15 The concepts – *icon*, *index*, and symbol – originate from the semiotic trichotomous setting of the American philosopher and scientist Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914), and refer to the different manner by which a sign is related to its object (see more in: Turino 2008: 5–12). The complete triad conception of the sign of Charles S. Peirce was first applied to Serbian ethnomusicology in the study of Mirjana Zakić (2009).

Given the possibilities and ways of preserving the kaval playing, through its revitalization by a small, but significant number of female performers visible on public stages in this historical moment, both at the informal (through workshops) and formal (institutional and professional music-making) level, it is clear that education and presentation, coupled with the gender awareness, are an integral part of sustainability of this practice, as an important segment of the intangible cultural heritage of Serbia.

#### Bibliography

Ethnographic and Literary Sources about the Instrument *Kaval* in Serbia and Macedonia]. *Zbornik Matice srpske za scenske umetnosti i muziku* 49: 9–22.

### **Female Leadership in Serbian Metal Music. Frontwomen at the Crossroads of Visibility, Genre and Voice1**

*Bojana Radovanović (Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Belgrade)*

Abstract: *Metal music is known for being, in the words of sociologist Deena Weinstein (2000: 134), a genre primarily designed "(...) of, by, and for males". Although its foundational postulates, sound and behavior are traditionally seen as masculine, this genre has been also a place for subversion of the masculine and transgression into androgyny and feminininity. Since its inception in the 1970s, metal offered a myriad of possibilities for male performers. It is, thus, not surprising that during the first several decades ofthe genre's development,womenwere mainly part ofthe audience or male musicians' muses. This trend is more noticeably being challenged in the last two decades. Women are taking on not only the role of band vocalists (which is traditionally expected), but also the symbolic leadership as guitarplayersand otherinstrumentalists.This chapter shedslight onthehistorical circumstances and characteristics of female leadership in Serbian metal, focusing on the development of metal subgenres and their relationship to women in the local and international context. Since female roles in metal bands are still, by and large, the ones of vocalists, this chapter also gives insights into the development of female voice in metal – from mainstream clean and operatic singing in symphonic metal to the technically extended vocals of extreme metal.*

Keywords: *Serbian metal music, metal frontwomen, women in metal, voice, extreme metal, symphonic metal.*

To introduce the topic of this chapter, I refer the reader's attention to one typical example of metal music "best of " top lists, namely, Loudwire's "Top 50 Metal Bands of all Time" from 2016, which, like many similar ones, praises the world-renowned and now mainstream bands such as Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Judas Priest, Slayer, Pantera, Motorhead, Dio, as well as pleiad of more extreme metal acts such as Death, Cannibal Corpse, Morbid Angel, Carcass, Behemoth, and so on. Within these bands, it is

1 This study is the result of research done at the Institute of Musicology SASA, funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development (RS-200176), as well as part of the project *Applied Musicology and Ethnomusicology in Serbia: Making a Difference in Contemporary Society* (APPMES; No. 7750287), funded by the Science Fund of the Republic of Serbia.

not very difficult to notice the lack of gender diversity. This list gives an idea of the position of women in various subgenres of metal music: from heavy, thrash, to death and black metal, not one woman made it to the list. However, although this sample is not entirely exaggerated, the history and contemporaneity of metal are colored with a number of women, not only in the audience, but also as influential figures and leaders, both globally and in the Serbian context. In this chapter, I examine the presence and position of women as front-figures in metal in two ways: through the historical and factual view of the frequency of appearance and features of women in metal, and then through the prism of vocal techniques they use, viewed through the lens of philosophy of voice and the implications of vocal pedagogy. My goal is to demonstrate how female vocal leaders in metal gradually "conquered" the realm of vocal frontmanship within the dominantly masculine genre, as well as the area of "aggressive", extreme vocals over the decades.The overview of the development of female frontmanship in Serbian metal also points out how this local, small-scale scene reflects the tendencies of the international scene.

### **Women in Metal Music**

Although its origins can be traced to psychedelic and acid rock and the African-American blues music of the 1960s, as well as in the musicianship of figures such as Jimmy Hendrix and James Brown, it is common to locate the beginning of heavy metal in the 1970s, in the musical works of white (usually British) musicians copying and building on the urban blues styles (Walser 2014: 9).Heavy metal almostimmediately gained popularity amongst the blue-collar, male audience. It is practically impossible to trace the first appearance of the name of this genre that had its mainstream success in the 1980s. However, the term "heavy metal" can be found in the 19th-century vocabulary, having both a technical meaning (in military affairs) and a figurative/social one referring to power, influence, mental or bodily abilities.

Numerous studies were written about masculinity in the metal subculture (Khan-Harris 2007; Walser 2014; Weinstein 2000;). As Deena Weinstein (2000: 134) puts it, this is a genre primarily designed "(...) of, by, and for males".The issues that ensued from the dominance of masculinity do not connote the metal genre alone. Indeed, these issues are recognizable in metal's immediate predecessors, rock and hard rock music, where sexism is evident in lyrics, music videos, and behavior towards women.2

While discussing masculinity and gender in heavy metal music, in his seminal study of metal *Running withthe Devil* (1993), Robert Walser writes that, since around 1987, a gender balance throughout metal concert audiences can be noted. However, "metal is overwhelmingly concerned with presenting images and confronting anxieties that have been traditionally understood as peculiar to men, through musical means that have been conventionally coded as masculine"(Walser 2014: 110).The aggression emerging from metal's

2 It should also be noted here that sexism in rock became the subject of academic scrutiny ever since Simon Frith and Angela McRobbie's study in 1978.

"big wall of sound", high volume, and distortion is conventionally coded as masculine in music.3

As argued by Keith Kahn-Harris (2007: 160), the marginality of women and non-binary people within the extreme metal scene is "not necessarily any more severe than in other contemporary music scenes". However, that is not always the case.  Given that women nevertheless listen to this genre, Sonia Vasan explored the possible reasons for "women's *knowing* participation" in this subculture, with conclusions that this environment in a way empowers women and frees them from mainstream society expectations. This freedom, however, comes at the cost of "submitting to the masculinist codes of the subculture" (Vasan 2011: 334). As fans and musicians, women treat their femininity and compliance to essentialist gender stances as capital for participation in the scene. Rosemary Lucy Hill (2018: 266) emphasizes the discrepancy between academic discourse claiming that metal is sexist and the fans who insist that it is not. Nevertheless,Hill (2018: 269–270) points to the aspects in which said stance towards women is most visible: the objectification of women and "personal shortcomings"(the experience of sexismis sometimes seen as justified, connected mostly to the biological gender differences, see more in Powell and Sang 2015) in mosh pit or concert-going in general. It is also not uncommon for male fans to subject their female counterparts to a more rigorous examination about their knowledge of the history of metal, facts about metal albums and songs, etc. as a way of gatekeeping. However, many female metal fans do not see the problem in the chivalry or the essentialist approach to gender roles in the context of the metal scene (Hill 2018: 272). Similarly, female fans underline the feeling of safety from sexual harassment or unwanted advances, which ensues not only from the general idea of equality or chivalry, but also from the fact that male metal fans are primarily "there for the music" (Hill 2018: 272).4

Commenting onWalser's note that "(h)eavy metal is,inevitably, a discourse shaped by patriarchy" (2014: 109), Heather Savigny and Sam Sleight (2015: 344) point out that "there is nothing inevitable about this" and that this is more a case of, speaking in Judith Butler's terms, the performance of gender and not something inherent or natural. In metal – as in other music genres – masculinity is constructed through performance on the scene and in media in numerous and complex ways (Savigny and Sleight 2015: 244). Having that in mind, the metal subculture can also be a place where the concept of masculinity is challenged and subverted through performing androgyny and femininity, albeit these performances are almost always reserved for men. Androgyny, femininity, or, more generally, any type of transgression is performed in metal through various channels – visual, discursive, or sonic. One of the most prominent forms of transgression, especially regarding 1980s heavy and glam metal, is vocal transgression: clean male singing voices in the higher range, asserting dominance over the sonic picture of the rest of the band in what can be seen as female vocal range and space.

3 See more about the specificities in metal music sound production: Wallmark 2018.

4 It is also possible that some women who participated in the interviews did not want to name sexist behavior "due to the risk of alienating other hard rock and metal fans" (Hill 2018: 273).

The conquering of the feminine or, in other respects, *othering* traits in some metal subgenres did not, however, diminish the initial and cornerstone, dominantly masculine ideal of the genre. When it comes to women musicians in metal, one of the more extreme examples of the two-faced male subculture behavior and male aggression towards women in the scene/on the stage of recent years is seen in the case of Danish experimental black/folk metal band Myrkur, led by singer and multi-instrumentalist Amalie Bruun. On one side, her one-woman project releasedin 2014 was critically acclaimed,while a certain part of the black metal community, mostly American, white, and male, proceeded to send her death threats on accounts of her being a woman in a male-dominated community.

The models of behavior and relationships to women metal fans transfer to female performers – instrumentalists as well as vocalists.With the genre representing a masculine, rugged, and potent symbol of meaning and music production, women performers – and most notably instrumentalists – can still be evaluated based on the criteria of upholding the perceived standard of the majority, i.e., their male colleagues. Phrases like, for example, "playing like a man" are consistently considered the highest compliments to one's performing skills. Admittedly, metal culture is not isolated or exceptional in this mode of thinking. Speaking of the alternative and underground culture and certain areas of traditional music, one can see that similar discursive figures are not uncommon. Female instrumentalists are often viewed through the prism of the deep-rooted idea that ties women to intimacy, home, private, chamber music – and most notably, usually vocal spheres of musicking. It is noticeable that the overall picture of popular music, be it commercial, alternative, or underground, is slowly changing in terms of gender representation and participation in music production. However, having in mind the initial preposition in the metal genre of required masculinity, strength, power, and aggression, it is perhaps even more interesting to investigate the ways in which women are conquering spaces in domains of participation and even leadership.

In most cases, the point of intersection of leadership and front(wo)manship in metal (as in other related genres) refers to the position of vocalists. Considering the already mentioned insistent general historical connection between women and voice in performance, this point is also made more complex by including specific vocal techniques required for the performance of (extreme) metal music.

Setting aside the visual and verbal discourse for the moment, the singer's voice is one of the main channels and mediums for performing masculinity, femininity, power, normalcy, or monstrosity in metal music. Transgression into the *other* is achieved by using the high male voices with bountiful vibrato in heavy metal, screams and screeches, more elaborate growl and scream techniques in extreme metal genres, or female sopranos singing in the bel canto technique.Women have been singing and growling since the 1980s – take for example Sabina Classen from Holy Moses, who is credited with some of the first growls in metal, and Doro from Warlock (later, Doro). The expansion of female vocals in terms of the number of women on the scene and the performing style, however, has come later.

Since the appearance of heavy metal in former Yugoslavia in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and up until the early 2000s, women performers in metal in this region were extremely rare. Namely, some of the greatest and most popular Yugoslav heavy metal bands in the 1990s such as Divlje jagode, Gordi, Pomaranča, Osmi putnik, and later – with the development of speed, thrash, and early death metal – Heller (thrash/speed, Belgrade, 1984–1993, 2013–2019), Bloodbath (death/thrash, Belgrade, 1988–1995), Bombarder (speed/thrash, Sarajevo/Belgrade, 1986–1992, 1996–), Sanatorium (thrash/speed, Skopje, 1987–2004, 2011–), Mortuary (old school death, Kragujevac, 1990–1995), all had exclusively male members. The development of the metal scene in Yugoslavia reflected the state and potential of the genre on a global level. The dominance of masculinity was evident in metal and more broadly encompassed guitar-based genres such as Yugoslav rock'n'roll, alternative rock and new wave during the 1980s and 1990s (Nenić 2015: 137). The occurrence of women instrumentalists in alternative bands was mostly considered transgressive of gender norms and expectations in music, which was also recognized in the discourse of music journalism (Nenić 2015: 137).

During the 1990s, the scene grew and developed in diverse genre strains. Nevertheless, the ideas of all-female metal bands (such as, for example, Serbian hardcore band P.M.S.), or more numerous female band members were still foreign.

### **Frontwomanship and Voice**

Unpacking the female voice in metal in more detail can benefit from insights made by philosophy, history, theoretical psychoanalysis, and vocal pedagogy. Furthermore, it requires deepening our understanding of the relationships between voice and body, voice and language, voice and subjectivity. In these knowledge networks, we discover the tendencies that philosophy and other disciplines in humanities harbored over millennia: to silence the "female domains" of voice, body and music in favor of "male domains" of written language, *logos* and thinking. The phrase "woman sings, man thinks", written by Italian philosopher Adriana Cavarero (2005: 6), sums it up quite nicely. Just as the tides have started turning with the *vocal turn* in humanities – which can be described as the result of the intensification of interest in voice in theoretical psychoanalysis, poststructuralism, and later on, performance studies in the 20th century, when voice became a valid research subject and a window to scrutinization of various issues in humanities (see Kane 2015) – the voice in metal, almost paradoxically, became the place of asserting dominance.

Two types of vocalization in metal music can be discerned.The first type, a more common and mainstream one, includes clean singing and "raspy", somewhat distorted, vocals.The second type of vocalization encompasses a wide variety of extreme metal vocals that rely on extended vocal techniques. Although the first type is, by all means, not exclusive to metal, the other one is proudly presented as the sonic genre identifier for many extreme metal strains such as death, black and doom metal, grindcore, and numerous subgenres. Given the emanated and perceived aggression of vocal techniques typical of extreme metal subgenres, it was expected by general metal fandom – given the deeply ingrained notion of female (physical) fragility – that more female vocalists perform with a clean singing voice. However, the rising number of female vocalists in extreme metal has been evident in the last couple of decades.

Extreme vocalizations, however, pose before listeners the riddle of who is performing because the gender of the performer is not evident in the sonic picture of the extreme voice.The distorted sound experience, which leaves behind the clear singing melody and resides on the vocal techniques and behavior usually considered unpleasant, monstrous, and unregulated by the social conventions, thus hides not only the performer's gender identity, but also "plays the card" of introducing a non-human, animalistic element, so proudly embraced by the extreme metal community. Therefore, this can easily become the pointin which female vocalists transgress the expectationsimposed on them of clean, pleasant and likeable vocalizations and reach the point of sonic equality with their male colleagues. While this is the case for the most extreme of the subgenres, in other areas of metal, female vocal leaders have also been broadening the range of desirable vocal behavior.

It can be said that, although during the 1990s more women were getting involved in metal as performers – and especially in the position of the vocalist – two figures influenced female-led metal bands at the turn of the century for the decades to come. Those were, in order of appearance on the scene, Finnish opera singer Tarja Turunen, one of the co-founders of the band Nightwish, where she was active from 1996 to 2005, and German death growl vocalist Angela Gossow, the second vocalist of the USband Arch Enemy (2000–2014). Both these vocals were unconventional in the context of metal music nearing the end of the 20th century.On the one hand, classically trained bel canto singer Tarja transgressed the usual vocal practices and techniques used by women in metal and other genres such as belting and distorted singing. On the other hand, Gossow managed to produce the death growl, a *monstrous voice*, a voice that sounds like it does not belong to that (human, and more specifically, female) body.

The appearance of Nightwish and Tarja as a novelty in the domain of (female) metal vocals propelled the development of a specific symphonic/power subgenre of metal that leaned on operatic voices, classical instrumentation additions to the standard band structure, and epic stories and fantasies. In the early 2000s, the metal scene in Serbia started to diversify and include more female vocalists (see Table 1), especially those influenced by Nightwish's worldwide success. Bands like Abonos and Moondive, which resorted to multiple, female and male vocals, were among the more prominent acts, working within the globally popular symphonic metal genre. Besides the obvious and open references to the trends of female operatic vocal lead, these acts have also shown the traits of elitism, connections with high art and art music, and an interest in (Slavic) mythology and the medieval past. Aside from them, there were numerous tribute bands and some groups who never released their own material.

Following the development path of extreme metal, it is worth mentioning that Kramp, an old-school death metal band from Belgrade formed in 1999, had the extreme metal vocalist Ivana Savić, who continued her career in several other bands after the band's dismissal. During the following decade, although much shyer than in symphonic metal, metal bands with women singing harsher and fry, death vocals, started to emerge in larger numbers (Rain Delay, Odium Inc., Awaiting Fear, etc.).

Entering the second decade of the 21st century, a certain level of diversification and "progress" is noticeable in regard to frontwomen and women in metal in general. In 2013 two all-female metal bands were formed, which are still active today – speed/thrash band Jenner and melodic death metal band Nemesis. The vocalists of these groups practice singing with distortion and extreme vocal techniques, respectively. Furthermore, in the 2010s, trained vocalists such as Bojana Milosavljević (Rain Delay) and Aleksandra Đelmaš (Destiny Potato) started combining clean, pop-like voices with harsher, belting techniques and controlled screams. This – almost scholarly – attentive and careful approach to extreme metal techniques is likewise noticeable in contemporary extreme metal. Namely, Nemesis vocalist Sanja Drča attended masterclasses by Melissa Cross and Angela Gossow and learned to shape her false cord vocals and (fry) screams according to their pedagogical approach.

By shaping their voices in line with international trends and their role-models, these vocalists demonstrate the need for taking over the agency of their own sonic presence and leadership on stage. Moreover, the integration of extreme vocals in the repertoire of possible female vocal behaviors is a sign of embracing and incarnating transgressive femininities – the one that recognizes the manifold reality of being a woman in metal music. Aside from the voice and sound itself, some of the bands, such as Nemesis, are also outspoken about the feminist values and social issues in their song themes and concepts, as well as other public appearances. This adds a much-needed female perspective to, for example, death metal music, which is already marked as being explicit about and engaged in socio-political themes.

### **Conclusion**

The lack of women in extreme metal during the 1990s and the early 2000s, even in the position of vocalists is interestingly illustrated in the famous instructional DVD releases*The Zen of Screaming I and II.* These publications were intended and designed as introductory material for extreme vocalists with video explanations of the performing technique, guests – famous metal vocalists – who attended the vocal lectures and gave interviews for this release, and additional audio material with vocal exercises. Namely,in 2007 vocal coach,instructor and the writer of*The Zen of Screaming,* Melissa Cross defined the division between fry screaming and false cords as more suitable for tenors and baritones, respectively, showing that – even though she had Angela Gossow as a guest and a student in the video – the state of the scene did not call for more significant representation of women vocalists in one such project and Cross' classification.

As shown in this condensed overview, compared to the 1980s global scene, as well as in Yugoslavia and, from the 1990s onwards, in Serbia, female vocalists started to gain a more notable position. In addition, the diversification of female vocal output has also become pronounced. As the concept of voice remains one pluralistic knot of identities and knowledge, it is also suitable for (re)negotiations of power and leadership in metal music. Although the voice was already a polygon for transgression in the male metal vocalists' practices of heavy, glam, and, later on, extreme metal, the task for frontwomen vocalists was not only to reclaim their feminine, bodily, ephemeral position of a singer but to transform it from within. The transformation has been twofold: on the one hand, by way of introducing the female bel canto in metal, on the other hand, by mastering the extreme voice. Compared to the previous understanding of what female voice and

#### 220 Bojana Radovanović (Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Belgrade)

vocal leadership in metal and other music genres can perform (usually associated with the characteristics found also in bel canto), the inclusion or, better yet, mastery of the extreme vocalization works towards the understanding of diverse – and not always conventionally feminine, private and "proper"– modes of womanhood. In that context, the tendency for growth and development in both directions and the request and necessity for diversification of metal voice is notably seen in the international framework as well as in the Serbian metal scene which is humbler in terms of logistics and number of active participants. As a result of "catching up to" or even determining the direction of that trend, female Serbian metal leaders and vocalists are deserving of the audience's and scholarly attention, to which this text hopefully will contribute.

*Table 1: Serbian bands with female vocalists.*

### Bibliography

### **Female Agency, Genres and Aesthetics of Sorrow in Persian Classical Music**

*Nasim Ahmadian (University of Alberta)*

Abstract: *In today's Iran, the prohibition of female musicians from public performance of dance, solo voice, and occasionally, instrumental music under the rules by the Islamic regime extremely challenges women to maintain active professional status in music. Starting my all-women Persian classical music ensemble in 2011, my colleagues and I agreed upon defining ourselves within the "artistic" scope without falling into the "flashy" tagline of marginalized "all-women group" (gorūhe bānuvān). In Shiʻa Iran (since the 14th century), a long-standing urge to legitimize music by differentiating classical art from the "undervalued" light-hearted music of lower-class entertainers (motrebs), followed by Iranian modernization and influence motivated byWestern aesthetic schools led to emphasized divisions in the philosophy, ethics and aesthetics of genres. The ethos of sorrow, a dominant aesthetic expression in Persian classical music, has long defined the repertoire, genre and performing artistry through affiliation with maktab (artistic school) heritage and Persian mystic philosophy. The reinforcement of this ethos under Islamism through Shiʻa emotional culture and socio-political boundaries for musical performance was more intensified in the post-Republic (1979) Iran. The aesthetics has contextualized a social fabric for defining professional female agency in a competitively male-dominated tradition and an escape from the stereotypical past image of female courtesan entertainers and overall marginalization of art music. In this chapter, through several examples, including my autoethnography as an Iranian female musician, I explore the quality of social aesthetics of sorrow as a distinction of genre, agency, class and their implications in the case of female music in Iran.*

Keywords: *Iranian music, gender, music education, Islam, social aesthetics of music.*

As I founded my all-women music ensemble in 2011 under Iranian state's restrictions on female musicians, my colleagues and I agreed upon defining ourselves within the "artistic" scope without falling into the "flashy" tagline of marginalized "all-women group" (*gorūh-e bānuvān*). This choice was based on the awareness of at least two controversial connotations regarding the concept of "women's music" in the professional domain of the early 21st century Iran: first, women as the inferior and less advanced performers, excluded from the serious musical scene, who occupy a place somewhere on the margins

as a vulnerable musical "visibility"; and second, the exceptional women daring to stand independently to perform their own music, yet often overshadowed or devoured by a social message or political atmosphere in resistance to the norms of a segregated society. Disregarding both, my focus was "the art by women as artists", but not a marginalized gender.

In this chapter, I discuss the socio-historical dimensions of genre, class and aesthetics in Iranian classical music and their impact on the emergence of female agency and female musicianship in Iran. I explore how the historical and present choices and limitations in the socio-political, religious and cultural context of Iran have shaped aesthetics of sorrow as a distinctive element of a musical genre and social class. By presenting historical cases of female musicians' agency and sharing my autoethnographic experiences as a female ensemble leader, performer and educator, I analyze how women navigate the music system, particularly in the art music of Iran and how they develop their agency inside that system.

### **The Phenomenon of All-Women Ensembles in Iran**

Since the 1979 Iranian revolution, the female voice and dance have been eliminated from the public stage. Today, while women are allowed to learn music, they are under official restrictions regarding performance and their visible activity in the public space – especially for the mixed audience. These barriers are even more intense in some provinces, due to their local rules. Regardless of its dominance as one of the most historical and artistic cities in Iran, my hometown Isfahan has been long bearing the scar of prohibition on women's stage-performance. The political rules centralized around religious authority have marginalized women's performance even further, limiting instrumental music playing as well. My last public performances as a santūr player in Isfahan went back to more than a decade before opening my ensemble. They referred back to my conservatory graduation concert and a music festival held annually in commemoration of the 1979 Islamic Revolution. However, at the birth time of my ensemble, the oppression and conservatism in the post Green-movement1 era of President Ahmadinejad had already terminated many musical events and normalized tight restrictions. In Tehran, the rules against women's performance were slightly milder, although extremely unstable, depending on daily policies, propagandas, and legalities by both political and religious authorities.

While the category of "all-women ensemble" was hardly a preferred opportunity, my colleagues and I considered the initial proposition from my old-time conservatory master and the manager of an institution where I was teaching at the time. He was aware of our educational background in Isfahan Music Conservatory2 , a university bachelor's degreein Iranian classicalmusic,and recent professional career as performers and teachers

1 This movement happened nationwide in protest to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency in 2009.

2 Official music academies in secondary and high school levels that exist only in a few major cities of Iran.

– albeit with the regular limitations for women – in the conservatory and private institutions. As a supporter and mentor, my teacher was optimistic that the idea of an allwomen group performing for all-women audience would at least open a window for representing women's artistry, not to be wasted, while simultaneously adding more publicity and artistic resolutions to his institution and its inspiring leadership in the city. We found the potentials of this limiting, yet optimistic concept of "all-women ensemble" as an only – though narrow – possibility for our musical fulfilment. My years of teaching and leading Persian music ensemble courses in girls' conservatory3 and my young students' substantial achievements in school concerts optimized my urge to collaborate with colleagues, motivate our students for the future roles, contribute to the city's gender4 diversity, and pursuit farther horizons in professional performance.Women needed to experience and to be heard more independently – even if only by the female audience – in the male-dominated art music scene. Based on their competency, a selected number of young performers among my conservatory cohorts and other educated musicians were solicited to join the ensemble. I arranged a solid classical repertoire based on the *maktab* (artistic school) in which I was trained, with the aim of presenting a classical art performance, distinct from the common simplified or commercialized repertoire of many other groups. This was the beginning of my all-women *Nasim* Ensemble5 (*gorūh-e bānuvān-eNasim*) in Isfahan, Iran, that remained active and won several recognitions and awards from the most competitive Iranian international festivals until I left the country in 2016.

The recognition of my group as the only accepted ensemble from the province and the only female one admitted for competition among twelve selected classical ensembles nation-wide in the prominent annual *Fajr International Festival of Music* (Tehran) in 2013, brought some publicity. I received an interview from *Sharq Newspaper* to elaborate more on the status of female music in Isfahan. The interviewer quoted Mohammad Qotbi, a clergy member and then the head of Isfahan Culture and Guidance Administration, who (surprisingly) compared music bands to the national soccer team – where female performers must have (male) substitutes as of players in a soccer team. Qotbi stated, "this ban is an unwritten law that has been observed in the city for more than 10 years.Musical groups that perform in Isfahan must comply with the unwritten laws of his department and have a contingency plan to replace their femalemembers"(Eng. Trans.*Radio Zamaneh* 2014). Insisting on the importance of Isfahan as a religious city,Qotbi's disapproval ruled

3 The post-revolutionary Iran (since 1979) obligates the gender-segregated education prior to the university level. This rule applies to music conservatories which are divided to boys' and girls' schools. The issue of teacher's same gender for each is still a point of conflict in provincial legislative systems as women are disallowed to teach in boys' school, however the lack of female teachers for some music courses makes the male employment in girls' schools unquestionable. This is a recurring matter of dispute – with less intensity in Tehran compared to other cities – between religious authorities and music directors.

4 The concept of "gender" in Iran stills remains in the male and female categories as formally recognized frames.

5 The state's official restriction on video-recording female music made the recording impossible. However, unofficial video samples and rehearsals can be found on "Nasim Ahmadian" YouTube channel.

locally, despite the official authorization from the Central Ministry of Culture in Tehran. *Sharq Newspaper* reflected, although briefly, my response to Qotbi as I emphasized the more fundamental issue of holding women, the equally professional and active talents, from the art scene by quoting me, "the omission of female players [performers] in Isfahan has led to the deterioration of the music scene in the province. Women make up half of the active and creative population and they have been paralyzed" (Eng. Trans. *Iran Times International* 2014).

In such an imposing socio-political and prohibitive frame, the idea of beginning an independent female ensemble of educated young musicians distant from Tehran, not only in a marginalized social life, but also a male-dominated art was a question of critical aims and attitudes. A female ensemble was unparalleled in non-egalitarian musical arena, yet unavoidably, a form of social resistance and professional solidarity that could simultaneously overshadow its own artistic value. For this reason, my focus was on presenting the music *per se*, the aesthetics and authenticity of the classical genre, rather than the prevailing gendered, political, or religious label that had long imposed definitions to Iranian music and its morality.

### **Duality in Genre, Elitism and Social Class for Iranian Music**

The aesthetic education of Iranian classical (art) music with inclination to the ethos of sorrow was established through various historical dimensions. Here, I focus on the important aspects coinciding with two dynamic changes during the Iranian modernization in early 20th century: first, the rise of musical elitism with an urge to draw a distinction between musicians as masters of the art music and the general *motreb* (entertainers) known as the lower class of the illiterate society; and second, the formalization of *maktab* to be an inclusive system of art education and ethics through dissemination of music as a "respectable" craft and crystalized national heritage.

Both these interdependent factors were outcomes of several socio-cultural changes in Iran regarding modernity, nationalism and Westernization. The new experiences included a general advancement in the educational system, increasing awareness toward national identity and the collective past, foreign relations and influence, and radical cultural directions such as *kashf-e hijāb* (unveiling women) in 1936 under Pahlavi regime.This period was also the beginning for music schools and publications, public concerts, new music bands, national radio and television, recording industry, and the emergence of bourgeoisie, especially in the Iranian urban life. The pinnacle of these changes settled new contexts for defining the arts, aesthetics, identity, class, educational tradition and performing stage. The result drew hard borderlines between the music of *motrebi –* as a light joyful music of the uneducated – and classical music – as the sophisticated art for the educated who are aware of Persian national heritage.

Although various regions and ethnicities in Iran have constantly added to the content and artistry of Iranian music repertoire, the bloom of modernized urban life and nationalism by the 20th century enhanced new cultural levels. An example is the social polarization of urban Iran, most notably in the spatial division of Tehran into the north and the south city. As Breyley and Fatemi (2015: 1) emphasize, this distinction marked the north city or uptown (*bālā-shahr*) as the "modern" and the south city or downtown (*pāyīn-e shahr)* as the "traditional" caste of musicians. The social status of *motrebs* was as the following,

The motreb [festive musicians] organized themselves under the direction of theatrical troupes with which they had previously been sporadically associated… In the eyes of many Tehran residents, the *motreb* is an illiterate, downtown [*pāyīn-e shahr*] musician. His manners are uncouth and he lacks respectability (ibid.).

Considering its historical and contextual layers of meaning, the term "traditional" in this division refers to illiteracy, lower values, and cultural and moral backwardness. It is noteworthy that the word "*motreb*" has been redefined in a fundamentally changed context throughout the history, as Breyley and Fatemi (ibid.) explain:

If the word *motreb* (derived from Arabic, literally "one who creates joy or generates pleasure") once referred to all categories of musicians without differentiation, today – more precisely, since the beginning of the twentieth century – it has become a derogatory term that is applied only to musicians who perform at weddings, parties and other festive events, to distinguish them from those who practice Iranian art music.

The modified definition of *motreb* and its attached subculture agrees with the historical references to the term – especially after the Safavids' officialization of Shı̒ism in Iran during 16th-18th centuries. According toWilliam Beeman (2007: 47–50), the secular music in Shiʻa Iran was marginalized socially and morally, attributed mostly to the non-Muslim, ethnic or minority groups (e.g., Jewish, Iranian-Armenian) who could perform it in public without religious shame.This status contradicts with theosophical use of the term praised in numerous Medieval treatises and Persian Sufi poetry. As Azadehfar (2014: 3–7) classifies the diversity of these views, many philosophers, scholars and Sufi poets (i.e., Rumi, Hafez, Saʻdi, Roudaki) who were also accomplished musicians, praised music to the level of mystic practice, wisdom, and a connecting source between the dual celestial (heavenly) and terrestrial (earthly) worlds that built the core of Persian cosmology.

Although there is no clear evidence on when and how the meaning of *motreb* was precisely recontextualized in reference to the light music of entertainment and festivity by the outcast, this frame seems to emerge with the formal establishment of musical education and dissemination of *maktab* pedagogy in Iran under Qajar dynasty (1789–1925). This was also the time of stricter boundaries for the male musical domains (Fatemi 2005: 400). While many distinguished musicians were still at the royal court's service, during this period the classical music began to embrace a deliberate and resentful separation from *motrebi*, entertainment and trivial pleasure.The reluctance or escape of some royalsponsored educated musicians such as Darvishkhan and Vaziri from the royal or patronage's obligations on performing demands are the instances of art musicians' resistance to joyful musical service for the royalty and the tasteless crowd.

The class and educational gap between the art and entertaining genres and classified societies, for both men and women, becomes even more dominant during the Pahlavi dynasty (1925–1979). This era was also the epitome of artistic revival and institutionalization, modernization, intellectual awareness, and genre division in the musical scene of Iran. With the Pahlavi's support of the ancient Persian identity and cultural affluency, many classical musicians constructed the basis of newly state-respected music.They aspired reflecting the artistic and cultural values to the highest levels of educational and aesthetic canons as they had encountered in Europe. Persian classical music was to flourish into its philosophical and technical grandeur as of the Persian poetry; this vision typically refused the light pop genres.The new elite's efforts, therefore,materialized in practice and scholarship as compensation formany centuries of scarcity and dismalin serious publicization of art music under the political and ethical authority of the Islamic state.

In his recent critiques on the overlooked case of *motrebi* culture in Iran and the popular entertaining music of the Middle East in general, Anthony Shay (2018: 11) argues that the contemporary scholarly attempts by Iranian and international intellectuals have despised the importance of this tradition by consigning them to the "historical trash bin" and condemning them as "imitative, repetitive, diluted and sensual". Classical music, on the other hand, is "creative, original, sober, and [above all], spiritual". Shay attributes a part of current public embarrassment of Iranian artistic society regarding the *motrebi* music to the dissemination of art music discourse as a high culture, emphasized through the international scholarly works by Dariush Safvat and Jean During and their influence on music studies over the past decades. In her historic analysis of the cultural and political degradation of the heavily featured *shesh-o-hasht* (6/8) groove in Iranian pop music, Farzaneh Hemmasi (2020: 39–40) also mentions the "unmodern, debauched, and vulgar" associations with the *motrebi* music that was restricted from pre-revolutionary state radio and television. The music of this genre, as Nahid Siamdoust (2017: 42–45) explains, refers to cafémusic and *kucheh-bāzāri* (songs of the streets and bazaar), with their distinct style and performing space or a part of *ruhowzi,* which was a social theatre performed in house courtyards, offering a comical commentary on daily life (ivi: 21).

Nevertheless, it is impossible to overlook the formation of art musical aesthetics as a doctrine based on its content, structure, interpretation, affect, and performing space compared to other genres, including *motrebi*. Not only the repertoire and musical skills by the master, but also the audience and emotional setting were among the signifiers of the art genre in contrast to the *motrebi*tradition.With its affiliation to the educated,mystic poetry, music schools and concert halls, the classical genre was an invitation for the audience to sit silently in a formal venue, listen deeply, concentrate on the weighty content of the poetry and even have some knowledge of the noble Persian art history. It was "the music by the elite and educated, for the elite and educated".The*motrebi* genre, on the other hand, was known as the music of weddings and happy ceremonies, street events and lighter moods played by "performing troops" who were often from the lower society and working-class. Although their music had various levels of sophistication from which occasionally great musicians arose, the occupation was still appointed to their low rank6 or in service to the upper class. In her categorization of the relationship between musical performance and social values, Ellen Koskoff also mentions the social-sexual role and marginality of women in the "class-stratified socioeconomic system" in the court music

6 There was a variety in the social rank, position, and performing stages of these minorities and public entertainers, however, they were often divided from the art music class.

context, especially in the Middle East and Asia (Koskoff 2014: 124). In Iran, the femininity and social inferiority were certain characteristics of the *motrebi* entertainment and at points, symbols of erotic pleasure and visibility as dancing and physical attraction were often left to women.7

### **Female Music and the Social Aesthetics**

In his ethnographic history8 of Iranian contemporary music, Rouhollah Khaleqi, the music historian, composer and educator (Khaleqi Vol. I. 2002: 360), emphasizes the lack of published evidence on the female's role in the art music. Except for a few female musicians' names mentioned in the court memoire of *Tarikh-e Azodi* in early Qajar era, women either decided, or it was decided for them to be excluded from the public attention. This absence, either through self-isolation or imposed marginality in the art genre interlinked with the moral criticism by the Islamic society and the attached image to the past courtesan performance. It increased the stereotyped stratification of female agency in *motrebi,* even though among them were high talents as singers, dancers and percussionists. Khaleqi mentions Mohtaram Kalimi and Ghodsi, to name a few.

Emphasizing this professional fracture in female's learning process of classical music, Khaleqi (Vol. I. 2002: 363–7) highlights a gendered, yet delicate aesthetic evaluation of female vocalists in Iran by which their training was deviated, especially when receiving admiration from their male counterparts or dedicated fans. The non-functional critical system and competitive stage for women, due to their position as alienated practitioners of the classical genre, as well as their physical and vocal charm, prevented them from the serious stage of aesthetic refinement and artistry.

What Khaleqi uncovers is an existing fact in today's Iranian vocal art, especially since the ban on female voice in post-revolutionary Iran. Women's vocal – and more broadly, instrumental – artistry is generally evaluated as lower levels of competency. In vocal music, this is notable in women's lesser tendency toward the risk of learning and applying sophisticated *tahrīrs* (melisma), advanced techniques, and as I discuss later in this chapter, moving beyond the structure of light *tasnīf* and *tarāneh* (metric love songs) pieces. Likewise, the situation stands in the instrumental music for the representation of advanced techniques, arrangements, improvisation and depth of interpretation. This dichotomy has affected the aesthetic arena of female music in a way that they are either over-encouraged by the non-expert feedback or dismissed for lack of substantial artistry by the experts' criticism. The extremes are lower for the formally educated women, especially the instrumentalists, due to their subtle self-projecting image, compared to the vocalist's central role.

7 See for instance the fresco painting depicting court dancers from Hasht-Behesht Palace, Isfahan, Iran, Safavid era, circa 1669. https://musiclifeword.org/material-culture/mehmoonifinal2/ (accessed 4 October 2022).

8 Originally published in 1954.

We should note that the gender-stratification of music education roots in a deeper texture of Iranian society in the 19th and 20th centuries. Khaleqi describes the social participation of Iranian women during the Qajar era as the following:

In the streets9 , men and women had to follow separate pedways, even if they were a couple! Women were excluded from attending theatrical plays. The only two movie theaters in Tehran accepted men only. There were a small number of girls' schools and only few families were able to send their daughters to public education. In general, the facilities for woman's education were scarce. (Khaleqi Vol. II. 2002: 195)

However, in early 20th century, several fundamental and ideological changes occurred in the educational environment of music through the new attitudes by Ali-Naqi Vaziri (1887–1979), who is also known as the father of musical modernity in Iran. Vaziri was a former military colonel and a composer, virtuoso tār player, teacher and musical theorist who started the first formalmusic school of Iran,*madrasa-ye ʿāli-emusiqi*(Superior School of Music) in 1924, after completing his musical studies in Europe. He made enthusiastic efforts to include women in the educational environment (Farhat 2003). In the light of his moral and musical competency, Vaziri gained the state officials' permission to lead women-only art sessions for educated women of respected ethical reputation. Known to be the female's first formal art education, the music and painting courses were offered to a limited number of women during restricted hours with the least male attendance. The training resulted in the formation of a musical club and movie theater for women, and a number of concerts by these educated female performers under Vaziri. However, according to Khaleqi (2002, 196–7), the music program was soon terminated, due to the conflicts caused by unsupportive authorities and social hostility toward Vaziri's modern views.

### **The Legacy of Female Musicians**

This awakening, yet turbulent era of music activism for women under the socio-cultural and religious struggles aimed at new aesthetic and moral divisions. A small number of young musicians, who set up the artistic and ethical models for the contemporary and future generations, blossomed. One of the eminent legends is Qamar10 ol-Molouk Vaziri (1905–1959), a highly respected classical female vocalist with a distinguished mezzo soprano voice, who began learning at an early age through attending female *rowzeh* sessions with her renowned *rowzeh-khān* (*rowzeh* singer) grandmother, Kheir al-Nessa. *Rowzehkhani* is a form of narrative and melodic recitation in a lamenting voice for the tragedy of Shiʻa martyrs of Karbalā, which is performed at the religious gatherings. Similar to many well-known Iranian vocalists, Qamar began learning and performing *āvāz* (Persian vocal art) through the religious ritual and mournful Shiʻa gatherings, with a focus on the musical interpretation of sorrow.

9 Translated from Persian to English by the author.

10 Evidently, she changed her last name to "Vaziri" in homage to Vaziri's efforts. Her iconicity in Iranian music and social values of charity is often compared to that of Umm Kulthum in Egypt.

In her remarks, Qamar emphasizes the role of these early trainings through accompanying her vocalist grandmother, ear training on the modal and tonal qualities of the Shiʻa religious elegies and the chance of performing in front of the *rowzeh* audience as her first aural music schooling and effective way to become an esteemed Persian vocalist (Khaleqi Vol. III. 2002: 139; Nakjavani 2008). Qamar is also known for the first public appearance of an Iranian female vocalist without the obligatory Islamic veil (*hijāb*) in 1924 in Tehran's Grand Hotel. She began her professional music lessons with the great master of tār, Morteza Neidavoud, who first accompanied her voice on tār in a private gathering and advised flourishing her unique voice with a proper knowledge and skills of the *radīf* repertoire. The incident resulted in Qamar's completion of training with Neidavoud and upcoming fame and concerts. She soon performed *āvāz* and technically elevated *tasnīfs* on national radio and new recordings with many distinguished musicians including Abol-Hassan Saba (violin), Habib Samaʻee (santūr), Hossein Yahaqi (violin), and Neidavoud himself. Her refined interpretation of melancholy, deep lyrics and the vocal artistry not only made her a primary icon of female musicianship, but also established genuine models for acclaimed musicians and male vocalists of the following generations, including Mohammad Reza Shajarian, the great vocalist master of *āvāz* in Iran.

Among the following generation of female vocalists, several acclaimed artists such as Roohangiz, Delkash, Marzieh, Moluk Zarrabi, Khatereh Parvaneh, Sima Bina, Afsaneh, and Parisa arose, who were also educated musicians11 and high-calibre performers of the art genre.They contributed to the establishment of female agency, not only through their specialized competency in Persian classical music, but also their publicity with distinguished orchestras and ensembles through then highly-valued music programs of Iranian national radio and television. These valued recordings are continuously referential as training models by contemporary musicians, including my ensemble.

### **The Impact of** *Maktab* **Aesthetics and the Ethos of Sorrow on Female Music**

The ethos of sorrow (*huzn*) and its aesthetics form a predominant aspect of artistry and affect in Persian classical music, which have been appreciated and addressed by Iranian and Western scholars (Azadehfar 2017; Caton 2008; During 1991; Zonis 1973). A subtle, yet enriched emotional and technical interpretation of the classical repertoire, with its philosophical and mystic content through the ethos of sorrow relate the performance to the authenticity of this genre, which is the focus in *maktab* training. Accordingly, a deep classical performance is integrated with the understanding of Persian classical poetry,its themes and the rhetoric of mystic love and melancholy. By contrast, a performance based on light lyrics, festive moods, and less complexity reminds the music of entertainment and the less educated from the past.

Historically, the praised aesthetic frame focusing on the depth of melancholy and sorrow roots not only in the turbulent emotional life and cultural memory of Iranians' battles and misfortunes over the centuries, but more deeply, in the philosophy and poetics of love and *ʻirfan* (mysticism) in Persian thought and literature. However, in the mu-

11 Mostly under trainings of Vaziri and his musical descendants' *maktabs.*

sical culture, this aesthetic quality dominates the structure, performance, and authenticity, due to the historical exploitation of music as an illegitimate craft or a disgraceful occupation, unapproved by religion and moral values of the society.Thus, the *maktab* education and its framework not only provided a method of transmitting music as a secular art to the selected deserving pupils, but also created a respected culturalidentity forindependent musicians.Through this shared awareness, the art musicians in modern Iran focused their efforts on the establishment of*maktab –* andits aesthetic values – as a division or sanctuary for the art genre. In her survey of the integration between musical genres and current socio-political issues of post-revolutionary Iran, Ann Lucas (2006: 84) also highlights a more secure position in terms of the state's persecutions for Iranian classical music due to its "erudite reputation" that was "housed in conservatory-style facilities and integrated into governmental bureaucracy before the revolution". It resulted in a more "lenient regulation" of classical music compared to other genres. Ameneh Youssefzadeh (2000: 38–41) also brings examples of the new cultural policies by the Islamic Republic to legitimize traditional Iranian music under directives of "development of spiritual culture".

Nevertheless, it is also considerable that a long-term marginalization of women in public musical arena, firstly within the context of Islamic restrictions on music performance, then intensified by the elite male-dominated class of the Shiʻa society, and finally through the extreme prohibitions by the Islamic Republic have faded out women's image of artistry and activism on the aesthetic arch of musicking. This paucity has increased the educated female musicians' preference to pursue the aesthetic values of melancholic expression and ethos of sorrow as the "erudite" authenticity in the classical *maktab* repertoire and interpretation.

An example for the aesthetic division in the artistry of the genres through *maktab* is the interpretation of classical *āvāz*ī 12 repertoire, which requires years of intensive training and dedicated master-apprentice relationship. It is a collection of modal vocal and instrumental pieces with metric flexibility, interpretative elements, and abundant ornamentations in the *radīf* repertoire. Performing *āvāz* is sophisticated, interpretive, expressive, and it requires not only a demanding understanding of Persian poetics and symbolic emotional components, but also an advanced level of musical techniques, dynamic expression and improvisation integrated with the memorized *radīf* material. Additionally, the musician is required to represent the mood of the *dastgāh* (mode), its *gūsheh* (modal sections), and the phrasing dynamics as well as learning how to create, direct, and fulfil the mood of performance.This is merely a brief example of the aesthetic framework of *āvāzī* that differentiates its artistry and affect from the simple *tasnīf* and *tarāneh* music in the more popular (*mardomī*) and entertaining genres.

This is a potential reason for the artistic modern evolution of *tasnīf* in terms of the content, message and artistry toward themes of freedom, justice, patriotism and social improvement, especially by the new wave of poets and songwriters such as Malek o-Shoara Bahar and Aref Qazvini. This change occurred in light of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905–1911) and categorized the new high-calibre works under the title

12 Lit. vocal in Persian. A lot of its artistry derives from the vocal centrality of Persian music.

of "revolutionary *tasnīf* ". Yet, the traditional *tasnīf* was attached mostly to the entertaining mood, lyrical content and easy-reaching to the audience crowd.

Within the context of these boundaries, the framework of aesthetic interpretation is more identifiable for the female musicians who follow *maktab* training. Their level of artistry is a deliberate decision and effort to exclude themselves from the preconception and the past public image of an "entertainer" and find their place as respectable performer musicians and teachers in a male-dominated and historically marginalized art.Thus, the musical elements such as virtuosity, improvisation, interpretive complexities, emotional expression, and professional display, along with the choice of repertoire, poetry, body movements and sexual visibility form the evaluative approach for the authenticity of *maktab* aesthetics, including the ethos of sorrow.

In this perspective, the aim of my ensemble was to present classical music within the *maktab* aesthetics and emotional scopes, though beyond the gender stratifications of artistry. While I was firm in maintaining the female identity, there was no intention for false boundaries on the content and quality. My classical repertoire and *maktab*-calibre performance was maintained equally throughout our concerts with a female vocalist for female-only audience, as well as when performing in *Fajr Festival* with a male vocalist – due to its restrictions on performing for the mixed audience. The performers' outfit and visual appearances were carefully chosen to be subtle and traditionally formal. The setting and arrangements for the audience demanded extensive attention to the artistry, silent listening,interpretive poetry and ethos ofmelancholy.Our focus on collective emotional cultivation and dynamic interpretation was frequently appreciated by the audience. The program contained a classical repertoire of successful works with reference to both male and female vocalists from the pre-revolutionary era of Iran, which had not been performed often after 1979.

### **Coda: New Paradigms for Female Music and the Public Image**

After a strict shut down, the gradual resume of musical education for women in the post-revolutionary Iran and fundamental changes under the new regime has made women aware of their qualified voice through promoting themselves as professional art musicians. They have developed enthusiastic efforts toward the classical aesthetics and credibility found in Qamar and other distinguished female musicians who took *maktab* and/or formal music school education. They have entered the competitive maledominated ground and when restricted by law, they take the women-only opportunities. In a close study of the female-only musical events in Iran, Wendy DeBano (2005: 455) highlights the symbiotic relationship between music and gender roles in Iran:

Arguments about the permissibility of music in Islam, the general social status of musicians, the important distinction between professional and amateur musicians, and the hierarchy of musical genres in a given context cannot be divorced from issues of gender.

In a broader context, the matter of gendered musical phenomena such as "women-only ensemble", "women-only concerts/festivals" have been debated as the alternative methods by the political regime to "foster gender segregation" in Lucas's terms (Lucas 2006: 81) and open a (controlled) space for female activity through giving semi-free yet Islamic identity to women empowerment in Iran. This semi-open space is subject to multiple dimensions of criticism and controversies among both female and male musicians and audiences.

Projecting on the case of female music in contemporary Iran, my observations and personal engagement as a musician and ethnomusicologist confirm the existence of multi-layered perspectives and priorities by women ensembles: The resistance to the primary concept of "women's music as a division" is reflected in firm avoidance of some groups to perform in non-negotiated female-only events, while others, such as *Nasim* Ensemble*,* stand to perform autonomously within the aesthetics of the art genre. For several reasons,including publicity, other groups (e.g. *Mahbanoo*) moderate the aesthetic challenge and female autonomy in favour of the entertainment. These are among the facts contributing to the rearrangement of the socio-cultural fabric for Iranian classical music and its emotional aesthetics not only for women musicians, but also for the gender-free domain of artistry at large.

Today, in the first half of 21st century, aesthetic paradigms of classical music are going through a major change under the dominance of social media. Women dress up and flash out their visuality, as well as their music and picture.Their caution for self-portrayal with head-covering is still maintained while presenting solo vocal performance – illegal in the Islamic Republic law. Many female ensembles (e.g., *Gillariss, Bahar-narenj*) now release their works exclusively on social media or perform on foreign satellite channels. Regardless of the length and level of their studies in *maktabs,* women publicize their education via sharing photos and selfies from the classroom settings by renowned masters such as Shajarian and Lotfi. While the authenticity of genre, repertoire and live performance stand on the margin, the new visual accessibility and competitive virtual publicity (e.g., number of followers, comments and music video clip circulations) rearrange the aesthetic criteria for female performers. In addition, women's access to music education and their arrival in various fields of music have encouraged male musicians and composers to work with women, especially in terms of vocalists, or all-women groups with a male leader. The goal is often to satisfy the prompt visual and sonic needs of the forever judging audience who quickly roll down their social media pages to the next post, leaving prompt comments in attack or favor of women performers.The expression of female agency is shifting from aesthetics of sorrow and musical techniques toward the visibility of performance, space and self-portrayal. Whether or not these changes lead to the formation of new aesthetic structures and performing ethos in female musicianship will be a question for future research and observation.

*Figure 1: Poster of Nasim ensemble's concert (designed by artist Najmeh Moradi Chadegani) depicting symbolic elements of Isfahan's historical architecture, calligraphy and Persian colorful birds. The announcement reads "For Women only". The venue was a private music institution in Isfahan, 2012. Image used by permission.*

### Bibliography

Azadehfar, Mohammad Reza. 2014. "Diversities in Iranian Philosophical and Theosophical Views toward Music and its Impact on Iranian Youngsters". *European Journal of Science and Theology* 10(3): 1–14.

—. 2017. *Melodic Structure in Persian Music.* Tehran: Nashr-e Markaz.

Siamdoust, Nahid. 2017. *Soundtrack ofthe Revolution.* Stanford: Stanford University Press.

### **"What Moves the World, Moves My Ass as Well": Mimi Mercedez as an Anti-heroine of Postsocialist Serbia**

*Adriana Sabo (Postgraduate School ZRC SAZU, Ljubljana)*

Abstract: *Milena Janković,better knownasMimiMercedez,isa Serbian rapper,whoachieved great popularity during the past decade. Working in the domain of trap/hip hop music, and adapting various key features of the genre – keeping it real, promoting a "badass" attitude, dealing with issues of street life, sex, crime, violence, drugs – she constructs Mimi Mercedez as figure of an empowered, strong, "say-it-like-it-is" woman. This chapter focuses on how such an empowered femininity is performed within the context of contemporary Serbia's music market, and how it intersects with various positionsthat resonate withthe idea of leadership. Namely, in her interviews and public appearances, as well as her music, she emphasizes her role as the "leader of her generation", someone teenagers and young adults (should) look up to, and has, particularly in the past two years, been active in "educating" her fans about various social issues, attitudes they should adopt, very often sharing her life views and attempting to help people "find their way through life". She adopts/adapts the roles of a "hero" and/or "anti-hero", "idol", a representative of both good and bad aspects of contemporary Serbian youth etc., and in doing so, continuously de/re/constructsthetrope of female empowerment, which currently dominates the music industry.*

Keywords: *Mimi Mercedez, trap, leadership, empowerment, postsocialism.*

My goal in this chapter is to analyze the ways in which the notion of female leadership is (re/de)constructed and intertwined with various other strategies of the contemporary music industry in Serbia, focusing on certain aspects of the music and public persona of a famous hip hop/trap artist, Mimi Mercedez. I place emphasis on the notion of female empowerment, as a token of feminism which became omnipresent in the popular culture and media over the past three decades. Seeing how the construction of a figure of an empowered woman is today a commonplace within the music industry, my goal is to understand how such a persona is imagined through different leadership roles in the case of Mimi Mercedez and within the context of postsocialist Serbian music market. Given that she works predominantly within the genre of trap/hip hop, Mimi Mercedez readily uses different tropes of the global hip hop culture, attempting to voice the experience of women working in a predominantly male genre, as well as women living in "disaster capitalism" (Atanasoski and McElroy 2018: 273)1 that flourishes in ex-Yugoslav and Eastern European countries.The work of this particular trap artist was chosen primarily because she has been drawing the attention of the public for the past decade as the "controversial (female) rapper" who doesn't shy away from discussing,in songs as well as public appearances, gender roles, sex, female sexuality, politics, etc., and who built her reputation as someone to whom younger generations look up to. As a woman who speaks her mind and does her own thing, Mimi Mercedez openly insists on the fact that she should be something of a role model for young people of the region. My goal is to analyze different strategies that she employsin the process of constructing herself as such a role model and to understand how she constructed her persona to be an (anti)heroine of contemporary society. In the case of Mimi Mercedez, I speak about leadership in a variety of ways, given that her public persona is constructed through tropes of being the best among rappers (mostly through dissing other rappers in her songs), an idol who can teach younger generations how to think for themselves and be strong, and even a kind of life coach, filming videos about her chosen lifestyle. With that in mind, my focus in this chapter is on her constructions of the figure of an antiheroine of our time, which in a way underpins, or rounds up her various leadership agendas.

### **Mimi Mercedez**

"That artistic 'last name' sounds to me like an extravagant Black or Latin female name and also […] the porn star Nina Mercedez is my 'mother' and because the German quality is the Serbian mentality" (Svet&Scandal 2015). This is how Milena Janković (1992),2 one of the prominent hip hop artists from Serbia, described the choice of her stage name, mapping some of the most important features of her music and work: the relationship

1 The quoted authors use the term to refer to truly disastrous consequences that the introduction of capitalism into socialist systems had on the countries' economies, as well as on lives of ordinary people, some of which I analyze in this chapter. Disaster capitalism is used to refer to various contradictions of the Euro-American liberalism, as well as to denote a situation specific for postsocialist countries, in which the disastrous features of capitalism are clearly revealed through the process of transition away from socialism (Atanasoski and McElroy 2018: 273). In addition, Naomi Klein uses the expression as well, when writing about "orchestrated raids on the public sphere in the wake of catastrophic events, combined with the treatment of disasters as exciting market opportunities". (Klein 2007: 4). In other words, I employ the term to denote capitalism's tendency to make a profit out of everything, which has become something of a motto of corporations and political elites in postsocialist countries over the last three decades.

2 According to another interview, she chose this nickname because a Mercedes hit her when she was a little girl, which is an information that could easily be made up. The Mercedes nevertheless has an important symbolic place, as it references the love for the German car brands among Serbian citizens and especially the members of the large Balkan diaspora in Germany and Austria, among whom the Mercedes is considered something of a status symbol, a token of success and wealth. In the early stages of her career, she used other aliases as well, like Guda iz Huda (a free translation to English could be Pig from the hood), Sestra Drugarica (sister-female friend), Kabasti Koblenc and Jovanka Oroz (a wordplay alluding to Jovanka Broz, wife of the Yugoslav president Josip Broz Tito, and the Serbian word for a trigger on a gun). In a Facebook status from 2015, she mentioned that the other aliases help her "artificially boost Serbia's quota of female rappers".

with the music of the people of color in the US via hip hop, exploration of women's sexuality and life experiences in her texts and music videos and wish be the voice of the young generations living in postsocialist Serbia.

She belongs to the younger generation of rappers who primarily perform trap music and whose popularity and influence substantially grew during the last decade.One of the main features of the work of these trappers is the wish to differentiate themselves from older generations of rappers, who saw the genre mainly as an alternative to the dominant culture. Over the course of around forty years, local hip hop scenes developed through multiple processes of renegotiation of elements of global hip hop culture, with their most important feature being the belonging to the underground music scene. Artists mostly performed reality rap (Nenić 2006: 160), speaking about various social issues and the reality of living in postsocialist Serbia, adapting/adopting signifiers of hip hop like rapping about the ghetto (Ajduk and Pišev 2018; Nenić 2006; Šentevska 2017), sampling various signifiers of the local culture (Cvetanović 2019; Nenić 2019) and so on. Such a scene was changed with the generation of rappers following role-models such as Ivan Ivanović Đus (Juice),3 a rapper who was among the first ones to promote the idea that hip hop should be mainstream and a means for obtaining wealth and luxury.4 Of course, despite the immense popularity of trap in the Balkans, there are still musicians, as well as local music scenes, that nurture the underground character of hip hop.

Within such a context, Mimi carefully built a reputation for being fond of controversies and drawing attention with videos or lyrics often labeled as explicit, which is very important for my analysis, as it is the result of her well-thought-out play with expectations and labels, and a careful navigation through the various matrixes of the music industry. In an interview from 2020, Milena Janković explained who is Mimi: "she is a personality that was created in relation to my life and the lives of people who surround me. Everything [about her] is overstated, and only those things that are supposed to represent something are pulled out".5

In the last few years (roughly speaking, since her last album, issued in 2019), the fans of Mimi Mercedez have witnessed a kind of maturing or growing up of Mimi Mercedez, which is a change that she herself often emphasizes (differentiating between the old and new Mimi), as most of her public appearances and interviews from the past couple of years have been a kind of reflection on the past, as well as an explanation of the changes she went through.6 The trapper started her career around 2010 in Belgrade, as a member

3 Đus began his hip hop career during the 1990s and is mainly famous for his inclination towards mixing genres of hip hop, dance and pop-folk in his songs. He was among the first rappers whose music obtained great commercial success and who began affirming the subjects and attitude that was adopted later by Bombs of the nineties and other (t)rappers – emphasizing the love of money and luxury, rapping about getting easy money quickly, often producing controversies etc.

4 One possible outlook on this development is offered in Musić and Vukčević 2017.

5 Netkulturno 2020. "Mimi Mercedez: Folk i Rep su Muzika Naroda!" https://www.youtube.com/w atch?v=mTOvO3QQQFY (accessed 9 June 2022).

6 See, for example: Nešto Drugačije 2020: "Nešto Drugačije 111: Mimi Mercedez" https://www.yout ube.com/watch?v=8pHAtFhySZA (accessed 15 February 2022) and Realna Priča 2021: "Mimi Mercedez: Iza Mog Garda se Kriju Ekstremne Emocije!" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqExRN5 OnkM&t=2s (accessed 15 February 2022).

of the hip hop group Bombs of the nineties (Bombe devedesetih), who have been strongly influenced by the work and attitude of Đus.7 So far, she published four albums: *The Only Thing I Know* (*Jedino Što Znam*, Universal Music Group, 2013), *I Put on Makeup and Wreak Chaos*(*Našminkam Se i Pravim Haos*, Bombe Devedesetih, 2015),*Godmother* (*Kuma*, Universal Music Group, 2018), *Hatred* (*Mržnja*, Geto Gerila, 2019). Additionally, her discography is rich with compilations, EPs, singles and collaborations with other prominent rappers, like Juice, as well as stars of the locally immensely popular pop folk music, like Mile Kitić or Stoja.

A number of Mimi's songs were realized in collaboration with Zartical (Žarko Krstić) and JanZoo (Jan Magdevski), in charge of production, mixing, etc., while most of her latest songs and albums/EPs were published through her own label, *Ghetto Guerilla* (Geto Gerila).With the exception of the latest singles, which introduce various Latin, reggaeton and dance beats as well as various collaborations with local stars of pop/pop folk music, Mimi's songs mainly stay in the domain of trap, with her latest album (*Hatred*) often defined as belonging to "hard" rap (Dašić 2020), with elements of gangsta rap. The matrix for most of Mimi's songs is comprised of different layers of repeating samples – a low bass, a few melodic samples, the unavoidable high-hat, the trademark of trap music – and envisioned so that the vocals are always dominant. Performing songs that musically pertain to what could be labeled as "classic" trap/hip hop, especially in the early stages of her career, was most likely meant as a strategy employed so that she could establish herself as an equal within the local trap/hip hop scene, as a woman who could rap equally well as any man.

In addition, as is the case with other members of the Bomb of the Nineties group, Mimi uses various elements and signifiers of pop-folk in order to "mark" her belonging to a particular generation of rappers, and to provoke reactions from the public by making positive references to a decade that is considered "dark" by many citizens of Serbia. The elements of the genre are also used byMimiMercedez, as well as other rappers, as a signal of their wishes to move hip hop into the mainstream music scene, and be seen as making music "for the people", for wide audiences, the working class, people in rural areas, etc.

As one of the few women in Serbian hip hop/trap,8 she chose to emphasize her difference in the music scene, not wanting to hide her gender, but rather stressing that being a woman is what makes her unique and better than others. Despite the fact that certain subjects,like sex, sex work, gender roles, crime, drugs, guns,love of luxury, etc., persistin her music since she began appearing publicly,it is noticeable that her strategy for achieving popularity, which initially relied on shocking the audiences, was somewhat toned

7 Their relationship with Đus is explored in more detail, for example, by Dragan Đorđević (Ђорђевић 2019: 198–223). The members of the group also openly discuss the impact Đus had on their music and aesthetics, for instance, in an interview for the web portal Before After (Beforeafter 2015).

8 During the past two decades, there were only a handful of women who managed to build careers within this scene. Sajsi MC (Ivana Rašić) has been active since the early 2000s; in the period 2003–2006, an all-female rap group called Bitcharke na travi (Bitches on Grass) was active, although never as popular as Sajsi MC or Mimi Mercedez; in recent years, with the commercialization of the trap scene, more and more women are gaining popularity – like Milica Miladinović, Indodjija, Zoi, etc.

down as time went by.9 Most of the examples I chose to present in this paper are from the earlier stages of her career, given that this is the period in which most of the trademarks of her music were formulated and that the basic premise behind them was never abandoned. During 2019 and 2020, she created a number of YouTube videos in which she explained her earlier songs and the agenda behind them,10 videos in which she answers her fans' questions by talking about a wide variety of topics (spanning from issues of dating, sex, self-esteem and discrimination, to marriage and family, to 5G network). Then, mostly during the Covid lockdown, she hosted a number of live Instagram videos consisting of tips on how to change your lifestyle, and get yourself on a daily schedule, which books to read, makeup tutorials, how to deal with overeating (with cooking tips),11 and so on. In other words, she focused more on developing her position as a kind of role model for her fans, wanting to empower them to grow, change and do better.

Since the very beginning of her career, Mimi Mercedez stressed that she wanted to make people think with her lyrics, because rap can enable a person to grow and learn: "I always said that everyone should work in rap", she stated in an interview from 2018, "because this is a great way for people to concretely define themselves as persons, get to know themselves better, and love themselves through what rap represents" (Vijesti 2018). She also didn't shy away from openly saying that girls should be more like her. In the song 'Porno', for example, she coined the line that was then often quoted on the internet and in the media: "Chicks, copy me, and the world will be a better place" ("Ribe kopirajte me, i svet će biti bolje mesto"). Picking up on such an attitude, the online portal Mondo filmed a video with the trapper, titled *Mimi Mercedez's school for girls: Pay for your own drinks* (*Škola za devojke Mimi Mercedez: Plaćajte svoje piće*, Mondo 2016), in which she gives tips to girls about how to act around boys, how to be independent and suggests that girls should adopt her strong attitude towards important life issues. When she was, on a different occasion, asked if she thought that she is a good role model for younger women (which is something "many say"), she replied:

Of course. I wish I had such a role model when I was a kid. Even though many will say that I'm ruining the youth, I represent the strata of girls who are more ready to boldly step out and show their true colors. They are not burdened by moral barriers and the judgement of others, they just do their own thing. On the other hand, a

10 The videos are a part of the "Auto portrait" series.

9 One example of the mentioned change is visible in her approach towards women's subjects. Earlier songs on the subject, like 'Cleopatra' ('Kleopatra'), 'True Lady' ('Prava dama'), 'Tips' ('Bakšiš') from the first album, or 'Money, Money, Money' ('Parice, parice, pare') from the *Godmother* album, speak about female pleasure, sex, striptease, using crude language, a lot of swear words, with accompanying videos showing close-ups of women's breasts and bottoms, strippers and various forms of nudity. A more recent song that deals with the matter, 'Evil Chick' ('Zla riba', 2020) is directed at women's experiences in relationships and women learning to say no, choosing themselves over a man. The video is much more "polished", with no explicit nudity, or open attempts at similar provocations. In other words, topics persist, her music remains in the domain of trap/hip hop, with the same producers creating the matrixes, but the need to provoke and offend her audience, as well as the general public is much less explicit.

11 All videos are available on her Instagram profile: https://www.instagram.com/mimimercedez/ch annel/?hl=en

girl who listens to my music relates to my songs with good reason, I don't impose my lifestyle on anyone. (Svet&Skandal 2015)

Throughout her career, thus, Milena Janković carefully constructed the figure of Mimi Mercedez to perform a kind of "power femininity" (Lazar 2006)12 which she carefully constructs in order to emphasize her personal strengths as a successful, creative and emancipated woman, but also because she aims to help others achieve the same. I further elaborate this aspect of the trapper's career – which can be viewed through the prism of leadership – in the coming sections, but before diving deeper into that aspect, I briefly address the notion of empowerment in the context of capitalism, given that it is important for understanding how the figure of a leader (or idol, a hero, etc.) is constructed and renegotiated in the specific case of Mimi Mercedez.

### **Empowerment**

Since the 1990s, within the popular culture and the media, empowerment became one of the main frameworks within which femininities are imagined and constructed. It has, at that time, taken on numerous faces – as a trait that adorns contemporary women, or a goal that we should strive to as a feminist ideal par excellence, or a kind of proxy for feminism (as many women will acknowledge their power, but will refuse to be labeled as feminists), a legacy left to younger generations of women, or a political strategy that focuses on women as well as nations "to be empowered" (Dosekun 2015; McLaughlin 2016; Sardenberg 2008). Wanting to paint a picture of how important empowerment is, Rosalind Gill(2008: 36) quoted an article publishedin 2003 by the satirical program*TheOnion*, titled "Women Now Empowered by Everything a Woman Does" (The Onion 2003). In an attempt to emphasize how much the entertainment and advertising industries, as well as public discourses, rely on the notion of empowerment, the authors at *The Onion* decided to publish the findings of an imaginary study, which found that "women – once empowered primarily via the assertion of reproductive rights or workplace equality with men – are now empowered by virtually everything the typical woman does". (The Onion 2003). Such a state of affairs also prompted Jennifer Keishin Armstrong13 to (not satirically) note that feminism (and its different tokens, like empowerment), has become something of a "job requirement for female pop stars" (Billboard 2017). In other words, we could say that "empowerment" – as a word, token of feminism, hashtag, political stance, etc. – means many different things to many different subjects, and as such, it can, but does not need

12 The term is borrowed from Michelle Lazar who defines it "in terms of women's exercise of selfdetermination and agency, which constitute an important goal for feminists and postfeminists alike, albeit envisaged differently. Whereas for feminists, women's ability to take charge and act upon life choices is construed as a collective struggle, for postfeminists this is conceived more in individualistic terms". (Lazar 2008: 510). It is used here to refer to various ways in which women's strength is (re)presented, but also to shed light on the fact that it is mainly equated with individual power and success and should be understood as being an important aspect of how femininities are constructed within the music market.

13 https://jenniferkarmstrong.com/ (accessed 15 February 2022).

to be, related to any particular feminist movement in any particular time or geographical area. It has become a central term of various neoliberal agendas and as such, it circulates in the pop cultural and media space of postsocialist Serbia as well.

A body of articles and publications produced in the domain of media and popular studies over the past three decades looks precisely at how, and with what consequences, has empowerment (understood primarily as a signifier of the feminist movement in liberal contexts) been employed and renegotiated/reconstructed in advertising, television shows, movies, magazines and other artifacts of popular and media cultures.14 Several authors (see fn. 11) mainly agree that constructions and representations of empowered femininity have an important place within the current market economy and that they are employed in a plethora of ways in order to produce, promote and offer various products for consumption to women across the globe.  Tisha Dejmanee noted that we are witnessing a "reduction of post feminism to empowerment *as an empty signifier* applicable to whatever issue, product or behaviors need to be sold to women, as dictated by social, cultural and economic conditions" (Dejmanee 2016: 120; emphasis by the author). By placing empowerment in the center of the processes of construction of femininities today, as well as seeing it as a kind of proxy for achievements of the second-wave feminist movement in the liberalWest, the author also drew attention to the definition of empowerment through highly individualistic terms. And, given the fact that empowerment has been saturated with numerous meanings during the past fifty years, especially in relation to the fight for women's liberation, any of these meanings can be called upon, re-envisioned, renegotiated or removed, depending on the context and the goal towards which it is employed.

The empowered figure that Mimi Mercedez constructs is primarily based on her individual qualities and strengths, emphasizing the importance of having an *attitude* rather than an opinion. As she proclaims in one of her more "explicit" songs 'Cleopatra', she is like the Egyptian queen, "half woman, half fire", who "manipulates her pussy" in order to "tighten her power" ("da učvrstim moć, manipulišem pičkom"). Most of her lyrics are written in the first person and she rarely misses an opportunity to express her uniqueness and an uncompromising attitude, which she usually describes using the slang word

14 Kasey Windels and the group of authors (Windels et al. 2019) have, for example, explored different instances of "femvertizing" (female empowerment advertising), which gained momentum as "marketers have recognized that femvertising sells, as it improves a brand's reputation and promotes a positive message for women" (Windels et al. 2019: 1). Michelle Lazar explores different aspects of what she calls "power femininity" (Lazar 2006), while other authors focus on magazines (Majstorović 2016), films and television shows (Dejmanee 2016; McRobbie 2009), reality TV programs (Harvey and Gill 2011), etc.