(b Nazareth, 12 Dec 1934; d Berlin, 10 Aug 1998). German ethnomusicologist and composer of Palestinian birth. He studied piano and theory at the Haifa Conservatory and composition at the Israel Academy of Music, Tel-Aviv, with Alexander Boscovich. In 1964 he received a scholarship from the Deutscher akademischer Ausauschdienst which brought him to Berlin, where he studied ethnomusicology at the Free University with Kurt Reinhard and obtained the doctorate with a dissertation on Arab music theory. From 1969 until its closure in 1997, Tūma worked for the Institute for Traditional Music, which published many of his short articles, reviews and interviews in its journal World of Music. He was also able to pursue private academic projects and study trips in south Turkey, Iraq and Bahrain. He initially analysed the maqām technique of improvisation, developing a theory of the non-temporal ‘tonal spatial component’ in its organization; later in life, he studied the contemporary role of the Arabic musician as well as the Moroccan nawba, to which he devoted the last ten years of his life and his final, posthumous publication. In Berlin Tūma organized the Arabien Festival Traditioneller Musik (1978) and Festival Traditioneller Musik Islam (1986); he was also concert adviser at La Maison des Cultures du Monde in Paris and made recordings of traditional music for the UNESCO collection. His compositions are fundamentally infuenced by his studies of Arab music.
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Oriental Rhapsody, 2 fl, perc, 1958; Suite arabe, pf, 1961; Sama'i, ob, pf, 1961; Study no.1, fl, 1962; Study no.2 (Combinations), fl, 1965; Reflexus I, 12 str, 1965; Taqsim, pf, 1966; Maqam for Natalie, pf, 1974; choral pieces |
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Principal publisher: Israeli Music Publications |
Der Maqām Bayātī im arabischen Taqsīm (diss., Free U. of Berlin, 1968; Hamburg, 1976; Eng trans., Tel-Aviv, 1975)
‘Maqam: a Form of Improvisation’, World of Music, xii/3 (1970), 22–31
‘Musikwissenschaft und Musiktherapie’, Musiktherapie: Berlin 1971, ed. H. Wilms (Berlin, 1971), 32–9
‘The Maqam Phenomenon, an Improvisation Technique in the Music of the Middle East’, EthM, xv/1 (1971), 38–48
‘Die Musik der Araber im 19. Jahrhundert’, Musikkulturen Asiens, Afrikas und Ozeaniens im 19. Jahrhundert, ed. R. Günther (Regensburg, 1973), 49–70 [with Eng. summary]
‘The Arabian Musician Today’, World of Music, xvi/1 (1974), 28–37
‘The Education of the Musicians and their Public in Arab Countries’, ISME Yearbook, ii (1974), 33–7
‘Die Koranrezitation: eine Form der religiösen Musik der Araber’, Baessler-Archiv xxiii/1 (1975), 87–120
Die Musik der Araber (Wilhelmshaven, 1975; Fr. trans., 1977; Eng. trans., rev. 1996)
‘The Fijīrī a Major Vocal Form of the Bahrain Pearl-Divers’, World of Music, xix/3–4 (1977), 121–33
‘Zur Volkmusik im Irak’, Neue ethnomusikologische Forschungen: Festschrift Felix Hoerburger, ed. P. Baumann, R.M. Brandl and K. Reinhard (Regensburg, 1977), 167–76
‘Was hätte Ziryāb zur heutigen Aufführungspraxis mittelalterlicher Gesänge gesagt’, Basler Jb für historische Musikpraxis, i (1977), 77–94
‘Present State and Problems in the Study and Research of Arabian Music Heritage’, World of Music, xx/1 (1978), 110–16
‘Aussereuropaïsche Heilmusik’, Grundlagen der Musiktherapie und Musikpsychologie, ed. G. Harrer (Stuttgart, 1982), 287–91
‘Indications of Arabian Musical Influence on the Iberian Peninsula from the 8th to the 13th Century’, Alfonso X El Sabio y la música: Madrid 1984 [RdMc, x (1987)], 137–50
‘The Maqām Phenomenon’, Conference of Ethnomusicology IV: Taibei 1991, 83–8, 234–8
‘Das Maximale und das Minimale in der Musik: ein Beitrag zur musikalischen Mentalität der Araber’, Festschrift für Josef Kuckertz, zur Vollendung des 60. Lebensjahres, ed. R. Schumacher (Salzburg, 1992), 545–9
‘Basics of Ratio in Arabic Music’, ‘Lux Oriente’: Robert Günther zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. K.W. Niemöller, U. Pätzold and Chung Kyo-Chul (Kassel, 1995), 59–69
‘De la présentation des musiques extra-européenne en Occident’, La musique et le monde, ed. F. Gründ (Paris, 1995), 27–35
‘La música andalusí en el Norte Africa’, Música y poesía del Sur de Al-Andalus, ed. R. Fernández Manzano and E. de Santiago Simón (Seville, 1995), 35–49
‘Music in the Arabian Epos Ebu Zaid al-Hilali’, Música Oral del Sur, i (1995), 103–7
Die Nūbah Māyah: zur Phänomenologie des Melos in der arabisch–andalusi Musik Marokkos (Hildesheim, 1998)
P. Gradenwitz: The Music of Israel (Portland, OR, 1996)
J. Dietrich: ‘Les musiques du monde en Allemagne’, Les musiques du monde en question, ed. L. Bernard, P. Gouttes and C. Khaznadar (Paris, 1999), 295–302
CHRISTIAN POCHÉ