Multipart singing tradition: Albanian Iso-polyphony

This study aims to present, within a holistic framework, the structural components, performance practices, and cultural–social dynamics of Albania's unique multipart singing tradition, iso-polyphony. The central research question concerns which musical elements, which performative–social relationships, and which cultural values shape iso-polyphony, and how these components jointly generate its musical functioning. Within this scope, the study first discusses what multipart singing traditions are, the paradigm they offer in terms of musical creation and performance practices, and their examples across world musics; it then examines the analytical steps required to derive a structural template of iso-polyphony. During the research process, the realization that Eurocentric analytical approaches remain limited in explaining the unique structure of this tradition made it necessary to conduct the analysis from a different perspective. Moreover, the insufficiency of structural analysis alone to fully comprehend the tradition directed the study toward the cultural background of performance, individual and collective memory, processes of meaning and value attribution, creativity, and the dynamics present at the moment of performance. The research employs a qualitative method that combines conceptual analysis, musicological examination, and thematic evaluation of field data. Within the fieldwork focused on the Lab style, interviews were conducted with Roland Çenko, Shkëlqim Guçe, Golik Jaupi, Myrdar Jera, and Engjëll Serjani in the regions of Gjirokastër, Tepelenë, and Memaliaj; the collected data were analyzed along performative, structural, and cultural axes. The findings indicate that the Lab style can be reduced to a fundamental musical template and that the variations in sub-regions appear as different interpretations of this template. Iso-polyphony is a dual phenomenon—both a process of transmission and a transmitted cultural–musical heritage; it functions as a way of life, a domain of prestige, and an essential medium of intergenerational identity construction. The learning process largely relies on familial habitual memory, with oral and experiential transmission taking precedence over written notation. Text and space are the primary elements determining the direction of performance. The functional distribution of roles directly corresponds to the "coordinated participation in the performing act by sharing knowledge and shaping values" model observed in multipart singing traditions. It was observed that competition varies according to context and that each performer and group possesses a distinctive sonic signature. The listener is not in a passive position but acts as an active determinant in the continuation of the tradition. In conclusion, this thesis is significant in that it provides cultural and structural data enabling comparison with similar multipart singing traditions worldwide, lays the groundwork for developing new methodological approaches to the analysis of traditional musics, and serves as a qualified source that may be consulted in the face of cultural homogenization trend.