Tawsheehs in religional Turkish music

Tawsheehs, quite abundant musical types in religious Turkish music, are musical works whose lyrics mention Muhammad (PBUH), according to traditional descriptions are composed by greater rhythmic patterns to be performed before each part of Mawlid and Mirajiyyah by a chorus and have specific composition and execution styles. Being a sub-genre of hymns, tawsheehs have different definitions among different sources. Since there is not a comprehensive study that deals with tawsheehs in detail, in this Master's thesis, it is aimed to analyze tawsheehs, to reveal their characteristics and to present a new definition of them by taking their distinctive properties into account. The importance of art and music in religion; the effects of religious customs, rituals and traditions on origins and advancements of different religious musical genres are all discussed in this study. 255 tawsheeh works have been analyzed structurally and they have been studied with respect to type and content of lyrics so that the close relationship between tawsheeh and aruz meter has been examined and furthermore; their properties such as makam, rhythmic patterns, tempo and execution have been handled. The connection between tawsheehs and Mawlid and Mirajiyyah has been evaluated and some information about these two genres were also given. The contextual characteristics of tawsheehs have been evaluated thereby it is argued whether the habits of listeners and the function of this particular genre have an vii effect on the genre itself. In light of the data obtained, a new description of the tawsheeh genre has been made. The notes, the lyrics and the meters of each 255 tawsheehs which are present in the analyzed repertory are also given in the study. Keywords: Tawsheeh, Mawlid, Mirajiyyah