Beyond the Azhan: Abu Dhabi’s Cacophonous Soundscape

Diana Chester

In Abu Dhabi, a city where the adhan, (The Islamic Call to Prayer), is recited five times daily, mapping the cacophony of its sounds can provide insight into its built environment and the lived experiences of the people in it. By considering the urban ambiance of the city through the acoustical mappings of both the uniform and pre- recorded natures of the adhan in Abu Dhabi City, I will offer a perspective of how live recordings can participate in a discourse on the aesthetic and temporal landscape of the city. What is it about the process of recording what we hear that allows the sonic content of the recording to become live, and does this impact our understanding of place? What do recordings reveal about urban spaces, and how do we “listen back” to them?

Introduction

Sound Mapping

The History of the Azhan

Sound of Space and Place

References

Al Nowais, Shireena (2018). “Talented Emirati Muezzins Sought to Lead the Call to Prayer.” The National, July 19.

DeMarinis, Paul (2011). “On Sonic Spaces.” In Caleb Kelly (ed.), Sound: Documents of Contemporary Art (pp. 73-75). Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

Eisenberg, Andrew (2013). “Islam, Sound and Space: Acoustemology and Muslim Citizenship on the Kenyan Coast.” In Georgina Born (ed.), Music, Sound and Space: Transformations of Public and Private Experience (pp. 186-202). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

General Authority of Islamic Affairs & Endowments (2012). “Manar Al Islam.” April Issue (p. 9).

Kahn, Douglas (2003). “The Sound of Music.” In Michael Bull and Les Back (eds.), The Auditory Culture Reader (pp. 77-90). Oxford: Berg.

Lee, Tong Soon (1999). “Technology and the Production of Islamic Space: The Call to Prayer in Singapore.” Ethnomusicology 43/1: 86–100.

Rasmussen, Anne K. (2010). "Learning Recitation: The Institutionalization of the Recited Qur’an." In Women, the Recited Qur’an, and Islamic Music in Indonesia (pp. 74-124). University of California Press.

Saeed, Saeed (2011). “Capital Muezzins: The Faces of Abu Dhabi’s Most Familiar Voices.” The National, August 1.

Sells, M. A. (2007). Approaching the Qur’an: The Early Revelations. Ashland, OR: White Cloud Press.

Thibaud, Jean-Paul (2011). “A Sonic Paradigm of Urban Ambiances.” Journal of Sonic Studies 1

Touma, Habib Hassan (1971). “The Maqam Phenomenon: An Improvisation Technique in the Music of the Middle East.” Ethnomusicology 15/1: 38–48. https://doi.org/10.2307/850386.

Recording the Azhan

Listening Back to the Recordings

Conclusion

References

Tip

Tip