Multiplicity of Compasses and Registers in the Range of Iranian Male Singers’ Voice

The theoretical foundations of Iranian music, due to the lack of the necessary standards, do not have a comprehensive theoretical basis in the field of the registration of musical sounds. The numerous concepts and terms in this field, based on the oral traditions of Iranian music education, often have not exceeded the level of providing qualitative descriptions of sonic ranges. Identifying and explaining concepts related to the subject of registration, and examining the vocal range of Rāstkuk, as the vocal range of Iranian male singers, are the main issues of this article. Therefore, specifying the position of the range of Rāstkuk in the musical echelon and explaining its subsets sonic range, is the main purpose of this research. This research is fundamental and qualitative and was done in a descriptive-analytical way. The data of this research is based on primary and library sources. The use of Muslim philosophers’ ideas about the separation and classification of perceived phenomena by human has formed the theoretical framework of this paper. The findings of this research show that the results of the research conducted in the field of describing and explaining the term Rāstkuk are not consistent with the realities in the performance of Iranian male singers, and this concept generally represents the gender of singers. Examining the performance tunes of some Iranian male singers, from the three time periods of the late Qājār era, Pahlavi era and the contemporary era, shows that the Rāstkuk range includes four sonic sub-ranges, which are named as the compasses of Rāstkuk-pāein (similar to Bass), Rāstkuk-vasat (similar to Baritone), Rāstkuk-bālā (similar to Tenor), and Rāstkuk-ghis (similar to Alto) in this article. Among them, compasses of Rāstkuk-vasat and Rāstkuk-bālā are used in singing performance and compass of Rāstkuk-pāein in the field of singing education. According to the findings of the article, compass of Rāstkuk-ghis has no use in the contemporary era. Each of the compasses of Rāstkuk range is divided into three separate registers: Bam (down), Miyane (middle) and Owj (up). The register of Bam with an interval of perfect fourth, the register of Miyane with an interval of perfect octave and the register of Owj with an interval of one perfect fifth constitute the maximum limit of a vocal compass from down to up. Among these cases, the register of Miyane is an important interval in the voice of Iranian male singers.