The Music of Googosh: A song analyzed

The music seems uses Aerophones, Membraneophones, Chordophones, and possibly Idiophones. The Aerophones sound fairly western in origin, although with the similar backgrounds of many Western and Middle Eastern Aerophones, these may well be Eastern instruments. These “flutes”, as I will call them, are played mainly during cadences of the singing. The chordophones contain the harmony which accompanies the main melody of Googoosh. Instruments that sound like a violin provide that harmony which also occasionally includes a zither, perhaps the Qanun. There are a variety of Membraneophones and Idiophones, which sound very Eastern in origin, providing a constant beat throughout the song and the occasional ornament, such as a shimmer, to add to the character of the song. The rhythm is a constant pulsatile beat throughout the song. The timing is simple duple meter.

The verses begin each time with a full cadence of the music and are homophonic through most of the song; however, during some of the musical cadences between verses the music takes on a polyphonic nature. The range of the music is not very large and has conjunct motion.

The music video itself seems very western, the hair and makeup are very much Western styles. The set was meant to look Eastern, along with the clothes Googoosh is wearing. The time seems to be during the 80’s but it is hard to pin down, and the video seems as if it were made so that it would be marketable in the west, although it may well have been meant for an Iranian audience, although the lack of head covering would suggest otherwise.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8-duSlrJYY