Monājāt Yulchieva

Monâjât Yulchieva (b. 1960) is a leading performer of Uzbek classical art song. From humble origins on a cotton-growing collective farm in the Ferghana Valley of eastern Uzbekistan, Yulchieva appeared suddenly on the concert stage, and like a spark, her career was ignited. While many musical sparks fade as quickly as they appear, Yulchieva has maintained her preeminence through a sustained focus on the performance of classical songs arranged for her distinctive alto voice.

In Central Asia, men and women have traditionally moved in separate social worlds, each with its own characteristic musical genres and performance traditions. Much of the separation between men's and women's musical genres is still in place, but beginning in the 1920s, when the Soviet Union began to exert both political and cultural authority over Central Asia, women infiltrated the male world of classical music, or maqâm. In 1978, Monâjât Yulchieva enrolled in Uzbekistan's Tashkent State Conservatory with the intention of becoming an opera singer. Her talent for traditional music was discovered by a young instructor at the conservatory, Shawqât Mirzâev, who became her mentor and accompanist. Working with Mirzaev, Yulchieva learned to transpose the high-pitched nasal timbres of traditional male baritone and tenor maqâm singing to the low tessitura of her luxuriant alto voice. In doing so, she established a new and compelling performance style, and many aspiring young female singers now imitate her dark, alto tone.

Monâjât Yulchieva has resisted the trend toward lighter and faster music that shapes the repertories of most contemporary singers in Central Asia. By devoting herself exclusively to an older style of classical music, with its slow, contemplative melodies and Sufi-inspired texts, she has built a devoted following both in Uzbekistan and in the West. -- Theodore C. Levin