Non-Western Music Theory — Raga, Maqam, and the Lü

“Music Theory” Is Not “Western Harmony”

The fact ethnomusicology posed in the previous article — Western music theory is not universal but one local system. As we saw in Article 1, China and India had independent theories from antiquity. And while the West headed toward “harmony, function, all keys, equal temperament,” many non-Western cultures refined the order of sound in an entirely different direction — melodic type, microtones, improvisation, timbre.

This article surveys the world’s major theoretical systems and sees that “there is not one way to grasp the order of sound.”

India — Raga and Shruti

The theory of Indian classical music (Hindustani in the north, Carnatic in the south) is extremely refined:

• shruti — dividing the octave into 22 microtones (finer than the West’s 12 semitones). There are intermediate tones “between the notes” that the West lacks
• raga — not a mere scale, but a type of melody / rules of behavior. The notes used ascending and descending differ, and emphasized notes, ornamentation patterns, mood (rasa), and even the time of day and season to perform it are prescribed
• tala — a theory of refined rhythmic cycles (cycles of complex meter)

Whereas the West developed the “vertical (harmony),” India refined the horizontal (melody and improvisation) and microtones to the limit. Harmony (the simultaneous progression of multiple notes) barely developed; instead, a single melody unfolds endlessly over a drone (a sustained tone).

Arab / Middle East — Maqam

At the center of Arab, Turkish, and Persian music theory is the maqam:

• a tuning including quarter tones — the octave is divided (depending on the system) into 24. There are intervals the West’s equal temperament lacks, such as the “three-quarter tone”
• the maqam, like the raga, is a modal melodic type + rules of improvisation
• medieval Arab theorists (al-Farabi, Safi al-Din) inherited and developed Greek theory and left precise treatises on tuning (another line of inheritance of the Greek theory the West received via Boethius)

China — Twelve Lü and the Pentatonic Scale

Chinese theory (continuing from Article 1):

• the sanfen-sunyi method derives the twelve lü (12 reference tones) — the principle is essentially the same as Pythagorean tuning (taking 2/3 and 4/3 of a string)
• the pentatonic scale (gong, shang, jue, zhi, yu) — five notes are basic
• tuning was tied to astronomy, the calendar, weights and measures, and politics (the thought that “correct pitch = correct governance”). The reference tone (huangzhong) was revised with each dynastic change

That music theory was one with cosmology and statecraft is a distinctive feature different from the West (a branch of mathematics) as well.

Japan — Ritsu-Ryo and Scales

The theory of Japanese traditional music:

• ritsu and ryo — the tonal organization of gagaku, transmitted from China
• the miyakobushi scale and the min’yo (folk) scale — uniquely Japanese five-note scales. Miyakobushi contains semitones and produces a “Japanese” mood (the basis of enka and shoka)
• the aesthetic of “ma (間)” — valuing the silence and reverberation between notes over the notes themselves

Indonesia — the Non-Equal Tuning of Gamelan

The tuning of Javanese and Balinese gamelan (an ensemble of bronze percussion) overturns Western common sense:

• the two great tonal systems slendro (5 notes) and pelog (7 notes)
• the octave is not divided evenly — each instrument set (gamelan) is tuned slightly differently, and there is no “absolutely correct pitch”
• there is no universal standard like the West’s standard pitch (A=440); each ensemble has its own sonority

The idea that “tuning is not universal but the individuality of an instrument group” is the opposite of the West’s equal temperament (all equivalent). It is well known that Western composers like Debussy encountered gamelan at world’s fairs and were shocked.

West vs. Non-West — Contrast in Directions of Development

Culture	Tuning	Axis developed
West	12 equal (all keys equivalent)	harmony, function, modulation (vertical)
India	22 shruti (microtones)	melodic type, improvisation, rhythmic cycle (horizontal)
Arab	24 divisions (quarter tones)	modal improvisation, microtones
China	twelve lü, pentatonic	union with cosmology and statecraft
Indonesia	non-equal (per instrument)	timbre, the sonority intrinsic to an ensemble

That Western theory poured all its energy into “layering and progressing multiple notes vertically (harmony)” is, seen globally, rather exceptional. Many cultures refined “how richly to sing and improvise a single melody,” “the nuance of microtones,” and “timbre and reverberation.” There is no single correct answer to “music theory.”

From This Article to the Next

We have surveyed non-Western theory and seen the diversity of ways to grasp the order of sound. The final article returns to the present — the practical theory of jazz and popular music. The chord-scale theory of the Berklee method, stock progressions, Neo-Riemannian theory. Apart from academic theory, we approach how the “usable theory” that supports the performance and improvisation of the field grew in the 20th-21st centuries, and bring this series to a close.