Esfahan, capital of Iran during the brilliant Safavid period (sixteenth through eighteenth centuries), is architecturally the most beautiful city in Iran, and the saying "Esfahan nesfeJehan ast" (Esfahan is half the world), recalls its splendor. The name Esfahan is found in lists of dastgah-ha used during the medieval period in Iran. Surprisingly, the scale is not too dissimilar from that used today. As given by the thirteenth-century theorist Safi al-Din, it is C D E^ F G A^ Β* Β" C.
The present scale of Esfahan, derived from the fourth degree of its parent dastgah, Homayun, is F G A* Bb C Dp E F, or, CDE > FGA l 'BC, a harmonic minor scale with the sixth degree raised a quarter tone. Contemporary Persian music, especially the popular and semiclassical varieties, often lises the Western minor scale for pieces written in Esfahan instead of the authentic Esfahan scale.
The daramad of Esfahan, Examples 50-53, usually contains an upward leap of a fourth to the tonic, followed by a descent. The shahed is clearly the fourth degree, but theorists disagree on which note is the ist. Vaziri and Khaleqi say it is the sixth, and two of the four examples do indeed cadence on this note. But equally often, the lower tonic, c', functions as the note of stopping.
That Esfahan is now designated as a naghmeh is a change from the radif tradition earlier in the twentieth century. In the earliest record of Mirza Abdullah's radif, that given by Hedayat, Esfahan is merely one of the thirty-odd gusheh-ha of Homayun.24 Gradually, it has become more independent, until, in current usage, it has nearly achieved the full status of a dastgah. Only its small repertory and its frequent return to the tonic of Homayun keeps it in the postion of a naghmeh.
Important gusheh-ha of Esfahan are Bayat-e Rajeh on the second scale degree, and Oshaq on the fifth. The latter gusheh is similar to the gusheh Oshaq in Dashti and Homayun. Rast tuning for Esfahan is D for tar and sehtar, C for santur and D for violin.
The Dastgah Humayun
