Farrokh Yadegari

Farrokh Yadegari was born in 1351 SH (1972/73) in Sarpol-e Zahab county, in Kermanshah, a province rich in artists. He is a first-class member of the Iran Music House (Khaneh-ye Musiqi). From childhood he learned from veteran masters, but his constant place was in the singing of the kalam (the sacred hymns of the Yarsan) in the jamkhanehs (the Yarsan ritual gathering houses) of Kerend, Sahneh and Kermanshah. Displacement caused by the war imposed by Iraq turned out to be a fortunate turn for him: during his high-school years he won national prizes with student ensembles. The first group he formed was the Shahed ensemble, which won first and second places nationally in 1367 and 1368 SH (1988/89 and 1989/90).

Then in 1372 SH (1993/94), together with the masters Keyvan Qalkhani, Faramarz Amirian and Houshang Amirian, he founded the Dalahu ensemble; in more than twenty-five years of activity they took part in all the national music festivals and won top national titles, plaques of appreciation and the crystal statuettes of these festivals.

Farrokh Yadegari, however, turned his aim towards teaching young Yarsan people and teenagers in the town of Sarpol-e Zahab and in the villages of Zahab and Dalahu, Posht-e Tang of Qalkhani, because it was from this area that the Yarsan and tanbur culture had spread to other regions, yet no kalam singer or tanbur player was to be found there any more, and the tanbur culture was dying out. Now, thanks to his efforts, more than a hundred pupils in the Qalkhani villages and a hundred pupils in the town of Sarpol-e Zahab are learning in classes for the sacred instrument, the tanbur, under his supervision. This worthy undertaking was carried out with the permission of the venerable sayyids of the Heydari tekyeh of Tutshami.

The largest ensemble, the Shahu maqam (traditional melodic pieces of the tanbur) players’ ensemble, made up of his pupils and led by him, within a very short time won second place nationally at the Zagros-neshinan (Zagros dwellers) festival and was also selected in the maqam music section of the Festival of Epic Melodies (Navaha-ye Hamasi). In Ordibehesht 1395 SH (April/May 2016) the Shahu tanbur maqam ensemble was selected in the veterans’ section of the ninth national Regional Music Festival in Kerman, and at the closing ceremony of the festival Farrokh Yadegari and thirty other artists were honoured as veterans. The Shahu tanbur maqam ensemble is currently the largest tanbur maqam ensemble in the country.

Source: Telegram channel “Navaye Tanbur”, 6 December 2016; written by Seyed Hekmat Hosseini.