Dance Is Music Made Visible: What Authentic Musicality Really Means With Maya Youssef
- Fanoos Magazine Oriana
- Aug 10
- 6 min read
Updated: Aug 13
Dance Is Music Made Visible: What Authentic Musicality Really Means
I want to take you back to my childhood in Syria where I grew up watching black and white movies with dancers of the golden age. My absolute favorites were Tahiyya Karyoka and Suhair Zaki. I never danced, myself (except for weddings and in my kitchen) but I have played music since I was 8 year old. 37 years later of music making on the world top stages and after the creation of the Maqam Building block ™ method which helped over ten thousand students from all over the world who finally could access tarab maqam and taqsim without theory, I am here to share an important message to the dance community.
My raw and real take on what is maqam and what it is for dancers
What made you dance in the first place? Every dancer will say unanimously ‘ the music’
Having thousands of dancers lurking behind the scenes in my musicians workshops hoping to have some clarity amidst the sea of vagueness I will say this with love as a fierce custodian of the tradition;
The way Arabic music has been taught is deeply broken..
Why? Because dancers were locked out of the very source of Arabic music ; Maqam
Yet somehow dancers are told ‘maqam is for musicians’ and for dancers to just work on technique, rhythm and lyrics…
They are told ‘just listen and feel it’ without being given any guidance what to listen for.
On top, the information given to the dance community is a combination of inaccurate, complicated to death, with an abundance of unnecessary details that makes dancers feel like maqam is a ‘secret club’ they are not welcome inside.
When I say that Maqam is the source of everything … I literally mean it.
Every song and melody you have ever dance to is made of maqam
Every moment of tarab is created from maqam
Every taqsim is made from maqam
Every shift in emotion is caused from a maqam shift
Maqam isn't some abstract theory sitting outside your dance.
It is the very thing animating it.
Dancers weren't struggling because maqam is inherently difficult.
They were struggling because nobody had shown them what to listen for.
How to hear the melody.
How to recognise its emotional landscape.
How to understand its signposts.
And how to let that understanding transform the way they move.
Because something remarkable happens when dancers are empowered with real maqam knowledge Even if you are a source dancer or if you have been dancing to Arabic music for decades…
You stop guessing.
The melody suddenly becomes clearer.
Taqsim becomes far less intimidating.
You begin to recognise the musical signposts in a taqsim that were always there.
Your confidence grows.
Your relationship with the music deepens.
And your audience may never know why...
But they will feel the difference.
Because authentic musicality isn't about adding more movement.
It's about allowing your movement to emerge from a genuine relationship with the music itself.
When people SEE the music in your dance… And thats when you will have the respect from your musicians, thats when you hear things like ‘ you have an Arab soul’ and thats when they will be moved to the bones..
You don't need to know maqam, unless if you have 50 years to immerse yourself in the culture
Let me be clear, not knowing maqam does not make you a bad dancer.
You can feel the music intuitively and even you can move an audience.. Learning by osmosis and cultural immersion is one way of deepening your connection to the music and its perfectly cool.
However this can easily take decades.
Having taught many dancers who have been dancing for 50 - 60 years… I still hear this ‘ it is amazing to finally have the language to describe why Arabic music moves us even after dancing for decades’
If you are the kind of dancer and secret ‘music nerd’ who is hungry to finally know how the melody tarab and taqsim works, read on.
Maqam is a cultural code for states of emotion which no one talks about
Learning maqam has nothing to do with memorising names!
In fact, names do not matter!
Memorising maqam names without connecting to their meaning in the music and culture is like memorising mathematical formulas without understanding how the heck they work.
Sure, you can repeat them.
You can sound very clever.
But if it is only mental gymnastics — if you cannot hear it, feel it, or understand what it is doing in the music — then what is the point?
Maqam is not a vocabulary test.
It is not about collecting the most names or trying to memorise every obscure, archaic term you find in a dusty maqam book somewhere.
It is about listening more deeply to the meaning of the sound in the culture.
Because here is the thing I wish every dancer knows; Maqam is a cultural code of collective memory and states of emotions.
Maqam saba will create a completely different emotional state for Arab audiences as opposed to maqam rast (which I nick name ‘ Mr. Tarab machine)
Names can be useful, yes. But they are nothing but a reference to the specific state of being induced by the sound.
So if the music is saying its time to soften and you are in full party mode… you can only imagine what your audience is thinking.
Because your audience might not know a rast from a nahawand by name … but by using these specific maqamat in these specific emotional contexts over decaes… they will expect to see the music in your dance.. Even if they cant tell a nahawand from a rast .
The Truth About Taqsim: It’s Not Random
Your musician just played the most incredible taqsim… you and the audience are enraptured..
You go to the musician and ask him’ how did you do it?’ and he will say something along the lines of ‘its just pure improvisation… I was just inspired’
Your musician is not lying … he simply doesnt have the language to describe whats going on inside a taqsim
Simply because musicians (me included) learned taqasim by copying and hoping for the best.
No one shows you what to do how to do it… simply because they didnt know how.
What looks like free improvisation in Taqsim is actually far from random. Authentic Taqsim follows a map, guiding the listener through a journey. It’s not random. It’s a story with a slow opening, intense peak, and a grand finale.
As a dancer, the most important thing is knowing where you are within that journey. Without it, you risk guessing, freezing, or worse being caught off guard — like when the taqsim ends and you’re still dancing.
When you understand the flow of Taqsim, you can anticipate the arc and finish strong, right with the music. There are seven stages every Taqsim follows. Once you know them, you’ll stop worrying about when it will end and start dancing with calm confidence, in conversation with the music.
Tarab: The Secret Behind the Spine-Tingling Moments in the Music
We’ve all felt it: a melody turns, your breath catches, and suddenly the room is electric. This is Tarab — those spine-tingling emotional peaks that transport both dancer and audience.
Having been on the giving and receiving end of tarab many times throughout my 37 plus year career I will say thing, tarab is mystical.
My personal experience of tarab is like being in deep meditation where everycell of my body was filled with light and everything disappeared except for that Divine.
But what dancers do not know is that tarab is maqamatical science (and no it has nothing to do with maths ;)
Tarab in a nut shell is the result of a maqam switch.
A maqam can be light or dark by character.
And tarab is created like this Light <><> dark = tarab
These powerful moments are engineered emotional peaks that musicians create intentionally — mainly through sudden shifts in Maqam which only lasts for a few seconds.
When you understand how Tarab works, you stop waiting for magic to strike by chance. Instead, you can anticipate these moments and let your dance rise with them — amplifying the energy, and drawing your audience into the same spine-tingling experience.
Ready To Go Deeper?
If you’re ready to hear the real emotion of the music, understand the flow of Taqsim, and anticipate Tarab moments with confidence, join me for the Connect to the Music Challenge, a free 5-day journey running September 22–26. (No theory, just your ears)
About The Author
Maya Youssef, known as the BBC’s “Queen of the Qanun,” is the world’s leading Maqam & Taqsim mentor. She has guided hundreds of dancers to learn and embody maqam and taqsim through her step-by-step, zero theory, dancer-friendly approach.
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