Combination of motifs of sad love and orphanhood in Crimean Tatar folk songs

The purpose of this study is to identify the unique artistic world of typical Crimean Tatar folk song examples belonging to the genre-thematic cycles of love songs and orphan songs. The authors of the article examine folk songs such as “Yuksek minareden” (“From the High Minaret”) and “Atadan oksuz qalhanman” (“Without a Father I Was Left an Orphan”). The scientific novelty of this study lies in its detailed analysis of these oral poetic works, revealing the uniqueness of their figurative and compositional system, sound organization, and other aspects of verbal and musical poetics. The study revealed that these songs are marked by a particular emotional richness and intonational versatility. They are characterized by the use of traditional symbolic images found in Eastern poetics, in particular, the red rose and blazing fire. Moreover, such vivid imagery is used extremely concisely, contrasting with the prevailing melancholic atmosphere and uniquely emphasizing it. The ornate chants, characteristic of Eastern musical poetics, are used here in a similar manner. They are relatively short (usually consisting of three or four, or at most six, notes). In the song “Without a Father I Was Left an Orphan”, this tendency is emphasized by the fact that a long, colorful chant appears only once. The folk works in question are characterized by dynamic development of their lyrical plots, also exquisite sound and rhythmic organization.