Music and Time Annotation << Back The Melodies of Wedding-Guest Tunes of Nagaibaks: on Some Features and the Genesis of Tunes’ Vocabulary of Folksongs Е.M. Smirnova The article is devoted to consideration of pitch and modal parameter organization of wedding and guest tunes of Nagaibaks – groups of Tatars Kryashens belonged to Cossack estate, formed within the community of sub-confessional community of baptized Tatars South Ural region. Consideration of tunes from the standpoint of pitch, modal and melody organization allows to determine the features and components of the genesis of musical folklore of the South Ural Kryashens. The tunes that are in pentatonic modes exhibit traces of genetic relationship Nagaibaks song tradition with the song tradition of Kryashens of Volga-Kama region, thereby identifying its Tatar «roots». Similarity of wedding-guest tunes of Nagaibaks and of Prekamsky’s Kryashens gives the possibility to draw a conclusion on their relatively early stadial accessories: Nagaibaks wedding-guest songs belong to a cultural layer, formed at the time of residence in the territory nearby to Kazan. The basic features of Nagaibaks wedding and guest tunes are maintained despite of various cultural contacts of Nagaibak people after their migration. Melodic content of Nagaibaks wedding-guest tunes that are using the scales with semitones differs from the pentatonic melodies described above. The melodies of so-called «semitonic» group show the resemblance with Nagaibaks lyric songs and have been linked with the culture of the Orenburg Cossacks. Thus, in the culture of the South Urals Kryashens semitone wedding-guest tunes had been emerged later than the tunes that are in pentatonic modes. The coexistence of tunes of both types within the wedding ceremony demonstrates the different phases of the development of Nagaibaks folksong tradition. Keywords: Tatar folklore, folk song, Nagaybaks, modal organization, melodic organization. Contacts: E-mail: seak@yandex.ru Pp. 18-26.