The work of Mollanepes in the Turkmen musical art was the subject of a fundamental monograph published by Bahargul Yakubova, a researcher and teacher, Head of the Department of Music History of the Turkmen National Conservatory named after Maya Kuliyeva.
In 2012, it was published her textbook “Turkmen folk music creativity” (co-authored with J.Kurbanova), addressed to students of music universities, and the book “Heroes of Turkmenistan Maya Kulieva” is currently preparing for publication.
Bahargul Yakubova often appears on the pages of the periodical press, raising important and diverse issues of the country’s musical life, is an editor and presenter of a number of television author’s programs.
The published new book of the musicologist was the result of her serious and long-term work, fragments of which were presented in speeches at international conferences, numerous articles published in scientific publications.
It is known that the literary heritage of Mollanepes (1810-1862) an outstanding Turkmen poet and musician, an unsurpassed master of the love-lyric genre received worthy coverage in the works of philologists who laid a solid foundation for a comprehensive and objective analysis of his work.
Meanwhile, the problem of the interaction of poetic texts of Mollanepes with musical art, is extremely important for understanding the aesthetic foundations of his artistic method, almost has not attracted the researchers’ attention.
In the light of the above-mentioned, the appearance of Yakubova’s monograph the first special scientific and analytical publication on this topic is important and timely and of particular interest.
The closeness of the nature of poetic art and music was repeatedly emphasized in the distant past by prominent thinkers and musical theorists of the East Al-Farabi, Ibn Sina, Jami and others, who noticed the close connection between the intersyllabic pauses in Eastern poetry and musical rhythms.
The unifying principle is also intonation, as a specific property of musical and poetic creativity. This idea has also been developed in the works of modern scientists.
Relating to the book by Bahargul Yakubova, its object of study became the compositions created at the junction of music and poetry of Mollanepes.These are folk songs of different character and artistic content, samples of vocal lyrics by Danatar Ovezov, Veli Akhmedov, Chary Nurymov, Aman Agajikov, Rejep Allayarov, choral opuses by Nury Halmamedov, as well as a symphonic poem by Nury Mukhadov and the Opera “Zohreh and Tahir” by Velimukhamed Mukhadov and Adrian Shaposhnikov with a plot based on the parallel poet’s destan.
The monograph consists of three chapters “Scientific views of musicologists on modern musical art and classical literature”, “Mollanepes and the art of Turkmen bakhshi”, “Literary heritage of Mollanepes and Turkmen composer’s creativity” and the conclusion.
It evidently and scientifically reveals issues related to the identification of the properties of national versification, the internal musicality of poetic creations of Mollanepes, being manifested in their emotional structure and structure and impacting on genre-style, dramatic, formative and other aspects of musical compositions.
The ability of the researcher to formulate the results of her scientific observations in a reasoned and clear manner inspires respect. Being informative and comprehensive in their coverage and scope, they comprehensively and deeply reveal core of the problem.
The presence of various non-musical, primarily literary, vocabulary in the work also impresses, which does not lead to interdisciplinary dissonances and terminological confusion, but is justified, since the author conceives at the junction of related humanitarian branches here.
The materials of Bahargul Yakubova’s work will undoubtedly have a wide practical application.They can be used in the curricula of courses on the history of music and musical literature in higher and secondary specialized music educational institutions, and will be useful for those who are interested in the art of bakhshi, as well as the work of composers of Turkmenistan and music in general.