Philosophical Problems of being in the Art of the Kazakh Küyshi

Extract

The question of good and evil, of man's place in the world and his relations to the superior powers always played an important role in the traditional arts of the Kazakh. The instrumental music of the Kazakh with its distinctive genre—küy—has embodied philosophical issues as fully as the verbal genres. In Kazakh culture, the connection between instrumental music and dance, movement and gesture is not important. For centuries, instrumental thinking has been formed in close connection with the narrative genres—myth, epos, historical legends, and stories about the life of the küyshy.