In Mashhad and Bojnurd during the late 1340s and early 1350s [late 1960s and early 1970s] patrons of tea-houses could hear daily performances by naqqals who retold stories from the Shahname and sang some of the verses. In conversation most naqqals emphasized the social value of their art, which in their view made listeners aware of the highest standards of ethical conduct. Critics of Shahname-khwani regarded it as mere entertainment for unemployed men. After the Revolution of 1979, most tea-houses were closed and naqqals lost their primary performance venue.
Two naqqals who performed in Bojnurd, each morning from 9 or 10 until noon and every afternoon from 3 to 5 or 6, used printed books in the possession of their families; one was affliated with the Khaksar order of dervishes. In Mashhad at least half a dozen naqqals performed in the late morning, early afternoon or early evening, and most belonged to either the Khaksar or the Shah Ne`matollahi order. Essential props in performances were a staff (`asa) and a manuscript or printed abridgment of the Shahname, although Ferdowsi's verses were recited from memory.
Each naqqal inserted some of Ferdowsi's verses within his prose narration of the story, which was cast either in colloquial or in more literary language. The relative proportions of sung verse and spoken prose varied from one performance to another: although some naqqals sang only a few verses, some performances consisted mainly of sung verse.
Any of us, as we read the Shahname silently, can choose to vary the rhythms of our reading, the ways in which we compare one beyt or one mesra` with another and the ways in which we form larger groups of lines. Aural experience of how this has been done by naqqals can enlarge our sense of the available options, just as it has done for countless Iranian listeners and readers in the past.
The most rudimentary tunes to which Ferdowsi's verses are sung have two segments, each accommodating the eleven syllables of one mesra` of the motaqareb meter. Choosing a tune that has only two segments and moving rapidly through a number of lines, singing each line to the same tune, can be appropriate when the events of the story move quickly, but to hear the same melody repeated for each line in a long sequence can also become tiresome. Most tunes used by naqqals have three segments, one of which is repeated, so that the whole tune accommodates two lines (four mesra`s). Some (but not necessarily all) of the pitches and rhythms in the second segment must differ from their analogues in the first segment - there are many possible juxtapositions of similarities and differences. Often one pitch in the second segment is noticeably higher, creating an accent (perhaps on the third syllable). If both segments do not end on the same pitch, the second will end lower, in order to give a sense of completion. A longer tune often brings out the flow of ideas from one verse to the next.
Some of the tunes used by naqqals in reciting the Shahname can also be heard in the zurkhane (gymnasium), which remains a popular institution in the Islamic Republic. As the athletes perform exercises on a takht-e shena, the morshed (guide) may sing some of Ferdowsi's verses, pausing after each mesra` to play rhythmic patterns on a large zarb(goblet-shaped drum). ...