The koron (Persian: کرن), meaning "less than lower in pitch", is a symbol used in traditional Persian music in order to lower or "flatten" a written note by an interval smaller than a semitone (broadly corresponding to a quarter tone, or specifically a half flat). It is used to alter the pitch of a written note, similar to that of a sharp or a flat.[1] It is written as a line with an open triangular head at the top-right. The koron symbol is positioned in the same manner as other accidentals in Western music, and can even be used in key signatures (see example below).
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/31/U%2B1D1EA.svg/40px-U%2B1D1EA.svg.png)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/94/Notes_on_a_Setar%27s_white_string%2C_tuned_to_C.jpg/125px-Notes_on_a_Setar%27s_white_string%2C_tuned_to_C.jpg)
In the early 20th century, Iranian master musician Alinaghi Vaziri established the standard usage of this symbol in written music.[2] It is used[2] for notating many of the microtones found in traditional Persian music.[2] A note so altered can be labeled as the note's letter, followed by "koron" (e.g., "B koron", "D koron", etc.). Character representation of this accidental symbol together with Sori[3] (encoded as U+1D1E9 and U+1D1EA, respectively) microtones used in modern Iranian classical music were added to the Unicode standard[4] in Version 14.0.0.[5]
-
Koron in music notation
See also
edit- Persian traditional music
- Dastgah
- Quarter tone
- Koron at Wiktionary
- Sori, the 1/4 step sharp accidental
References
edit- ^ Farhat, Hormoz (2004). The Dastgah Concept in Persian Music. Cambridge University Press. p. 26. ISBN 0-521-54206-5.
- ^ a b c Pirnazar, Maryam (16 July 2013). "Reza Vali: An Iranian Composer to Watch and - of course - to Hear". payvand.com. Payvand.
For transcription of the micro-tones, I use the standard notation of the micro-tones, the Sori and the Koron, which were developed during early 20th century by the Persian master Alinaghi Vaziri.
- ^ Pournader, Roozbeh (23 April 2020). "Proposal to encode two accidentals for Iranian classical music" (PDF). unicode.org. Unicode Consortium.
- ^ "The Unicode® Standard Version 14.0 – Core Specification" (PDF). unicode.org. Unicode Consortium. September 2021.
- ^ "Musical Symbols - Range: 1D100–1D1FF" (PDF). unicode.org. Unicode Consortium. 2021.