Avar folk music is the traditional music of the Avar people of the North Caucasus (primarily in present‑day Dagestan, Russia). It encompasses heroic narrative songs, wedding and dance repertories, lullabies, work songs, and spiritual chants tied to Sufi practices.
Musically, it leans on modal melody, heterophonic or unison group singing, and lively dance rhythms. Instruments commonly include piercing double‑reed shawms (zurna/surnai), various drums (frame drums and double‑headed cylindrical drums), and, since the 19th–20th centuries, button accordions (garmon) in village ensembles. Dance tunes often resemble or intermix with the wider Caucasian “lezginka” family, featuring brisk tempos and driving percussion.
Textually, lyrics are typically in the Avar language and center on mountain life, community values, hospitality, bravery, historical memory, love, and spiritual devotion.
Avar folk music arose from the mountain communities of the North Caucasus, where oral tradition shaped narrative songs, epics, and functional village repertoires for weddings, feasts, and seasonal work. By the 1700s, elements familiar across the Caucasus—fast duple and compound meters for dance, modal melody, call‑and‑response, and heterophony—were in active circulation among Avar singers and village bands.
Before modern instruments, double‑reed shawms (zurna/surnai) and drums provided outdoor volume for dances and communal ritual events, while unaccompanied or lightly accompanied singing carried epics, laments, and lullabies. In the 19th–20th centuries, the button accordion (garmon) and later other portable instruments entered village ensembles, expanding harmonic color while preserving modal melodic habits. Dances related to the regional “lezginka” idiom gained prominence in public performance.
From the 1930s onward, state ensembles, radio, and regional folklore expeditions documented and staged Avar repertories. Professionalized folk choirs and dance groups codified characteristic steps, costumes, and set lists, presenting Avar pieces alongside other Dagestani and Caucasian traditions. This period preserved many song types, though it sometimes standardized flexible village practices.
After 1991, community ensembles, cultural centers, and local festivals renewed grassroots interest in Avar folk songs, dances, and ritual repertories. Today, village wedding bands, women’s choirs, and youth groups coexist with state and municipal ensembles. Field collectors, educators, and community leaders continue to transmit repertory in the Avar language, while contemporary performers incorporate subtle modern arranging and recording techniques without abandoning core rhythmic drive, modal contour, and communal participation.
