Simorqmusic: Simorq is the magnificent bird of fables

He is a grand bird, which possesses a foundational and iconic position both in tales of battle and in traditional stories filled with secrets and mysticism. Simorq is an excellent, complicated and deep, multi-faceted symbol in the realms of wisdom and intelligence, knowing and giving, medicine and healing, leadership and reign, honesty and deliverance, and he illuminates not just our internal world but also the external one. This is why the birds of Attar, the wise elder of Neishaboor, end their search and passionate flight with him: See Morgh  to Simoq,  at the Alborz of familiarity and Kaf of unity.

Simorq is also a Mithraic bird, with a mysterious and complex relationship with the sun, that spring of light and eye of perception. This is why when Esfandiar sees Rostam, the strong and perfect, the unsurpassed in capability, in front of him ready for battle—the same man he had torn and scarred with tens of killer arrows—he remembers the sun, and he relates this amazement, which disarrays the mind and shatters the thought, to the mystery and trickery of Saam’s son who was raised and taught by the Simorq in such a way that his tricks have turned into a legend all around the world.

I have heard that Zaal, the Magician,
Reaches out to the sun in times of need
Once he is raged, no magic works on him.
This is something incomprehensible and unreal.

In this couplet, the sun stands for Simorq, the guardian of Zaal who raised him like a father, in the peaks of Alborz. This is why we can refer to Iran, which through history has been consistently known as the land of day—illumination and the sun—as the Mount of Simorq.

Now Simorq takes flight from the cloudy Alborz which holds the Heavens, from that house of music and home of songs, and from that upper world, open-winged and exhilarating, comes to the depths of the earth and the end of the world to bring us a gift from the sky. With his magic of sharps and flats and his joyful song, he binds the earth and the sky for a little while and unites the souls separated from bodies to their essence, bloomed and in love, in a piece created by an agile composer and musician, Hamid Motebassem, who has created it in honor of Simorq, the magnificent bird of fables. May his music be eternally joyous and exuberant. 

Mir Jalaleddin Kazazi 

January 2011