Turkish Music for Solo Violin SAYGUN • TÜRKMEN • CETIZ Ellen Jewett, Violin Ahmet Adnan SAYGUN (1907–1991) middle ages, and his insistence on using Greek and is reminiscent of a tone poem or ballade. used in Turkish especially in association with Mahir CETIZ (b. 1977) Violin Partita, Op. 36 (1961) terms from Byzantine music theory). Much like The Finale returns to a dizzying chromaticism calligraphic arts – literally means ‘a line’. The Soliloquy (2016) the introductory movements of Bach, this work and includes the brilliant evocation of a horon – composer first communicates, then attempts to Ahmet Adnan Saygun, born in 1907 in Izmir – of listening to Ottoman-influenced Turkish begins with an improvisation, in this case most a circle folk dance popular throughout the Black reveal a line made up of makams, modes and Soliloquy is a term that is used to describe the considered to be one of the most western- art music that he considered degenerate and likely inspired by the concept of ‘taksim’ – an Sea region. melodic conventions in Turkish traditional music, action of speaking oneself, both in dramatic arts oriented cities in the Ottoman Empire at corrupt with its Arabic influences. Atatürk also essential musical form found in Turkish traditional Although this work has never been recorded, in succession. If there is one strict principle of this as well as in real life. In dramatic arts, these that time due to the large Greek minorities – believed that the lack of polyphony in this music repertoire. The opening tonal centre is A, but and is very rarely performed even within Turkey, process, it is to preserve the purity of makams, sections are sometimes called monologues, and was influenced by his father’s love of Sufi was symbolic of the stagnancy of the culture in immediately from the first phrase, the music I believe this Partita to be a wonderful addition and not to mix them with any other structural they reflect the character’s psychological states music. He received a rigorous education in general. With a sense of urgency and demand wanders undecidedly between the B natural and to solo violin repertoire as well as a fascinating pitch materials. Makams melt into each other and flux of emotions. Furthermore, as they are Turkish makams and modal theory as well for radical reform, he provided for a group of B flat. When I began working on this piece, I met portrait of the rich cultural diversity and conflicting throughout the revelation of the line, which delivered when the character is in solitude, they as mathematics, science, French, history the brightest minds to study in Europe. Saygun with some Turkish musicians and composers ideologies that permeated Saygun’s world. is only an incident in an endless pitch space do not necessarily address the audience; these and Western musical theory, and by the age studied in Paris from 1928 to 1931, including to gain insight, and was told that the opening woven with resonance phenomenon. I have are the unique sections where the character’s of 15 had translated numerous harmony at the Schola Cantorum with Vincent D’Indy. movement was based on the ‘Uşşak makam’, Ellen Jewett always disregarded the cultural connotations of psyche is exposed in its most transparent form and counterpoint textbooks from French to He returned to Turkey and was one of the first a traditional mode characterised by a stepped makams as I believe culture is a living spectrum with her/his passions and vulnerabilities. Turkish. As a teenager, Saygun was witness composers working in a Western classical style opening gesture from G to A, and based on an that cannot be categorised. I am interested in This piece for solo violin, commissioned to tremendous political and social turmoil as of composition, both as an educator of Western attached tetrachord and pentachord from A to D Onur TÜRKMEN (b. 1972) the existentialist queries that they may propose. by Ellen Jewett, has similar features to the the weak empire of the Ottomans, having been classical music and as a researcher in the and D to high A. Saygun has chosen to compose Beautiful and Unowned (2013, revised 2017) In this context, I’ve realised that Hat is about notion of soliloquy in terms of moving from one allied with Germany in the First World War, new field of ethnomusicology where he was exclusively with the Western pitch system – exploring interspaces in between poles in active musical state to another without any logical lost tremendous power and territory to Russia, particularly concerned with the classification of unlike Bartók, whose seminal work for solo violin Ellen Jewett commissioned Beautiful and kinesis, such as object/subject, figure-non-figure, thread. Instead, the order of musical ideas England and France. indigenous folk music. His publications caught had two versions, one with microtones and one Unowned after I worked as a composer-in- but most basically past and present; yet such and their relationship gives an impression of Following the war of independence the interest of Béla Bartók, who travelled without. As he weaves a beautiful tapestry of residence at her chamber music festival, Klasik processes basically depend on reminiscences free associations. Relatively limited number of from Western powers in 1923, Atatürk, the with Saygun in Southern Anatolia, making colours throughout this dense chromaticism, it Keyifler, in Cappadocia in the summer of 2012, both personal and collective. Therefore, my gestural ideas manifest themselves in different president of Turkey, began the enormous task transcriptions of this music and focusing on seems to me as though his obsessive use of the which featured a ‘Composers Cauldron’ of new personal memories about Cappadocia (and the ways through variety of timbral and harmonic of modernisation as well as the formation of the resemblance between the Turkish and half step may be an expression of what had been music masterclasses, workshops and concerts. Klasik Keyifler festival) cannot be separated material. At certain points the piece progresses in a new nation. He focused on unification of Hungarian nomadic tribal influences along with ‘lost between the notes’, or ‘between the worlds’. She suggested that the piece could imply the from collective memories inherited in the town’s an improvisatory style somewhat corresponding the population by pursuing the ideology of their pentatonic elements. The Scherzo is full of virtuosic humour with the theme ‘The Land of the Beautiful Horses’, which unique dreamlike atmosphere that exhibits to the evolution of ideas and emotions that we ‘Turkishness’ in the wake of 500 years of multi- This four movement Partita is rich in middle trio-like section containing a ‘Zeybek’ – relates to the meaning of Cappadocia’s given remote layers of time concretely in its shockingly experience in our daily lives. ethnic Ottoman control. In addition to organising Romanticism as well as folk elements, often a Turkish folk dance glorifying the courage of name in 6th century BC during the Persian eclectic architecture (both human and nature- huge exchanges of ethnic populations, this expressed by melodies built on a fourth – local heroes. Inspired by the mystical identity invasion. This theme not only stimulated made) and landscapes. I believe that this is what Mahir Cetiz meant deliberate disassociation with the the tuning of the kemence, a Turkish fiddle. of the ‘Segâh makam’, the Tema con variazioni particular images in my mind, but also suited Beautiful and Unowned is all about. Ottoman past in terms of language and music All the movements are linked by dense movement is certainly the emotional heart of my artistic and compositional aims well. At that – both of which were heavily infused with non- chromaticism as well as use of the Phrygian this Partita, with the thematic half-step now time I was concentrated on a concept (and I still Onur Türkmen Turkish elements. In terms of music, Atatürk scale (called the Dorian scale by Saygun due transformed into a languid falling seventh. This am at different stages) that I conceived, called spoke of the ‘depressive effect to the population’ to mistranslation of the Greek modes during the very expressive movement could stand by itself, ‘Hat’. Hat – originally an Arabic word widely 8.579043 2 3 8.579043 4 8.579043 Ahmet Adnan SAYGUN (1907–1991) middle ages, and his insistence on using Greek and is reminiscent of a tone poem or ballade. used in Turkish especially in association with Mahir CETIZ (b. 1977) Violin Partita, Op. 36 (1961) terms from Byzantine music theory). Much like The Finale returns to a dizzying chromaticism calligraphic arts – literally means ‘a line’. The Soliloquy (2016) the introductory movements of Bach, this work and includes the brilliant evocation of a horon – composer first communicates, then attempts to Ahmet Adnan Saygun, born in 1907 in Izmir – of listening to Ottoman-influenced Turkish begins with an improvisation, in this case most a circle folk dance popular throughout the Black reveal a line made up of makams, modes and Soliloquy is a term that is used to describe the considered to be one of the most western- art music that he considered degenerate and likely inspired by the concept of ‘taksim’ – an Sea region. melodic conventions in Turkish traditional music, action of speaking oneself, both in dramatic arts oriented cities in the Ottoman Empire at corrupt with its Arabic influences. Atatürk also essential musical form found in Turkish traditional Although this work has never been recorded, in succession. If there is one strict principle of this as well as in real life. In dramatic arts, these that time due to the large Greek minorities – believed that the lack of polyphony in this music repertoire. The opening tonal centre is A, but and is very rarely performed even within Turkey, process, it is to preserve the purity of makams, sections are sometimes called monologues, and was influenced by his father’s love of Sufi was symbolic of the stagnancy of the culture in immediately from the first phrase, the music I believe this Partita to be a wonderful addition and not to mix them with any other structural they reflect the character’s psychological states music.