T.

C MARMARA ÜNĠVERSĠTESĠ
SOSYAL BĠLĠMLER ENSTĠTÜSÜ
SĠYASET BĠLĠMĠ VE ULUSLAR ARASI ĠLĠġKĠLER
ANABĠLĠM DALI
ULUSLAR ARASI ĠLĠġKĠLER BĠLĠM DALI

MODERNISM IN OTTOMAN&TURKISH MUSIC AND THE YEARS

OF 1930s, 1940s

Yüksek Lisans Tezi

MUSTAFA POYRAZ KOLLUOĞLU

ĠSTANBUL, NĠSAN 2010

 T.C MARMARA ÜNĠVERSĠTESĠ
SOSYAL BĠLĠMLER ENSTĠTÜSÜ
SĠYASET BĠLĠMĠ VE ULUSLAR ARASI ĠLĠġKĠLER
ANABĠLĠM DALI
ULUSLAR ARASI ĠLĠġKĠLER BĠLĠM DALI

MODERNISM IN OTTOMAN&TURKISH MUSIC AND THE YEARS

OF 1930s, 1940s

Yüksek Lisans Tezi

Tez DanıĢmanı: Doç Dr. AHMET DEMĠREL

MUSTAFA POYRAZ KOLLUOĞLU

ĠSTANBUL, NĠSAN 2010

 CONTENTS

THANKS…….. 5

ABSTRACT……. 6

ORIGINAL COVER….7

INTRODUCTION……. 8
Making Music in Modern Times and Tunes as Subtitles of Orient

CHAPTER 1……… 22
Relentless Desire for Modernism in a Daydreamed Nation and Music
during nation building times

CHAPTER 2………67
The Ambiguity of Occidentalism in Music

CHAPTER 3………155
The Shadows of the Past over Popular Culture Music
CONCLUSION………199
Rethinking Turkish Nationalism, Modernity and Music

BIBLIOGRAPHY…..211

INDEX……..220

BACK COVER……223
 Thanks
Before commenced doing my research I could not imagine that I would produce
such a thesis at the end. When I look over the past two years of my research, now I
realize that a thesis is not something to be written. A thesis is a living thing,
intruding into your soul, capturing parts of brain, enslaving pieces of your
impulses. And when it is finished it becomes a part of the whole body. It becomes
a part that can never be separated like your eyes, legs, arms.
I also think that long term writing productions are not soul representations,
reflections of the author. The experiences, the intuitions revealed by the related
and unrelated readings, different tastes of life such as pain, pleasure, bitterness,
different observations at different places and of course the people who
accompanies you in this journey. Those all has taken their part while writing my
thesis.
I would like to present my warm and sincere thanks to;First my mother who has
endured my hyperemotional reactions during the writing process and produced
the best comfortable study environment with an eternal love. To my father who
supported me financially in a patient manner, a twenty five year old, unemployed,
research freak boy. To my aunt Biray who showed me out the most passionate
readings that enlightened dark parts of my mind. Without her advices, I would not
able to make such an interdisciplinary research. To my advisor Ahmet Demirel
who endured my nutty small presentations, ideas and statements and produced
the most free research environment for me. Without the freedom that he provided,
I would not accomplish. To Yüksel Taşkın and Cengiz Kırlı for their contributions
and merciless challenges during my presentation. To my aunt, Aytap who always
backed me up with her lovely reassuring phones and visits. To my musician friend
Fırat who compensated my lack in musicological and music fields with his great
enthusiasm and vast knowledge. To my friend Gizem and my colleague Feyza of
course, for their challenging, passionate and flaming counter argumentations and
conversations that forced me to argue in the best, perfect way.

And to the life for giving me this opportunity to write this thesis.

5
 ABSTRACT

The main purpose of this research is to reveal, display and chart the socio-political and
cultural motions, dynamisms and processes of 1930s, 1940s following the path of music
revolution discourses in the early republic era. Instead of a macro level state centric history
narration, this research is inclined to unfold the individual self-portraits, responses to a
modernizing environment and discourses which were constructed under the umbrellas of
“Occidentalist Fantasy” and “Modernist Anxieties.” Shortly, empowered with a sociological
imagination and approach, a political and cultural history narration of the Turkish Music
revolution is presented.
Furthermore, this research aims to unfold the deep cores of the Kemalist
modernization project and the nation building times since it appears as a paradoxical task
pertained to being in an “Oriental” domain that is codified, patched as “inferior” by the so
called modern “Occident” world. The music, perfectly unfolding the traces of an “alternative
modernity”, is selected as the case to follow this purposely path.
The minor objective of this study is to reveal the ethno-racist discourses appeared on
the Turkish Music revolution agenda during 1930s, 1940s and follow those and the others
occurred by the “Modernist Anxieties” in the popular culture cases stretching through the
early 1990s.

6
 MODERNISM IN
OTTOMAN&TURKISH MUSIC
AND ONE PARTY ERA

Modernist and Occidentalist Anxieties in Turkish

Music Revolution

Poyraz Kolluoğlu

7
INTRODUCTION: Making Music in Modern Times and Tunes as Subtitles of Orient

What Can be Known About Music Is This: When

it first begins it resounds with a confusing variety of
notes, but as it unfolds, these notes are reconciled by
means of harmony, brought into tension by means
counterpoint and finally woven together in a seamless
whole. It is in this way that music reaches its perfection.

Confucius, the Analects

Every day, on the radio broadcasts in our cars, at offices, homes from the CDs that we
put in play, and on the street that we walk and to the concerts that we attended, we hear the
magical vibrations and taming sounds of music, among one of the most ancient human made
invention in the man-kind‟s history. It is still uncertain how and why this anachronistic,
immaterial human made production first appeared. German psychologist, Carl Stumpf states
that the music arose from the necessity of enhancing the speech volume to establish
communication in a more accurate and clear way between two far distances.1 Other arguments
regarding the foundation of music suggest that the imitations of the sounds in the nature such
as the birds, water and wind, caused the revival of this magical fact in the human life.2
Whether it occurred by a desire for imitation or for necessity of communication in the pre
modern communities, the abstractness, the fluidity and transparency of which are confined in
the insubstantial invisible body of music, empower it with a miraculous feature that is the
pouring into the every layers of politically and culturally constructed modern society.
However, this arcane if not seemingly fact of the social, has also the puissant, impetus to chart
the anthropological history map of a particular society. Music is not just a thing which
happens “in” society. “A society”, Seeger says, “might also be usefully conceived as
something happens in music”.3 Although, it has been a social and anthropological fact since
its existence, the sociological research study approach to music has not been considered as
significant around the academic circles. Willener suggests that “literature in the sociology of
music is not due to any particular difficulty within the field but rather to the fact that music is

1
Carl Stumpf, Die Anfaenge der Musik, Leipzig,1911 cited in Gültekin Oransay, Musiki Tarihi, Ankara: Eğtim
Enstitüleri Müzik Bölümü Yayınları, 1976, p.36.
2
Edip Günay, Müzik Sosyolojisi, Sosyolojiden Müzik Kültürüne Bir Bakış, Istanbul: Bağlam Yayınları, 2006,
p.17.
3
Anthony Seeger, Why Suyá Sing: A Musical Anthropology of an Amazonian People, Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press 198, p.140.
8
generally a less socially important occupation than many others at least in our industrial
societies.”4 Yet, as sociology a branch of academy mostly investigating the social relations
within a particular society5 music must also be included within this context, as being a fact of
establishing communication, creating subtitles of self and other definitions between and
within spatial social, ethnic groups or classes and divided groupings that are being oppressed
or dominate. “Music is socially” says Martin Stokes “meaningful not entirely but largely,
because it provides means by which people recognize identities and the boundaries which
separate them.”6 Music sociology is not just neglected by sociology but by its own
overarching twin disciplines as well. The musicology, ethnomusicology scholars have not
concerned about the music sociology due to the absence of commonly agreed distinct
methodological and epistemological grounds differentiated from the unorthodoxy of
sociology as being the general overarching social disciple.7 Most of the musicological and
ethno musical studies disregard the social motions and realities that are constituted,
constructed under political historical vortexes and transformations. This limited, narrow,
neglecting approach towards music is more apparent in the Turkish academic circles. In a
socio political surrounding where the art is only perceived as a “high culture” phenomenon
subsidized by the state support, music is detached from the reach of the society and its studies
are capsulated under the framework of the conservatories, excluded from the sociological and
anthropological contributions of social sciences. The absence of a musicology department not
bound to a Fine Arts faculty perfectly underpins the incident. 8 Indeed, I argue that this fact is
mostly due to the influence of the Turkish history writing of which the authenticity of its
history has always been problematic and controversial in the socio political discourses.
Repressing the music out of the influence of the history and social science department could
be linked to the hegemonic project of nationalism, in which a new history have been
manifested for erasing the traces, remnants of a denied, disregarded past. History arrives as
another related and flourishing discipline in the field of music sociology. A social history of
music “envisions interrelation of musical culture with general culture, and with political

4
Willener Alfred, Music and Sociology, Cultures I/1 1973, p.234 cited in Ivo Supicic, Music in Society: A Guide
to Music Sociology, NY: Pendragon Press, 1987, p.16.
5
Alex Inkeles, What‟s Sociology,An Introduction to the discipline and profession, Foundations of Modern
Sociology Series, New Jersey: Prentece-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, 1969, p.23.
6
Martin Stokes, “Introduction”, Ethnicity,Identity and Music: The Musical Construction of Place, Martin Stokes
(Ed), Oxford/NY: Berg, 1994, p.5.
7
Ivo Supicic, (1987) , pp.13-15
8
Edip, (2006), pp.253-254.
9
economical life as well”.9 I argue that the history, political discourse and social/cultural
motions cannot be abstracted from the overall phenomenon of this socially constructed
harmony. Hence, this study presents an interdisciplinary epistemological approach to
contribute to the music sociology researches related with Turkish history and political
discourses by empowering itself from objective history narration independent from prison and
pre approvals of the national ideological norms, anachronistic macro cultural impositions.
Concisely, this is a study of a social history of music in Turkey done for the sake of
contributing this field that is absent from interdisciplinary methodological approach.
Music, Nation State and Modernity
Martin Stokes tells us that “the social and cultural worlds that have been shaped by
modernity that‟s to say, the industrial-capitalist order, the nation state and secular rationalism
would be hard to imagine without music.”10 The fluidity, the spatiality, the power to reach to a
time scale beyond the earthly timing, the ability to jump from one geographical place to
another, or in other words “dislocation” of places, displays music‟ superhuman preternatural
features. All these point out to its prolonging existence till and through the modern life. Music
is clearly very much a part of the modern life and our understanding of it, “articulating our
knowledge of other peoples, places, times and things, and ourselves in relation to them”.11
How music becomes a part of our modern life through and through what kind of mechanisms
it pours inside our social life, can be explained by evoking Anthony Giddens‟ analysis about
the nature of the modernity. Following Giddens, place or “locale” refers to the physical
setting of social activity as situated geographically. Whilst he discusses about the
consequences of modernity, one of the point he explains is the “phantasmagoric” separation
of the space from the place, as places become “thoroughly penetrated by and shaped in terms
of social influences quite distant from them.”12 This “dislocation” requires relocation or as
Giddens says “reembedding”13 Amongst the countless ways in which we “relocate” ourselves,
music undoubtedly has a vital role to play. Attending to a music event, putting a CD into a
player, “evokes and organizes collective memories and present experiences of place with an
intensity, power and simplicity, unmatched by any other social activity”. 14 Therefore,

9
Paul H.Lang, Music in the Western Civilization, NY: Norton 1941, cited in Supicic Ivo, 1987, pp.13-15.
10
Stokes, (1994), p.3.
11
Ibid, p.3.
12
Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, California: Stanford University Press, 1990, pp.18-19.
13
Ibid, p.88. Giddens defines “reembedding” as a “process by means of which faceless commitments are
sustained or transformed by facework.”
14
Stokes, (1994), p.3.
10
apparently having a presence and a communicational role in modern life, music is inevitably
related with modern societies in other words, nation states.
The primary purpose of this research is to portray and examine the social, political
cultural dynamics of music in the society, in the modernizing nation state of Turkish Republic
focusing on 1930s and 1940s and extending to the late Ottoman era and popular culture cases
in modern Turkey.
Throughout the study, my aim is to present the panorama of the political and cultural
motions of the nation building process of the republic and examine stances and approaches of
ordinary citizens, intellectuals, politicians, as the “subjects” of the Kemalist ideology (I
include the Kemalists themselves as subjects) and as the individuals responding to a
modernization tension in a non-Western environment. Music is being chosen as the case study
in order to move beyond the macro political approach to the history writing and nationalism
scholarship. By moving beyond political-historical scope, this study aims to illuminate the
deep cores of the nation-building process and the responses of the society to the process of
becoming “modern” that is idealized as “Westernizing”. As I will elaborate below, the
political occurrence, the social experience and the economic constitution of modernization is
problematic in the non-Western world. Therefore I suggest a micro level sociological
approach is significant for understanding modernization in “Underdeveloped” world 15, a
geographical domain which is codified as the “other”, “Orient” because of its Islamic identity.
On the path from Ottoman Empire to the Turkish nation-state, like many other cultural
elements, the music life, traditions and likings were also influenced and tried to be configured
by the modernization project laid by the Kemalist cadres. The inspirational father of Turkish
nationalism, Ziya Gökalp as an intellectual, offered a roadmap for the creation- or as calls it
as a reborn, recreation- of a new national music. In a simple way, it was enriching the
Anatolian folk songs with Western polyphonic sound structure. Put another way, it meant the
spread of Western music culture in the society which would reveal real Turkish folk music,
freeing it from the yoke of Ottoman-Arab culture.16 This simple formulation reflects the
paradoxical framework of the whole Turkish modernization project; revealing the Turkish
ethnie on its road to the Western civilization but at the same time preventing a fully fledged
“degenerated” Westernization for the sake of retaining the distinctiveness of “Turkishness”.
15
Marshal Berman, displays how the city of St.Pereterburs, as a domain of East, was labeled as
“Underdeveloped”. See Marshal Berman, All That‟s Solid Melts into the Air: The Experience of Modernity,
London/NY: Verso, 1983, pp.173-191. In the statement above, I use the term “underdeveloped” in the same
meaning that Berman uses.
16
Ziya Gökalp, Türkçülüğün Esasları, Istanbul: MEB yayınları, 1990, p.33.
11
Furthermore, the fervent desire for modernization and the socio political discourse
accumulated within this context paved way to the revitalization of an “inferior” Oriental
legacy. Put another way, it meant having the new national identity‟s back against the wall of
an “Oriental Identity”. The dream for a “modern”, national music seems have fallen into the
ground. Notwithstanding today, there are not polyphonic folk songs on any radio broadcasts
or on the television music programs and there are not crowds in the concerts halls who are
overexcited while listing one of Beethoven or Mozart‟s symphony. Hence, for understanding
the “experience of modernity” in the music debate of modernizing republican Turkey, I am
intended to keep a micro level sociological perspective in dealing with the reflections of
nation building process as a macro elite project.
The first move in the journey for modernizing the music in the republican era came in
1926 when the Oriental Music Section/Department of the Dârü‟l-Elhan (“The House of
Tunes” -the first conservatory under the framework of Municipality at Istanbul which was
founded in 1917 with both music and theater/operetta department-17 was closed abolished.18
Starting from 1930s, the Kemalist ideology solidified and diffused itself into the sub layers of
the society. On the journey from multi-cultural imperial empire to a heterogeneous modern
nation state, music as a significant cultural element of the national identity also needed to be
taken up in more planed, systematized and “positivist” manner. Throughout this journey,
ordinary citizens, organic intellectuals, musicians, political elites19 and key position and statue
holders within Kemalist bureaucratic circles, all had some ideas and suggestions to offer for
the development of the Ottoman/Turkish music. The voices went out of mouths were high and
the debate forums were extremely vivid because of the fact that music being a matter of both a
national project and individual “intimacy”. This area of intimacy had been the arena of the
acceptance, resistance and production of new musical channels, forms, genres and ideas.
Unconsciously or consciously, the words, comments and opinions and in some cases direct
participations or penetrations positively or negatively contributed to the configuration of the
Turkish/Ottoman music life, paved way in the creations, fragmentations foundations and

17
Gönül Paçacı, “Cumhuriyet‟in Sesli Serüveni”, Cumhuriyet‟in Sesleri,Gönül Paçacı, (Ed), Bilanço Yayın
dizisi, 1998, p.12.
18
Orhan, Tekelioğlu, “The Rise of a Spontaneous Synthesis: The Historical Background of Turkish Popular
Music”, Turkey Identity, Democracy, Politics, Sylvia Kedourie, (Ed), London: Franc Cass Publishers, 1996,
p.195.
19
In the usage adopted here, the “elite” term do not take “Kemalists” a solidified group of politicians. It does not
only refer to a homogenous community of elites. It also does not refer to a bourgeois class or the class in charge
of power. The elites concept that I define for thesis, are the intellectuals who have diversified point of views
regarding the modernization project, nationalist formulation and have conflicting offerings and suggestions for
cultural policies, especially in the case of music.
12
disappearances of many musical patterns, items, traditions and themes. Even in recent times,
the remnants of discourses produced in 1930s and 1940s could be observed, seen. Still today,
in the public concerts, on the music programs on television or radio, especially on the state
television channel TRT, in the productions of popular musicians and groups, in the general
history of popular music or the in private or professional musical education institutions, the
traces, discourses of those motions, dynamics occurred in music during 1930s and 1940s can
be found as a legacy of social memory.
“History is work expended on material documentation (books, texts, accounts…) says
Foucault. Yet, he does not capsulate the purview of history just into these “rationally”
documented source. Furthermore, he appends, “the document is not the fortunate tool of a
history, that‟s primarily and fundamentally the memory”.20 Mostly, music being the part of
personal intimacy, individual area of enjoyment, I suggest that the “personal memories”
related with this study are more efficient sources for the object of this research. From a
methodological point of view, the “objectivity” of the personal history narration and
expression is disputable. However, my study‟s intention is not to draw mechanical causal
relations, observe objective facts to discuss the incident of music in Turkish modernization.
On contrast, my aim is explore and expose the subjective and personal experiences, reactions,
impressions and feelings through a particular history of the nation building process in Turkey.
Among the main reasons that I determined such genre of research resource for my study is
that, scholarship on nationalism mainly neglects the familiar train of “everyday life”. 21 All,
the macro level explanations, traditional approaches and grand methodological observations
to the social sciences, paid little attention to the micro level constitution that is the everyday
manifestation of nationalism. In order to clarify the dynamics of nationalism, I suggest it is a
necessity to probe into the process of the social motions to how ordinary people, in a
prolonging time scale, “imagine” themselves in an abstract community. In this study, a
sociological window is being presented for following how ordinary people and the elites who
are actively involve of the nation building project, believe in something that they “imagine”.
The music is chosen as the frame of the window, because it is a train of everyday life and also
both part of individual intimacy and group collectivity, hence a controversial and volatile fact
for understanding the collective imagination of nationalism from individual perspectives.
Briefly, the music is chosen as the research case to dig into deeper, unseen reflections,

20
Michel Foucault, The Archeology of Knowledge, A.M Sheridan Smith, (Trn), London: Tavistock Publications,
1972, p.7.
21
Umut Özkırımlı, Theories of Nationalism: A critical Introduction, London: Palgrave, 2000, p.195.
13
manifestations of the nation building and modernization processes on the individual souls and
minds.
I suggest that through this way I will be able to present some hints and clues about
how the citizens and the elites are in touch with something that they “imagine”. The micro
level approach to the study of political history required to use primary sources that are
comparably more individualized and personal ones rather than the official sources. Thence,
the unofficial individual history narrating sources such as, the audience letters to
Ankara&Istanbul radio stations, personal comments and offerings published on the
periodicals, journals and newspapers, individual self portrays of the people, from the top man
at the political hierarchy to the ordinary citizens, narrations about their experiences, feelings
and preferences in the vortex of the music revolution, are mainly the primary sources to
follow the modernization dynamics and the effects of nation building processes at individual
level.
The secondary purpose of this thesis is to reveal the ethno-racist elements and
discourses in the Turkish Nationalist ideology, a dynamic intensified after 1930s, and try to
demonstrate the place of these discourses and elements on the chart of Turkish Music. I also
suggest that the ethno-racist paradigms, still the hanging in the air even in recent political
discourses social narrations, were emanated from the modernist fetishism of 1930s for the
sake of being different from the Western civilization and “erasing” the “inferiority” label but
at the same time unconsciously or consciously reproducing Eastern identity again, in different
time scales. Besides, the fear of protecting the Turkish ethnie against a fully fledged Western
modernization, sometimes the anxiety for defending the personal political stances and
ideological differences22 caused the revival of these ethno racist paradigms, sometimes the
“absolute” and unconditional belief in the Western positivist principles. All these scientific
and extreme nationalist historical anchors were used as legitimization tools for solidifying the
myth of a sublime historic past such as Adnan Saygun‟s Pentatonic Theory, a historical
argumentation for proving the linkages between the Central Asian and Anatolian folk songs.
Whilst sticking to the case of music, a general critique of the Kemalist nationalism
will be presented by providing partial information in various places and paragraphs about its
basic principles and ideological roots. Yet, with the critique that I provide, my goal is not to
reveal the “deficiencies”, “defects” or “flaws” of the Kemalist projection regarding a

22
The head author of a periodical called “Yeni Adam,” Ġsmail Hakkıbaltacıoğlu‟s colorful diversified intellectual
and political stance may be placed within this context, where his narrations, comments and ideas hangs in a fluid
environment between Pan-Turkism and Kemalist nationalism.
14
“modern” nation. On contrast, the critical part of this study objects to “understand” deep cores
and oscillations of Turkish nationalism and its ideological discursive formations by digging
inside one of its cultural remarks, the music revolution.
Third purpose of this study is to reveal the discrepancy between the modernity and the
nation building process and contribute to the accumulation of challenges targeting the linear
history writing of modernization phenomenon. In other words, by exploring and charting the
“uncontrolled”, “undesired”, “unforeseen” contributions and responses of individuals to a
elite modernization project during 1930s and 1940s and by following those beyond and prior
to the nation building times, this research is intended to unfold divergence between elite
perception of modernization and the actual, true experience of it. The destructive dynamic
nature of the modernization cannot be capsulated into the specific time horizons and space
conjunctions. Put differently, a grand linear history narration of modernization is in sufficient
to reveal the drifting micro level experiences. Modernism, a personal experience unlike
modernization which is a micro level process, is a “permanent revolution against the modern
existence”23 and it is a “relentless” and “insatiable pressure for growth and progress beyond
local, national and moral bounds”.24 It is an abyss; a “maelstrom” says Marshal Berman “is a
mode of vital experience of space and time, of self and others, of life‟s possibilities and perils
that is shared by men and women all over the world today”25. Put another way, it is a
destructive and reconstructive, self making motion experienced by each individual of society,
ranging from political elites to ordinary people, in different time scales and the spaces where
it has being on action. Taking into the fact of modernism‟s “fluidity” through different space
zones and time scales, I will not delimit my study‟s research scope with 1930s and 1940s.
Music, as being both pungent and reconciling fact between modernity and nationalism, is a
phenomenon needed to be observed through different discontinued time scales. Therefore,
when it is necessary, I will touch upon the diversified incidents reaching from the Ottoman
history to the recent popular culture cases in recent Turkey. For instance, during the Tanzimat
era, the personal musical likening of Sultans, such as Abdülhamit II., had also configuring
influences on the Ottoman music culture and life in Istanbul as had on many other political
social aspects and cultural issues. The Sultan, as a person experiencing the notion of being in
a modernizing environment similar to Atatürk the leader of a modern nation state, also to the

23
Marshall Berman, All That‟s Solid Melts Into Air: The experience of modernity, London/NY:Verso, 1983,
p.30.
24
Ibid, p.121.
25
Ibid, p.15.
15
some degree, performed a configuration in the Ottoman music. What unified these different
persons on the merge of the different times of music reforms was the experience of
modernism at the individual level. This shared common experience by two leaders, revealed
alternations in the music life and culture that exceeded beyond the nation building times.
Another issue reaching beyond the music revolution years of the nation building process is the
Arabesk debate. The Arabesk case also exceeds beyond the “national bounds”, a wave of
music culture intensified after 1950s urbanization and industrialization movements. The
Arabesk case also has both dependent and independent social and political linkages with the
nation formation in 1930s and 1940s and prepared the ground of the musical heritages and
legacies for the modern Turkish pop music as well. Put another way, it is also a motion not
entirely dependent on the Kemalist modernization project. Therefore, in order to present a
full picture of the motions in 1930s and 1940s, it is necessary to touch upon a prolonging time
scale and reveal the micro motions, processes beyond the reach of the nation state history
narration. In brief, I will not approve the modernization phenomenon as continuing fact on the
same line with the nation building times. Instead, I will try to present the modernism
experience as a discontinuing fact, lived experienced and constituted by the individuals
themselves.
As I touched upon before, I will not delimit my research scope and take the nation
building process just an elite project and I will not accept the community as a lifeless and non
responding mass which just amalgamated with the project that is forced upon it. Instead, I
approve that all the subjects, from elites to ordinary citizens, all livings in this project exposed
to it, contributed to the occurrence of this “discursively” constituted motion, modernism. As
Berman points out, the modernism is a phenomenon, experienced by the all livings in the
society. Briefly, I will not take the modernism phenomenon as a nationalist elite project
imposed upon to a lifeless community who absorbs it. Instead, I suggest that the elite artificial
face of the Kemalist revolution is only one of the legs that the whole story of modernism
stands on.
Music: Subtitle of Orient towards West
The ethno musicological discipline points out to the importance of a sound, music and
conversation that forms a behavior or attitude. The attitude and speech empower the
communication in a particular community and make the people gather around the common
emotions and behaviors. Music, as an element of the discourses and values, is a part of the

16
culture26. It is a sub component of the language and literacy that are among the indispensable
catalyses of nationalism.27 In other words, music is not only a way of having fun and an art
piece of a particular society. In some cases it has apparent in others it has arcane functions in
creating a “mass” commonality in a particular society. Like many technological innovations
and the new modern cultural foundations in the line with them, such as the radio, the mass
sports, the romantic literacy came with print capitalism; the music may also be used as a state
apparatus for injecting and building the ideology‟s cultural bases. However, as the Turkish
case illustrates, music may sometimes be an area of both acceptance and resistance towards
the “domestication” policies of the state.28 Many years before the birth of modern nation-
states, Confucius had said “music sets up the state and ruins the state”. 29 Maybe, the state
policies towards music did not ruin the Republican Party presence in the state but it forced the
top man at the political hierarchy to make a confession: “Revolution in two things cannot be
performed, in the language and music”.30
What the revolution meant for the Turkish elites in the 1930s and 1940s was to lay the
Western framework to modernize the Turkish ethnie which had been under the Ottoman/Arab
yoke for centuries. Right after the victory at the independence war, when the all oppositions in
the beginnings of 1930s were ceased, the state embarked itself with iconic cultural reforms. It
was supposed these cultural reforms would solidify the unity within the Anatolian community
in the absence of a fully fledged industrial development. The elites in Turkish nationalism
believed that closing up an Oriental society towards the Occident on its “sublime” and
“ancient” migration history from Eastern Asia, was a sufficient movement to constitute the
unity among the community. Yet, like happened in many other cultural reforms or in the
“transformations” (İnkilap) as Kemalists name, the things did not occurred as planned. The
members of an Oriental society produced reactions against the imposed Western project. The
unsuccessful imprisonment of the Islam inside the privacy of individuals through laicism, the
pacifying women equality reforms committed with the former one, the abolishment of Tekke
ve Zaviyes done for a more “modern” education which jammed the modern evolution of Islam
religion in Turkey, all has had lead to unexpected oscillations that I name as “subtitles” in the

26
Ayten Kaplan, Kültürel Müzikoloji, Istanbul: Bağlam Yayıncılık, 2005, pp 13-15
27
Craig Calhoun, Concepts in Social Thought: Nationalism, University of Minnesota Press, 1997, p. 5.
28
For different cases, see John Baily, “The Role of the Music in the Creation of an Afghan National Identity”,
1923-73 and Suzel Ana Reily, “Macunaima‟s Music :National Identity and Ethno musicological Research in
Brazil” ,in Stokes, (Ed), (1997).
29
Cited in Kaplan, p 57, S.Ġçli, 1998 İnsanın Vasıf Dokusunun Geliştirilmesinde Müziğin İşlevi, I.Müzik
Kongresi Bildirileri, Ank.KBY.
30
Cited in Emre Ahmet Cevat, Atatürk‟ün İnkılap Hedefi ve Tarih Tezi ,Istanbul: Ekim Basımevi 1954, p.41.
17
social memory of the society. The music as being an arcane significant part of the cultural
heritage was also to be reconfigured by the nation builders. Yet, the Kemalists were also
“unsuccessful” on this field, to “modernize” Turkish music culture, as seen in the secular
reforms, the legacy of those reforms was shaken by the rise of the political Islam after the
1990s or the women‟s place in on the social gender panorama of modern Turkey. I suggest
that a sociological music study is a crucial and significant as other post modernist studies such
as gender, cultural and anthropological studies and other humanities divisions since the
universal freeing notion of the modernism has lost its power after the 1990s. I argue that
music case, as being both parts of arts and sub divisions of the humanities, is an efficient case
to see the mapping of the Western modernism on the Oriental surrounding.
The traces of the change and evaluation of a particular community could be followed
through examining its path on musical evolution. The deconstruction of a cultural system
could be obtained through finding out its discourses and values. Therefore, analysis for
solving out the balances or imbalances between the music and the cultural system could be
used as tool for enlightening the philosophical basics and dynamics of the society.31 The
reason that I choose the music as the case to study Turkish modernization and nation-state
formation phase is the belief in its incidental clarity that lays out the voices, sounds and
responses of the “Orient” against a dictated Western modernization. I argue that the musical
journey in modernizing Oriental environment is an efficient case to read subtitles of Orient
directed towards West. If there really stands a common cultural homogeneity of West that is
constructed against the Orient as “other”, music is an intimate issue for following “non-
linear” path of particular oriental community from “traditional” society to “modern.”
Music as a Fact of Identity Building Process
Identity is the total accumulation of the attitude, thought, manner and emotions that
separates particular persons from others. It is a phenomenon that both having individual and
cultural dimensions.32 Put differently, identity is a multifaceted constitution both has
collective social and personal dimensions. Both the macro level modernization process or the
experience of modernism at micro level fragment the structure of identity. Put another way, as
explained by Stuart Hall, modernization transforms the whole unit of both the individual and
the cultural identities into the form of “fragments” and “fractions”.33 “In the late modern

31
Kaplan, (2005), p.13.
32
John J Macionis, Sociology , New Jersey: Upper Saddle River, 2001, pp. 115-135
33
Stuart Hall, “The Question of Cultural Identity”, Modernity: An Introduction to Modern Societies, Stuart
Hall,(Ed), David Held,(Ed), Don Hubert (Ed), Thompson Kenneth (Ed) , Blackwell, 1996, pp. 596-97.
18
times” he says “identities are never unified…increasingly fragmented and fractured, never
singular, but multiply constructed across different and often intersecting and antagonistic,
discourses, practices and positions”34
The music is undeniably a social phenomenon, as I explained above; it is “a way of
communication” and constitutes an “attitude,” “behavior” that connects individual to the
“socialization” process through which person is amalgamated with the culture that is lived in.
It is the emblematic and attitudinal reflections of the cultural identity.35 It is both a learned or
at least codified collective social phenomenon yet at the same time it is often the display of
“individuality,” singularity, a response to the social world, a way of intervene in to the social
community as a “self defined,” objective actor. This, diversified, enigmatic, separated psycho
social function of music indeed becomes more interesting in the modern times as the personal
identity becomes more “movable feast”. Music as hidden, pure functioning part of the identity
abridges the spaces between ethnic, national, and personal parts of the whole unit of identity.
In some incidents, it may function as a productive tool for the formation of “mass
consciousness” among a particular society but at the same in a controversial way; it stretches
to the inner deep bases of individuality and privacy. Hence, it is a controversial constitution
encompasses the multi faceted fluidity of identity as it unfolds through modernism.
Forceful penetrations for squashing multi-faceted structure of identity into an
overarching unit identity may sometimes result in controversial reflections. Furthermore,
outside attributions to it inevitably causes problematic tidal waves.36 Outside attributions and
inside attributions that are formed in conjunction with them to the Oriental fragment of the
Turkish identity caused the occurrence of the problematic and controversial issues. Yet, I
suggest that these tense declinations are responses to a modernization project that is forced
from top to bottom. The traces of these tensions in the Turkish identity could be followed in
the modernization adventure of the Republic. The incident of Arabesk that appeared in the
late 1960 demonstrates triggered part of the Oriental identity as both a reactionary and
bending urban movement against the hegemonic ideology.37 In addition to this, the music can
sometimes be the representation of a distinctive group identity that comes against the
overarching national identity. In the fragmented nature of the modern identities, the musical

34
Stuart Hall, Who Needs “Identity?”, Identity: A Reader, P. D. Gay (Ed), J.Evans, P.Redman, (Ed), London:
SAGE Publications, 2005, p.17
35
Kaplan,(2005), p.79.
36
Ibid, p.74.
37
For the relationship between Arabesk music, urbanization and modernization see Meral Özbek, Popüler Kültür
ve Orhan Gencebay Arabeski, Istanbul: ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 1991.
19
heritage could have an eroding and dissolving function as well as unifying and amalgamating
one. For regions and communities within the context of the modernizing nation-state that do
not identify with the state project, music and dance are often “convenient” and “morally
appropriate” ways of asserting defiant difference.38 For instance, the Alevi community mostly
presents their identity with embracing their music, religious dances and traditions.39
In short, music and other pieces arts that are related with it such as theater, folk
dances40 are among the most untouched story tellers of individual identity. The main purpose
of this study, as I underlined above, is to chart the individual experiences, self portrays and
common collective experiences, discourses and awareness, following the path of an oriental
empire to a “modern” nation state in the 1930s and 1940s, basing on music as being a
significant part of collective and personal identity. I suggest that through this way, a plain and
simple critique of Kemalist nationalism would be avoided and a sociological window to the
readers would be offered for understanding the music debate process during 1930s and 1940s
by following the “leakage” from the fragmentations configured national identity. Simply,
instead of making deductions, critiques and observations from grand history narrations,
writings and information, this study intended to display the process of “imagination” for the
readers for understanding cores of the nation building times. The secondary aims, the follow
of the ethno racist oscillations and the epistemological ground challenging to the official
history writing of “modern” nation are the grounds that research stands on.

38
Stokes, (1994), p.12
39
Kaplan,(2005), p.80.
40
For a deteiled study on Folk Dances during the Turkish nation building process, see Arzu Öztürkment
Türkiye‟de Folklor ve Milliyetçilik, Istanbul: ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 1998.
20
 A mystic group of Ottoman music

(The Photograph is a French Postcard named as “Constantinople Dervhices Tourneurs” archived by

Levant Collection. Date is not provided

21
CHAPTER 1: Relentless Desire for Modernism in a Daydreamed Nation and Music during
nation building times.

If I were not a physicist, I would probably be a

musician. I often think in music. I live my daydreams in
music. I see my life in terms of music…I get most joy in
life out of music.

Albert Einstein, Autobiographical Notes

Who is out of the prison of Occidentalism or Orientalism?

Through the initial readings that I had been doing for my thesis, I had been aware of
the facts of “Orientalism”. Notwithstanding, I had not realized that I had been looking to the
world through the “Orientalist” lenses. At the beginning, my basic and simple aim was to
prove and examine the functional power of music and to demonstrate how Kemalists as the
nation “constructers” were well aware of this fact. To display how they initiated cultural
policies to form a national music through folk songs those were composed of Anatolian
themes saturated with Western polyphonic sounds and militarist marches by creating some
amount of “unity” for winning the hearts and minds of their “subjects”. I pre assumed that the
path that I follow would had led me to a conclusion that Kemalist were unsuccessful at
obtaining a “modern” national music. Yet, as I moved along with my readings I realized that I
had been approaching to issue of music as Kemalist did: looking for failures and
complications and searching for keys to corrections in a vista of two mirrors located across
each other, like the West and East were located.
As I deepened my readings especially in primary sources and read Edward Said by
putting my own self in the world of “Orientalists”, I decided to examine the free space
between the two mirrors instead of intervening and hunting for the deficiencies in the
Kemalist project. In other words, this thesis does not examine the role of music in the nation
“building” process between the years of 1930s and 1940s and is not intended to draw
mechanic causalities such that Kemalist cultural policies through these years led to the revival
of Arabesk music in 1960s. This thesis‟s theoretical frame is to examine the modernization of
“East” that‟s constructed in an “Occidentalist Fantasy” (the inverse twin reflection of
Orientalism) and reveal the responses of “East” to “West” within this historical dichotomy.
Meltem Ahıska‟s study about the place of the Radio as a technological material in the Turkish

22
nation building process and her theoretical framework “Occidentalism” is the main source for
establishing this part of my methodological stance towards this research.41 Although the scope
of her study is the Radio, she also touched upon the Occidentalist/Orientalist conflict in the
Turkish music and incidents related with controversial issue on the radio broadcast. My lunch
point for this research study was expanding her examples related with music case and
applying her theoretical framework to other research sources. As I distanced myself from the
Occidentalist/Orientalist controversy and succeeded in freeing my academical scope of range
from this blinding darkness, I found a more comprehensive source of material to study and
attach to my research. Unlike the previous musical history studies regarding the pros and cons
of Kemalist policies in this cultural area, I found a chance to present why and how subjects of
modernism came up in this Orient/Occident conflict and unconsciously contributed to the rise
of a discursive formation even by the defenders of the Ottoman&Turkish music. The
researched sources are used in a manner to investigate the journey of ordinary individuals,
bureaucrats, “constructers” of nation, intellectuals and musicians search for their own
“modern” music in the political and cultural turmoil of a collapsed Oriental empire on the
margin of an industrialized modernizing continent. Through this way, I believe I will be able
to present how the “Occidentalist Fantasy” as a pack of socio political motions, paved way to
the rise of its discourses among both amateur and professional music circles and try to show
this process intensified itself by injecting itself into daily life of ordinary peoples.

Imagined or daydreamed nation?

One of the most widespread scholarly definitions of nationalism is offered by Ernest
Gellner, who defines nationalism as the doctrine that the political unit (the state) and cultural
unit (the nation) should be “congruent”.42 Inspiring ideological father of the Turkish
nationalism, intellectual and sociologist Ziya Gökalp also offers a similar formulation.
According to him, the civilization and national culture may be not be harmonious, as the
Ottoman civilization was, composed of alien Arab and Persian elements which were not
concordant with the cores of the Turkish culture.43 Therefore, the newly constituting Turkish
state had to bring civilization in the line with the national culture of Anatolia. Ziya Gökalp
believed that there had existed a Turkish national culture in the lands of Anatolia and now it

41
Meltem Ahıska, Radyonun Sihirli Kapısı: Garbiyatçılık ve Politik Öznellik, Istanbul: Metis Yayınları, 2005.
42
Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Secoond Edition, Blackwell Publishing 1983,2006),in introduction
by John Breuilly, p.xxvii
43
Gökalp, (1990 ), pp.30-34
23
was the time to awaken this “dormant unity” by bringing the necessary elements of modern
Western civilization. The theoretical debate nationalism and nations studies may illuminate
whether Turkish nation is artificially created or up to what level pre-existing cultural linkages
were “usable” elements for a “unified” nation. Even though I am not fully intended to offer
answers for this theoretical discussion in nationalism scholarly, I argue that it is necessary to
probe some amount into the discussion for the Turkish nationalism case.
The question whether the nationalism creates the nation states or vice versa is still an
ongoing issue of discussion on the agenda of nationalism theoretical debates and scholar
circles. Although the primordialist approach lost its weight against the arguments presented
by the modernists, the ethno-symbolist offerings, conceding that nation are the products of
modernization yet at the same time pointing out the existence of pre-ethnic and cultural
linkages with traditional forms and structures, counterbalanced against the modernist camp.
For the modernist camp mainly, nationalism predates, creates nation. For Anderson, except
the primitive villages, where face to face contact is impossible to attain for the whole
members, all the communities are “imagined”44. They are all “imagined communities” and
artifacts that are designed through the process of modernization epoch. Hobsbawm also
defines nations and nationalism with the apposition of “social engineering” and suggests that
“invented traditions” abridges the novelty of nations with a “suitable” past.45 Different
explanations and variables are provided within the modernist camp that invades into the ethno
symbolist domain. For Hobsbawm, as well for Gellner industrialization and new class and
group formations are the main reasons for creating nations, for Anderson it was the print
capitalism and mass literacy. Overall, the modernist camp sticks on the vital playing role of
“mass” participation and consciousness and technological innovation for the formation of
nation, and so for explaining the relationship between nationalism and nation. On the other
hand, Anthony Smith, having a stance close to ethno-symbolist approach, draws different
perspective depending upon the arguments presented by Neo-Perennialists. Hastings
definition of nation establishes the cores of arguments presented by Smith. Hasting says that,
“one cannot say that for a nation to exist it is necessary that everyone within it should want it
to exist or have full consciousness that it does exist…”46 In other words, although the pre-
modern “nations” or “ethno-cultural” communities do not have the same common sense of
44
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities Reflections on the origin and the spread of Nationalism, Verso:
London/NY, 1991, pp.6-9.
45
J.E Hobsbawn and T Ranger, The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Pres,1983, p.1.
46
Montserrat Guibernau, John Hutchinson , “Introduction,” Understanding Nationalism, Montserrat Guibernau,
(eds), John Hutchinson,(eds), Cambridge: Polity Press, Cambridge 2001, p 15.
24
being a nation and do not constitute a secular institutionalized political umbrella under which
citizens are organized, this does not necessarily mean that we cannot categorize them as
nations. Anderson adds that if medieval and ancient nations have existed in a sense of culture,
rather political, this blurs the definition provided in the modernist camp. By accepting the
definition of ethnie (Smith uses the word instead of ethnic) in a broader sense, rather than in a
narrow sense which takes physical similarities as base, he defines it as “a named unit of
population with common ancestry myths and shared historical memories, elements of shared
culture, a link with a historic territory and some measure of solidarity, at least among the
elites”47
In her article, Nergis Canefe presents a theoretical discussion regarding the Turkish
nationalism and enumerates the facts which display the appropriateness and applicability of
ethno-symbolic approach for the Turkish case. She points out to the “measure of solidarity”
“at least” among the new generation educated military/political bureaucrats during last
decades of the empire, committed to the awakening of economical consciousness against the
non-Muslim bourgeois and the demographic purge of Anatolia at onset of Turkish
nationalism.48 Whether the Turkish nationalism was established upon the linkages with true
ethnic past and ancestry or whether it was purely an artificial “social engineering”, it was the
elites of the Turkish nationalism who were more enthusiastic and willing in (re)creating and
(re)constructing cultural symbols, themes, commonalities for defining their distinctiveness
against others. It was the secular intelligentsia who believed in this “shared” common
elements more than an ethnically homogenized community. However, even the elites in the
Turkish nationalism were not, unified group. There had been ideological cleavages, political
rivalries inherited from the Unity and Progress times and the Independence War times.
Although the Pan Turkism‟s Völkisch oscillations and Kemalist nationalism policies merged
with each during the initial abyss of the nation building process and onset of the WW.II, these
two deviations of Turkish nationalism and further fragmentation within themselves, can be
evaluated within this context. Therefore, instead of one shared ground regarding the ethnic
and historic linkages with the past, there had been diversified shared amalgamated ground(s)
where different nationalisms or ideologies arose out of diversified perceptions of ethnie. Tanıl
Bora‟s argument also verifies this fact. He suggests the manifestation of the nation building
process and the configuration of the national identity are problematic issues in general even if

47
Ibid, p.19.
48
Nergis Canefe, Turkish nationalism and Ethno-Symbolic analysis: The rules of exception, Nations and
Nationalism 8 (2) ,ASEN 2002, pp.133-155.
25
in the Turkish case, an ethnically purified geography would be among main pre conditions.
He offers the Nebula analogy for Turkish case and suggests that Turkish nationalism is
composed of diversified strata and social dynamics where different nation and nationalism
designs exist in it.49 Furthermore he states that a constant national identity was tried to be
revealed out of this Nebula after the War of Independence during the populist one party
period.50
Instead of sole use of pre existing cultural linkages the perceptions, discourses and
historical interpretations related with these so called pre existing cements were used for policy
legitimizations. Put differently, these different perceptions of the history and ethnie were in
the driving seat in the machinery of the Turkish nationalism. Hence rather than sticking on a
modernist or ethno-symbolist approach and try to solve the discrepancies between two camps,
I claim this nebula constitution laid the cores of the Turkish nation and the national identity
designed for its citizens. However, there had been another driving force in the Turkish
nationalism, like in all other non-Western nationalisms, that is the idealization of the Western
modernity. Indeed Smith, as an ethno-symbolist, also adds this factor into the basket of
nationalism theories.
Smith as an ethno-symbolist distinguishes two types of nation formation, what he calls
the first “lateral” (aristocratic) and the “vertical” (demotic). The lateral nation formation
where the ethnie(s) are mostly confined to upper strata mostly suits with nation formations in
the Western Europe. In the second case, where the ethnic persistence is based on religion, the
primary task of the secular intelligentsia is to alter the basic relationship between ethnicity
and religion. In other words, the community of faithful had to be distinguished from the
community of historic culture. Smith provides three different paths to solve this dilemma.
First, “a conscious modernizing return to traditionalism”, second “a messianic desire to
assimilate to Western modernity” and lastly,” a more defensive attempt to synthesize elements
of tradition with the aspects Western modernity.”51 The main task of an ethnic intelligentsia
was “to mobilize a formerly passive community into a forming nation around the new
vernacular historical culture it has discovered.”52 It was the third path that Kemalist elites had
followed, ostensibly not copying the Western modernity but enriching Turkish ethnie which is
historically had been “directed” to Western World. Indeed, what the elites did in the Turkish

49
Tanıl Bora , İnşa Döneminde Türk Kimliği, Toplum ve Bilim, 1996 N.71, p.171.
50
Ibid, p.172
51
Anthony D. Smith, National Identity, London: Penguin Books, 1991, pp.63-64.
52
Ibid, p.64.
26
nation building process was to use the enlightening principles of the Occident for charting the
Turkish ethnie and using the Occident as a legitimization ground instead of a full convergence
with it.
According to Chatterjee, Western ideas of rationality “relegated” non-Western cultures
into “unscientific traditionalism”.53 This label of “relegation” was valid as well for Kemalist
nationalism. It was believed that the traditionalist “regressive” themes, beliefs, principles in
political motions in the cultural fields could be melted through injection of “scientific”
“rational” Western values. The ruling elites of the Turkish nationalism expected that their
citizens, as the passive “subjects” of their ideology, would amalgamate all the stuff into their
new national identities that was served in front of them. They hoped that the peasants of the
Anatolia and the new migrated ethnic communities into these lands were going to imagine the
same “modern” community as the others had done in the continent of Europe. However, as
happened in all other Middle Eastern nationalist projects and colonized domains, the modern
nation state did not appear under the same cortex as happened in the continent of Europe.
Nationalism says Partha Chatterjee “was entirely a product of political history of Europe. “If
the nationalisms in the rest of world have to choose their “imagined community” from certain
“modular forms already made available to them by Europe”, what do they have left to
imagine”54 According to him, although the “derivative discourse” function of West exists
within the anti and post colonial nationalisms, the dynamics and motions were never
constituted in a flattered way. Put differently, it means nationalisms the third world was not
totally dominated by Western models of nationhood. If there was an imitation of the West in
every aspect of life, for then the distinction between the West and East would disappear and
“the self-identity of national culture would itself be threatened”55 On contrary, the positivist
principles of Western modernity did not eased the West and the East discrepancy but it
clinched it by establishing so called pre-existing linkages with the past. However in most
aspects these were not ancient bonds for finding the dormant cultural values of particular
nations yet were the recent cultural codifications for drawing the borders of the Eastern
national identities towards West. In some aspects, this provided an artificial and fragile unity

53
Partha Chatterjee, Nationalist Thought and Colonial World: A derivative discourse?, New Jersey: Zed Books
1986, p.16. cited in Özkırımlı, (2000), p.194.
54
Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories, New Jersey: Princeton
University Press,1993, pp.3-5.
55
Partha Chatterjee, “The Nationalist Resolution of the Women‟s Question”, Recasting Women Essays in
Colonial History, K.Sanghari, S.Vaid (Ed), , Rutgers University Press, 1990, p.237. cited in Özkırımlı,(2000)
p.194,
27
in the third world as presented in Turkish nationalism‟s unproductive weak stance towards the
separatist Kurdish nationalism. But in most sense, this fragility, baseless unity established
against the Western world, embarked the people in the third world to search for their destiny.
Rather than an easy flash of imagination task, the national formations in the East were much
more troublesome motion that I call as “daydreaming”.
I define the imagination of nation in the underdeveloped Oriental surrounding as
“daydreaming”. Daydreaming kills the creativity of making an action during the day time. It
is not imagination but daydreaming because the nation building process in the Turkish case
revealed an air of confusion, an act of blindness, an emptiness of the time, the problem and
the ambiguity of the present. This ambiguity of the vortex provided a new spatial time for
journey to search for their own modern story through which the “West” fancy/illusion was
both being allured and impelled. From Kemalist elites and bureaucrats, to the organic
intellectuals and ordinary peoples, all embarked on daydreaming for a modern nation through
“Occidentalist Fantasy”. The nationalist formulation was constituted in a paradoxical
arrangement, while protecting the distinctiveness of Turkish ethnie, it was to become a part of
Western civilization but at the same time this meant the admission of an Oriental legacy that
has been the part of “self-identity”. Daydreaming for their own modernity, own modern
nation paved way to a more complex and divergent configuration of the nation than
Anderson‟s “imagined communities”. Although, daydreaming annihilated the creativity of
“imagination”, eroded the notion of an “actual” Western modern nation, in the Turkish case,
it seeded the germs for a more dynamic, diversified original, peculiar creativity of which
vividness is dazzling, as experienced in the all third world, compared to the “less rigorous”
modernization process in the West.56 Furthermore, the Kemalist superficial positivist
approach also miscalculated the possibility that their subjects indirectly would contribute into
this daydreaming with them. Put another way, Kemalists did not expect that their passive
subjects would also daydream about their own destiny and renounce the idea of seeing their
existence as a nihilistic punch line. In the field of music, where the people reacted to the being
of a nihilistic punch line, occurred in the popular culture domain of the productions. The
Orhan Gencebay Arabesk, the popular market Allaturca music of Sadettin Kaynak, Minnur
Nurretin Selçuk just revealed after the abolishment of Tekkes and Zaviyes (religious lodges

56
Özbek, (1991), pp.45-46. Özbek says, the production of Arabesk music by Orhan Gencebay, a music genre,
enriched with Western music disciple and technology, with Arab rhythms and maqam music lyric structure, is an
indication of vivid creation of modernism in the third world.
28
and cloisters), the short lived Kanto music genre in Istanbul city57 or the arrangé songs of
1960s, and the 1970s mass popular music genres, all are indications that the subjects of nation
building process, that is the ordinary individuals also daydream for their own destiny, own
aesthetic entertainment elements that they themselves designed for the community that is
lived in.
Otto Bauer defines a nation as a “community of destiny”. “The nation is not the
product of more similarity of destiny” says he, “but that it arises from and consists in the
community of destiny, the constant interaction of those who share the destiny, distinguishes
the nation from all other communities of character”58 What unified the all subjects of Turkish
nationalism was the “common destiny” of daydreaming for a nation which can co exist with
the Western World without full submission to it. Rather than the imagination of a common
thing, the experience of common destiny has bound the Turkish citizens together, especially
this is very apparent in the motions of history of music. In brief, Turkish nationalism even
though never has been colonized, shares the typical characteristics of the nationalisms in the
all non Western world. Rather than the “imagination” of a body of commonness, the
“common destiny”, daydreaming for a distinctiveness constituted across the mirror of the
Occident, laid the motions and dynamics of Turkish nationalism.

The origins of the Turkish Nationalist Ideology and the Initial phases

According to the Stanford Shaw, the intellectuals, the migrated Caucasian rebellions
against the Russian yoke, constituted the biggest part of the Turkish nationalism. 59 Besides,
the educated military officers at the Western Thrace who were in close contact with German
army officers and under the influence of political philosophical doctrines of the West, the
Crimean Turks, the Caucasian Moslems who experienced the dreadful Russian Civil war,
later migrated to the Istanbul and other parts of the Anatolia, all contributed to the
configuration of Turkish nationalism60 through romantic literature channels and active
political oscillations.61 This romantic/cultural curiosity for a Turkish civilization beyond the

57
Tekelioğlu, (1996), p.198.
58
Otto Bauer , “The Nation”, Mapping the Nation, Gopal Balakrishnan,(Ed), London/NY: Verso Publishing
1996, p.52.
59
Stanford Shaw , History of The Ottoman Empire, Cambridge: Cambridge, 1973, p.26.
60
Mehmet KarakaĢ , Türkçülük ve Türk Milliyetçiliği, Doğu Batı Dergisi, Vol.9 Number: 38, 2006, p.62.
61
Ziya Gökalp and Yusuf Akçura, the two big romantic Turkish nationalists, both originally were from the
Caucasians. Many other intellectuals like them, migrated from the various parts of the Azerbeycan, Tataristan,
Central Asia and the Balkans, where a nationalist consciousness revealed among the trading strata against the
29
Ottoman lands and civilization was triggered by the Turcological studies published by the
European scholars in the 19th century. On the other hand, the political elements in Turkish
nationalism commenced carrying a compressible superior voice as the other doctrines
Ottomanism and the notion of Ümmet (belief in a sole Islamic unity) appeared as impractical
solutions for the disintegration of the Empire. The loss of the Balkan territories eroded the
Ottomanism notion and the Pan-Islamism as an alternative, as it also failed in the prevention
of disintegration of the Empire by the end of the I. World War. Following this process,
Turkish nationalism spread around the political circles of Unity and Progress Association, as
being the most dominant political institution in the Ottoman State, after year of 1913.62 The
cadres of the Unity and Progress association succeeded in the Independence War and in 1920
first parliamentary of the Republic were held, gathering the leading figures from this
association, at Ankara as the new iconic capital city against the ambiguity of failed Ottoman
center. In the very first years of 1920s, there had been divergence of opinions within the
Turkish nationalist political circles. The fractions survived in the first parliament of the
Republic between the years of1920-23,63 however the beginning of the second parliament
marked the definite domination of one-party system. After 1923, by the declaration of the
republic with a sudden unexpected decision, it was then a new mark in the Turkish nation
building history. In brief, converged with the Orientalist academic curiosity for the roots of
Turkish civilization beyond continent of Europe and the political turmoil of the Empire all
contributed to the rise of the Turkish nationalism onset of the foundation of the republic.
Gradually, the Unity and the Progress Committee spread through the institutional framework
of the empire and gained power to apply some degree of cultural social reforms on the society
between the years 1913-1918.64
The Unity and the Progress survived with its underground infrastructure just after the
invasion of the Istanbul. The linkages with Istanbul had weakened since the Damat Ferit

“Russification” pressure. Their journals, periodicals, poets all contributed to the revival of the romantic Turkish
nationalism in the Empire. “Young Pens” (Genç Kalemler) at Selanik and the Turkish Nation (Türk Yurdu)
periodicals were important sources of the romantic Turkish Nationalism. Even though, the romantic Turkish
nationalism had never been sharp and dogmatic as the official ideology, it opened the channels for the
constitution of it. For instance, Yusuf Akçura‟s article, “Üç Tarzı Siyaset” never manifested one of the policies
among, Islamism, Ottomanism and Turkism, it caused an inspirational effected in the bureaucratic and
intellectual circles. See, Suavi Aydın, Milliyetçilik ve Modernleşme, Ankara: Gündoğan Yayınları, 1993,
pp.162-166.
62
Erik Jan Zürcher, Modernleşen Türkiye‟nin Tarihi, Istanbul: ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 1995, p.163.
63
For a detailed information about the first parliament period see, Ahmet Demirel, Birinci Mecliste Muhalefet:
İkinci Grup, ĠletiĢim yayınları, 1994.
64
Zürcher, (1995), pp. 176-179.
30
Pasha Administration took over charge of the parliament.65 After the independence war, this
underground political institution with the constitution of diversified competing ideas and
authorities had appeared as the sole power base in the political panorama of the Anatolia.
After 1920s, there left no external and internal political obstacle for these military elite cadres
for laying the cores of their project.
The initial phases of “nationalism the flourishing of so called “democratization” phase
is crucially important and has significant embodying effects on the multitudes which
experience it. Type of political experiences, institutions and the hegemonic power bases
which prevail during this phase can be decisive for the formation of national identity.
Nationalist elites commonly are inclined to prevent the constitution of any dissident power
base such as ethnic minorities, working classes or rival elites against their authority. Any
power base run counter to the hegemonic elite class could be labeled as enemy or threat. In
short, nationalism, a doctrine of rule in the name of the people but not necessarily by people,
provides open grounds for elites to be popular and dominant without being fully democratic.
The absence of democracy among the “six arrows”, six principles of the Republican Party
program was thence not surprise. The democratic notion of harmony, the endurance for the
diversity lessens in the line with the inherited socio political structure and legacy from the late
Ottoman era. The power race within the fragmented Union, the existence of Istanbul as an
alternative administrative base and the threat of the Imperialism were the all other sources of
power that paved to vanishing of democracy from the agenda of the Turkish republic.
Coupled with the harshening economic conditions, the notion of the democracy were the least
mentioned norm discussed in the political debated among the nation constructers.
Jack Snyder suggests that if the economic development level, social political fields
and frameworks are not that advanced within a particular community, the national elites are
more free to “hijack” political discourse so does the national identity. Nationalism becomes
exclusionary, revolutionary, counter-revolutionary and turns out be ethnic nationalism in the
worst case scenario as the strength of the institutional, economical framework and also the
“adaptability”66 of elite interests decreases. In other words, the political agenda, so the
cultural and social formations are much more vulnerable to the elite manipulation as the
power of institutions decreases. Therefore, the elite interests become more effective in
65
Ibid, p.222.
66
The adaptability of the elite‟s interests and types of revolutions can explained differences in the cases of pre-
war I Germany and Revolutionary France, the ethnic nationalism occurs as in the case of Serbia, where the elite
adaptability and the level of institutionalism are much poor. See Jack Snyder, From Voting to Violence:
Democratization and Nationalist Conflict, NY/London: W.W.Norton&Company, 2000, p.39.
31
shaping the national identities.67 Furthermore, where the adaptability of elites interests are
rigid and where both representative and administrative are weak, the appearance of
“propagation” of the exclusionary cultural and revolutionary themes are highly likely for
gaining “popular” support.68 These facts were valid for the Turkish nationalism as well. The
relentless and destructive desire for breaking up with the past paved way the annihilation of
the all institutions established under the Ottoman framework. The destructive tidal waves of
the great depression of 1930s and the onset of the insecure surrounding of the World War II
all decreased the level of “elites” adaptability. Furthermore coming from the Unity and
Progress cadres –the convergence of a militarist political institution in which the power
relations and bases were fluid- political ambitions for taking the leading role on the
continuing Milli Mücadele (National Struggle) committee, as the rebellious union against both
Istanbul and to imperial invasions, harden the “rigidity” of the Kemalist‟ interests
adaptability. As the 1923s arrived, all the source of opposition or balancing political power
against the hegemony were destroyed or at least mitigated. The birth of the one-party system
opened a new era in the Turkish modernization history.
However, this does not mean the reduction of the Turkish modernization project to an
elite project under a particular determined ideological map imposed from top to down layers
of the community. This type of approach do only assesses Turkish nationalism as a “non-
historic” and non-sociological fact. Nationalist ideology, says John Breuilly “is neither an
expression of national identity (at least there is no rational way of showing that to be the case)
nor the arbitrary invention of nationalists for political purposes. “It arises out of need to make
the sense of complex social and political arrangements”69 I suggest these “complex
arrangements” have been the actual gears of the Turkish nationalist ideology and the
modernization machine that it runs. In sum, the appearance of Kemalist ideology as the sole
and manipulating source of power did not directly influenced the configuration of the national
identity at all. Instead, the ideology‟s complex nature of the modernism project, the threats
and the targets that it own self created, contributed to the formation of its cores so does the
dress of national identity on the souls of the people.

67
Ibid pp.36-39.
68
Ibid, p.75.
69
John Breuilly, Nationalism and the State, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1982, cited in Zygmunt
Bauman Modernity and Ambivalence, London: Politiy press, 1993, p.343.
32
 The Ottoman Music as a Waste of Modernity: the dichotomy of Modernism and
Modernization
In general, the modernization theories basically are formed to explain the
modernization process in the countries where the capitalism could not be initiated by natural
causes.70According to common ground of these theories, modernization is the great
transformation of the tradition; it is an inevitable alteration of the traditional societies in a
linear path, from traditional societies to modern ones.71 This approach mostly conjuncts
modernization with mass production of goods and properties, capitalist industrialization,
increase in telecommunication webs and the technological innovation that accompany them.
Through the increase of material aspects of the modernization, it was believed that the
democratic, liberal values, notions regarding individuality and rationality would spread
through the non-Western world72 and at the end, a deemed cultural universal harmony would
encompass this trend yet with the “remnants” of the traditional and “folkloric” customs and
attitudes.73
However, the recent debates displays that the pre assumption of modernization
“linear” development path “decays.” “Many diverse combination of modern and the
traditional are to be found in the concrete social settings” says Anthony Giddens.74 Hence, it
is might be argued that dichotomy of “modern” and “traditional” basically do not disappear
through modernization process. The “invention of tradition” in different time scales and space
horizons also connects by joint to this process.75 Hence, instead of accepting modernization as
a linear process I suggest that it as a metamorphosis in a “non-linear” process that all the
traditional modes of production, structures of social organization, political legitimization, as
well as traditional norms and values are progressively pressured and changed by patterns of a
new modern society76. Put another way, although the different process of industrialization
becoming progressively similar in their socio-cultural correlations, the responses of the

70
Daniel Lerner , Modernization Social Aspects, International Encyclopedia of Social Sciences, Vol.5, New
York: Free Press, 1968, pp. 386-384.
71
Dietrich Jung and Wolfango Piccoli, Turkey at the Crossroads, Ottoman Legacies and a Greater Middle East
LondonZed Books, 2001, p.13.
72
Aydın, (1993), pp.22-23
73
S.N Eisenstadt, “The Kemalist Regime and Modernization: Some Comparative and Analytical Remarks”
Atatürk and the Modernization of Turkey,Jacob M. Landau(Ed), Brill Academic Publisher, 1997, p.8, see in
Turkish Meral AlakuĢ(Ed), Atatürk ve Türkiye‟nin Modernleşmesi, Istanbul: Gündüz Basım Dağıtım, June,
1999, p.23.
74
Giddens, p.36.
75
Ibid, p.37.
76
Dietrich and Piccoli, (2001), p.13.
33
society towards modernization are different.77 Whilst the overall process of modernization
could be universal, it manifests itself in different particular ways in each affected society.78
Modernization should be seen as unplanned complex long-term process79 in which the social
and cultural structures are shaped, affected, altered sustained or purged as in the case in the
case of Ottoman/Turkish modernization.80
The evidences for different manifestations of modernization process paved way to the
critiques of modernization concept and alternative ways of explanations since the last quarter
century. Although the post modern discourse is produced within the Western world, it became
more attractive to the intellectuals and academicians of non-Western world, where the
modernization were not manifested in a full-fledged Western style.81 “In Turkey and around
the world today, we are witnessing eclipse of the progressive and emancipatory the discourse
of modernity”. Sibel Bozdoğan and ReĢat Kasaba describe Kemalist doctrine as
“antidemocratic” and “patriarchal” lean from top to the bottom.82 Indeed, the scholars who
praised the Kemalist revolution and who have neglected the social aspects of Turkish
modernization project in recent times started modifying their arguments such as Bernard
Lewis who pointed out the “deeper affinity” between Turkish community and Western
civilization.83 Bernard Lewis had been “applauding” the emergence of Modern Kemalist
Turkey, but later in recent times, he admitted that the Republic has been hanging on a place
between the East and West and could not catch the required modern standards.84
The ultimate production of the modernization is the nation-state structure, a given
definite territory, a “political community” with a capitalist market that is ordered by the
monopolization of the legitimate physical force of state, in Weber‟s terminology. However,
modernizations in the West were the natural causes of the strata formations and social

77
S.N Eisenstadt, “Introduction”, Patterns of Modernity: Modernization Beyond the West Vol.I , S.N
Eisenstadt,(Ed) ,New York University Press, 1987, pp.2-11.
78
I.M.Lapidus “Islam and Modernity”, Patterns of Modernity: Modernization Beyond the West Vol.II S.N
Eisenstadt,(Ed), New York University Press, 1987, p.87.
79
Giddens describes modernization with a “Juggernaut” narrative, a truck which do not have “integrated”
machinery but “in which there is a stressful, contradictory, push-and-pull of different influences. He claims that
the road of this juggernaut is sometimes predictable but sometimes not. “The juggernaut could also crash who
resists” says he. See Giddens, (1990) p.139.
80
Dietrish and Piccoli (2001) p.13.
81
Nur Verin, Siyasetin Sosyolojisi: Kavramlar,Tanımlar,Yaklaşımlar, Istanbul:Bağlam, 2003, p.283.
82
Siblel Bozdoğan and ReĢat Kasaba, “Introduction”, Rethinking Modernity and National Identity in Turkey,
Sibel Bozdoğan (Ed) and ReĢat Kasaba (Ed) , Seattle: University of Washington Press 1997, pp.2-4. for Turkish
translation Türkiye‟de Modernleşme ve Ulusal Kimlik, Istanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yayınları 1998.
83
Bernard Lewis, The Emergence Of Modern Turkey, 3rd Edition Oxford University Press, 2002, p.17.
84
Bernard Lewis, The Future of the Middle East, London: Phoenix 1997, p.48. cited in Ahıska, (2005), p.39.
34
changes while in the East were the dictation of the ruling elites from the top to the bottom.85
Modernization in the Turkish Republic, similar to the colonial and post colonial cases, was
initiated under the hegemony of the state and performed for only sake of being “modern”. Put
another way, the nation formation and the state configuration processes converged with each
other. It is not a process that is motioned in its own dynamism but an “elite driven” one.86
Furthermore, the modernization project under the control of Kemalists did not aim to
modernize individual and create harmony between individuals and the society that they live
in. On contrary, Kemalists aimed to modernize the whole nation in which the subjects are
being forced to live in a united homogenized structure.87 The “modern” for the Kemalist, was
a relentless pursuit after the Western idealization that was being reinvented in different time
scales space horizons. The resurrection of the modern Turkish ethnic soul from the “Arabic”
Oriental Ottoman death body was sublime mission to be completed. Through only this
sublime but infeasible task, the Kemalist would accomplish the idealization of being a
“bridge” between the East and the West.
The paradoxical synthesis, being a bridge between the East and the West, a narration
that is still valid in recent times,88 or what Breuilly would call the “complex arrangement”
between the Eastern Turkish ethnic identity and the elements of Western Civilization, have
been forming new “ambiguities” and “ambivalences” for the Kemalist top-down
modernization project since the foundation of the republic. ReĢat Kasaba says, “It might be
worthwhile to remember that what inspired and empowered many of the thinkers, writers and
activities of the modern era were not certainties that were later invented but the ambivalence
and excitement of modernization as it unfolded as a world historical process.” 89 Indeed, the
smell of “chaos” in the air was the legitimization of the Kemalist state for performing its
policies and cultural penetrations made through the mid of the society. For the sake of
bringing “order” to “chaos”, the society could be labeled as multitude to be educated and so
its cultural “backwardness” would had been erased. In other words, dividing the society into

85
Aydın, (1993), p.77.
86
Bozdoğan and Kasaba, (1997), Introduction, pp.3-4.
87
Çağlar Keyder, “Whither the Project of Modernity? Turkey in 1990s”, Bozdoğan, (Ed) and Kasaba, (Ed),
(1997), p.38 in Turkish translation 1990‟larda Türkiye‟nin Modernleşmenin Doğrultusunda,Bozdoğan and
Kasaba (1998).
88
Ahıska, (2005), p.43.
89
ReĢat Kasaba , “Kemalist Certainties and Modern Ambiguities”, Bozdoğan,(Ed), and Kasaba, (Ed), (1997)
pp.18-19.
35
two fragments, as “advanced” “backward” provides a legitimized political apparatus to the
administrative elites for correcting the deficiency in the society.90
The theoretical approaches to modernization process mainly neglect the cultural and
moral aspects. However, besides the macro level existence of modernization there is also the
micro level experience, living and side effects of it at the individual discretion. The
dialectical linkage between Modernism and Modernization process which is put forward by
Marshal Berman successfully summarizes this distinct but converged faces of modernization
process. He says besides the socio-economic modernization that is mostly converged with
“development” and the socio economic modernization also creates incentives for self
development at the individual level in a cultural context. He claims that “modernity” cannot
be abstracted from the individual effect. He says “modernity is either embraced with a blind
and uncritical enthusiasm, or else condemned with a neo-Olympian remoteness and contempt;
in either case, it is conceived as a close monolith, incapable of being shaped or changed by the
modern men”91. As I suggested previously, the individuals are not passive subjects of the
modernization projects that is mostly in the third world imposed upon them. Chatterjee‟s
argument related with the colonial and post colonial nationalism, especially the Indian case he
deals with, illuminates how the modern existence creates incentive for individuals to search
for their own “modern” structure and how they actively and creatively contribute to this
process. Berman also describes the “modernism” in the third world as search for their original
cores.92 In the usage adopted in this study, modernization process or the modernism at
individual or social experience refers to the generalized panoramas which display the various
transformations and alternations of social life attendant upon the rise of a market society and
nation state. In sum, my research is more inclined to investigate the individual experience of
modernism and human felt and made micro contributions to it. I will try to present how these
micro individual motions and dynamics have an effective role on the whole story of the music
revolution and modernization story.
Through the radio audience letters, on the methodological lessons in the music
journals, in the memories of the Kemalist musicians and in the Atatürk‟s souvenirs related
with music, as the soul and pure representation of the whole nation as a “father” icon, I
discovered the signs, leaks and words of tenseness being in a modernizing environment.
Through the quest for the “modern” in an Oriental surrounding revealed the destroying desire

90
Ibid, p.24.
91
Berman, (1983), p.24.
92
Berman, (1983), pp.124-126.
36
to change, modify, demark or to give meaning to everything that was “ambiguous” and
“ambivalent” Most of the comments about the condition of Ottoman/Turkish music, even the
ones made by Ottoman/Music performers themselves and skeptics who defend the absurdity
of imposition of Western music on the public, included words related with “chaos” and
“order” or the necessity for the modernizing the Ottoman Music. According to Western
admirer musicians and defending political bureaucrats of this camp, the Ottoman music
because of its complex blending sound structures saturated by different geographies and its
religious/mystic elements and teaching techniques, urgently needed to be abandoned.
Intellectuals, who had nationalist perspective more close to “Urbanism” mostly discussed the
issue whether the Ottoman music was Turkish or not, complained about the Western influence
in Turkish music, and pointed out necessity for creating a “new” real national music. Among
those, even there were the ones who opposed the spread of folk songs of Anatolia, labeling
them as the songs of the “past”. Everybody was so enthusiastic about the offering their own
formulations or standards for modernizing and classifying the music they listen, including the
ordinary citizens from rural sides or small children who were passionately following the
music programs on radio, offering suggestions about the length of the programs and kinds
songs that they prefer listening. During this vortex There were tremendous discussions about
the classification names of the music genres existed and lively creative debating forums based
on questions such as: Was Ottoman music Turkish or not? Were the religious songs of Itri and
Dede Efendi could be classified as Ottoman Art Music? If there existed art music, was it
necessary to spread Western art music in these lands? What about the popular songs such as
Kantos of Istanbul city or the new popular rhythmic songs of Ottoman music such as the ones
composed by Haci Arif Bey? Could these music genres be classified under the mighty
legitimization of “modern” and “Occidental” labels? What was the difference between the
folk songs of Anatolia and Ottoman music of Istanbul? What about landing polyphonic
Western structures in the veins of folk songs? All these questions had been the basic
discussing topics of the intellectuals, musicians and musicologists of the early republic period.
Zygmunt Bauman defines modernity as a “self-destructive” and “self-propelling”
struggle against ambivalence, it is a dynamic quest for order but at the same time this
dynamism requires and creates chaos for questing order. The ultimate aim is to obtain order
which is not chaos and the chaos is what is not “orderly”. “Modern state and the modern
intellect alike need chaos-if only to go on creating order. They both thrive on the vanity of
their effort. Modernity sets an impossible and eternal task for itself to achieve. “The
37
impossible task is set by foci imaginary of absolute truth, pure art, humanity as such order
certainty harmony the end of the history”. Furthermore he says, “modernity is what it is – an
obsessive march forward- not because it always wants more, but because it never gets enough:
not because it grows more ambitious and adventurous, but because its adventures are bitter
and its ambitions frustrated.” Through this self creating dichotomy process, modernity
produces new channels and partitions. It creates new fragments and prides itself on
fragmentation of the world. Fragmentation is the prime source of its strength. “Modernity is
about the production of order then ambivalence is the waste of modernity” 93
After the readings I did about the music life in the late Ottoman Period and early
republic, I found s very complex and blended panorama of songs, musicians and ideas for the
improvement of the music. Many musicians were thickened in the abyss of Occidental-
Oriental music and polyphonic-monophonic contention. There also had been hybrid popular
music genres, such as the Kantos of Istanbul or the Hacı Arif Bey‟s latest productions in the
form of song. It was hard to determine the sides or classify and categorize song genres. For
instance, whilst the Rumeli (Western Thrace) folk songs were approved as ethnically Turkish,
Ottoman Istanbul city music was not. Mostly, the content of opinion articles, interviews or
the discussions published in the music and radio journals were about the “superiority” of
Western music and “inferiority” of Ottoman. The advanced polyphonic sound structure of the
Western music was praised even by the supporters of Ottoman music. When the beacon light
of the hegemonic ideology in power pointed out the necessity for the spread of Western music
culture and customs, like it was done in many other cultural reforms, the music men in the
Republic got lost and started searching for their path in the abyss. When this “complex
arrangement” is simplified, the core of the discussion reflects the tension of newly projected
national identity‟s place between the Western and Oriental civilization which is mostly related
with the inferiority of “Arab” identity. In the young rational and modern nation-state, the
Ottoman music appeared as an “ambiguous” art element neither Western nor “national” but at
the same it became as a cultural waste of modernity. The polyphonic superiority discourse of
Western music defined the Ottoman music as “inferior” because of its chaotic sound system
and it appeared as a necessity to nail the orderly Western Sound System for the sake bringing
order to chaos. In elaborated musicological terminology, the Ottoman Maqam (Makam)94

93
Bauman, (1993), pp.1-15.
94
Maqam is a modal structure, pairing of particular series of notes, tunes or sounds. “It is a set of compositional
rules by which the melodic component of a piece of music is realized.”(Signell, 1986) The closest counterpart in
Western music would be the medieval mode. Maqam or Makam, in Turkish way of writing, is mostly present in
38
music which has 590 different scales and rows with 75 different rhythm systems was trying to
be pressed into the 12 partition of sharp and flat Western note system of Piano.95

“Gardening” Kemalist State and Paradox of Distinctiveness

The modern state has been born as a “crusading, missionary, proselytizing force” on a
particular dominated population for with sublime mission to transform it into an orderly
society. Rationally designed society is declared as causa finalis of the modern state. Modern
state says Bauman is a “gardening state” and “its stance was a gardening stance”. Furthermore
he adds, the design authority of the gardening state is based on the split of the population into
useful plants to encouraged and tenderly propagated weeds to be removed out or rooted out.
They mighty voice of “reason” stiffens the unquestionable authority of modern state and the
task of gardening state96
The 1930s was the beginning of “gardening state” role for the ruling elites. Those
years, states Soner Çagaptay, were the years of “High Kemalism” with the convergence of
ethicist nationalism juxtaposition to the territory and religion in the nation building process of
the Turkish Republic.97 It was the years of a party-state-public unification in an organic sense
with a totalitarian disposition and configuration. The Republican Peoples Party diffused itself
into the layers of the public in order to enforce its rigid secularization and modernization
policies. The goal was to create a common homogenous Turkish identity with the
compensation of ethno-racist elements that were thought to replace/fulfill the place left by the
Islamic item. Although this rigid secularization process did not fully aim the disappearance of
Islam element from the identity, it was in some degree akin to reconfiguration of religion in
society, hoping to swindle it into the private sphere of the individuals.98 The Kemalists aimed
to create a homogenous and secular society that first required the transformation of the
religion. The catalyst of this reconfiguration was race. The vacuum of the Islamic element in
the Turkish identity was expected to be fulfilled by the “revival” of Turkish ethnie. The 1930s

the Oriental music, including Greek, Sepharadic Jewish, Ottoman/Turkish and Arap music genres. For a detailed
information about maqam see Cinuçen Tanrıkorur, Türk Müzik Kimliği, Istanbul/Ankara: Dergah Yayınları,
2004, pp.24-30. and also see Karl L.Signell, Makam: Modal Practice in Turkish Art Music, NY: Da Capo Press,
1986, p.16.
95
Tanrıkorur, (2004), pp.34-48.
96
Bauman, (1993), p.20.
97
Soner Çağaptay, Reconfiguring the Turkish Nation in the 1930s, Nationalism and Ethnic Politics, Vol.8 No.2
Summer 2002, p.67.
98
Lapidus, (1987), p.114.
39
were the years of the “race” as the key element for imagining a national identity and cohesion
within itself.99 Islam was not anymore needed as a binding element like it had been in the
1920s100 and as the time progressed it became a threat and a “weed” to the interests of the
elites. ġeyh Sait Kurdish-religious rebellion in the Eastern part of Anatolia gave the
opportunity to promulgate the “Law on the Maintenance of Order” (Takrir-i Sukün) on March
1925 which was the harbinger of the authoritarian years of the 1930s. 101 “The law on the
maintenance of Order and the independence tribunals effectively served the Kemalist regime
in crushing political opposition established around a liberal-Islamic scale, (that comes from
the period of first parliament)102 silencing critical journals and rushing the cultural
reforms”.103 In order to mitigate the threat of Islam and to purge the opposition and the weeds
formed around it, religion was retreated next to the national identity and moved out of its
mystic spiritual cortex.104 The abolishment of the Tekkes and Zaviyes, the annihilation of the
Ulema class (educated theologians) was among the visible footsteps for having a less
“threatening” religion. The closure of the religious institutions and houses does not only mean
forceful removal of Islam from the public traditions of society, but at the same times it was
the destruction of the art and culture sources, where Ottoman music and other areas of art had
been performed. It meant the destruction of the Mevlevi houses in various parts of Istanbul
and Anatolia where the Ottoman musicians had been holding classes in a traditional teaching
style for ages. The Islamic doctrines and lifestyle were imprisoned into privacy of individuals.
However this imprisonment found a new body in the political Islam in following and also

99
Nazan Maksudyan, Türklüğü Ölçmek: Bilimkurgusal Antropoloji ve Türk Milliyetçiliğin Irkçı Çehresi 1925-
1939, Istanbul: Metis Yayınları, 2005, p.14.
100
Çağaptay‟s article is illuminative to understand Kemalists pragmatic stance towards that could be observed in
their migration and resettlement policies. The independence War fought against Christian Greeks and the early
tragic events in the Easter Anatolia, handed Kemalists “Islam” as a political card during 1920s. There was a huge
influx of non-Turkic and Turkic Muslims from Balkans and Circassians to the republic On 31 May 1926, the
first resettlement law was codified in order to regulate and cope with this massive migration (approximately
719.808 migrants to 13 million population of Anatolia). The article basically prohibited the immigration of
Christians, including the Gagauz Turks and accepted the ones as migrants “who share with Turkish culture” The
Muslim identity had been used as a melting pot for assimilating the new habitants of Anatolia coming from
regions around. Atatürk‟s speech at the parliament in 1920 proves this fact. He says “You, the members of high
parliament are not only Turks or Circassians or Kurds or Lazes, you are the Islamic element made up of all
these” Nevertheless, as the 1930s arrived, there was more references to the “Turkish” ethnie. The article 7 of the
new resettlement law passed on 13 June1934, banned Jews, Christians, Arabs, Kurds and including Muslim
Albanians whose remoteness to “Turkish” ethnie was the primary reason.
101
Zürcher, (1995) , p.257.
102
For a detailed information about the opposition groupings in the initial years of the republic parliament see
Demirel, (1994).
103
Dietrich and Piccoli, (2001), p.70.
104
Lapidus, ( 1987) p.105.
40
recent years.105 Another imprisonment, the indirect limitation on the Ottoman religious music
and the inhibit on “melancholic” Ottoman popular music on radio broadcast found its body in
Arabesk music, in the notes rising from Orhan Gencebay‟s instrument Saz through the streets
of urbanizing cities in late 1960s.
The Kemalist “transformation” is planned on creating a classless “corporatist”
“solidarist” body of society for avoiding the revolutionary dynamics and “harmful” of
Marxism and capitalist-liberal market principles.106 “Positivism” was very common among the
discourses of Kemalist ideology and it had been a justification tool for carrying out the
transformations made on behalf of the people.107 For plugging the “mass consciousness”
concept into their new “organic” society, a new and more glorious history was required for
erasing the remnants of Ottoman civilization. Recreation of myths, (race and origin myths,
emancipation and migration stories, golden age and heroic stories) and going back to the
ancient times were approved as a necessity for creating the notion or the “imagination” of a
nation for all the states108 so for the Kemalist state as well. “Turkish History Thesis” and “Sun
Language Theory” were the academic studies led by the Kemalist intellectuals in order to
create and to propagate the glorious ancient days to the community. These along with other
academic studies, Kemalist supposed that all would contribute to the notion of the glorious
history and superiority of the Turkish Race. From then on, the romantic love of the
“Turkishness” by the teachers of literature such as Yusuf Akçura and Ziya Gökalp was
converged with an ethnie-racist sense depending upon the legitimacy of the Western scientific
positivist principles. The absolute belief in the scientific and deniable principles of the Western
Enlightenment solidified the state oriented borders of Turkish ethnie. Like all other Eastern
nationalisms, Turkish ideology started drawing the borders against a “degenerated”
Westernization, for retaining the distinctiveness of Turkishness. This contradictory attempt,
also occurred in the German nationalism, the acceptance of Western civilization and the
rejection of its cultural penetration, “was the leitmotiv in Turkish nationalism as it evolved
alongside Turkish modernization”.109

105
See, Haldun Gürlalp, “Modernization Policies and Islamist Politics in Turkey”, Bozdoğan,(Ed) and Kasaba
(Ed), (1997).
106
Taha Parla and Andrew Davison , Corporatist Ideology in Kemalist Turkey: Progress or Order, New York:
Syracuse University Press, 2004, pp.29-34.
107
Ibid, p.101.
108
Smith, (1991) p.66.
109
AyĢe Kadıoğlu, “The Paradox of Turkish Nationalism and the Construction of the Official Identity”,
Kedourie (Ed), (1996), p.179.
41
 The basic formulation of Turkish History thesis breaded a paradoxical new kind of
plants to the garden of society. It was the superiority of “Turkish” ethnie legitimized by studies
based on Western positivist principles and it was put forward to prevent the possible
“irrational” deviations in a rational modern society.

Turkish History Thesis

The Turkish History Thesis was suggested as one of the key elements in defining the
national identity and glue for constructing the cohesion within the national unity. The basic
goal of the studies done for “writing” this new history was to determine a glorious past, as a
launch point in order to jump over the backward history of the Ottoman Empire. Although this
new drafted heroic past aimed to destroy the backward history of the Ottoman Empire which
had been caused by the yoke of “alien” Arab and Persian civilizations, at the same time
Turkish nationalism nourished itself from this “backwardness” complex. “Backwardness of a
society” says Marshal Berman “has a volatile mixture of both “inferior” and “pride”.110 The
Turkish History Thesis was also put forward as a scientific proof in order to refresh collective
self-pride of the community and erase the “inferior” label that was posted during the late years
of the Ottoman Empire.111 The first study of Turkish History Thesis was performed by Afet
Ġnan -adopted child of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk- in the Turkish History Inquiry Association,
which was called Turkish History Institution after the merge into the structure of the party.
Basically in her speech, she said “the first and high tribe of the civilization is Turks, who are
from Central Asia and the Altay Lands”. Furthermore, Turks are the founders of the ancient
grand civilizations such as Sumerians, Akats, Hittites and Greeks, seeded all roots of the
civilizations, reaching from Mesopotamia, to Persian Lands and Anatolia throughout their
migration waves from Central Asia.112 The migration theory was so exaggerated that, Afet Ġnan
once even claimed that the swastika symbol of Nazi Germany belong to the Turks. 113 The
primary objective of the Turkish history thesis was to wipe the catastrophic history of the
Empire by creating a glorious history which is independent from it. It stepped out of the
“Occidentalist Fantasy”, the supreme belief in the Protestant positivist ethnics of
Enlightenment and was inspired by the Turcological studies made by the European Orientalists

110
Berman, (1983), p.43.
111
Ahmet Yıldız, Ne Mutlu Türküm Diyebilene, Türk Ulusal Kimliğinin Etno-seküler Sınırları 1919-1938,
Istanbul:ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 2001 p.160.
112
Ibid, p.58.
113
Günay Göksu Özdoğan, Turan‟dan Bozkurt‟a, Tek-Parti Döneminde Türkçülük(1931-1946), Istanbul:
ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 2001, p.85.
42
during the late 17th and 18th century. The Turkish History thesis is the mark of the
exclusionary ethnic face of the Kemalist ideology. It had an exclusionary sense towards Greeks
and Armenians who assumed as collaborators of imperialist powers, and it has been
exclusionary to the non-Turkic communities like Kurds. By the geographical-historical linkage
established with the Central Asia, it displayed the reflection of being different from the
Western civilization but at the same time this gave birth to the cleavages and fractions in the
Turkish Identity.

Pentatonic Theory
The new Turkish history thesis set out new dependents and essentials for the new
modern Turkish nation. The notion, the sentiment of coming from a “sublime” “ancient”
“mythical” history dependent on the undisputable mighty voice of the positivist principles and
the unifying feeling of the “common ancestors” were put forward by the nation builder elites
for solidifying the cohesion and belongingness within the new citizens. Committed to this, the
cores of the Turkish Folk music were also needed to be rediscovered by the positivist ethno
musical foundations. It was assumed through this way the “neglected” real Turkish folk music
could be injected into the hearts of the new citizens. Ahmet Saygun, as one of the member of
the Turkish Five in the field of music, published a workshop, discussing the cores of the
Turkish Music and the sublime Turkish race. As being former student of Hungarian musician
Béla Bartôk, he was inspired from the theory of Pentatonism, which is a note line system
composed of five pitches musical scales114. He claimed that the pentatonic lines were only
present in the folk songs of different provinces reaching from the lands of Central Asia to the
East of Europe geographical domains stretches beyond. According to him, Turkish folk songs
were among the ones that contained pentatonic sounds and tune structures. Nevertheless, his
first example for the pentatonic notation line up was among one of the songs that he himself
composed which was similar to a folkloric arrangement made by his friend Mahmut Ragıp
Gazimihal115. Saygun as being the passionate defender of the Kemalist ideology suggested that
the map of the pentatonic sounds was intersecting with the migration map of the history thesis
and claimed that where the pentatonic notes were available, it was the proof of the marks of

114
The definition of pentatonism can be found the inside, Uluslararası Dördüncü Türk Kültürü Kongresi
Bildirileri, pp.215-216.
115
Adnan Saygun, Atatürk ve Musiki:Onun ile Birlikte Ondan Sonra, Ankara: Cenap And Müzik Yayınları
Vakfı, date is not provided, p.47.
43
Turkish ethnie.116 The traces of the pentatonic tunes, drawn by Saygun, reaches from the Far
East Asia to the South America, although he had never been in these geographical zones and
performed empirical researches.117
Instead of an objective musicological study, his study was done for the purpose of
solidifying the Turkish History thesis. The creation, foundation of the Turkish national
language must also be added into the cultural package of music and history. Language as being
the significantly important element of the music, as it lays the lyrical phonetic structure, must
also be examined within detailed way.

Music: the sub component of the Language

For Hobsbawm, “the national languages spoken or written cannot emerge before
printing, mass literacy, and hence mass schooling”. 118 Before general primary education or the
print capitalism as Anderson points out, the vernacular dialects were established in small
towns, communities and these regional dialects were showing massive differentiations even in
the geographically near domains. Similar to many “social engineering” aspects and pieces of
modern nation, national languages are products of modern nation projects as well. Hobsbawm
says that “national languages are almost always semi-artificial constructs” and suggests that the
need for having a national language required both social and cultural (re)construction.119
Hobsbawn offers different explanations how a national language is established.120 I argue that
for the Turkish case, it was a reductive transition from an imperial Ottoman language to a more
simplified, “purified” vernacular dialect chosen by the political/bureaucratic circles mostly
spoken within them. In other words, “the official or cultural language of rulers and elite…came
to be the actual language” of the modern Turkey “via public education and other administrative
mechanisms.”121 For defending the necessity of having a national language, it can be argued
that, purification of an imperial language was a “pragmatic”122 choice made by the Kemalists,
taking into account the Turkish majority on the Anatolian lands. Whether it is a rational choice
for the majority of the public or the obtaining a “purified” common language that is more used

116
Adnan Saygun , Türk Halk Musikisin de Pentatonism , Istanbul Numune Matbaası, 1936, p.6.
117
Ibid, the map of pentatonic tunes is available at p.10.
118
E.J, Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism Since 1780, Cambridge University Pres, 1990, p.10.
119
Ibid, p.54.
120
Ibid, pp.54-62.
121
Ibid, p.64.
122
Even though I do not find it sensible to discuss the “pragmatism” of Kemalist ideology‟ cultural and social
policies, in various pages and specially in the second chapter, I have presented how the ruling elites had been
distanced from “pragmatism” in attaining the cultural goals and how this pragmatism was much more like
“experimentalism” attendant upon the elite‟s “unfamiliarity” towards the Anatolian community
44
by the new national elites, this does not change the fact that, the imperial Ottoman language
and the regional minority dialects were the targets to be removed and the “artificiality” of the
new Turkish language since many new words were created or founded by the Turkish
Language Institution. Indeed, I suggest that the creation of the modern Turkish language has
not even fulfilled the role of a nation language, a body of communication channel bringing all
the citizens within borders to a harmonic neutral ground. Unlike the modern national languages
of Europe, especially Latin oriented ones; it also did not open easy ways of communication
channels with the new neighbors and former house mates such as Arabs, Greeks or Armenians.
Instead of positive aspects of a modern language, it even jammed the communication channels
with the minority vernacular languages such as Kurdish or Istanbul Greeks. Moreover, the
imposition of a designed national language also influenced the folk songs of the Anatolian
lands.
The music as a sub component of the langue also needed to be taken in hand. Atatürk‟s
famous speech regarding the “discreditable condition of present music” at Sarayburnu on 9th of
August in 1928 was initiated by Pasha‟s declaration about the new alphabet revolution. He
handed a note paper written in new Turkish alphabet and words to one of his officers who were
unsuccessful in reading it in the open public arena. After the incident, he said “My brother had
trouble in reading the notes that I wrote in the new Turkish alphabet. I am sure after working
on it a little bit, he will succeed.”123 The alternation of the Arabic alphabet signs and the
(re)foundation of the “essential” Turkish words, or put another way, the creation of a national
language meant Turkification of the Anatolian songs, an issue that I will touch upon in the next
chapter. In the light of the provided detailed examples, I will illuminate how the vernacular
dialects of the Anatolia were tried to be squeezed into the modern Turkish language phonetic
structure and how the “essentiality” of these non-Turkic folk songs was converted. Before the
detailed case analogies, the linkage between the language and the music must be broadened.
The acceptance of Latin alphabet was the first move made in one night on the path for
having a national language. Atatürk showed himself with a white chalk in front of the black
board in the rural sides of the Anatolia. The Arabic alphabet was the alphabet of the Koran and
it was not compatible with the new secularist principles of the modern Turkey. 124 The old
imperial language with heavily under the influence of Arab and Persian phonetic, grammar
structure must now needed to be converted in to a new form, into a “comprehensible” modern

123
Atatürk‟ün Söylev ve Demeçleri (1907-1938), Ankara: Türk Ġnkılap Tarihi Enstitüsü Yayınları, 1959, p.251.
124
Bernard, (2002), pp.276-279.
45
 125
one as Gökalp offered. The new comprehensible language needed the (re)discovery of its
ancient origins and phonetic structure. As being a civilization coming from Central Asia, the
reviving Turkish language needed new words, a new history and a scientific theory. The
establishment of “Turkish Language Inquiry Institution” in the 1932, and the first congress
held in the Dolmabahçe Palace in the 26 September 1932 (just after the congress held for
history) were the signals that led to the creation of Sun Language Theory. According to the
first draft accepted in the congress, “as the Turks are founders of the first civilization in the
history of humanity, their language, there is no doubt that Turkish language is the first
language of the history.”126 Following the second, the third language congress was the
declaration of Sun Language Theory and according to the philological proposals accepted in
the theory, purification of language was going to be based upon establishing new words which
were “assumed” as Turkic origins127 and this process is supposed to “liberate the Turkish
Language from the Islamic Yoke.”128 Following the language revolution, many new Turkic
words were found or restructured according to the phonetic sounds of the theory.
In the absence of a common national language and modern technological innovation
such as radio, naturally, there had been regional differentiations among the folkloric songs of
Anatolia. Lying on the grand geography, there had been various vernacular dialects and
different communal languages spoken such as Greek, Armenian, and Kurdish on the lands of
Anatolia. The new national language requested a homogenized, purified common spoken by
purging the “chaos” of various spoken dialects and the official Ottoman language. In this
context, the rules of the phonetic structure determined by the Turkish Language Inquiry
Institution, inevitably was reflected on the Republic‟s new folk songs. Necdet Hasgül says
most of the folk chants collected for establishing a national folk archive lost their essentiality
mostly including Armenian, Greek and Kurdish ones. On the path for establishing a national
folk music archive, most of these folk songs were rewritten in a purified Turkish language and
were auscultated and thought to the public on the radio program called Yurttan Sesler,
performed by Mustafa Sarısözen who contributed to all the TRT and conservatory folk

125
See,Gökalp, (1990), pp.113-139 for his suggestions and offerings about the new national language.
126
Murat Katoğlu, Yeni Tarih Anlayışı, ve Türk Tarih Kurumu, Türkiye Tarihi 4, Istanbul: Cem Yayınları, 1992,
,p.420 cited in Maksudyan, (2005), p.68.
127
Maksudyan, (2005), p.70.
128
Afet Ġnan, Atatürk ve Türk Tarih Tezi Belleten Vol.3, 1939, pp. 234-6 cited in Hugh Poulton, Top Hat, Grey
Wolf and Crescent: Turkish Nationalism and the Turkish Republic, London: C.Hurst Publishing, 1997,
p.114.
46
archives. 129 Unlike the Ezan, the melodic call for the Moslems for pray, converted into Turkish
in 1932130 the alternations on the folk songs were generally irrecoverable. Most of the songs
which had been performed under the Turkish lyrics lost their original tuning and melodic
structures yet survived till the recent days such as Sarı Gelin, an Armenian folk song, sang in a
purified Turkish language.
The new language phonetic structure inevitably had converted most of the songs tuning
and musical essentials. The Ottoman high culture music constructed on poetic lyrical
frameworks and harmonic language structures such as Aruz, appeared as the wastes of
language reforms since their heavy complex lyrical structure became as redundant. The folk
songs of the periphery were also converted attendant upon the language revolution. However,
differentiating from the Ottoman high culture music, the process had a fragmentary sense on
the folk songs. For instance, Hasgül states that, the fact of singing in Turkish paved way to the
alternation of most of the Kurdish songs and created a new type that he calls “Kurdobesk” that
is still present in the popular Turkish music.131 Whether it is forcefully or voluntarily, the
imposition of the new national language that is constituted in a manner with ethnic anxieties,
burned the bridges with the minority dialects such as Kurdish, Greek and Armenian. The civic
territorial notion of Turkish nationalism was minimized in the language revolution. Whether it
was forcefully or voluntarily, state oriented or not, the new language was imposed upon the
minorities. The campaign that was initiated by the Türk Ocakları in the January 1928 was a
reflection of this reality. The camping urged the citizens to speak Turkish in the public areas
such as, theaters, cinemas, cafes and transportations by hanging posters and notes on the walls
and discouraged the minorities from using their vernacular languages132. Although the proposal
to legalize the camping was rejected by the government, it created tensions among the society
and an uncomfortable irritating environment especially for the non-Muslim minorities.133 In
1938, the British Ambassador Sir George Clark reported that “local Greeks and Jews were
fired or blamed for speaking a non-Turkish language”134 In such turmoil of the language
revolution and the discourses regarding the use of language, singing in the other language was

129
Necdet Hasgül, Cumhuriyet Dönemi Müzik Politikaları, in BÜFK 1996, N.62, p.35.
130
Lewis (2002), pp.276-279.
131
Hasgül (1996) p.45.
132
Arus Yumul, “Azınlık mı, Vatandaş mı?”, Türkiye‟de Çoğunluk ve Azınlık Politikları: AB sürecinde Yurttaşlık
Tartışmaları, A.Kaya(Ed) and T.Tarhanlı (Ed), Istanbul Tesev,2006, p.91.
133
Yıldız, (2001), pp.288-290.
134
Annual report on Turkey 1983 Foreign Office 371/23301/E1214 cited in Poulton,(1997), p 116.
47
probably disapproved. The “promiscuous” minority women singing on the meyhanes at
Istanbul135 or the Greek boys busking136 at streets of Izmir were mostly despised.

From Imperial submission of Modernism to National Modernist destruction in Music

The modernism in the Ottoman/Turkish music and admiration in the Occidental
polyphony encounters to the late Ottoman period during the Tanzimat reforms. The very first
incident of which material superiority of the West is approved was the military. The Janissaries
political diffusion into the palace interior domain and the defeats at various wars paved way to
modernization of the military institutions. The new orderly established army, the Nizam-I
Cedid, under III.Selim, needed a new dynamic march in a Western style, instead of the Mehter,
the Janissaries traditional band that was performed by two steps forward one left. The Italian
opera composer Giuseppe Donizetti, who received the rank of Pasha later on, was invited in
1826 to Istanbul for composing new “dynamic” Occidental band marches for the new army.
His presence in the palace paved way to the establishment of Saray Mızıka Mektebi (The
137
palace Military Band School) and the spread of the written notation skill among the public.
It is important to note that these “soldier musicians” had influential and constitutes the
pioneering cadres of the Western type musicians during the Republican period, 138
It is very interesting that the Abdülhamit II., the “opera lover” sultan‟s comments and
suggestions about Allaturca music is very much the same line with Gökalp‟s statements. He
says “I am not especially fond of Allaturca music. It makes me sleepy, and I prefer Allafranga
(Occidental) music, in particular the operas and the operettas.” He is also doubtful about the
origins of Allaturca music, since the Persian, Arab and the Greek influences are very apparent
in it.139 However, the discourses regarding the music reforms in the late 19th century Ottoman
Empire had sense of submission rather than destruction. There had been an increased interest
and admiration in the Occidental music within the palace since most of the Tanzimat Ottoman
rulers were so much enthusiastic in both listening and performing art of music. Nevertheless,
the notion of Ottoman modernism in the field of art, in the music was more based on a
“spontaneous synthesis” between East and West, rather than the destructive modernism of

135
Ahmet Sevengil Refik, Istanbul Nasıl Eğleniyordu, 1453‟ten 1927‟ye Kadar, Istanbul: ĠletiĢim Yayınları,
1998, pp 145-146.
136
The practice of musical performance at streets
137
Tekelioğlu (1996), p.199, see Kemal Sünder,(1998) p.50, Paçacı Gönül,(1998), p.10.
138
Tekelioğlu,(1996), p.198.
139
cited in Tekelioğlu (1996), p.197.
48
paradoxical Turkish nationalism. The spread of polyphonic music was commenced with the
flourishing of operas and musical operates at the Byzantium Bazaar in 1870 and at the
“Christian Pera,” Beyoğlu during 1839s and 1845s where the Rossi‟s Il Barbiere di Seviglia
had been performed on stage. From the newspaper announcements and the placards it is also
known that between years 1846-1847, famous occidental musicians such as F.Liszts,
H.Vieuxtemps, L.Auer had held public concerts at Pera.140 The Byzantium Bazaar was not the
only place, The French Theater founded in 1839 and the Naum Theater were the other stages
where operas and operates were staged. It is claimed that, the galas of famous operates such as
Cavalleria Rusticana and Aida were performed on these stages in 1872s before their premiers
at Paris.141 In addition to this vividness at the public domain, many music education institutions
both civilian and military were also founded during this decade. The Soldier Band Harmonica
School in 1863 and the Dârü-l Elhan (house of tunes), the first conservatory in 1916 were both
founded within these processes. It is very noteworthy that in an economically stagnated
imperial Empire, where the first urban horse tramway and a little metro tunnel was founded in
the 1870, these motions in the musical circles for the spread of polyphonic “sounds” are
precious.142 The musical surrounding was so vivid that since 1850, approximately 400 piano
and Western instrumentals and 6000 music note papers were imported to Istanbul to be sold on
the newly established music shops at Beyoğlu.143 After the declaration of II.Meşrutiyet, with
the end to the “tyrant” rule of Abdülhamit.II, the musical vivacity increased with the rise of
free political and culture environment. The famous Tambur instrumentalist Tanburi Cemil Bey,
was persuaded to hold a public concert for the first time.144 The musicians of the Muzıka-I
Hümayun, (the harmonica school founded by Donizetti), established the famous civilian Mızıka
Mektebi (Harmonica School) which held a concert at the opening of Eminönü bridge on April
1912 with 60 orphan instrumentalists. The Dârü-l Bedai, the theater/drama school with an
invited French director called Antuvan, was also founded in 1912. This school also contained
both Occidental and Oriental music departments gathering famous teaching cadres such as in
the Eastern section, Tanburi Cemil Bey, Rauf Yekta, Leano Hancıyan, Yusuf Efendi, at the
Western section, Asaf Radeglia, Silveli, Furhalini, who seeded the cements of the Dârü-l
Elhan, Istanbul conservatory. The Dârü-l Bedai first held a theater representation on 12

140
Kemal Sünder, “Çok Sesliliğe Yöneliş Konusunda Kimi Düşünceler”, Cumhuriyet‟in Sesleri Gönül
Paçacı,(Ed), (1998),p.50.
141
Evin Ġlyasoğlu, “Yirminci Yüzyılda Evrensel Türk Müziği”, Paçacı (Ed), (1998), p. 69.
142
Sünder,(1998), p.50.
143
Gültekin Oransay , Çok Sesli Musiki,Istanbul: CDTA, date is not provided p.1519.
144
Mesut Cemil, Tanburi Cemil‟in Hayatı, Ankara, date is not provided, p.125 cited in Paçacı, (1998), p.11.
49
January 1916 at 21:00 in which Tanburi Cemil Bey performed a solo instrumental concert with
Rast maqam.145
The panorama charts a voluntarily “East-West” synthesis between two music poles of
which two were being converged in a natural progress. Instead of spreading the polyphonic
music tradition through high art education institutions with the teachings of “Turkish” children
and their ethnical polyphonic production such as the Saygun‟s famous Yunus Emre Oratorio,
the real Occidental owners of this music were welcomed and their “entertaining” pieces were
brought and tried to be pleased by the public. Through this way, it was hoped the musicians
within the empire would find inspirational sources to improve their musical quality. Hence, the
modernism anxiety during late 19th century was much more motioned for the purpose of
developing, improving the music quality rather than enhancing the Turkish cultural “pride” in
the Western art arena.
The traces of this “spontaneous synthesis” could be found in the alternation of the
music teaching methods during the last decades of the Ottoman Empire. The high culture
Ottoman religious and non religious music, which had been thought and performed at the
Mevlihanes (Mystical religious order houses), was based on a teaching method system called
Meşk in the absence of a Western note written tradition.146 The harmonic phonetic structure of
imperial Ottoman language had provided special mystical teaching method “resisting” to the
written note ways of learning.147 The Meşk formed on a “loyal” master-apprentice (student)
close relation, in which the volunteer young music students were expected to perform, sing and
memorize the songs with their masters during long hours of teaching periods. Through this
immaterial way of instruction, the craft was assimilated gradually in a prolonging time.
Sometimes, the Meşk education may have lasted for a long life period. The masters were
transferring their accumulated musical knowledge to the students without any payment.
Besides, the masters at Mevlevihanes were so selective that they mostly accepted the “genius”
young kids to be trained. This “spiritual” “immaterialist” teaching method provides a free
space for the students where the “ownerless” ancient religious songs (Duraks) were performed
in improvisational styles by different singers. Differently from the written Occidental music
education, Meşk training empowers the students to make improvisational contributions to these

145
Nazmi M. Özalp, Türk Musikisi Tarihi, Eds, V.1, Ankara, 1986,p.83.
146
The Meşk training and teaching method is mostly based on following the maqam structure and the lyric
measurement with the rhythms knocked by hands on knees. The reason of this the MeĢk method is also called as
“Chastising the Knees” (Diz Dövmek).
147
Paçacı,(1998), p.22.
50
ownerless songs.148 Among the most famous Ottoman musicians within the Meşk chain, there
are such great names, Itri, Zekai Ahmed Dede Efendi, Hafız Cemal Efendi and their next
generation students Sadettin Kaynak, Minnur Nurettin Selçuk, Sadettin Heper. 149 The
Occidental music teaching method through written music notation were mostly interpreted as
“unproductive” and “spoiled easiness” by the Ottoman music authorities of those times. The
incompatibility of Western music 12 noted structure with rich maqam Oriental music also was
another issue that the authorities were anxious about. However, Zekai Dede Efendi who started
working at Darüşşafaka music school in 1926 (he was unwilling to work as a tutor in exchange
for monthly wages or payment for private lessons), just after closure of Tekkes and Zaviyes,
initiated a new synthesis teaching method, in which he both used the Meşk and Occidental
solfegé system. In the photography, taken on 1926 at Darüşşafaka, Zekai Dede sits with his
young students who hold instruments and written note papers in their hands displays the
voluntary synthesis between two different teaching methods. At this institution, Sir Zekai Dede
had trained young music students through fruits of both methods till his death day. 150 The
Darüttalim Music institution, Üsküdar Musiki Community (Üsküdar Musiki Cemiyeti) and
Dârü-l Elhan were the other institutions which combined a “loose synthesis” in education
method using both Meşk and solfegé. However, the forceful 1926 imposition of solfegé as the
only music instruction method to the education institutions moved this teaching method to only
private study hours after the official instruction times.151 Ironically, after the imposing law, the
Ankara and Istanbul radio houses were other sources where the Meşk method was being
performed by the musicians and their students. During the ban of the Ottoman/Turkish music
training under any instruction association, the radio houses had been the only source where this
music was being trained and taught. Cevdet Kozanoğlu‟s memories regarding the radio years
displays how the Meşk method had been the primary method of music education during initial
radio years.152 The crafting through Meşk had existed under the radio shelter till 1954 when the
prime minister‟s office reminded the Radio that it was not an education center and ordered to
cancel the lessons.153As the time progressed, the traditional teaching method of Meşk has
seemed disappeared with the appearance of European pedagogical model, yet has survived in

148
For a detailed information about the Meşk method see, Cem Behar, Aşk Olmayınca Meşk Olmaz: Geleneksel
Osmanlı/Türk Müziğinde Öğretim ve İntikal.Istanbul: YKY, 1998.
149
Cem Behar, Musikiden Müziğe Osmanlı/Türk Müziği:Gelenek ve Modernlik,Istanbul: YKY, 2005 p.290.
150
See, Behar, (1998), p.177.
151
Ibid pp.140-141
152
See, Cevdet Kozanoğlu, Radyo Hatırlarım,Ankara: TRT yayınları, 1988, p.35
153
Behar, (1998), pp. 142-143
51
an arcane way inside subconscious social memory of music instructors and their teaching
ways.
The absolute belief in the positivist scientific principles of Western civilization caused
the official destruction of the “spiritual” “preternatural” traditional Ottoman Meşk method. As
this incident illustrates, as the path is taken, from “traditional” empire to “modern” nation state,
the modernist anxiety in music occurred in a sense of destructive fetishism in which the
traditional Ottoman music started decaying in an “Occidentalist Fantasy”. As I will touch in the
next chapter, the radio examination applicants and the written letters asking about the
procedures of this examination, prove that most of the amateur musicians were well equipped
and trained about the maqam structures and the rhythms that they had to perform while
performing the songs. On the other hand, the examination committee was much more
concerned about the solfegé skills of the applicants and insistently requested this Occidental
skill from the applicants although everybody knew that the Meşk was the only instruction
method in the Ottoman Empire. Similar to the incident of Alphabet revolution when the whole
country became illiterate at one night, with the law came into force in 1926 regarding the
music instruction method, caused an amnesia feeling through the music performers and
amateur followers. Just a decade after the music reforms, the amateur musicians, vocals and
singers were questioned about their solfegé skill and note knowledge degree and their affinity
with Occidental music during the radio music application competitions. Although the
applicants were not capable of performing with written note papers, in a contrast style most of
them had sufficient knowledge about the maqam structures of ancient Ottoman music and were
succeeded in performing songs in particular maqams that were asked. In an ironic way, even
though the contenders said that they had never learned the “note reading”, they were able to
recognize the note signs and provide their names when asked. For instance, in Istanbul radio
official singer application competition, an old lady around her fifties replied that she did not
have any training in solfegé education. Yet, when the note signs were shown to her, she was
capable of providing their names, such as “sharp” and “flat” “C” and the other regular notes.154
The high number of the published written notes of amateur musicians in the periodicals such as
the ones that I studied, The Note Periodical (Nota Mecmuası) also verifies this fact. There had
been a significant amount of amateur musicians sending their own composed songs with
written notes to the periodical to be published and shared. Hence, the ordinary people and
amateur musicians were already able to recognize the note songs but did not require using them

154
Radyo, “Istanbul Radyo‟sunda Bir İmtihan”, September-November-October V.8 N.94-95-96, p.18.
52
in the presence of maqam structures which provides a less complicated road map in performing
the Ottoman/Turkish songs. Yet, the Kemalist was inclined to label those who do not have the
solfegé skill as the ones to be “trained” and this fact was also codified to the public.
As I will elaborate in the next chapter, the elite cadres‟ unfamiliarity – rulers who hold
the political power and the bureaucrats circulated around them- with the public they addressed
paved way to the occurrence of a modernist fetishism and a relentless desire for “breeding”.
The elites and their organic intelligentsia were not interested in their subject‟s educational
capabilities or the adaptability of their accumulated basic skills to the “scientific” norms of the
Western “illumination”. The “inferiority” discourse that they laid into the fractious veins of the
society caused a feeling of amnesia. As happened in the language revolution after which the
man who was partly capable of reading and writing with Latin alphabet now became a
“foreigner” to his own language with the same alphabet, also the amateur musician who
recognizes the note signs but does not necessarily require using them, appeared as an
“ignorant” citizen in both self perception and perception of elites. Through this way, the public
was relegated to a “tamed mass” that urgently needed “breeding”. This fact was sanctified to
the public. The absolute belief in secular protestant enlightenment and its imposition on to the
public revealed an air of heaviness, dullness in which the hearts and minds of the citizens were
thicken. The panorama of the education system during 1940s which acquired a full sense of
Turkishness after the language reforms is an example of this. ġerif Mardin reminds us this fact.
He says, “Although the students do not understand the books, everything was going on with the
assumption that they understand, (even the examinations prepared for them). The teacher was
also incapable of reading the book but kept going on doing his duty”. 155 With various
education reforms and alphabet revolution made, the absolute belief in the enlightenment and
the pre approval of the Occident‟s superiority in the scientific field paved way to turn blind eye
to the public. In a way, this motion created an air of confusion both on minds of ordinary
citizens and elites. In case of music, this “dullness”, “confusion” or the “daydreaming” as I
defined above revealed an air of environment, where the music authorities expected that the
each ordinary citizen must have the “necessary” solfegé skill. In this context, both the amateur
and professional musicians started feeling “ignorant” because of the sense that they were not
up to the “expectations”. Even though, they recognized the note signs and they were relegated
to an area of “inferiority” where they were or they codified themselves that they never learned

155
ġerif Mardin, Türkiye‟de Toplum ve Siyaset,Istanbul: ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 1990, pp.210-211.
53
or studied solfegé. Even though, they did understand of Occidental music signs, unconsciously
or consciously they were made to think that they did not.

The Turkish Five and the “Germs” of Occidental music

As I explained above, the modernism in Ottoman/Turkish Music commenced during the
last reforming decade of the Empire. On the road transition from empire to modern nation
state, this alternation brought more rough and unfolded fractions, cleavages in the music life.
These cleavages, fractions, (I use the term in both positive and negative sense) renovations and
disappearances both occurred attendant upon romantic Turkish nationalism come into
existence as an ideology. Ideologies offer what‟s right and what‟s wrong regarding social,
political and economical issues.156 The hegemonic ideology tries to capture the hearts and
minds of its subjects by compassing the conditions eliminating the possibilities of “ideological
pluralism.”157 In case of music, ideologues appear to “have a free hand” in deciding what
“criteria are in play” in the definition of national style, even in most unlikely circumstances.
According to Martin Stokes, the ideological manipulations are more than the “blanket notion”
of “reinvented traditions”.158 Put another way, the political penetrations in cultural arts such as
music reveals more artificial “appropriate” productions that are absent from the already
available materials. These facts were valid for Kemalist ideology as well and the traces o the
destructive nature of ideological modernism could be followed within the issue of music.
What‟s wrong in music was labeled as the “Oriental” tunes, modular structures,
instruments or traditional teaching methods. The “right” was spreading the Occidental musical
culture, injecting of the church music‟s polyphonic sounds and the sublime necessity of
Western style “breeding”. The mighty voice of the Kemalist ideology pointed out that the only
music genre that could be the “national style” was the polyphonic Anatolian folk songs
saturated with rural, pastoral themes and lyrics. After the composition of such songs, the
Occidentals would be able to give ear to the Turkish songs without regarding them as a product
of “outsider” or “alien” and could understand and appraise them under the “unifying” standards
of Western polyphony. On the other hand, the peasants, the mass “distanced”, “ignored”
community of Anatolia, could find a channel to reach to the “contemporary level of
civilization” and enjoy listening to the same songs with accompany of European audiences,
with the same enthusiasm, through the lyrics and motifs that are understood by them. Indeed,

156
Parla and Davison, (2004), p.24.
157
Ibid, p.36.
158
Stokes, (1994), p.14.
54
the fetishism of polyphonic Anatolian folk songs perfectly reflects the amalgamation of the
“Occidental Fantasy” and the “Peasantry Declination”, or in other words peasant centered
cultural policy configuration of the Kemalist ideology.
It is noteworthy to say that, Kemalist nationalism also included “counter discourses” to
imperial face of the Western World159 constituting the main working mechanism of its
Occidental Fantasy. The desire for enhancing the Turkish pride among the European
community and prove it to the ones who deny its existence under the historic umbrella of
Europe is an apparent indication of the aggressive face of Kemalism towards the Occident.
The Occident, the Western civilization was domain of razor‟s edge for the Kemalist cadres and
elites. As the national anthem lyrics displays, “the (Western) civilization” was “one teethed
hell kite” reminding the “destructive” face of the Occident. In addition to this, the hegemonic
ideology also had an encompassing, resisting sense to the unfolding of Marxist peasant
principles and liberal oscillations.160 Within the context of “peasant ideology”, the paradoxical
face of Kemalist revolution perfectly suits with the “Passive Revolution” concept that Partha
Chatterjee offers. Performing limited economic revolutions for attaining the popular support of
the masses, purging the oppositions in the political arena and the setting obstacles and barriers
for the full-fledge participation of the masses into the politics.161 In short, both full submission
to the Occident Civilization and the handing the rule to the peasants, to mass publics were
encompassed by the arcane discursive oscillations of the ideology. Yet, as being the
determinants of the “right”, the convergence of them on the polyphonic Anatolian songs was
approvable. Instead of a real socio economical merge with the Anatolian public and the
European Community, the cultural iconic apparatuses, such as the polyphonic folk tunes were
assumed as the appropriate and ample for the nation builders.
The setting of “right” facts and determination of the goals to be attained did not
necessarily meant the realization of them in a systemized way. The “timing” of the Kemalist
policies often caused the revival of its own “ambiguity” and “chaos”. Such as, in the instance
of the law codified in 1926, imposing the solfegé lessons with written note materials to high
and middle school institutions encounters to the times when there were not any trained teachers
who was going to hold this education to the students.
The republic, within the context of a new “modern” nation-state, had to produce new
education and cultural policies for the configuration of the new citizens of the “imagined

159
Parla and Davison, (2004), p. 69.
160
Ibid,pp.132,140.
161
Chatterjee, (1993), pp.211-214.
55
community”.162 The music education loomed a large place among these policies for the
Kemalists.163 The teachers who were supposed to hold this education at middle and high
schools, first had to be “produced” than needed to be “trained” and sent abroad to learn the
basic methods of the written note system since the teaching methods, the performing principles
and basic facts of the Occidental music traditions were not widely spread in the Oriental
imperial empire. For the production of “the new generation” music teachers, the Musiki
Mualim Mektebi was founded on 1 September 1924 when Vasıf Çınar became the education
minister. However, two years were needed fully to activate the school with full cadres and
students.164 The very first six students were brought from Balmumcu orphanage and the first
teachers were mostly from the Riyaset-I Cumhur Orkestrası, (the presidential Orchestrate).
“Talented” students and musicians in Occidental music were sent to Europe for training after
foundation in 1924. The students in the middle and high schools had to wait a couple of years
for their teachers to learn the Occidental music. Among the famous names gone to Europe
encountering the foundation of the school, there were Ahmed Adnan Saygun, Ekrem Zeki Ün,
and Necil Kazım Akses, who constituted the group of “Turkish Five” later on. 165 Miss Afife
(holding history and citizenship lessons),166 Cevat Memduh, Nurullah ġevket were other
famous under the framework of the institution, who became important figures in the
Ottoman/Turkish music culture in the following years.167 The head of the Musiki Mualim
Mektebi in 1934 and the composer of the national anthem, Osman Zeki Öngör,‟s comment
regarding the mission of the institution is very noteworthy. He says, “You are my germs. You

162
For a detailed analysis of the education policies and context of the instruction system at the republican era,
see Füsun Üstel, “Makbul Vatandaş”ın Peşinde:II.Meşrutiyet‟ten Bugüne Vatandaşlık Eğtimi, Istanbul: ĠletiĢim
Yayınları, 2004. In her book, Üstel mainly displays the “ethno racist” paradigms, motifs and themes in the main
instruction sources of the republican era and follows the education system‟ constitution on the path from a
citizen notion during the II.Meşrutiyet times to configuring the new “idealized”, ethnically “purified” Turkish
citizen at the republican era.
163
Murat Okan Öztürk , Benzerliler ve Farklılıklar: Bütünleşik bir “Geleneksel Anadolu Müziği ”Yaklaşımına
Doğru,20.Yıl Pan‟a Armağan, Istanbul: 2006 Aralık Pan Yayıncılık, pp.152-153
164
Adnan Saygun, one of the active actors in the school says, “Following after a couple of years after
foundation” the institution was ready to train the new music teachers., see Ahmet Saygun, Atatürk ve Musiki:
Onunla Birlikte Ondan Sonra Ankara: Cenap And Müzik Yayınları Vakfı, date is not provided, pp.20-21
165
Ġlyasoğlu,(1998), p.73
166
The music teachers at the Musiki Mualim Mektebi attended Citizenship Lessons, carrying heavily militarist
and racist paradigms and discourses, prepared under the guidance of the Atatürk himself. Afet Ġnan says
“Atatürk did not find satisfactory” the citizenship books that I prepared for my duty at “Ankara Musiki Mualim”.
He advised me to use “Instruction Civique” part of a French high school book that of which I also studied during
my high school years. See Üstel, (2004), pp.217-221. Indeed, this incident reveals, Musiki Mualim Mektebi, was
much more designed as an instruction center for contributing to the formation of the “esteemed citizens”.
Basically, the institution primary and sole aim is not to make a contribution the “music revolution”, or music
improvement, but to a new music education and the new national music genre born out of this educative system,
for unifying the “souls” and “likes” of the “new citizens”.
167
Paçacı,(1998), pp.15-16.
56
 168
are going to spread the Western music in Turkey”. “The teachers were trained within this
mentality at Musiki Mualim Mektebi” says Cinuçen Tanrıkorur.169 Yet, very later on, it was
confirmed that the amateur music performers, professionals, ordinary audiences have had
immunity against these “germs”.
The “Occidentalist Fantasy” in the case of music was much more like “Russian
Fantasy”. The famous “Russian Five” artificers, who performed a revolution in the Russian art
music, painting, and literacy by combining the “superior” Western art methods and techniques
with the traditional motifs and themes, was an inspirational case for the setting of the Turkish
Cultural Revolution. The musicians who are called as “Turkish Five”, Cemal ReĢit Rey, Hasan
Ferit Alnar, Ulvi Cemal Erkin, Ahmed Adan Saygun and Necil Kazım Akses, were the very
first musicians who tried to apply the Russian formulation in the new polyphonic folk songs
productions.170 Although the invited famous Western musicians such as Joseph Marx who held
a presentation upon the invitation made by Istanbul Conservatory on 13th March 1932171 and
Paul Hindemith, invited upon the foundation of the Ankara Conservatory in 1935, both argued
the “inefficiency” of the Russian formulation for attaining a modern national music.172 The
very first three national operas constituted with the Russian Fantasy, came from Adnan Saygun
and Necil Kazım Akses. The Taşbebek and the Özsoy opera composed by the Saygun, the later
one upon the arrival of the Iran Shah in 1934, were the very first fruits of the harmonic Turkish
music.173 However, the newly produced polyphonic Turkish operas did not even satisfy the
Kemalist organic art media and press.174 Indeed, Saygun himself points out to the shortage of
time and the lack of “infrastructure” of such a polyphonic opera during that time. Even himself,
did not feel secure in the “job” that he was doing.175 Furthermore, Atatürk also sent two foreign
inspectors to follow the Saygun‟s workshop for not being “ashamed” in front of the Shah. The
Özsoy opera was the only available choice says Saygun “for showing something different,
something that does not exists in Iran.176 As a leader of country, coming from more East, the
“ethnographic relativistic” anxieties were the driven force in the creation of Özsoy opera rather

168
cited in Atatürk Devrimleri İdeolojisinin Türk Müziğine Doğrudan yada Dolaylı Etkileri, Boğaziçi
Üniversitesi Türk Müziği Kulübü Yayınları, 2007, p.37.
169
Ibid,p.37
170
Ġlyasoğlu,(1998), p.78.
171
See, Musiki Mecbuası, Ecnebilerin Türk Musikisi Hakkındaki Görüşlerinden Profesör Joseph Marx‟ın
fikirleri, 13 March 1949, N.13, pp.12-13,17
172
See Paul Hindemith , Türk Küğ Yaşamının Kalkınması İçin Öneriler, Gültekin Oransay(Trn), Ġzmir: Küğ
Yayını ,1983, pp.103-105
173
Füsun Üstel, “1920‟li 1930‟lu Yıllarda „Milli Musiki‟ ve „Musiki İnkılabı‟” Cumhuriyet‟in Sesleri,(1998),p.48
174
Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri, “Ankara‟nın Ulusal Opera Gecesi”, February-March N.6-7, p.12
175
Saygun, Cenap And Müzik Vakfı Yayınları, no date, p.40
176
Ibid, p.4.
57
than presenting a work shop of art. Atatürk‟s keen on the production process of this opera is a
proof of those “anxieties”. The topic of the opera was simply about two lost brothers helping
to each other, inspired from a Persian story. The plot was also purposely selected for
solidifying the amity between two newly established secular nations. Neither art nor the quality
of music was important for the Kemalist ideology, the art‟s power to represent “superiority” in
the political arena or its fluidity to open communication channels with the Occident through
which the Turks would be approved were more concerned issues. Yet, this desire to find
channels with the Occident jammed the communication that is tried to be established with the
public that is addressed. The ideology needed explanatory handbooks or guide lines to be
understood by its own nation. “The Commentary Opera Hour” (İzahlı Opera Saati), on the
radio broadcasting is a perfect example of this fact, a program which was put on the
broadcasting schedule on Sundays for the audiences who were complaining about the “brays”
of a music genre that they were no fully informed about.177 Both explanation and presentation
of “innocent” new harmonic Turkish music was necessary for the resisting audience. The radio
once addressed to the opponent voices. The absurdity of the new music genre and the
dissatisfaction of the public were confirmed and tried to be fixed. The Radio calls “It is
possible to find strange the production of our new composers. The “new” is like a baby, you
have to get used to and take care of it.”178

The Folk Music Archive Studies: The configuration of “real” public music
As the formulation set by Ziya Gökalp, the new national music must be the
convergence of folk tunes and themes saturated with the Occidental positivist musical
standards. The first step to accomplish of this two legged formulation was the collectivization
of a “national” folk archive. Put another way, in the absence of mass technological facilities,
such as the radio, the television or mass music education, the forming of a national folk archive
meant the “reviving” of the folk songs from their local cores and “regionality”. The very first
archive studies were made under the Dârü-l Elhan shelter, under a commission called Tasnif
Heyeti, (Selection Committee). The Tasnif Heyeti members were generally appointed from the
banned Oriental department of the institution, including famous names such as Rauf Yekta,

177
Vedat Nedim Tör, Radyo, “İzahlı opera Saati”, , 15 June 1943,V.2 N.19, p.13.
178
Radyo, “Radyo‟da Genç Türk Bestekarları”,15 May 1942 V.1 N.6 p.16.
58
Yusuf Ziya (the head of the school) and Dürri Turan. In 1924, first attempt to “collect” and
“select” folk songs were done through “vouchers” sent to the music teachers at the periphery
regions who was charged to make local contacts with the local musicians, the Ozans,179.
Through 3000 vouchers approximately 100 songs were collected and only 47 were published
on the Dârü-l Elhan periodical.180 Later on, the inefficiency of the first “experimental”
research was understood. The lack of the notation skill, (the elites probably assumed that the
music teachers and performers at Anatolia were capable writing notes on paper with the
Occidental standards) erroneous writings, non musicological approach in selecting the songs to
be recorded were among the main reasons for alternating the experimental way of the
research.181 For solving the problem, the musicologists and musicians themselves were sent to
the research fields for making live experiences on the study grounds. However, this attempted
did not also bring the desired efficiency for finding out the “essentiality” of the folk songs.
There still appeared problems since the folk songs were tried to be recorded by Occidental
written note technique. The inefficiencies in collecting folk music in such ways caused the
appearance of “versions” of the same folk songs such as a song called Kozanoğlu since all the
heavy lifting was on human ear for recording.182 For recording the folk songs with their live
performing, a phonograph was entrusted to Cemal ReĢit Rey who was abroad at Paris for his
own musical studies. By the arrival of the phonograph, the field research trips were initiated on
31the July 1926 with four authorities.183 The committee first visited Adana, Gaziantep, Urfa
and Kayseri and collected approximately 250 songs. The second trip in 1927 included Konya,
Ereğli, Karaman AlaĢehir and Aydın. In 1928 and 1929 two more trips were made to various
places such as Trabzon, GümüĢhane, Erzincan Ankara, EskiĢehir and 155 more folk songs
were collected and written with note signs. The whole songs collected during these trips were
recorded with the written note system and all the compiling studies were made under the
guidance of a committee gathering Adnan Saygun, Cemal ReĢit and Mahmut Ragıp. The
written works of committee were later on published in the Istanbul Conservatory Periodical
composed of 15 notebooks.184 However, the folk songs, as being the periphery music genre that

179
The local musicians of Anatolia, who performs music with a poetic style generally at the peripheral regions
180
Darü-l-Elhan Külliyatı Anadolu Halk ġarkıları (Mukaddeme) Defter 1, Istanbul, 1926. s.3 cited in
Paçacı,(1998) p.17.
181
Paçacı, (1998), pp.17-18.
182
Martin Stokes, The Arabesk Debate: Music and Musicians in Modern Turkey, Oxford Clarendon, 1992,
Turkish translation, Türkiye‟de Arabesk Olayı, Istanbul: ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 1998, p.67.
183
Ragıp Mahmut, Anadolu Türküleri ve Musiki İstikbalimiz,Istanbul: Marifet Batması 1926, p.158 cited in
Paçacı (1998), p.18.
184
Gönül Paçacı, “Cumhuriyet Döneminde Halk Müziği”, Cumhuriyet‟in Sesleri, Paçacı(Ed), (1998), p.120.
59
had been in contact with the Ottoman music for years, were also composed of “non-
systematized” rhythms and tunes and sounds beyond the scope of the Occidental music.185
Indeed, Sadettin Arel, musician and musicologist in the republican era, also admitted this fact
and confirmed the linkage between the Anatolian and Ottoman music. 186 Hence, the squeeze of
the “chaotic” folk songs into the organized 12 note Tampere Occidental system was also a
controversial incident. Rauf Yekta, an effective musicologist in collectivization process, was
against the purge of the essences of the folk songs and published the songs that he own self
observed by taking account into the rhythmic structures and maqam lines of the Ottoman
music. However, his approach was criticized by Ahmed Adnan Saygun for holding an
“unscientific” approach.187
In the following years, the “scientific” approach in building a folk archive militated.
The famous Magyar musicologist, Belâ Bartôk arrived in 1935 upon the official invitation
made by the state and performed various field researches in the folk archive studies with
Saygun‟s assistantship.188 The scientific norms were now arrived at the picture for the proof of
the Sun Language Theory and Pentatonic Theory. Therefore the archive studies, after the mid
1935 were much more performed around “racial” matters.189 Indeed, the invitation was also a
good opportunity for Bartôk as well, for studying his theory based upon the assumption of the
linkage between Magyar and Central Asian music.190 However, Bartôk was critical about
methodology of the collecting research. He was against idea of making a folk music archive by
field researches, instead he was in favor of in sending the students into the periphery and
makes them to stay there for a while, for learning and performing the folk songs at their
original regions for sake of obtaining the most “objective” and “detailed” research. He was
either not content about the scientific quality of the previous field researches made before as he
listened 130 melodies through recorded phonographs.191 Paul Hindemith, (arrived in 1935 for
the foundation of Ankara Conservatory) also shared the same point in the collectivization
process and pointed out to the necessity of “learning folk songs at their original places where

185
See, Bülent Aksoy, Geçmişin Musiki Mirasına Bakışlar,Istanbul: Pan Yayıncılık, 2004, p.38.
186
Hüseyin Saddattin Arel, “Türk Musikisi Üstüne Birinci Konferansı”, published on Vakit 7-16 July 1927,
avialable inside Cumhuriyet‟in Sesleri, Paçacı,(Ed),(1998), pp.108-113.
187
Adnan Saygun, Halk Türküleri, 15TH Istanbul Konservatuar, (no date) cited in Paçacı, “Cumhuriyet
Döneminde Halk Müziği”, p.120.
188
Günay,(2006) p.47.
189
Paçacı, “Cumhuriyet‟in Sesli Servüveni”, Paçacı , (Ed), (1998), p.26.
190
Belâ Bartôk, Küçük Asya‟dan Türk Halk Musikisi, Bülent Aksoy(Trn), Istanbul: Pan Yayıncılık, 1991,p.35
also in English see Turkish Folk Music From Asia Minor, Benjamin Suchoff ,(Ed), London&Princeton,
Princeton University Press, 1976.
191
Bartôk (1976), p.7.
60
performed”. His offer was to make the researchers to stay at the field research for a satisfied
longing time for experiencing the essentiality of the tunes in their cultural surroundings.192 The
suggestions made by the “white” musicologist from Central Europe did not satisfy the
authorities and bureaucratic circles. Bartôk‟s request for further studies was rejected by the
government193 and Hindemith did not leave the country with a satisfactory “content”.194
Further archive studies were done under the guidance of Muzzafer Sarısözen, folk music
program producer at Ankara radio station, also became the Conservatory Archive Chief in
1938 that had been a leading figure in the configuration of a national folk archive. In 1937,
Ankara Conservatory initiated compiling field researches and till 1957, 3000 new folk songs
were added into the already existing archives.195 Besides, Sarısözen‟s folk program called
Yurttan Sesler on the Ankara Radio broadcasting played a significant role in the “unification of
hearts” in his own words. Instead of a diffusing movement from periphery to centre, the folk
songs were first reconfigured through compiling studies and were diffused from center to
periphery with broken versions, far from representing the essentiality. Then after the first
move, they were transmitted from center, Ankara, through the “magical” waves of the Radio,
reaching to the deep cores of the Anatolia. Therefore, the folk archive studies falls on the side
of artificial creation rather than the “(re)invented tradition”. These folk songs with artificial
essentialities were “taught” to the people.
The archives established through inverted diffusion by the leading role of Muzzafer
Sarısözen and the “unsatisfactory” initial studies, were transferred to the TRT archives in 1967
when Gültekin Oransay took over Ankara Conservatory archive Chief office from Sarısözen
with collected compile of 1738 songs.196 However, most of the essentials of the Anatolian folk
songs were lost committed to the forceful application of Western sound framework and
phonetic structure of the new national language. Those songs are still being performed by the
popular musicians on radios and television programs and are being thought to the students at
the private music courses and state education institutions.

192
Ibid.p.68.
193
Günay, (2006), p.49.
194
Stokes, (1998), p. 68.
195
Nida Tüfekçi, Türk Halk Müziği,Cumhuriyet Dönemi Ansiklopedisi, Istanbul, 1973, V.6, p.1488 cited in
Paçacı, “Cumhuriyet Döneminde Halk Müziği”, Paçacı,(Ed),(1998), p.125.
196
I.J Markoff, Musical Theory: Performance and the Contemporary Bağlama Specialist in Turkey (University
of Washington Ph.D Thesis, 1986) p.47.
61
 The quarter sounds of the Oriental Music
The desire to systematize the Oriental Ottoman music, including both its folkloric
periphery and centre music genres, inevitably exerted the musicologists and musicians to work
on the task to plug, adopt the Occidental note system framework to the Ottoman-Turkish
music. The “quarter sounds”, as Gökalp says, were the reflections of the Oriental-Byzantium
legacy of the Ottoman music that must be removed.197 Yet, not ever had there existed “quarter
sounds” in the Turkish music198. Gökalp‟s lack of musicological skill left him to offer an
ideological suggestion that both had influenced the defenders and offenders of Turkish music.
The discourse thrown into the discussion forum of musical debate, paved way to presence of
dogmatic pre approvals and nationalist narrations even by the defenders of Ottoman/Turkish
music. For instance, the famous musician and musicologist who had been working on the
“adaptation” of Western music note system into the Ottoman music, Mahmut Ragıp, on
contrary to Gökalp‟s statement, claiming both folk and periphery music of the Ottoman Empire
“owing” its existence to the Turkish ethnie and belonging to it, “must be spilled into technical
moulds” as the new “naysonalists project (nationalists) who are going to be successful” in
homogenizing the “virgin souls”.199 By the appearance of such discourse environment, where
the unwritten monophonic Ottoman music were equalized with feudalism and the polyphony of
Occident with capitalism, the Occidental note system appeared as a “necessity” to be
encompassed even by the ones who refuted Gökalp‟ “quarter sound” argumentation. Rauf
Yekta and his students Sadettin Arel and Suphi Ezgi‟s musicological studies were performed
within this context both rejecting the idea of irrelevance of Ottoman music with Turkish ethnie
and pointing out to “modernize” it with common folk cement. Although they were the
defenders of Ottoman music, their studies to systematize and matriculating the unwritten both
religious Duraks and song formations were “insufficient”. Cem Behar claims that, the
musicological studies done for matriculating the Ottoman music by Yekta and later on
advanced by his students, Arel and Ezgi are not dependent on any “historical and technical”
facts. 200 The Arel&Ezgi Turkish note system- constituting the basics of the first Turkish music
conservatory founded in Istanbul 1975 when both operational and disclosure ban on the

197
Gökalp,(1990), p.145.
198
For a detailed musicological interpretation about the quarter sound argumentation, see Behar, (2005),p.276
and also Cinuçen Tanrıkorur,‟s statements in Atatürk Devrimleri ideolojisin Türk Müziğine Doğrudan yada
Dolaylı Etkileri, 2007, p.92.
199
AkĢam, 24 Mart 1922, cited in Behar, (2008), p.276.
200
Ibid, p.274.
62
Ottoman&Turkish music training lifted, are “inadequate” to serve for training. 201 According to
Cinuçen Tanrıkorur, Arel&Ezgi studies were done in a manner with the “anxiety” to make the
Ottoman music polyphonic. These studies absent from the pre approval of the material
superiority of the Occidental music are not appropriate written representations of Ottoman
Turkish music.202 The recent debates unfolds that the Ottoman&Turkish music still requires its
own written note system. Although, studies of Arel&Ezgi were done to protect the Ottoman
music against Gökalp‟s claims, they were not independent from the notion of material
superiority of the Occident. In sum, instead of creating Ottoman music‟s own note system, it
was much more the “import” of the “system tonalé” sound structure of the Occident and makes
the traditional Ottoman music, even the religious Duraks compatible and playable with them.

The fragmentation and modernist penetration in the Ottoman/Turkish music

There are still recent discussions in musicological circles and forum debates203
regarding the “benefits”, “efficiency”, “harms”, “appropriateness” and “pragmatism” of the
Kemalist culture policies towards music and the direct and indirect causes. Although in this
study, I am inclined to put myself out of the abyss of this conflict, I had to touch upon the
“negative” discourse accumulation and offer a general critique of the Kemalist ideology by
sticking on the music case, for following the musical evolution of which still shout out
branches. Put another way, my aim is not to discuss the “failures” or the “achievements” of the
Kemalist policies for “developing” and “improving” the music in a modern sense or not to
defend the Ottoman music and its musicological quality against the Oriental discourse that
labels it as “inferior” since modernism is an inevitable feeling in which the material and
spiritual structures of the life converge through motions of urbanization, industrialization and
other similar processes. On contrary, this study tries to unfold the discourses and the
“discursive formations” in the Ottoman/Turkish modernism and how those motions were
saturated with the Kemalist policies committed with the “Occidentalist Fantasy” that they
created. Put another way, I try to unfold the motions, try to unpack the box of these discourse
formations and the process for examining the hybridization of the Ottoman/Turkish music.

201
See the statements of Mumamer Sun, Murat Belge, Cinuçen Tanrırkorur inside, Atatürk Devrimleri
İdeolojisinin Türk Müziğine Doğrudan yada Dolaylı Etkileri Açık Oturum , Istanbul:, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi
Yayınları, 2007.
202
Tanrıkorur, (2004), p.254.
203
See, Atatürk Devrimleri İdeolojisinin Türk Müziğine Doğrudan yada Dolaylı Etkileri Açık Oturum and
V.Türk Kültür Kongresi: Cumhuriyetten Günümüze Türk Kültürünün Dünü Bugünü ve Geleceği, Müzik Kültürü
.V.X (Ankara: Atatürk Kültür Merkezi BaĢkanlığı Yayınları, 2005.
63
The modernism motion and the Kemalist “try and see” project in music caused fragmentation,
creation and disappearance of new musical genres, traditions, motifs and tunes in general rather
than creating a common auscultated national music genre. Indeed, this fragmentation was the
nature of modernism process within itself. In the following sections I intent to chart the
panorama of the modernism motion on the individual souls rather than discuss the pros and
cons of these cultural revolutions.
On the initial years of the republic, in an indirect way, admire in the Occidental music
and imposition of its traditions were more successful in Westernizing the Ottoman music rather
than the new folk music genre that was designed to create. Even the passionate defenders of the
Kemalist ideology in music benefited from the harmonic maqam structure of the Ottoman
music culture. For instance, the work of art produced by Ulvi Cemal Erkin, Cemal ReĢit Rey,
Adnan Saygun‟s such as the Yunus Emre Oratorio were composed of maqam tune structures
and motifs. The Yunus Emre Oratorio was mostly inspired from the Durak (religious song)
maqam tunes of the Itri‟s famous work of art called Nevâ Kâr, the music genre which was
rejected, “condemned”, by secularist ideologue Saygun. Rey‟s work of art Piano Sonata in
1936 was also based upon the Dûgah maqam and used many other motifs. On contrary, the
Ottoman/Music had already inaugurated producing work of arts, saturated with Occidental
music framework. Starting from the late Ottoman Period, Tanburi Cemil, Mr.Udi Nevres, Fahri
Kopuz, Ġsmail Hakkı Bey, Ali Rıfat Çağlar were the new Ottoman music performer generation
who composed new works similar to the song structure of the Occident which can be given ear
by the Europeans without finding them “strange”. After the abolition of the Tekke and Zaviyes,
during the early republican era, the performers of the Ottoman music went out to music market
for earning money. Through 1930s and 1940s, the Ottoman music inevitably acquired a more
sense of “modern” committed with the market necessities for entertaining the public.
Musicians also absent from the traditional impositions of high art Ottoman music, produced
and composed new songs that were much more close to the polyphony of West compared to
the productions of ideologue musicians in the high arts. The marketization of Ottoman music
laid the seeds of a new music genre and which found its body during the 1950s in the songs of
Sadettin Kaynak mostly sang by Zeki Müren. On the other hand, popular names such as Minur
Nurettin Selçuk, Mesut Cemil, Vecdi Seyhun, Cevdet Çağla, Refik Fersan and others,
produced Ottoman music with Occidental rhythms and sound structure that were compatible

64
with the market principles.204 All this process contributed to the popularization of the Ottoman
music and created new productive fragmentary cleavages that had existed till 1980s and been
an inspirational source of motion even for the recent composers and producers.205 On contrary,
the Russian Fantasy, the polyphonic folk songs died before they were born. These folk songs
with “bizarre” singing prosodies were mostly come under the title of “Occidental Music
Program” and never dominated radio broadcasting. Indeed, they were hardly understood by the
audience and never been “preferred” by anyone in the surveys that I examined.
In short, it was the fragmentary of Ottoman music genre that merged with more
polyphonic sound structures and produced more popular works of art approved, liked and
listened by the public. However, through this process, the high productions of Ottoman music
were disappeared and the high art of the Occident music genre and its concerts appeared as an
obligatory duty for being more “cultivated” yet never been liked enthusiastically by the public.
The Kemalist dream for multi sounded vivid dynamic, music genre unlike the Ottoman, the
reflection of Arab‟s numbness, were not realized in the productions of the Turkish fives.
Furthermore, all the compiling and collecting studies for creating a national folk archive did
not skyrocketed the folk music broadcasting on the radio programs or did not necessarily
caused the revival of the great enthusiasm for folk songs among the masses. The squeeze of the
Anatolian folk songs into the Occidental music and the Turkification efforts created a national
folk music with stable, fixed rhythm modules with “bizarre” dialect prosody-most of the
Blacksea folk songs are the most apparent examples- mostly performed collectively at the TRT
studious abstracted from dynamic audiences. The masses on the other hand had found their
souls on the fragmented Ottoman music genres such as in Orhan Gencebay‟ Arab/Western
hybrid music, arrangé songs, converted from French, Italian into Turkish between 1950s and
1970s, or in the popular polyphonic compositions of Armenian musician Onno Tunç in 1980s
and 1990s.

204
Bülent Aksoy, “Cumhuriyet Musikisinde Farklılaşma Olgusu”, Paçacı (Ed), (1998), pp.32-32
205
Personal conversation with Meral Özbek, Professor at Mimar Sinan University Sociology Department,
Istanbul: 21 May 2009.
65
An amateur Ottoman&Turkish music group from Istanbul, holding their Oriental instruments.
(The photograph is taken from Nota Periodical, Istanbul Musiki Birliği, 1 July 1934, N.30, p.141.)

66
 CHAPTER 2: The Ambiguity of Occidentalism in Music

Music is a credible metaphor of the real. It is

neither an autonomous activity nor an automatic
indicator of the economic and political infrastructure.
Undoubtedly music is a play of mirrors in which every
activity is reflected, defined, recorded and distorted. If
we look at one mirror, we only see an imagine of other.
But at times a complex mirror game yields a vision that
is rich, unexpected and prophetic.

Attali Jacques, Noise: The Political Economy of Music

When I first determined my research title, I was warned about the “infeasibility” of
reaching to the souls, ideas and preferences of ordinary people and their feelings towards the
motions in the music, in the abyss of nation building process and modernizing environment.
One of my professor‟s comments made me concerned about the difficulty in finding out and
writing about the “who had been listening to what kind of music in 1930s and 1940s”. Indeed,
there had been a considerable amount of musicological studies covering the issue under
general leitmotivs such as “Modernism in Ottoman/Turkish music” (these are mostly done by
musicologists) “Direct or indirect effects of Kemalist ideology on the Turkish music”, or
sociological studies done on the popular culture issues such as the Arabesk debate, both
covered by Meral Özbek and Martin Stokes respectively. Yet, there had not been many
research studies focusing on the individual level of analysis and micro level processes of
experiences during music revolution times of the republic. Put differently, there were not
many detailed studies regarding the dynamisms and reflections of the music revolution times
on personal portrays of the ordinary individuals. In the light of this fact, my enthusiasm in
investigating the “who had been listening what music genre” question intensified.
Before, I read Meltem Ahıska‟s book and understand her theoretical framework‟s
basic principles, I was planning to perform the archive research for just discovering the news
and events regarding the limitations put on Ottoman Music, focusing on the 20 months period
of time, through 1934-1936, when the Ottoman/Turkish music was banned on the Ankara
radio broadcast. Actually, I committed my first archive research within this
(un)consciousness, searching for the “news” at the formal media sources, the publishing of
propagating announcements or the official state documents, which would provide the fabric of
my research. In the Occidental/Oriental music controversy, I expected to find the journal news
of the angry, discontented multitudes who protested the banning of Allaturca music and the
67
articles of elites regarding their forceful dictations and their recipes for the curing its
“melancholy” and “illness” of this music. Put another way, I put myself in the compulsion,
the prison of performing research on a macro state level approach. Although I had come
across with many “personal” narrations, articles mostly reminiscent of reportages,
bibliographic quotations, columns with emotionally intensified, unprofessional comments,
arguments or individual self portrays within this panorama, I was not concerned about their
“usability” for my thesis methodological framework. However, as my perception towards the
“Occidentalist Fantasy” unfolded, I started examining the Radio and Music journals,
periodicals from a different perspective, with a broader vision than I previously had. I
discovered out a more vivid and complex air of environment than I had previously
experienced. And Ahıska‟s other contribution to my methodological fabric came with the
“usability” of the personal history narrations. Succeeded in assimilating “personalization of
history” to my methodological repertoire, I was also close to follow “Who had been listening
to what music genre(s)”. In other words, “Occidentalist Fantasy” and the “Personalization of
the history” roadmap provided me opportunity to look at the history from sociological
window that I had never envisaged.
The Personalization of the History
Whilst Meltem Ahıska cites one of her anecdotes regarding her research experiences
that she had during the radio archives, she says the archives that she focused on, were more
like “interesting personal memories” rather than the official documented compiling(s) that
would contribute to a “mass commonality” in the history writing. 206 Ahıska connects the
“personalization” of the past to the absence of rationally ordered collective archives and to the
destructive breaking off from the Ottoman Empire “underdevelopment” time scale and desire
in jumping to the “new” developed time scale and zone for the sake of erasing the
“inferiority” label stuck by the Occident. She shores up her argument with discourses
regarding the past tenses in the Turkish language compared to the Western Latin languages, in
which the latter one consists of past times that are mostly a prolonging, ancient story which
has never “finished” and the in the former one there is an ambiguous and uncertainty of an

206
She argues that archive studies done on Western methodological principles take the modernization project as
a “form”. At first she believed the archive studies that she had done would help her to expose the role of the
radio in the nation building process, a study of that the “imagined community” concept of Anderson inspired.
However, she found out that the radio archives were mostly collected in a manner with an “Occidentalist
Fantasy”, where most of the them were destroyed for fulfilling the time gap between the West and the Republic.
She compares the BBC radio archives and Turkish radio and reveals how the perception of “past” differs in an
essentialist way. The past in the Turkish language discourse is matter of “ambiguity”, maybe never pasted,
unlike in Latin language discourses where the past is certainly left behind. See Ahıska, (2005), pp.55-60.
68
timeless history. However, her encompassed dependence upon the personal memories
revealed another face of the history narration. The observation of Turkish modernization
projected from sociological perspective, in other words not considering the modernism as a
“project” but as a “form” revealed the “sprinkling” of personal “teasing”, “interesting” and
“emotional” memories. For instance, in the case of music, Safiye Ayla, performing a solo
concert at the beginning of 1930s in the radio station located at the up stage of Post Office
(Yeni Postane) at Beyoğlu, says “As being a person coming from the bottom layer, I am both
calling to myself and to the public” before singing a song called “Nerdesin Gönlümün Nazlı
Civanı”207. In this “ironic” comment, the traces of an excited and overwhelmed singer could
be followed at the initial times of a “magical” technological facility. Fascinated by the
assumption of incantation of the fluidity of the radio waves reaching to every citizen and even
to a grand, far civilization, the Occident, she thought she was even calling out to “herself” as a
“subject”. What the personalization of history provided me was to observe the dynamics of
the Turkish modernism experience on the individual souls rather than making a dry and
shallow critique of it. Indeed, recently, there have been an augmentation in post modernist
critical studies regarding the Kemalist Modernism in cultural aspects such as gender studies,
political Islam, ethnic diversifications and others topics under similar leitmotivs. However,
Meltem Ahıska suggests that “overturn” or “inside out” critique of Kemalist modernism just
capsulate it into a “copy” of Western modernization and is not enough to see the “historical”
authority “constituting” power of the “representations”.208 Put another way, rejecting the
universal notion of Western modernism and evaluating sociological cases of Turkish
modernism are not adequate to unfix the “sociological constants”.
Foucault says “the history must detached from the image that it satisfied for so long,
and through which it found its anthropological justification: that of an old collective
consciousness”.209 Furthermore he states that official documents and macro level approaches
to history fixes “the sociological constants”.210 For him, the historical analysis beneath
documents are not the “fortunate of a history” but the memory. Following Ahıska‟s suggestion
with accompany of the Foucault‟s statement on the point, I am also intended to “detach” the
history from its justification grounds and I believe that an “inside out” critique is not enough
to the break the prison of national history narration. Put another way, in Foucault‟s

207
Elçin Temel, Radyo Anıları, cited in Ahıska, (2005), p.62.
208
Ahıska,(2005), pp.35-40.
209
Foucault, (1972), p.7.
210
Ibid, p.3.
69
terminology, “undertaking the history” in its original linear “traditional” form is not enough to
avoid the transformation of documents into “monuments211 as the history is mostly composed
of many “discontinuities”. Hence, for following the discontinuities, for unfixing the
sociological constants and for revealing the representations or the discourses in the minds of
the individuals and in social memory in general, that are constituted beneath of the Turkish
modernism, I selected the memory, the memories of ordinary citizens, ranging from top man
at the political hierarchy to the ordinary radio audiences for examining the Turkish music
modernism story. From I commenced to perform my research study in the beacon light of this
expanded perception.
My archive studies first started with the Radio periodicals and journals that are started
published since the foundation of the Istanbul radio house. Although in the early 1930s, the
radio periodicals are more like amateur guiding hand books for introducing this new
technology to the public, after the midst of 1930s, it acquired a sense of music journal
including famous artist interviews, news about the concerts, visiting artists at the radio
houses. I was surprised with this fashionable face of the periodical and most of the numbers
were colorful as the recent popular music pages. Ironically, there were also heavy political
discourses, personal statements, messages and dictations regarding the cultural revolutions,
especially the music reforms and the radio in the other pages. As the time progressed, I found
myself more interested in these “personal pages” in the light of the realities that I read from
both Ahıska and Foucault. I felt myself very close to the answer the enigmatic question that I
was concerned about. Uygur KocabaĢoğlu‟s chronological research study regarding the radio
institution on its path to the TRT institution was also another source that established the
fabrics of my primary research resources. His statistical analysis regarding the radio broadcast
times and the roadmaps that he provided in the journals also helped me out to follow the radio
periodical in a more accurate way. In the light of his observations, I was able to skip the radio
resources in a more useful and efficient way.
Even though, I was doing a critical research of Kemalist ideology, I was heading to the
Atatürk Library at Taksim for reviewing the radio journals and others. The Atatürk library
was like the history hub of the whole storia of the Republic and the late Ottoman times and
was able to provide every historical journal, periodical and newspaper whenever requested.
The Yeni Adam periodical with an extreme ethno secular and modernist discourse was the
second primary sources that I examined for my study. Even though, the periodical was not a

211
Foucault, (1972),p.8.
70
music journal, its head writer, Ġ.H.Baltacıoğlu‟s role in the cultural revolutions of Kemalism
and his periodicals prolonging success among the public stimulated me to focus on the
periodical. Especially, when I found out that in the radio periodical his voice carried a lot of
weight in the Allaturca ban committee, I decided to examine his periodical. Ahıska‟s and
KocabaĢoğlu‟s citations in their books, in the music sections, are also other undeniable
stimulants to increase my interest in Baltacıoğlu‟s periodical.
The Atatürk Library at Taksim provided the names of the other musical journals and
periodicals from its rich and easy index which was placed on the table. I found the names of
Musiki Mecmuası, Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri and Nota Mecmuası from the archive index of
the library. However, I went on my research in another library called “Borusan Music
Library” as the friendly library assistant girl in headscarf advised me to go there for
shortening the time to reach to the archives at the grand Atatürk library. In the light of her
advice, I kept on doing my archive research at Borusan Music Library, a library sponsored by
the international Borusan trading company which is famed for supporting Western Classical
Music at Turkey, by providing funds to the grand orchestrates and scholarships to the students
who wants to be mastered at the Occidental music. The irony followed me from the Atatürk to
Borusan library as the library assistant there was very curious about my research title. The
lady was very helpful for me since I was a political science student doing a research related
with music. However, when she understood the fact that my thesis was critical about the
music reforms in the 1930s and about the supremacy of “Western Classical Music”, her
interest at my studies decreased. At the Borusan Music Library, I completed my archive
studies in the ccompany of the discussion hours with the assistant lady during my breaks.
Even though she was upset with my thesis objective, she showed me out other secondary
sources related with my thesis title at this small music library.
The music periodicals that I studied were much more fruitful sources for my thesis
since I was more concerned about the personal experiences of modernism and the reflections
of the ideological penetrations on the individual souls. Since the music periodicals were more
like colorful magazine journals deprived of official music new, I also succeeded in revealing
out some macro observations such as the ethno racist oscillations of Kemalist ideology in
music. Furthermore, by examining the periodicals I also found a chance to dig inside
previously observed, studied incident such as the period on the ban of the Allaturca music on
the radio. What is more significant from my research perspective, I was able to witness the
ambiguity, the paradox of the Kemalist modernism project and its oscillations between the
71
East and West. Especially, the ironic facts that I observed in the Nota Periodical, an organic
music periodical of Kemalist cadres, were apparent indications that espoused my theoretical
framework. The archive studies that I made provided me to see the personal obscure
experience of nation building process from the ordinary individual eyes. Put differently, the
personal history narrations enabled me to see how the ordinary citizens live in the something
that they “imagine” (daydream), on the initial formation times.
The most of the examples and incidents within this chapter includes ironic memories
and reveals the “tense” and “overwhelmed” feeling being at modernizing political and cultural
surrounding. The memories cited by Burhannedin Ökte shared with Atatürk, the Pasha, the
key and the top man at the decision making mechanism, for instance unfolds the war between
the mind and the heart, the political leader identity and the personal identity of which the
latter enjoys the Allaturca music on the dinner tables, or in Bauman‟ terminology, the conflict
of the split domains of spiritual and material planes, the “dualism” of modernism as “species
of pure sprit” and modernization as being the “complex of material structures-political, social
economical”.212 Being in an Oriental surrounding with the triggering effects of the
“Occidentalist Fantasy” the personal memories also displays ironic stories of the individuals
who try to fulfill the gap between the Occidental idealization and the Oriental “undeveloped
singularity”. For instance, the instrumentalists and singers of the “Historical Turkish Music
Orchestrated”, had to “run through the corridors of the radio station” to catch the program of
the Yurttan Sesler (Tunes from Homeland) orchestrate where they had to perform Folkloric
Anatolian songs, just after religious songs of the Itri Dede Efendi. It is narrated that this
“acrobatics” crossing between two separated “emotional moods” is not appropriate for the
musicians and could be “damaging” for their musical skills. Hereby, an examination was held
for employing new musicians to the Yurttan Sesler orchestrate and for preventing the
“mixture” of two different kinds of music.213 These two separated music kinds that are able to
be performed by same musicians at the same time, today are being presented and codified as
“enemy brothers” in music social memory of Turkey. In most of the programs on the state
television channel, TRT, the concerts of the Folk music and Turkish music are usually

212
Berman,(1983), p.132. In the third chapter of his book, Berman narrates the story of Baudelaire a French
intellectual and artisan, who was overwhelmed by the urbanization of Paris. As being under the influence of
motions of modernism, Baudelaire defends the art must be set of from the material world (modern world) where
the artisan leaves in. Nevertheless, following the story of Baudelaire, Berman points out to the “impossibility” of
dispensing the art from the “modern” surrounding. Indeed, Baudelaire‟s feelings, inspirational sources and
argumentations about art are very similar to Atatürk‟s so a good case to follow the path of individual experience
of modernism.
213
Radyo, “Yurttan Sesler”, September 1947, Vol.6, N.71, p.14.
72
separated, titled under different names and visiting performers. Today still, the demarking line
between the ideologically supported Folk music and the Turkish&Ottoman music is strong
and visible. Hence, the “discontinuity” of the historical evolution resumes in an arcane
discourse construction that prevents the linear unfolding of the modernization. Put differently,
the ambiguity that is produced across mirrors between the Occident and the Orient in 1930s
and 1940s still holds its existence in an arcane cortex on the screens of TRT, state television.

The Ambiguity of the Occidentalism

Most of the music and radio archives contained personal experiences, self portrays,
letters written to journals by ordinary citizens, interviews and personal intimate memorials
worded by the musicians, intellectuals, journalists and bureaucrats. The sources were much
more like “personal diaries” as Meltem Ahıska states, instead of rationally collected
chronological archives regarding the musical motions and development of the young, modern
state. Hence, I found a chance to see attitudes and feelings of ordinary citizens, intellectuals,
elites and their ironic contradictory responses to the motions of modernizing surrounding. The
archives that I studied also verified Ahıska‟s “Occidentalist Fantasy” theoretical offering, but
for my study the fantasy was about achieving a “real” national music saturated with Western
polyphony, a fantasy that cannot be realized and have still been effective and available, even
in the productions of popular musicians of the present days. The ironic and common
interference that I observed in the archive study was the “uncertainty”, “indefiniteness of the
present or as Bauman says “ambiguity” as the waste of modernity. Whilst the fantasy had
been in progress, it created an environment of ambiguity in the field of music. I would like to
underline that following the traces of “ambiguity” is not the same as criticizing the Kemalist
nationalism. Hence I did not examine the Turkish modernization project from a critical
perspective which turns the inside out and reveal the deficiencies. I do not try to display how
the Kemalist direct or indirect policies had been effective in shaping the musical identity of
the new nation. Put another way, my aim is not to present the dissatisfaction of the audiences
about the hostility towards their old Ottoman Music or ideology‟s influence in the music life
of the society. In fact, I realized that finding out “who had been listening to what” was as
“reductionist” as the nationalist perception of the society, assuming it as “heterogeneous
multitude”. On the contrary, my aim in this chapter is to display and present the responses,
personal experiences, comments, feelings of people, ranging from the man at the top of the
73
political hierarchy to the ordinary music audiences. Whilst displaying the personal portrays in
a modernizing environment, I will try to demonstrate how the “ambiguity” served for the
production of “discursive formation” web and through this way how the nationalist ideology,
or the “sovereignty” as Foucault names, nourished its working mechanism. Hence, instead of
mechanically trying to observe who had been listening what kind of music genre, my aim in
this study is to reveal how the Occidentalist/Orientalist music jargons, discourses were used
for the making the “revolutions” or “improvements” in Ottoman Turkish music by depending
on the legitimizations and manipulations on the personal music preferences. I will try to
present through these motions, in Foucault‟s terminology how the notion of the
“Governmentality” were diffused into everyone‟s minds, hearts and comments, putting them
into the same community who are headed towards the same destiny.
The Pasha Orders
The Turkish Music Periodical (Türk Musikisi Dergisi) starting from January 1947 is
among the most interesting primary sources that I studied. The periodical‟s main objective is
to defend the Turkish/Ottoman music against the configuring policies and ideas those had
been directed towards it since so far. The journal defines its task as the fulfilling the “space”
and honor of the “neglected” Turkish music.214 Throughout the entire publication heavily
ethno-nationalist discourses were used for the defense of “Turkish” (primarily the Ottoman)
music against the intellectuals and musicians of Western music “admirers”. In various articles
and interviews published in the periodical, there are attributions and messages underline that
Turkish Music belong to “us” and urges the “Young Turks” to defend their music. Unlike
other music and radio periodicals, there are many Turkish musician biographies and more
traditional, Allaturca songs presented in the columns. Yet at the same time, heavy critical
discourses are also available for the “Allaturca” musicians, performers and audiences who
lower the Turkish music quality and present it as “shanty town” music.215 For instance, the
column called From Month to Month (Aydan Aya) worded by a nicked name writer called as
“Monthly” (Aylık) complains about the quality of the Turkish music concert audiences. “There
are the ones who eat food in concerts and who hugs his/her partner” says he. Furthermore he
complains about the ones who applauds whistles and sings with the performer in an
“excessive” way.216 What this incident unfolds is that; the Kemalist music reforms relegated
the Ottoman&Turkish music camp and its defenders to a more traditionalist and conservative

214
Türk Musiki Dergisi, Neden Çıkyoruz?, 1 November 1947 Vol.1, N.,1 p.1.
215
Süha Gezgin,Türk Musiki Dergisi, Musiki Davamız, , 1 December 1947, Vol.1, No.2, p.2.
216
Türk Musiki Dergisi, Aydan Aya: Dinleme Adabı, 1February 1949, Vol.2, N..6, p.17.
74
domain where it became a “stagnated” music genre resisting to development. It also appeared
as a music genre/sort requiring the protection of ordinary individuals for the sake of “national
morality”. What is left in the social memory of the music audience from the 1930s and 1940s
is that, even today still the audience “excessiveness” is a must for the Turkish music concerts
performed in TRT (state television channel).

A caricature taken from the Türk Musikisi Dergisi perfectly summarizes the panorama of the periodical,
displaying a Tambur instrument under shadow of giant Occidental violins. A conversation between the
instruments also provided in which the “Occident” says we are under the favour of the state and the “Turkish
Music” replies “We are in the hearts of the nation”.

(The caricature is taken from Türk Musikisi Dergisi, 1 December 1947, Vol.1, N.2, p.2.

The audiences of these concerts are expected to dress in a proper style and act moderately
even in the public concerts of pop singers who addresses to mass of an audience which is
mostly city-dwellers and have high level socio-economic status. The nostalgia for the

75
respectful Gazino audience and customers is another fact which unfolds the “traditionalist”
perception of the Turkish&Ottoman music on the social memory. I will touch on the present
facts in the following chapters. However, it is a good example how the discourses about the
music still exists in the present time through a discursive formation of web.
Among the leading editors and writers of the periodical, Burhannedin Ökte, a former
ney instrumentalist in the Republican Presidential Orchestrate, (Risyaset-i Cumhur
Orkestrası), worded his memories with Atatürk during his participation in the Oriental Chorus
board between 1925 and 1930. (Fasıl Heyeti). In all of his writings, his ultimate aim is to
display Atatürk‟s pleasure and affection to Turkish Music and his joy while listening to the
Fasıl217 performed by the Oriental board. By proving Atatürk‟s enjoyment of Allaturca music,
,he tries to erase the “negative” discourse towards the Ottoman/Turkish music that caused by
Atatürk‟s own comments, as being the iconic representation, reflection and legitimization firm
of the whole nation. And at the end of his column, he tries to soften the incidents that caused
Atatürk which distanced him from the music that previously he had been listening in an
enthusiastic feeling.
Ökten‟s memories are very useful in understanding the cultural dynamics in music
revolution in the early republic; thence I am very inclined to provide a detailed citation as
much as possible. His join into the Fasıl Heyeti and his experiences there perfectly unfold the
history of Turkish modernism in a detailed manner from an ordinary individual perspective.
Those also provides useful hints about the deeper sights of the music revolution and Atatürk‟s
place within this vortex, as being the most dominant figure in the cultural revolutions.
Just after joining to Fasıl Heyeti (a sub group of the Western Harmonica Orchestrate
of the Istanbul Palace) in Istanbul, he says “we received a missionary order from the Çankaya
Pavilion”218.The order was to bring up the Istanbul Ottoman Palace orchestrate for
establishing the nucleus of the modern polyphonic Turkish music and feeding the music and
orchestrate hunger of the newly founded republic. Actually, the order from Ankara reveals the
problem of “present” that occupied the ruling elite in Ankara at that time. Although, the whole
linkages were broken with Istanbul, the inside of the new capital was tried to be fulfilled by
the things shelled out of it including such as the Western Harmonica Orchestrate (Muzika-ı
Hümayun) of the Ottoman palace. Zekai Bey, the head of the Muzika-ı Hümayan, says, “Fears
inside my heart” for getting caught by the servants of Sultan Vahdettin, 150 musicians were

217
The word is generally used for the concerts of Ottoman music groups performing for entertaining.
218
Burhannedin Ökte, Türk Musiki Dergisi, “Atatürkten Hatıralar”, 1 December, Vol.1 No.2 p.4.
76
deployed inside the train wagons, secretly during the night, including their instruments, all
were headed to the new capital.219
The Fasıl Heyeti became an important part of night parties given by the head of the
state. They always accompanied Atatürk during the parties given for the elites and
intellectuals and they even followed him on his political tours and yacht voyages. I suggest
that the memorials worded by Burhannedin Ökte, Atatürk‟s paradoxical stance towards Fasıl
Heyeti unfold how the Orientalist dynamics and the split of the private (spiritual) and political
identities, affect, trigger the man on the top of the political power hierarchy. Although he
enjoys listening to the music that the Fasıl Heyeti performs, he regularly feels testing the
artistic skills of the musicians by putting pressure on them and checks the cultural background
of the musicians with pop up questions. At some nights, he puts space between the Fasıl
Heyeti and the dinner tables but sometimes he invited them to sit very close to him and sings
with them, an act “surprise” narrated by the instrumentalists. However, Mr.Ökte approves
Atatürk as a “father” figure, and resembles himself like exited son and finds his examination
useful for his self-development even though he is ashamed in various spots.220
In first night when the Fasıl Heyeti accompanied Atatürk, the musicians of the board
waited around five on the dinner table without performing. Mr.Ökte says “I was surprised,
usually after eating the dinner we used to start performing”. After a while, the president of the
republic demanded Mr. Ökte to sing a song for the night. Although he was a ney
instrumentalist and mentioned it to Atatürk, he was forced to sing by visitors and his musician
friends. When he started singing, at the first sentence he was ceased by Atatürk and criticized
for pronunciation on the lyrics of the song in a “wicked” way. Ökte probably pronounced the
words compatible with Ottoman alphabet and divan poetic structure. However, his “father”
expected him to pronounce the lyrics in a more “modernized” way, although his modern state
was just o year old in 1924. Atatürk also questioned about the Ökte‟s educational background
and his family‟s socio-economical status that night. “I was happy to pass my first
examination” says Ökte. Atatürk had kept on doing inspections and tests.
The very first memory depicted unfolds that the “father of the nation” is foreign to the
children of his new nation. He is on the task recognizing and identifying his own “children”
with the investigations and pop-questions raised. Indeed, Ökte‟s memories are mostly about
pop examinations made for the musicians at the Fasıl Heyeti, or Atatürk‟s efforts in knowing

219
Muhittin Nalbatoğlu İstiklal Marşımızın Tarihi ,Istanbul: 1963 p.148, cited in Paçacı, (1998), p.14.
220
Burhannedin Ökte, Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “No Title”, 1 December Vol.1 No.2 p.4.

77
the socio cultural capabilities of the ordinary citizens around him. For instance, during a trip
to a village near by Ankara, he questions the İmam‟s (religious officer at the mosque)
knowledge about a flying airplane although he knows that the İmam is not capable of
answering such a question. When the İmam said he does not know how an airplane flies,
Atatürk responded to him by saying “So tell me anything about that you know”. The İmam as
an undermining iconic representation to the republic‟s new secular and “modern” setting, says
“What all I know is to obey what you order. If you demand me to commit suicide by jumping
out of that plane, I can do it”. The İmam was not the only person who was tested by Atatürk.
Just after two days when the new Latin alphabet declared, the Fasıl Heyeti members were
asked by Atatürk to write a lyric of an Old Ottoman song in Latin Alphabets. “Some of us
were able to write but some of us not” says Ökte. Although Atatürk scolded Ökte for his
failures at some lyrics, he says “I know, this scolding was not for me, it was for one of the
instrumentalist, who even had written any Latin letter on the paper”.221 This incident clearly
displays how the language and the alphabet revolution were made. The revolutions were
much more in the form of “try and see” experiments for the Kemalist elites.222 The Pasha tried
to see the appropriateness of the alphabet revolution that he made by testing the Fasıl Heyeti
members as being instrumentalists coming from a low socio economic statute. Another reason
might be to observe his subjects‟ “familiarity” with the new language signs under the fact of
the Ottoman society, especially Istanbul which had been in touch with the Western Latin
World.
After a couple of years with the accompany of the Fasıl Heyeti to Atatürk at his dinner
nights given for the bureaucratic elites of state, an incident at Istanbul was a mark for Atatürk
and the Turkish&Ottoman music. The incident at the Sarayburnu marked as a turning point in
the “Music Revolution” as suggested by most of the scholars.223 The event at Sarayburnu in
1928, on a party where the famous Egyptian Singer Müniretül Mehdiye, professional Western
music Orchestrate and the amateur Eyüp Music Board performed for foreign visitors, Atatürk
made his significant comment on Turkish music. After the “disastrous” performance made by
the Eyüp Music Board, he said “this music is far away from representing our excitement”. He
pointed out to the necessity in forming a new national music that heightens the Turkish pride
among the “contemporary civilization”. Burhannedin Ökte says after that event “A Turkish

221
Burhannedin Ökte, Türk Musiki Dergisi, “Atatürkten Hatırlar,”1 August 1948 Vol.1, No.1 p.8.
222
Personal conversation with Ahmet Demirel, Professor at Marmara University, department of Political Science
and International Relations, Istanbul: 24 May 2009.
223
See, Paçacı(1998), Aksoy(2004), Üstel(1998), Tanrıkorur(2004), Behar(2008).
78
music antagonism occurred in all the people including himself” as a ney instrumentalist.224
The Pasha, as being the representation of the whole nation in a physical body, knew that he
must listen to the music kind, the Occident music that the music revolution requires. The
relentless desire for the modern and “better” music caused the scatter of the Fasıl Heyeti. As
head of the modernizing state, Atatürk knew that he must distance himself from the board.
Yet at the time as an ordinary individual, he used to enjoy singing and dancing with the
Zeybek songs performed for him. Even during the presence of the music group, his hate and
love approach to them was an indication of it. He was in a dual mood, both enjoying the small
concerts performed for him at the same time he was also intended to “bring line” the
“undisciplined” Ottoman musicians. Eventually, the music group scattered. Ökte says, “I
resigned because I was worried about the Pasha‟s health, when the Fasıl Heyeti was nearby
him during the night parties he had never rested.
Ökte‟s personal and intimate memories with Atatürk might be broadened. Ökte
regularly mentions about the Atatürk‟s participations in some performances, for instance
during a big invitation dinner, when the Atatürk sang a Gazel.225 Ökte says he was very
excited to hear the singing of a commander who “ordered to march to the Mediterranean”. 226
Atatürk had a dual approach to the music group, sometimes enjoying and singing with them
but sometimes confounding them with pop questions regarding the musicians‟ musical
capabilities and cultural backgrounds. I suggest that the reason for it is that the Fasıl Heyeti
was mostly used as an arena of legitimization by Mustafa Kemal during his dinner tables and
summons. Besides, enjoying the Allaturca music, he kept the board close to him for
legitimizing the “music revolution” to be made on the eyes of the elites and key political
figures close to him. For instance, upon an invitation given for the head of the official bank of
the state, Celal Bayar, the Pasha ordered Mr. Ökte to accompany to an amateur woman who
requested a song. He was not very successful in following the “lady” with the ney instrument
and scolded by his father again in front of the whole guests. Although Atatürk apologized
from Ökte “for breaking his heart” he legitimized his act beneath the legitimization that he
wants his all artificers to be capable of the knowledge in every music genre and become
“precious” to compete with “others”.227

224
Burhannedin Ökte, Türk Musiki Dergisi, “Atatürkten Hatıralar:Atatürkün Musiki Hakkında Meşhur
Nutku,”1 January, Vol.2, No.15, p.8.
225
Poetic and improvisational singing style mostly in conjunction with Arab Literature structure.
226
Burhannedin Ökte, Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “Atatürken Hatırlar: Ordular İlk Hedefiniz Akdenizdir İleri”, 1
February, 1948 Vol.1, N.2, pp 9-10.
227
Burhannedin Ökte, Türk Musiki Dergisi, “Atatürkten Hatırlar”, 1May 1948 ,Vol.1, No.8, p.8.
79
 The “others” here probably refers to the “Occidental” musicians who were much more
advanced in the musical capabilities and knowledge compared to the “less educated” Ottoman
musicians. Atatürk‟s memories with the Fasıl Heyeti perfectly chart his feelings and thoughts
regarding the music debate. As an ordinary person, he used to enjoy listening to the Fasıl
Heyeti and even singing with them. Yet, as the sole leader of a modernizing nation state, he
was determined to make a music revolution for enhancing the Turkish pride which was lost
during the Ottoman times. Thence, sometimes he used the Fasıl Heyeti for his legitimizations
of the reforms that he was intended to do. In other words, by “scolding” the musicians and
making statements in front of the bureaucrats and politicans regarding the “quality” of the
Fasıl Heyeti, he used them as a source of legitimization for his desires regarding the
Ottoman&Turkish music. Indeed, his dinner tables were the diffusion center of the political
discourses. Unlike other authoritarian leaders who show themselves in front of grand
multitude, Atatürk preferred little bureaucratic circles for pumping the necessary political
discourse that legitimizes his cultural reforms.228 The music revolution was one of the
incidents where he used these small “bureaucratic circles” to legitimize his reasons. In the
light of Ökte‟s memories, I suggest that the other reason for explaining Atatürk‟s passive
aggressive approach to the Heyet is the feeling of being in a modernizing environment as an
individual. As I explained above, as a leader of a nation, he was in a relentless search for more
“modern” and “better.” However, in his spiritual inner domains, he was also enjoying the
Allaturca music, specially the Western Thrace folk songs. In brief, as an ordinary person
experiencing the drastic feeling of modernism and the being the political leader of a
modernizing nation state, he knew that he must distance himself from the Fasıl Heyeti. At the
end, after the incident at Sarayburnu, even though he did not officially send away the
musicians of the Heyet, he made feel them “inadequate” to play for Atatürk, as the
Ottoman&Turkish music appeared as a “shameful” music genre. It was exactly the same self
codification arose by idealization of Occident, among the public in 1930s and 1940s and
within the popular culture circles between 1950 and 1980s.

First Years of Radio: Live Music Broadcast from Restaurant

228
Personal conversation with, Cengiz Kırlı, Assitant Prof. at Atatürk Education Faculty at Bosphorus
University, Istanbul: 10.May.2008.
80
 Technological innovations in telecommunication and transportation, of the 19th
century (rail-way) enabled states to reach to previously unreachable distances. Hobsbawm
says “Government and subject or citizen were inevitably linked by daily bonds, as never
before…..revolutions in transport and communications typified the railway and the telegraph
tightened and routinized the links between central authority and its remotest”229 The Radio is
a technological innovation that forces individuals to “imagine” through the voices that is
vibrated from its channels. It could serve as a material apparatus of the hegemonic ideology
for the configuration of the national “imagination”. The audience mass has no chance to
expect to imagine while they listen the talk programs, news and the discussion debates that
are broadcasted. Besides, radio is the new music box of the new modern states where the new
bourgeois strata could entertain without going to the expensive performance halls or concerts.
The takeoff point of this study was to investigate the banning of Turkish/Ottoman music on
the radio broadcasts and reveal how the radio had contributed to the creation of a national
music that the elites designed for the souls of their subjects.
However, after the archive research that I did on Radio periodicals and examine the
statistical data provided in Uygur KocabaĢoğlu‟s book -covering a chronological evolution of
radio broadcast between 1926-1964- and taking into the account of the facts that Meltem
Ahıska reveals in her study, I found out that this technological innovation of the 20th century,
had existed as an arena of the “Occidentalist Fantasy” in the modernizing Turkish state that
has been hung between the “Occident” and “Orient” spaces, especially in the case of music.
The technological impossibilities, financial problems and the relentless fetish for catching the
civilization level of West caused the appearance of “ironic” incidents in area of music under
the framework of Radio broadcast. In brief, the Radio on the field of music like in its other
cultural aims, did mechanically took a role in forming a national music genre. Instead, like in
the case of Atatürk, it became the source of a cultural discourse which transmitted the
Occidentalist Fantasy to its audiences, especially during the 1930s and 1940s when it was
converted into a state institution.
The very first radio broadcast was two live concerts of Turkish musicians made by a
transmitter put at the Post Station in Istanbul, March 1927.230 These initial broadcasts unfold

229
Hobsbawm, (1990), p.81
230
Servet-Ġ Fünun Vol.61 S.120-1594, 3 March 1927,p.122 and Ayın Tarihi, Vol.12, p.36 1927, p.2084 cited in
Uygur KocabaĢoğlu, Şirket Telsizinden Devlet Radyosuna: TRT ve Öncesi Dönemde Radyonun Tarihsel Gelişimi
ve Türk Siyasal Hayatı İçindeki Yeri, Ankara: AÜSBF yayınları, 1980 p.29. However, Uygur KocabaĢoğlu
states that the exact time of the first radio broadcast is uncertain, there is also a live concert broadcast in 1923,
see KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p.11.
81
that the technical and infrastructure impossibilities of the radio was fulfilled by sole music
broadcast. The first radio station of Istanbul was established in a small room inside the
“Ambassador Cafe” located on Beyoğlu (Christian Istanbul). In a short time of period, the
Istanbul Radio station became the “music box” of the city and become the hub of the Turkish
music performances. In the introduction of a guidance book for inventing a simple radio
receiver, it writes, “It is harmony of music going on the Istanbul wireless telephone
transmitter. You don‟t have to go to somewhere or you do not need to spend bunch of money
for listening Saz instrument in the hoarse concert halls, rooms and theaters…”231
In the initial broadcast years, “Telsiz Telefon Stüdyo Alaturka Musiki Heyeti”
undertook the Ottoman/Turkish music performing, part of this orchestrate also had performed
Western music.232 Afterwards, as the popularity and number of the radio receiver was
increased, the temporary Ottoman/Turkish music orchestrate was established as “Bedayii
Musikiye” and in the following years two more Turkish music orchestrates, “Hafız Burhan
Saz Heyeti”, “Cemal Kamil Saz Heyeti” also joined to the staff of the Istanbul radio.233 In
addition to this, visiting orchestrates and guest singers of the city were welcomed by the
station. Although the Istanbul Station was established under the framework of state controlled
anonym company called TTTAŞ, (wireless telegraph telephone Anonym Company), it had
been most vivid and free source of Ottoman/Turkish Music during its initial times, unlike the
Ankara Radio station where only the Presidential orchestrate had been dominant.234 Although
the Ankara radio wireless was established during the same period of time, there is no written
source related with its broadcast information till the 1930s.235 However, according to the
findings of KocabaĢoğlu, between the years of 1927 and 1936, % 84 percent of the both
stations‟ broadcasts contained music, including live concerts and record plays. Although there
is a period of 20 months ban on Turkish music on both stations, the percentage of the
Turkish/Ottoman music is % 30.23 and the Western music portion is % 40.28 in overall. The
noteworthy point is the percentage of Western entertainment music with a percentage of %
20.66 and unidentified play records which could be categorized under the Western
entertainment, such as American Tango and Jazz music. The publication of the radio
institution itself also declared that the record plays are important source of music under this
“poverty” of the broadcast facilities and are important source to “fulfill” the broadcast time.
231
ġemsi, Gençlere Telsiz Telefon Hocası,4 August 1927, p.1 cited in KocabaĢoğlu,(1980) p.75
232
KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), p.84.
233
Milliyet, 21 Mart 1984.
234
KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), pp.61-62.
235
Ibid,p.31
82
Furthermore, it is also written that the audience does not pay attention to these record plays.236
On the contrary, primary sources which I studied, displays the anxiety for “fulfilling” the time
caused the spread of American Jazz and Tango music, especially among the young audience,
that I will touch on the following pages. It is also very interesting that ideologically supported
folk music is nearly absent on the broadcast in the first initial years. The portion of the
Turkish Folk music broadcast is only 0.85.237 In brief, the radio broadcasting dominated by
the Istanbul Radio, has been the source of the Ottoman&Turkish music even though there had
been a country wide music revolution in progress. The reason laying beneath of this fact, I
argue, is the “ambiguity” of the present for the Kemalist revolution. In the absence of a
infrastructure for a widespread cultural revolutions in the early 1930s, the Radio appeared as a
source of the diffusion of the Occidentalist Fantasy (the radio was perceived as the voice of
the modern nation heard by the Occident through short wave frequencies), an arena where it
messaged that there was a necessity of revolution, yet never fully contributed to it or
undertook the leading role. Through the ambiguity of initial years, the radio directly or
indirectly contributed to the spread of both Jazz and Ottoman music.
Regarding the Radio broadcasting quality there also had been many blames for using it
as just source of “music”. The owner and the head writer of Yeni Adam, a periodical contained
heavily ethno-racist and modernist discourses, Ġsmail Hakkı Baltacıoğlu, criticizes the radio
broadcast and blames the responsible authorities for using it just a “Music Box”. He suggests
that the stations must be used as a “breeding”238 apparatus for the “New Men” of the republic.
The radio, he says, “might be the most powerful and most efficient worker of the
revolution”239. There were other sources of criticism blaming radio for just being a “music
box”. As the time progressed into late 1935 and the infrastructure facilities of the stations
improved, the duration of the talk and educative programs increased. However, critiques
commenced to accumulate around the “Oriental” and “Occidental” music conflict.
The aim of the music programs was declared as reaching to the Turks beyond borders
of Anatolia, to all “Easterners” and to all “Europeans”. Yet, the former aim declared as the
primary task by the Radio station through its initial years.240 This paradoxical task reflects the
“self propelling” and “self destructive” national imagination of the republic. Whilst the

236
Radyo Programı, “Plak Yayımı”, Saturday 15 February 1936, Year:1 N.6.
237
KocabaĢoğlu ,(1980), p.72 and also see the table. 7 for a detailed monthly analysis .The %84,04 is music
broadcasting and the rest is talk programs.
238
Ġsmail Hakkı Baltacıoğlui, Yeni Adam, “Radyo‟dan Ne Bekliyoruz,” 15 November 1934, N.45, p.3.
239
Ġsmail Hakkı Baltacıoğlu, Yeni Adam, “Radyoyu Ülküleştirmek Lazımdır”,19 February 1934, N.8 p.19.
240
Telsiz, “Radyo Programlarımız ve Musikimiz”, 14 July 1927, N:3 p.1 cited in KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p.85.
83
Istanbul radio station was embarked to address to the East part, the Ankara was calling out to
the Occident with popular entertaining Jazz songs. This notion of “duality” accepts the
Oriental part of the new identity and determines an impossible task to be fulfilled which was
to address to the Western civilization from a geographically more “Eastern” domain, Ankara.
Within this context, the Ottoman/Turkish music broadcast prevails over the Western Art
music on the Istanbul station program. However, it is the opposite scenario in program
schedule of the Ankara radio station. The most noteworthy part is the percentage of the
unidentified record plays sometimes reaching over % 30 percent that was mostly composed
Jazz and Tango tunes from America, which had been the dominant country in the play record
industry. By the mid of 1934s, the number and the kinds of orchestrates appeared on the
Istanbul radio station increased. The head of the station, Mesut Cemil, as a Western style
educated Ottoman/Turkish musician, also made room for the performance of Western
Orchestrates, such as “Istanbul Çigan Müziği Takımı” (rhythmic Magyar songs are called
“Çigan”), “Istanbul Radyosu Balalayka Takımı” which performs rhythmic Russian and
Balkan oriented tunes. “Oda Musikisi Cemiyeti” under the conduct of chief Cemal ReĢit Rey
was also welcomed as visiting orchestrate.241
Whereas, Istanbul radio station, horizontally more close to the Western Civilization
which was established in a café room, Ankara radio station started its broadcasting in a
country house near Cebeci Conservatory. The first information regarding the broadcast
schedule reveals that Ottoman/Turkish music was mostly scheduled in the new radio station
of the republic. Unlike Istanbul, the Ankara radio station was a source of additional income
for the Presidential orchestrate including its small groups such as “İnce Saz” (the
Ottoman/Turkish music group), Bando and Jazz groups.242 In the various numbers of the radio
periodical that I reviewed, in the most of the news, it was boldly and proudly written that the
Ankara radio station was broadcasting live concerts from live orchestrates that were
performing at the Kerpiç Restaurant and the Ankara Palas Hotel. I suggest that the
information regarding the very first broadcast years of the capital unfolds the willingness of
the hegemonic ideology for replacing the legacy that it acquired from the Istanbul-the capital
of chaos where Armenians, Jews, Greeks and Moslems had lived for centuries- and how this
relentless desire created the “ambiguity” and “irony” of present. The capital station was

241
KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p86.
242
Conversation with Ferit Tan 11 February 1976, cited in KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p38.
84
labeled as the “The voice (mouth) of the state.”243 However, the music that it broadcasted
was mostly Ottoman and Jazz record music and the flurry of the prime time forced authorities
to put transmitters in a restaurant and hotel where speaking of people, fork and knife sounds
mixed with the melodies and heard as the “voice of the nation”. 244 Probably, the fork and
knife sounds were found less “threatening” than the undefined, rich and fragmented songs of
Istanbul and the cosmopolite community which had been performed them for years.
The quantity of the folk songs played on the both radio stations was also at very low
points.245 There were ongoing musicological field researches for colleting and making a note
archive of Anatolian songs between the years 1927-1930. Therefore, the Anatolian songs
were being performed on regional levels, absent from the notion of “nationality”. However,
in an ironic way, in the absence of a written note archive, a few folk songs were only played
at the Istanbul radio station which was muted in the beginning of 1940s. There were two
musicians during the 1930s, which had been playing folk songs on the broadcast. Osman
Tanburacı Pehlivan was the famous one among these who usually had been playing Rumeli
(Western Thrace) Folk songs.246 In the absence of a folkloric orchestrate, the Greek themed
folk songs satisfied the music “hunger” of the radio. The other folk music genre was the
polyphonically saturated ones which were sang in a “bizarre” pronunciation at the Ankara
Station.
In short, whilst there had been an ambiguity of present at the broadcasting programs of
both Ankara and Istanbul, the latter one relatively had more free environment of music with
its live orchestrates coming from the heart of the city. Istanbul Radio station being far away
the influence of the center of the state also contributed in presenting the pure folk songs
performed by the local singers such as Tanburacı. On the contrary, although the panorama
seems similar at Ankara, due to the presence of state influence there, at least at some degree it
contributed to the notion of the music revolution. However, the jazz songs and the live concert
broadcastings for fulfilling broadcasting time contributed the ambiguity of present.

243
Selim Sarper, Radyo, “Ankara Radyosu Milletin Emrinde,” , 15 February 1942, Vol,.1 N.3,(unidentified
page).
244
Vedat Nedim Tör‟s memories illuminates the “primitive” and “unprofessional” very first broadcasting years
of the radio. He says, “the lack of the technical and infrastructure incapability, in the absence of professional
radio rooms where the noise isolation coverings were missed,” “the sound of the gong sound of the Tramway at
Beyoğlu at Istanbul” and “the plate, knife and fork sounds from Ankara Palas were perceptible.”. see Vedat
Nedim Tör, Yıllar Geçti Böyle, Istanbul: Milliyet Yayınları, 1976, p.50.
245
See the table 7 and p.82.
246
Yücel Ertugal, A radio program called “Türkiye Radyolarında Yarım Yüzyıl”,Ankara Radyosu Kitaplık ve
Diskotek ġube Müdürlüğü ArĢivi, Band no: MER-8-706, cited in KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), p.102.
85
 The ban of the Allaturca Music
Till the mid of the 1930s, the hunger for the music was satisfied with the “Allaturca”
and invited visitor city musicians to the radio stations. Sometimes, patching transmitters to the
live concert halls, restaurants and hotels, the blank of the present was tried to be fulfilled.
Ankara as the new capital of the modern/nation state was the symbol of the being “Western”
but in a “disciplined” way. Ankara represents the limit of Westernization.247 Unlike the
entertaining Western orchestrates on the Istanbul Radio station, more artistic ones like the
Presidential Orchestrate and more “appropriate” and elegant ones came up at the capital
station. The new elites of the republic felt themselves to discipline the cosmopolite pleasures
and living style of the public. The city of train was selected as Ankara where the grips of the
dominant class could find more space to muffle both themselves and people. Unlike in 1920s,
in 1930s the Kemalists approached to create a new ideology in a more “systematized” way.
The elites who criticized the radio for just being “music box” did not succeeded in increasing
times of the talk programs. Because of the unprofessional and inexperienced staff structuring
and with low technical qualities, the music was the most easy and cheap source of voice to
address to the whole nation. The only way reaching to the hearts of the ordinary people was
needed to taken up and put into order. The chaos on the music broadcasting needed to be
fixed.
The ban on the Allaturca music is a proof of the “Occidentalist Fantasy” through
which the republican elites and its organic intellectuals look into the material world. The word
Allaturca was an Italian word meaning the opposite of “Allafranga” mostly used in the late
Ottoman period and early republic era, originally meaning “Turkish method”. It is a label
stuck by the Occidental to mark the distinction between the Oriental worlds and now it
became the legitimization source by Kemalists for homogenizing and developing the
Ottoman/Turkish music. In the minds and goals of the administrative cadres and intellectuals,
there had been a relentless desire to erase the distinction between the Occident and dig a
Turkish place in the zone of the Western civilization. The actions and political decisions were
done within this paradoxical manner to prove that Turkish identity could coexist within
Western world but at the same time protecting its distinctiveness. Music had been a good
incident to trace these marks. For having a “coexistence” with the Occident, the material
aspects were codified as “importable” since the Western World had already proved its
superiority in the technology and illuminating positivism. And these material imports were

247
Ahıska, (2005), p.115.
86
also used as the tools for erasing the gap between the Occident and Orient. The aim was first
to catch the contemporary level of civilization, to keep up with Occident‟s speed, to be
“heard” and to be “understood” by it. In an interview made by Western journalist Emil
Ludwing on April 1930, says Atatürk, “You can see we have been making a progress in the
field of music, however it took 400 years for the Western world to develop their music, and
we do not have such time to wait. You see that we are importing the Western music to
ours”248 In short, what was codified by the Occident to the Orient as inferior, was tried to be
corrected with Occident‟s material apparatus. Moreover, this transition were tried to be made
in a swift fashion, in a fait accompli manner.
After the speech made by the “teacher” Atatürk to his students on 1st October 1934 at
the parliament, the ministries of the government with direct and indirect prescriptions ordered
the ban of the Allaturca music and the “Music Revolution” was initiated. The father of Turks
said that the music that had been tried to be listened is “discreditable” and “new songs must
be composed with the recent music techniques which are accumulated around narrations
composed of national elegant emotions, thoughts and feelings. Only through this way the
Turkish music can take its place among the universal music.” “I wish the ministry of culture
would assist in this incident” he adds. The newspaper headings in the following day marked
the approval of the directive made by the “Ghazi Highness”.249 Through various sources, it is
still not clear whether the Interior Ministry,(ġükrü Kaya was minister during those times)
Cultural Ministry (Abidin Özmen the leading name at the institution) or the Matmuat Umum
Müdürlüğü (The Press Public Directorship) was active on the process of the ban. However, it
is known that upon the speech made by Atatürk, ġükrü Kaya said “Maybe the Pasha orders
the ban of the Allaturca music”. Hence, the Allaturca music prohibition on the radio was
initiated within such an abyss of ambiguity where Atatürk‟s speech at the parliament ignited
the confusion fire in the air.
During the prohibition on the radio, a commission was appointed and gathered on 26th
of November at the Cultural Ministry, including musicians and key state officers such as
Cemal ReĢit Rey, Mahmut Ragıp, Ulvi Cemal, Ahmet Adnan Saygun and Vedat Nedim Tör.
The committee commenced meeting with the question of “We need to make a music
revolution but how are we going to do it” The prohibition of the monophonic music on the
radio was not enough for improving, meliorating the backwardness. After the ban on radio,

248
Ayın Tarihi, April 1930 Vol.22, N.73, pp.6054-6055 cited in KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), p.91 .
249
Musiki ve Sanat Hareketleri, “Ulu Önderimizin Yeni Bir İşareti Şarkı, Gazel Devrinin Sonu”, October
1934,N.2, (page is not clear).
87
the committee discussed the “possibility” of the ban among the community and on the
streets.250 According to Necdet Hasgül, the enthusiasm in the music revolution was so
exaggerated that, the gendarme forces collected the saz instruments in the villages and funny
pictures appeared during these incidents.251
From organic intellectuals, musicians and to the ideologues, there had been a heavy
criticism on the Allaturca music broadcast. Even the ones who fall on the side of the Ottoman
music camp produced some cynical comments of their own music genre pertained to the
feeling of being in modernizing environment. The most interesting one comes from ney
instrumentalist Neyzen Teyfik, complaining about the cheap quality of the Allaturca music
and states his “discontent” in his poem that this music was being heard by the “Occident”.252
The anxiety of being “heard”, “watched” by the Western world was a common ground shared
by everyone including from man at the top of political hierarchy to ordinary musicians
including the ones performs and defenders of the Allaturca music. Another label stuck to the
Ottoman/Turkish music was the “alcoholic” and “melancholic” emotions that it stimulates.
Peyami Safa in his article published at Cumhuriyet Newspaper and also cited in Yeni Adam
periodical, complains about the convergence of “alcoholism” with Allaturca music and says
“there is something like, drawling words with a strange accent, a sense of being dissolve,
letting go, tactlessness, something animal here”253 In, Hakemiyet-i Milliye newspaper, Aka
Gündüz writes, “Whenever I listen the Turkish radios, I feel the tears in my eyes”. 254 The
minister of Internal Affairs, ġükrü Kaya says “Nowadays there are not songs which do not
incite the sexual desires” and he argues that it is a big task of the state to get grip on the issue
after the spread of Allaturca music from coffeehouses, to radio, to records.255
In the new nation state, in the hierarchy of the priorities, the nation is the first priority
to be thought of, and then the family and lastly the citizens themselves come. This
formulation leaves no space to individual pleasures and desires. As I argued before, music is
both part of a personal and collective identity. But in the new nation state the personal part
was forced to be retreated next to the newly national identity where “alcoholism” and
“melancholy” could undermine the militarist construction of the “collectivity”. The daily

250
Sadi Yaver, Musiki ve Sanat Hareketleri, “Ankara‟daki Büyük Musiki Komisyonu”, November 1934, N.4
p.7.
251
Necdet Hasgül, Cumhuriyet Dönemi Müzik Politikaları,Folklora Doğru, BÜFK, N.62, p.38.
252
Hilmi YücebaĢ , Neyzen Teyfik ve Şiirleri,Aka, Istanbul Aka: 1961, p.197 cited in KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p.90.
253
Peyami Safa, Yeni Adam, “Alkolik Musiki”, 19 February 1934, N.8, p.9 .
254
Gündüz Aka, Hakemiyet-İ Milliye, “Radyo İşimiz”,2 February 1934 cited in KocabaĢoğlu,(1980) p.90.
255
Ayın Tarihi, 1-31 May 1934, N.6, p.32, cited in KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), p.90.
88
pleasures of sexual desires which are included in the love themed Allaturca songs were also
against to the notion of solidarist corporatist organic nation. Similar to the gender case, the
women as the display of the sexual desires committed to it which was codified as an
“honorable” family mother,256 the Allaturca songs were also tried to be disciplined committed
with the notion of the Western order. However, the forceful retreat of the musical privacy to
an overarching identity caused tensions feelings on the souls and spiritual worlds of the
people.
Mustafa Kemal, as the iconic representation of the Kemalist ideology, also
experienced this identity fragmentation and conflict that his own ideology forced him upon.
As an individual, he enjoyed listening to the Allaturca music on the big and long dinner nights
he usually gives, as I cited from the memories written by Burhannedin Ökte. However, after
the music revolution appeared on the political agenda of the state as equipment of cultural
transformation, things had become more controversial for him as well. Once in a reply to a
polite request for abolishing the ban on the music, made by Yunus Nadi, the founder of
Cumhuriyet Newspaper, he said “I also enjoy listening Allaturca songs. However, it must not
be forgotten that this generation performs revolution and must give sacrifices for attaining its
goal”257 On the speech at the parliament he made, he states that the music that was being
listened was “disgraceful” and as the face of the nation, he must be the first one to make
sacrifice. Cemal ReĢit Rey in an article published in the newspaper writes about a memory
with Atatürk. “On 1925, we were on a boat trip on crossing from Mudanya to Ġzmit, we were
performing Cesar Franck‟s Kentet to Atatürk and to his guests, but a little time after paying
attention to our performance, he commenced having conversations with his guests. We
thought that it was better to cut out our concert short. Since that day, I understood that he was
not interested in Western Classical Art Music but I admired his efforts to spread the
polyphonic music in our country”258 Atatürk himself, was experiencing the self-destructive
taste of being in a modernizing surrounding. He felt that he must point out the “rational”
music to his children as being the sublime “father”. As being the reflection of the “souls” of
his citizens and leading “sublime” head, what he had felt while listening Allaturca music, was
also an emotion that the whole nation must had felt. In a march called “Unity March” (Birlik
Marşı), the lyrics perfectly display this organic linkage between the nation and its leader. The

256
Deniz Kandiyoti, “Gendering the Modern: On Missing Dimensions in the Study of Turkish Modernity”,
Bozdoğan(Ed) and Kasaba (Ed), (1997), pp.119-123.
257
Gürkan Turhan , Cemal Granada Atatürk‟ün Uşağı İdim,Istanbul: 1973 Hürriyet Yayınları.p.122.
258
Cemal ReĢit Rey, Cumhuriyet, “Hatıralar”, 11 November 1963.
89
march written and composed by Mualim Haydar B, illustrates “the unity of the souls” which
is tied with the “sublime leader/head of Ghazi (Gazi)259”. The whole body of nation had to
wait Atatürk‟s “diet” on alcohol for listening Allaturca music on radio.
Vasfi Rıza Zobu, a theater actor and also an Ottoman/Turkish music singer, was
usually invited by the Pasha to the grand dinners and were kindly asked to sing a few classical
Ottoman/Turkish songs. However after “music revolution” was initiated, his visits were
lessened. After a long time, the “unlucky” incident happened at Sarayburnu, Zobu was once
more invited and he arrived at the “Marmara Pavilion” located on the road that leads to the
ranch house. Atatürk kindly asked him to sing a classical Ottoman song that himself
composed. “I did not know what to do” says he “I was afraid of being criticized by Atatürk if
I sang the song and I was also anxious for being called “bootlicker” if I did not sing”. Finally,
the song was sung by an order coming from the Pasha in front of the eyes of “surprised” and
“confused” visitors. “The reason that I have not invited you was because I have been on an
alcohol diet. This night I give a break to my diet”260
The ban on the radio was lifted after another “ironic” incident happened on a dinner
table again, with a tambur instrumentalist called Osman Pehlivan. There are two narrations
related with the conversation between instrumentalist Osman Pehlivan-who regularly visits
the Çankaya Palace and plays his tambur instrument on special nights- and the Pasha. In the
first one cited by KocabaĢoğlu, Atatürk gets very pleased the with the Rumeli Folk Song that
Tanburacı plays for him and asks whether these kind of Rumeli Folk Songs are being
broadcast on Radio. Onto the question, the instrumentalist reminds the prohibition that the
Pasha ordered. The Pasha says “I did not give such an order. Once again they misunderstood
me.” Mr. Tanburacı also stated that the public were listening Cairo radio station because of
the ban. Eyewitness of this event intellectual and literacy teacher RuĢen Ferit Kam says that
Pehlivan‟s allegation for the spread of Arabic music among the public was effective in the
sudden decision that the Pasha gave.261 The other narration is: The Pasha orders Tanburacı to
play his instrument. Osman Pehlivan asks whether the play of this instrument is prohibited or
not. Visitors laugh and say that it is only banned on the Radio broadcast. Onto this, Pehlivan
politely requests lifting the ban on the Radio and following this, Atatürk being intensely

260
Cited in, Atatürk Devrimleri İdeolojisin Türk Müziğine Doğrudan yada Dolaylı Etkileri, Istanbul: Boğaziçi
Üniversitesi, Türk Müziği Yayınları, 2007, p.4.
261
KocabaĢoğlu , (1980),p.95.
90
touched, orders lifting the ban.262 Nevermore, he could not resist polite requests and critics
addressing to prohibition.
The fear of the spread of Arab music probably persuaded Atatürk to lift the ban. I
argue that he was well aware of the ban on the radio broadcast and the spread of the Egyptian
Radio which was the second powerful radio broadcasting reaching through the lands of the
Anatolia. Many letters were written to the Radio station for publishing the Egyptian Radio
broadcast schedule on the Radio journal where broadcast schedule of Western radios, such as
Milano, Bucharest, Moscow, Vienna, Frankfurt, were regularly had been published. The
Egyptian broadcast schedule was given a place for a couple of weeks for pleasuring the
“amateurs who enjoys Arab music” under the title of “Orient” section. 263 However the Radio
editors decided to discontinue and declared that they may give place for the schedule in the
upcoming weeks.264 Peyami Safa previously complaining about the Allaturca music now was
now anxious about “Arab” music. In his article published at Cumhuriyet newspaper, he writes
“Turkish public deems the voice raising from Arab radio its own voice…Through increasing
quantity of Turkish folk songs on radio broadcast we can reverse this “Arab Injection”
Furthermore he makes a confession and writes “I do not want that old Turkish music is
deemed as the brother of Arab music, maybe they are brothers but surely not are twins, two
brothers who does not resemble to each other.265
In short, the fear of the “Arab” caused the lifting ban on Turkish/Ottoman music. The
Occidentalist Fantasy converged with the self destructive fast modernization environment and
“Arab” fear quickly changed the stances of Kemalist intelligentsia towards the issue. The
ambiguity of the present is also another factor to be added into the basket. The Ankara Radio
station had been broadcasting the concerts of an unprofessional orchestrate from the Kerpiç
Restaurant on Thursday and Friday night during prime times.266 Without the Ottoman/Turkish
music which constituted nearly half of the broadcasting time, in the absence of subsidizing
national music genres, both stations became redundant Western Art Music sources, where
most of the Western radio stations broadcast the same music type through short frequencies.
The population of the republic was declared as 16.158.018 million by the census made on
1935,267 and with nearly 10.640 radio receiver in 1936268 the socio psychological effect of the

262
Cevdet Kozanoğlu, Radyo Hatırlarım,Ankara: TRT yayınları 1988, p.11.
263
Radyo Programı, “Haftalık Notlar”, Saturday 22 J January 1936, Year:1, N. 7.
264
Radyo Programı, “Haftalık Notlar”, Saturday 11 April 1936, Year: 1,N.12.
265
Peyami Safa, Cumhuriyet, “Mısır Radyosu” , 6 August 1936, p.3 .
266
Follow the details of broadcasting Schedule through Radyo Programı, Haftalık Notlar.
267
DĠE, 75.Yılında Sayılarla T.C, Ankara,1998 cited in KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), pp.142-143.
91
ban on the society cannot be denied. Radio, as being the only source of entertainment and the
connection with the outside world through those years, was an important technological
innovation for the people of the modern states. However, in the Turkish case and in the music
revolution incident, rather than the modern national oscillations, the fear of the Oriental
legacy, the anxiety to be heard and listened by the Occident and the solidarist perceptions of a
lifeless community played greater roles. Even though, there had been short wave frequencies
of the Occident radios, broadcasting Western classical music, there was an anxiety to perform
the same music genre at Ankara music station, make Occident listen its own music and
“breed” the public who was “wandered” with “sexual desires” induced by Allaturca music.
However, the fear of Orient, the invasion of Arab was effective in lifting the ban.

The Radio Instruction and Examination

The Ankara radio station unlike Istanbul had been purposely and systematically used
as the state‟s ideological apparatus for the “education” and “development” of the society
especially after 1940s. The Istanbul Radio station being away from the influence and
nourishment of dominant socio political classes, had not made broadcast during the 1940s,
had been muted for 10 years. In the dichotomy of Ankara and Istanbul, the latter one as the
legacy of past, was separated from the Turkish modernization machine, so its institutions.269
The Istanbul Radio station had been silenced till the end of the 1949 and the Radio Journal
argues that the station was occluded because of its “irrational” broadcast and the undisciplined
staffs.270 The radio was an important area of panorama for following the theoretical
framework that I choose to study in the case of music. The broadcasting of the Western
entertaining songs and the Ottoman/Turkish music for fulfilling the broadcasting schedule
was the first incident that unfolds the problem which is the ambiguity of the present. The
other issue was the examinations done under the shelter of the institution for employing
singers and instrumentalists.
In the skirmish environment between the Occidental and Oriental music, although the
Ankara Radio declares its neutrality, the station indicated the necessity of music “education”
and the increase the quantity of national folk songs. Moreover, officially it was announced
that that the institution was determined in its task for the “national music reform” when the

268
KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p.142.
269
Ahıksa, (2005), p.121.
270
Radyo, “Istanbul Radyosu Niçin Kapandı?”, 15 April, 1944, Vol.3, N. 29, p.9.
92
early 1940s arrived.271 The radio stations inevitably were under the hegemonic ideology‟s
sphere of influence after Atatürk‟s speech on the parliament in 1934. Sometimes even
inspections made by the ruling elites themselves, prove this apparent “influence” on the
station. Ġsmet Ġnönü replacing Atatürk after his death, as the “chief” of the nation, once
personally visited the Ankara Radio station and pointed out to the necessity of using “national
tunes” in the songs broadcasted on radio.272 Just after the visit, the aim of the station was
declared as the “cultivation and elevating the cultural level of the society”. On the path of this
determined aim, sometimes the ordinary individuals who were listening Allaturca music were
displayed as legitimization sources in an arcane manner. The existence of Allaturca audience
was put as a necessity, as a reason for making the revolution. For instance, in an interview, a
forty year old bank worker says, he enjoys listening to the news agency and his wife is
enthusiastic for Allaturca music as if, pointing out to the importance of the radio as cultivation
apparatus and its “breeding role”. In the sub titles of his interview, the old man complains
about his wife‟s enthusiasm in the Allaturca songs.273 The Allaturca music was “cursed” by
the audience and this is published as if pointing out to the “miserable condition” of the
Allaturca music. An interviewed made by the 10 year old boy is also published as the proof of
the sublime “successful” mission of the institution and presented in the journal as source of
legitimization of the national goal. “I learn the folk songs in the program called “Yurttan
Sesler”… If I listen to the songs a couple of times, over and over again, I can memorize them
songs.” “If I have missing lyrics I consult those with my friends at class. I carry out the
missing parts” says ten year old audience. These interviews unfold an audience picture
perfectly being cultivated by the radio. In other words, these interviews prove the existence of
an idealized Western radio which teaches, examines and cultivates its subjects. The male in
the family criticizes the female for listening “shameful” Allaturca songs. The ten year old boy
who studies to memorize the folk songs is the peak point of this idealization. Yet, this was just
the picture that the radio bureaucrats and politicians desired to see.
The Yurttan Sesler program maker Mustafa Sarısözen whose influence is undeniable
on the Turkish Folk music, mentions his “mission” not just as “entertaining the audiences” but
“gathering of the whole hearts and uniting the whole nation in a united emotion”.274 That was
the missing part of the Kemalist ideology, winning the hearts of his children and the Ankara
271
Ġzettin Tuğrul NiĢbey, Radyo, “Alaturka,Alafranga ve Radyomuz”,15 August 1942, Vol.1, N.9 p.2 .
272
Ġzettin Tuğrul NiĢbey, Radyo, “Musiki İnkılabımızda Benliğimiz”, 15 January 1943, Vol.2 N.14, p.2.
273
Baki Süha Edipoğlu, Radyo, “Radyonun Büyük ve Küçük Dinleyicileri Arasında”, 15 July 1944, Vol.3 N.32
p.10.
274
Radyo, “Mustafa Sarısözen ile bir Konuşma”, 15 June 1944, Vol.3 N:31, p.5.
93
Radio undertook this role. Pertained to its role, the institution apparently provided ideological
support to Western music performers, “approved” folk music musicians notably Mustafa
Sarısözen as the folk music “teacher.” Since the mid 1930s, there had been many efforts to
make a collection of regionally oriented folk songs and create a national archive that the
whole citizens could sing altogether. Sarısözen was among the dominant figures in this
process with his programs on the Radio and the archive studies that he had done on field
researches. The programs that he broadcasted before “Yurttan Sesler” were called in turn, “We
are learning a March” (Bir Marş Öğreniyoruz) and “We are learning a folk song” (Bir Türkü
Öğreniyoruz). These programs were supported by the published notes and lyrics on the Radio
periodical, in a column prepared by him. There were also militarist marches in these columns
which were mostly about the sublime role of Turkish nation and its citizen‟s obligations
towards their “father” and “chiefs.” On the other hand the folk songs drew attention with their
purified Turkish lyrics. However, the teaching period of these programs lasted only 4 months
and the chief head of the station, Vedat Nedim Tör said “we learned that we have very few
marches and folk songs to be taught to our citizens”. Yet, a teaching period of four months
was enough for Sarısözen and Tör and they initiated a new program called “We are singing
altogether” (Hep Beraber Söylüyoruz). It was now time for the whole nation as having a
unified emotion to sing altogether the songs that they were supposed to learn. 275 The whole
cultural reforms were performed with this fait accompli manner for catching the idealization
of the Occident world. Instead of working on the establishment of a national folk archive for
years, it was assumed that the whole nation would memorize the songs that were taught by
Sarısözen. The relentless and fantasized desire to have a national folk archive like other
Occident nations, even pulled ahead to have one and created an ambiguity of present.
Furthermore, the utopia of the West and the desire to catch the time scale of contemporary
civilization paved way to the occurrence of the ethno nationalist oscillations of the Kemalist
nationalism. The fetishism of the “imagined community” acquired a destructive feature on the
process for bringing order to the chaos.
As I argued before, the migration and re-settlement policies made for the sake of
creating a homogenized unified society, a new nation with a purified community, unlike the
Ottoman Empire, an image of cultural richness and chaos. While the radio had saturated its
hunger for the ambiguity of present problem, the process of cultural nationalization of
Anatolia through Turkification and Islamizing its population converged with it. Regardless of

275
Radyo, “No Title”, 15 April 1943, Vol.2, N.17 ,p.22.
94
the number of the receivers and the broadcast scope of the stations276, the radio was supposed
to reach to every citizen and subject that was addressed. And the subjects were “imagined” as
if they were commodities who receive the “education” and “breeding” that arose from the
sound of the center of the nation. The folkloric song archive that was constituted by the
initiations of Muzzafer Sarısözen and the programs that taught these songs can be evaluated
within this context, which I define as the efforts for the purification of the diversity. The lyrics
sometimes with the weird and “incomprehensible words” were the points which took my
attraction during my research on the radio journal in Sarısözen‟s columns.
Consciously or unconsciously the writers in the Radio Periodical did not hesitate to
display the ideological stance toward Ottoman/Turkish. In various news and conversations,
“Allaturca” musicians and singers were displayed as temporary “visiting” artists, unlike the
Western music performers. For instance, The Ottoman/Turkish music orchestrate performs
their programs in a small room with only one microphone. An article published in the Yeni
Adam periodical writes, “The Fasıl Heyeti is in a miserable condition. But it is not their fault.
The orchestrate performance is due to the cheap technical quality provided for them” 277 On
contrary to this, after the grand hall provided for the large Presidential Philharmonic
Orchestrate, (Risyaset-I Cumhur Flarmoni Orkestrası), another grand hall is provided and
new a “Western” mandolin orchestrate were established.278 There were also other grand
Western orchestrates performing on the broadcast radio, such as the Symphonic Orchestrate
under chief of Ferit Alınar with 64 instrumentalists and the Hall Orchestrate directed by Necip
AĢkın and Halil Oyman. In a contrast style, the only Turkish music orchestrate (Fasıl Heyeti)
composed of 7 instrumentalists with one singers, was regularly asked to participate
examination selections as a requirement for working in the Radio. Although the Western
Orchestrates had performed their concerts in a time schedule with companionship of live
audience in their grand halls, on contrary, the broadcast times of the Fasıl Heyeti were
determined in an arbitrary manner279. The Fasıl Heyeti instrumentalists were usually treated
as “visiting” unprofessional performers and they never got the opportunity of having live

276
KocabaĢoğlu displays the number of the radio receivers and average price list. The table shows that there had
been only 1.178 receivers within the borders of the republic in 1927, 1.536 in 1928, 4.000 in 1932 and 1936 in
10.640. Although the numbers are low compared and below the average of the Western states, it is noteworthy
that most of the radio receivers were placed under the Republican‟s party Public Houses (Halk Evleri) and
speakers were also put on the public spaces where citizens could hear the broadcast on day time.(see
KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), pp.50-55.
277
Yeni Adam, “Radyo‟da Müzik”, 13 February 1941, N.320, p.5.
278
Radyo, “Müzik Hareketleri”, Vol.4, N:37, p.18.
279
Radyo, “Ses ve Saz Sanatkarlarımız”,15 Mart 1942, Vol.1, N.4, p.19.
95
audiences in their small room. Many of the Turkish music performers resigned for having low
quality of working conditions and were complaining about the ideological discrimination
towards the kind of music that they perform.280
The radio was also been a source of education center in the field of music especially
after the 1930s. It is a legacy still present today on TRT as the state‟s radio and television
broadcasting institution. The famous Istanbul singer, Radife Erten describes the Ankara Radio
station as a “school”. She says “Sometimes we work three or four hours per a day in the dark
studio. Our teachers usually come and check whether we work or not. The ones who do not
work take warnings”281 Indeed, the discipline was tried to be established for erasing the
chaotic environment on the institution, to solve the problem of “ambiguity” and inject the
Western capitalist rational discipline to the state officers. The “Occidentalist Fantasy” was so
exaggerated that the elites imagined a community who had already reached to the high
standards of the Occident. For instance, in the first competition held for the granting new
singers to the institution, the officials of the radio were not pleased with the quality of the
applicants. There were one hundred applicants coming from various parts of the Republic
such as Ġzmir, Adana, Sivas, Konya. The head of the Ankara Radio Station, Vedat Nedim Tör
(his brother is a member of parliament Edip Servet Tör), describes the condition of
applications with “misery”. He complains that all the applicants were deprived of written note
skill and sings with their “throats” and make sounds like they were “ill”.282 The traditional
Ottoman music teaching system did not require the system of musical notation.

280
Sabahatin Volkan, Türk Musiki Dergisi, “Istanbul Radyousu Açılırken”, 1 January 1949 p.1.
281
Elçin Temel, Radyo Anıları, Radyo Anıları Programı,, cited in Ahıska(2002), pp.61-62.
282
Vedat Tör, Radyo, “Ses ve Zevk Sefaleti”, Vol.1, N.9 p.3.
96
The photograph shows the Fasıl Heyeti and its musicians, practicing before the live broadcast
(The photograph is taken from Radyo, Müzik Hareketleri, Vol.4, N:37 p.18.)

The Presidential Orchestrate is practicing in the grand concert hall before their concert
(The photograph is taken from Radyo, Müzik Hareketleri, Vol.4, N.37, p.18.)

97
 Therefore, in the newly established republic, it was hard to find ordinary citizens or
musicians who were capable of this Western skill. Nevertheless, the applicants were expected
to perform this Occidental skill in the radio competition and were questioned about their
educational experiences that previously had. The competition committee was composed of
nine authorities, including Cevat Memduh as the head. They were insistently searching for the
“educated” singers and they were really “happy” and content when they found singers who
had leaning to a “Western style” voice.283 It was interesting that the ordinary people were
more aware of the situation than the officers at the Radio. In the following competition, one of
the applicants says in an aggressive tone that he was not ashamed of being deprived of solfegé
knowledge. He says he does not understand why the selecting community questions it since
there are not conservatory schools out of Istanbul and Ankara.284 While the ordinary citizens
were sending letters to the Radio Station regarding how they can better be prepared for the
competition,-such as in a letter from Erzurum, the applicant says he plays Duduk instrument
and he is well-skilled in Turkish music and he asks whether is appropriate for the
competition- the radio responses that the only way to be well prepared is to attend to the
conservatory music notation classes or take private lessons from elder musicians.285 On
contrary to its selective approach in the singer competition, the station welcomes 8 year old
child who plays the folkloric instrumental saz and declares that the station proudly registers
this child into the conservatory although he is illiterate. The boy was also given the
opportunity to make a live performance on the broadcast. The reason behind approving this
child, is obviously the anxiety, the fantasy to constitute a national folk song music genre at
one go.286 The ethnic concerns are also influential. Ten year old boy playing the “national”
instrument is perceived and approved as an opportunity to enhance national pride. However,
the Ottoman performers or the Duduk player from Erzurum was not appreciated as the young
child.

283
Cahit Beğenç, Radyo, “Radyomuzda Saz ve Ses İmtihanları”, (Unobserved Date), Vol.1, N.9, pp.11-12.
284
Baki Süha Edipoğlu, Radyo, “Ses ve Saz Sanatkarlarımızın İmtihanı”, 1 March1946, Vol.5, N.51, p.15.
285
, Hikmet Ecipoğlu, Radyo,” Radyo‟da Çalışmak İsteyenler Nasıl Bir Yol Tutmalı”, 1 July 1946, Vol.5
,N.55,.p.15.
286
Radyo, “Radyo‟da Sazını Dinlediğimiz Yeni Harika Çocuk”, 1 May 1946, Vol.5, N.53, p.20.
98
 The selective committee is seen in the photograph, examining an applicant
(The photograph is taken Radyo, Radyomuzda Saz ve Ses İmtihanları, Vol.1, N.9, p.11.)

The ideological sympathy and support towards the Folk music could also be found in
the discourses of the professional and amateur musicians. In the artificially created dichotomy
between the Ottoman/Turkish music and the Folk music, the songs of Anatolia were
confirmed as the representation of Turkish ethnie while enriching the “national” with Western
civilization music. Ruhi Su, as one of the visiting folk artists who performs at the station,
claims that the folk music is less “threatening” to the Occidental music”. Furthermore he says
his ultimate intention is the “discovery” of the original singing style of Folk music with the
“Occidental” singing techniques.287 It is a matter of question while the discovery of Turkish
ethnie on the paths of Western civilization is an ongoing endless process and desire, how and
in what ways people define this transition period. Put another way, how they name and give
meaning to their current situations on the transition period. For instance, in what kind of style

287
Hikmet Münirebcioğlu, Radyo, “Bas Bariton Ruhi Su”, (Unobserved Date), Vol.3,N.29, p.18.
99
and technique Ruhi Su, as a folk singer, had been singing if he was on a path to discover to
sing the Turkish lyrics with Occidental vocal techniques? How he had been fulfilling the gap
of uncertainty and ambiguity. In other words, why singing the Anatolian folk songs in a
Western style performing technique is a matter of “discovery”? What causes this
“infeasibility”? The answer to these questions is the self creative reshaping incentives, the
bombardment of being in a modernizing surrounding and destructive desire for developing
coupled with the Occidentalist Fantasy. As the Occident appears as a utopia that can never be
attained, people in Turkish republic acquired a mission of “discoverer”. Ruhi Su was not the
only one who embarked the discoverer mission in the music debate.

Public Surveys and Questionnaires on Music:

Through the periodicals that I researched, I came across with many surveys and
questionnaires made for investigating public‟s preferences, ideas, and likings related with the
music. There were also question forums in various periodicals in which the music audience
and unprofessional performs were “enlightened” through the answers provided for them, such
as the “Mail Box” columns At initial stage, I was content to make a direct contact with the
feelings and comments of ordinary people and amateur music followers about the motions of
music. I thought that I found a chance to make a critique of Kemalist cultural policies and
how “negatively” their indirect or direct penetrations caused anomalies on the music life.
However, I found out that these surveys and questionnaires were an area of “legitimization”
for the top down imposed cultural policies. I argue that these kind of forum channels, “liberal”
breathing spaces, pretended democratic expansions were used as self-chain mechanism for the
society, for the sake of bringing order and disciple, for drawing the obscure border of up to
what level for being Western, (unlike in the Ottoman Empire, in “degenerated” Istanbul) for
plugging a successful self-watch machine that could possibly function better than the
Panopticon state design. For instance, it is underlined that only “useful” (beneficial) answers
are going to be published, in the start of a survey regarding the radio broadcast, which is made
by Yeni Adam periodical.288 These kind of surveys were done for proving how the abstract
projected public which is needed to be regulated/corrected existed in reality and how the
hegemonic ideology was in touch with them and gave a free space to offer their ideas and how

288
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 23 January 1941, N.317, p.10.
100
the it was compatible with the principles of “liberalism”.289 Hence, these surveys and similar
programs on the Radio station, such as “Audience Desires Hour” (Dinleyeci Ġstekleri Saati)
do not totally display the pure reflection of individual preferences. Anyhow, if the subjects of
the governing classes were free enough to follow their paths, the necessity of revolution
disappears. Burhan Belge says “People between ages of 30-70, generally enjoy Allaturca
music and they enjoy many other things. Yet, unless we led these things to exist in the
Turkish community, revolution (inkılap) becomes redundant, (unnecessary)”290 Thence, these
liberal oscillations in the periodicals were the arcane mechanisms laid by the ruling elites to
unfold the necessity for making music revolution. These forums and surveys were also used
as mirrors to reflect the inferior condition of the ordinary people to themselves.
The survey done by Yeni Adam periodical regarding the opinions about the radio
broadcasting is constituted of seven questions also including sub parts such as free opinions
about the music performed on the radio. For example, the first question asks among which of
these: news agency, music, plays, talk programs, conferences, do you want to become more
frequent? The second asks “When you turn off your radio”? The last question is very
interesting and asks whether it is approved to salute an “invisible” public? The issue of
invisibility/visibility of the social public reveals how the subjects of the nationalism becomes
materialized “things” in the broadcast of radio and I believe that this question is provided to
check whether they approved or disapproved this reality.291 The very first persons who answer
the question before the publishing of surveys were Sabri Korkmazoğlu and Bekir Baltacıoğlu,
whose surname is the same with Ġsmail Hakkı Baltacıoğlu, the owner the of the periodical. “I
turn of my radio” says Baltacıoğlu, “When I hear a very slow, motionless and boring
conference and heavy classical music”. “I turn of my radio when I hear the Fasıl Heyeti
(Turkish/Ottoman Music group) performs” says the other one. Although the periodical in
general criticizes the Radio stations for being “music boxes”, Muazzefer AĢkın was led to say
that he wants more music programs.
Ġ.H Baltacıoğlu whose ideological stance is more close to Pan-Turkish camp, criticizes
the Western admirers and the ones who defend Ottoman/Turkish music. He also criticizes the
ones who support Ziya Gökalp‟s formulation, harmonizing the Folk songs with Western

289
Ahıska presents the Nazi Germany case where the quantity of these kind of audience preference surveys were
more than Wienmer Republic.She also claims that these kind of surveys were in accordance with Nazi policies to
demonstrate how the principles of “liberalism” was compatible with theirs and how these principles are not only
peculiar to the Western Democracies.(see p.146)
290
Burhan Belge, Yeni Adam, “Radyoda Türk Sesi”, N.171, 8 April 1937,p.9.
291
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”,(Unobserved Date), N.317, p.10.
101
polyphony. He offers a fourth solution to this area of chaos and says that “A new national”
music is needed to be founded. “The folk songs are the old songs of this community” says
Baltacıoğlu. He claims new songs are urgently needed to be composed, the ones which must
be called as “European” when Europeans listen and the ones that must be liked as “Turkish”
songs when listened by Turks.292
The periodical, through its entire publishing time scale, saturated itself from this kind
“complex arrangements” and modernist fetishism. The “discovery” of the new men of the
Turkish nation was a task that ought to be done and the Baltacıoğlu devoted himself to the
mission the “discoverer”. Music also appeared as a matter of discovery for Baltacıoğlu. I
argue, among the main objectives of the survey, so for the periodical as well, is to reveal “the
chaos” in the area music and this is the only way Baltacıoğlu might fulfill the role
“discoverer”. Indeed, Baltacıoğlu had been active figure in the music revolution since 1920s.
With Cemal ReĢit Rey he was in the committee constituted by Education Minister Mustafa
Necati, the committee which enclosed the Oriental music department on 9 December 1926.293
Hence, I argue that Baltacıoğlu‟s studies and written articles are arcane representations and
subtitles of the hegemonic ideology. Being an organic opposing intellectual and his
periodical‟s efficient and determinant long publishing life compared to other periodicals, he
had been an influential figure in the production of discourses regarding the music revolution
and reforms
In the following the weeks, Baltacıoğlu had kept publishing the results of the survey
that he made. Hikmet Söğütlü says “I am in favour of turning the radio other than the times of
news agency, radio newspaper, what I mean when Allaturca and Oriental music performance
are not being broadcasted”. At the same page, Cemil Solakoğlu says “When I hear the cry of
the Fasıl Heyeti, I turn off my radio”294 Another answer from Bursa, says “I claim that the
broadcasting time of the Allafranga (Occidental) music must be more than the Oriental” and
he claims that in future the majority of the music broadcasting will be constituted of the
Occidental music.295 The “Alcoholic Music” label which is stuck by the intelligentsia to the
Ottoman/Turkish music is also shared by the readers of Yeni Adam. The Ottoman music had
been mostly coexisted with the restaurants that served alcohol to their guests in the company

292
Ġ.H Baltacıoğlu, Yeni Adam, “Musikide Türke Doğru” , 18 September 1941, (page and volume is unclear).
293
Gönül Paçacı, Kuruluşunun 77.Yılında Dar-ûl-Elhan ve Türk Musikisinin Gelişimi”. Tarih ve Toplum Dergisi
N.121 January 1994, p.54 .
294
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 6 February 194, N.319, p.3/13.
295
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 13 February 1941, N.320, p.20 .
102
of small Oriental music groups, especially in the cosmopolitan Istanbul.296 There was no place
for Meyhane restaurants and its music in the new rational “well ordered” nation where the
citizens are expected to entertain in a “temperate” level. “When I hear the Meyhane music”
says some of the readers, “I turn off the radio”.297 Nevertheless, it is also admitted that the
majority of music programs are constituted of Allaturca songs hence the “necessary amount of
breeding” had not been obtained in the field of music.298 On the other hand, Melih Ünaku
believes that in future the majority of the music broadcast will be constituted from “National
Tunes”. He argues that the national song “performances” are important sources of “national
propaganda”.299 However, in a paradoxical stance, Aziz Zaimoğlu complains about the less
broadcasting time of Turkish folk songs. He claims that those folk songs are “objective” and
“collective” examples of Turkish music.300 “The mystic Oriental music under the name of
classical artistic songs” and “degenerated” American Jazz songs are among the condemned
ones. “These play records (including Ottoman Turkish/Music ones) are the ones when I hear
and turn off radio” says Cemil Silistireli. This letter displays how the radio saturates the
hunger for present, by putting the jazz and oriental play records on the play list when it is
impossible to broadcast live concerts. Hence, it is not a coincidence the spread of the Jazz
music which is against the “well-bred” Turkish ethnic identity that the Kemalists designed,
was initiated by its own state apparatus that is the Radio. The most interesting and “wise”
answers that I found, belongs to S.Hakkı Esatoğlu who suggests that it is impossible to
envisage what kind of program would constitute the majority of broadcasting in future. “The
human preferences might change and only the time is a determinant within this context” In
fact, his comment is also an example that displays the Kemalist reshaping effects on the
perceptions of individuals towards music. The Kemalist goal on attaining a national citizen
character snapped off from the private music preferring is well illustrated in this answer. What
is important under the subtitle of this answer is that, music was approved as a fact which can
be “changed” or configured. It is narrated as something independent from human preferences.
Following this statement he claims, the music broadcasting must be majority in times of peace
but during the war times the news agency and similar kinds of programs must constitute the

296
Meyhane is a Persian word, composed of two fragments, “Mey” which means wine and “hane” which means
house and the direct translation is Wine house in English.
297
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 3 April 1941, N.327, p.12 .
298
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 16 April 1941, N.329, p. 12.
299
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 8 May 1941, N.332, p.12 .
300
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 6 March 1941, N.323,p.11.
103
majority.301 His statement perfectly displays how the music retreated from a personal
enjoyment to an obligation that must be done in a “collective” and unified manner. The other
answers to the survey, more or less included the same discourses and narrations within the
same context. After a four month period of investigation the periodical published a general
evolution regarding the results that were collected. The general evolution is far away from a
scientific observation only justifies policies and ideas of the periodical defends in music
revolution. For instance, generally Baltacıoğlu and various writers at the periodical criticize
the radio for being a “music box.” It says “in the light of the answers for the first question it is
deduced that the Turkish community approves the radio as source of “education” and
“propaganda apparatus”. The following deductions are: the “significant” talk programs and
302
conferences must have a priority their quality must be enhanced in the radio broadcast.
The complexity of the ideas preferences regarding music questions, points out to the necessity
to form a “new” national music, since none of the existing ones are “satisfactory.” The music
within this context must also be displayed as a form of “obligation” and “disciple”. In the
result of the survey, the music is presented as fact for enriching the culture in the absence of
war times. That‟s why the entertaining American Jazz music and melancholic Allaturca
music were condemned because this kind of music possibly may disturb the “disciple” of the
subjects.303
The Yeni Adam‟s survey was not only one performed, saturated form and contributed
to the controversial air of Occidental/Oriental music. Beneath the foundations of the survey,
Baltacıoğlu, rejecting all the developmental possibilities for the music revolution, suggests
that music must be secondary compared to the “serious” radio programs. His offering, “the
fourth” solution path for the development of music is more an idea of the destruction of the
music rather than creating a new one or the meliorating the existing ones. His periodical‟s
survey is not the only one in which the music audience personal preferring and comments
were used for legitimizing the ruling and governing class‟s cultural policy towards the music.
The state also actively performed similar kind of legitimizations surveys under the wrap of
“liberal” expansions. Before, proceeding to that I will unfold how the vortex of modernism
was used as an opportunity to obtain different kinds of goals and interests by following the
Nota periodical.
301
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketi”, 15 May 1941, N.333, p.12 .
302
Most of the letters complains about the long and “aimless” conferences and the speech technique that is being
used in talk programs. The audience generally wants to hear these kinds of “earnest” and significant programs
however the radio is far away from catching the quality level that is demanded.
303
Yeni Adam, “Radyo Anketinin Bilançosu”, 22 May 1941, p.10.
104
The “Harmony”: The new Turkish Instrument
The word beynelmilel refers to “internationally approved” in the Ottoman language.
The Note Periodical (Nota Mecmuası) which was published since April 1933 is a significant
“educative” music periodical with instrument lessons, music note publishing lyrics and
biographies of musician. The owner of the periodical, Mildan Ziya, describes the mission of
the periodical as “the war for educating and informing the readers”. Furthermore, he says the
ultimate ideal of the periodical is to make contribution for having a “beynelmilel” music that
is saturated by the Occidental polyphonic sounds. The periodical, embracing heavily ethno
racist discourses, includes articles that try to prove the sublime Turkish music history that was
put forward by the pentatonic theory and undertakes the press role of the hegemonic ideology
in the “war” of music revolution. Mildan Ziya presents his thanks to the “guardians” of music
for providing the financial support for his periodical.304 However, the periodical is a perfect
reflection of the confusion, the ambiguity of modernism and clearly presents the problem of
the present. Although the war is being defined as educating the readers with Occidental music
principles, most of the published song notes are Oriental ones which have maqam structure.
Anyhow, the first publishing also involves a detailed history of Oriental music with a
biography of Farabi whose music note books are put forward as a proof that the music note
are “works of sublime Turks.”305 Actually, the subjective Oriental music history is given place
for contributing to the construction of the mythical history of Turks, coming from Central
Asia, a “scientific” observation that had been put forward by the Turkish History Thesis. The
place of the Turkish mark in the world music is so exaggerated that the Greek, Indian,
Persian, Arab and Chinese music are claimed to be part of the Turkish music.306 Through
various parts of the entire periodical, in an ironic way, the Allaturca songs are accompanied
by few militarist marches which involve heavy nationalist and racist narrations where the
Turkish ethnie is being praised and named as “unique”. The most interesting among the
marches that I skipped is the one called “Istanbul March”. Similar to the other marches at
those times, the “Turkishness” is exalted and the father, the Ghazi, the head of the state
Atatürk is again being presented as man who is not “worldly”. Although the march is called
Istanbul march, it is really noteworthy that the name of the capital of the old Ottoman Empire

304
Mildan Niyazi, Nota, “Haftalık Musiki Mecmuası, Niçin Çıkıyoruz?”, 23 April 1933, N.1, p.2.
305
Dr.Salahaddin, Nota, “Farabi”, 23 April 1933, N.1, p.3.
306
Nota, “Şark Musikisi Tarihi Mukaddeme”, 1 May 1933, N.2, pp.6-7.
105
is never included in the lyrics. On contrary, every statement includes words such as “new”,
“newly” which might be seen as a proof of arcane antagonism towards the “old” Istanbul.
The periodical provides a chance to amateur composers to send the notes of their
songs to be published. This is also an indication of the abyss between the periphery and
center, between the intelligentsia and the ordinary citizens. In an ironic way, the ordinary non-
professional musicians were expected to write the notes of the songs that they compose in
1930s. As I explained before, the Ottoman music teaching method in the religious community
houses had not been performed in a Western style where the written music notes were
important source of education. Ergo, the assumption that most of the unprofessional
musicians know this Western skill is an indication of the ambiguity of present. However, the
number of the music notes published in the entire publication is noteworthy. Notably the ones
sent by the amateur musicians. The periodical also seeks for the poets who want their lyrics to
be composed. The music as being the sub component of the language, Turkish language
lessons are also given place. The articulation of the new Turkish words and prosody of the
sentences in the songs are being taught passionately in a detailed way. The readers are also
being thought the “new” Turkish words and urged to use them in the lyrics of the songs.
In the first publication of the periodical Allaturca violin, Oriental ud and cümbüş
instrument method lessons were also initiated. The readers are both informed about the
Oriental and Occidental music principles and about the different techniques used in these two
different music traditions. For instance, the holding way of the violin, both Oriental and
Occidental is being shown but the latter one is being advised to use. In the initial stages, the
periodical is tenderer with the Oriental legacy. For instance, the readers are informed about
Ottoman poet structure and such as the one mostly used in the Ottoman music which is called
“Aruz Vezni”. In the “answers to readers section” upon a question, it is said that “the
periodical both teaches Occidental and Oriental solfegé techniques. 307 Nevertheless, the
Oriental part is mostly described under the title which does not have linkages with the Turkish
ethnie. For instance, Dede Efendi, the great Ottoman musicians, is being presented as an artist
of “Oriental” not “Turkish”.308
After couple of publications, Mildan Niyazi‟ s article called “Revolution in our music”
appears as a harbinger of the change in the “tender” approach. The readers are warned to
perform their music with Western principles and even the Allaturca instruments are suggested

307
Nota, “Okuyucularımıza Cevaplar”, 15 July 1933, N.6, p 26.
308
Nota, “Kapak”, 15 July 1933, N.6, cover page.
106
to be tuned with the Western standards. He claims that the “chaos” in our music could only be
fixed through plugging the “Occidental principles” to our music. In the article it is advised to
use the Western call signs of the music notes and it is also advised to use only the
“appropriate” maqam structures in performing. The Ottoman rhythm performing style (Usül
Vurma) is found “funny” by the author and it is advised to use the Western style hand
technique while making rhythm.309 Moreover, the periodical which is presented as the “only”
music journal of the 1930s publishes an “open letter” to its readers about the conflict of
Occidental and Oriental music. It is admitted that the Oriental music had occupied “majority”
the publishing. It is stated that this fact is known and does not satisfy “particular classes”. It is
written that for having an international Turkish music (beynelmilel Türk Musikisi), Occidental
music publication will also be included in the upcoming numbers. “It is hoped that all the
composers and artists will support us in this case (in the music revolution)”. A survey
composed of seven questions was also added under the letter including questions such as:
“Would you prefer music like Occidental or monophonic like the one we have today?”
“Through which way would you like to integrate Occidental music to ours? First, approving
the classical Occidental music as it is? Second, concentrating on Jazz music? Third, saturating
the Occidental tunes with Turkish themes and sounds? A group of classification in the
Turkish music is also offered and asked which one is preferred among the Folk music of
Anatolia, Classical songs or the Oriental ones?310
It is not a coincidence that the survey is very similar to the one done by the Yeni
Adam. It appears as a source of legitimization in the music revolution war. Mildan Niyazi
resembled the goal of the periodical to a “war” that ought to be fought. For the sake of taking
the resent of the people, the sound and existence of the Ottoman/Turkish music was given
permission to exist as an “enemy” figure at war. An opportunity for offering ideas was given
permission, a free public discussion environment was provided for the goal of fighting against
the “enemy”.
In fact, Foucault presents these kind of liberal oscillations of the governance are ways
of governing the subjects by “liberalizing them”. He argues rather than imposing laws and
dictations upon the subjects of governing, “disposition” of tactics, or “using the laws as a way
of tactic” is at the core “art” of “Governmentality”.311 Through the art, music and radio

309
Mildan Niyazi, Nota, “Musikimizde İnkilap”, 15 September 1933, N.11, p.41-47.
310
Nota,” Garp ve Şark Musikisile uğraşan sanatkârlarımıza açık mektup”,15 April 1934, N.25, p.120.
311
Michel Foucault, “Governmentality”, The Foucault Effect: Studies of Governmentality Burchell G.(Ed),
Gordon C,(Ed), Miller P,(Ed), Chicago: The University Press of Chicago 1991, pp.94-95.
107
periodicals by creating an air of conflict in the Ottoman/Turkish music, the legitimization of
injecting Occidental music into the veins of the Oriental was provided. The comments and
ideas of the citizens, who are defined as the material souls which need “education” and
“breeding”, were now used for hijacking the discourses in the field of music. Put another way,
the ordinary citizens were commoditized as the masters and teachers of their own. Instead of
direct penetration, the ruling classes and the governing educated cultural elites settled its own
system of governance into the layers of the society, into the souls of the subjects for running
machine that they had created. Through this way, a revolution at the hearts of the people-
music as a matter of intimacy and individually- may be accomplished.
The first citizen to answer the survey comes from the head of the art department of the
Trabzon people‟s house (halk evi). His very first comment reveals how the positivist
principles of the Enlightenment are approved. He says “Music is not a matter of entertainment
anymore, it is a matter of science and art”. He also complains about the “ambiguity” of
maqam structures and defends the necessity to order them. 312 Another person called Mazhar,
says he believes in the “birth of the real Turkish music” but disapproves total approval of the
Occidental music.313 Ercüment Behzat‟s letter unfolds really significant narrations about the
sharp discourses of the hegemonic ideology and how successfully these were transmitted into
the mouths of the ordinary people. He claims that a war is requested against Meyhane and
Jazz music. All the kinds of the Ottoman music must be “purged” for the sake of having
order. He resembles the effects of Jazz and Allaturca music to cocaine and morphine and
claims that all the communities which had marched with a “romantic tempo” had already
decayed. He also labels the ones as “insane” who wants to perform the songs like religious
songs of Mevlana and Hayyam. The readers of the periodical were all unified in favour of
“discovering” the real Turkish music by modifying the existing principles with Occidental
ones. As ordinary citizens, they were so enthusiastic for “cursing” monophonic Ottoman
music and praising polyphonic sounds, probably of which they really do not have sufficient
knowledge about.314
Another letter clues about the radio broadcast from a perspective of ordinary person.
The reader, who suggests the spread of the Anatolian folk music in the big cities such as
Istanbul, claims that the radio must not broadcast entertaining songs and must undertake the
role of “breeding”. When he talks about the “breeding” he passes an incident happened at

312
Nota, “Okuyucularımızla Baş başa”,1 June 1934, N.28, p134.
313
Nota, “Anket Hakkında Fikirlerim”, 15 June 1934, N.29, p.139.
314
Nota, “Ankete Cevap: Meyhane ve Caz Musikisine Karşı Harp”,N.30, 1 July 1934, p.143.
108
Paris during Cemal ReĢit Rey‟s concert when a bored Turkish man shouted “Quel tapage
mon cher!..” to Rey (the man was probably discontent with Rey‟s Occidental music
performance at an Occident city, Paris). The reader criticizes this “tragic” incidents and points
out to the necessity of “education” for listening Mozart, Wagner and other Occidental
classical songs. As the other critiques about the radio broadcast that I had presented
previously, the fact of the music in the first stages of the republican era had been perceived as
a matter of “education” and a mirror of self-perception against the West. Listening the tunes
and sounds of the reformist Protestant ethic was perceived as a matter of “secularization” and
“civilization” and booing Cemal ReĢit Rey who performs this Occident music to Westerns at
Paris was indication of “ignorance”.
Introduction of a civilized Turkish music which can be listened and applaud by the
Westerns had been a relentless desire shared by everyone. “I would establish a conservatory
and invite professors from Germany, through this way within 20 years we would be able to
make revolution in Turkish music and introduce it to Europe” says Kemal Ġzzet, while
answering the questions of the survey.315 This is a perfect indication of how “Occidentalist
Fantasy” works in the discourses among ordinary citizens who were literate and had relatively
higher socio-economic status. The anxiety of being “heard” and “listened” by the Occident
also overwhelms the ordinary souls and bodies. The sole aim in the cultural revolutions was
perceived to be represented in the Europe. Furthermore, the reader makes a classification of
the Occident and complains about the ones who enjoy Italian operas which is a “weak section
of the Occidental music”. Making a classification of Occident gives the Turkish ethnie a less
“inferior” place on the map of the continent and provides imagine of less “superior” Western
civilizations, like Italians which could be by passed by easily. The reader says “even” the
Balkan countries have operas and do not understand why the Turks can‟t have them.316 On the
other hand, Halit Bedi from Bursa, says “Each day everything changes and we face a newness
in each day, we see those things and we just watch”. After ten years, after all the wars that had
been fought till that day, the only thing is left which is music, he claims. He also complains
about the absence of operas in the capital city Ankara, the center of the hegemonic ideology
unlike in Istanbul where a few had left and had been on stage. “We wait for the friends who

315
Nota, “Ankete Cevap”, 1 August 1934, N.32, pp-149-151.
316
Ibid, p.150.
109
are going to perform this revolution in music” he says, by pointing out the necessity of newly
composed Turkish songs.317
A new music instrument called “Harmony” (Ahenk) is also being presented in the
periodical under the title of “Revolution in instruments”. Throughout various numbers of the
periodical this “invented” instrument that is a restructured type of the Ud had been presented
as a “miracle” which combines the sounds of the both Ud and Tambur. The inventor of the
instrument, Süleyman Suat B. from EskiĢehir is also introduced and his atelier‟s address is
given for the ones who want to buy this instrument.318 In fact, this incident is a good proof of
how the feeling of chaos during the music revolution, was being used as source of trade by the
newly established bourgeois class and how the principles of the modernist fetishism supports
the spread and principles of the capitalist market economy. The editor of the periodical did
not hesitate to make a further step and took the opportunity of music revolution for making
the presentation of the music education group that he own self founded where Occidental
style music education is underlined in bold letters.
The article which is called “To arms: Our ideal is in progress” written by Mildan
Niyazi, approximately after one year of the first publication, reminds the readers that it had
been written that his ideal was to make revolution in the Turkish music, saturate the tunes of
Anatolia with polyphonic sounds and create an “international” (beynelmilel) music that is
being able to listened by the Western. Niyazi reminds his readers that the new era is the era of
the Ghazi and the religious music of Mevlevihane, the Orthodox Church and Jewish
Synagogue must not exist in the new Turkish secular nation. He warns there may be many
“wounded and death casualties in this war” and understands the ones who enjoy listening
Allaturca music. He reminds about the hat and alphabet revolutions and says “now it is very
funny to come across with the ones who wears the Fes” and says “the ones who listen
Allaturca music will be laughed tomorrow”. He also sends a message to the ones “who wants
to learn the new music” and points out to the necessity of having instruments such as
“havaiyan guitar, Spanish guitar and mandolin” for learning the new music. The education
center of the “new music” Istanbul Music Unity (Istanbul Musiki Birliği)-that had been
established under the leading role of the Mildan Niyazi- is also being advertised on the article
and prices are provided about the Occidental lessons. Furthermore, he adds that the periodical
stops publishing the songs of the readers which are monophonic and warns them to send “four

317
Nota, “Ankete Cevap”,15 July 1934, N.31, pp.145-148
318
Nota, “Sazda İnkılâp”,15 April 1934, N.25, (unidentified page), see also the advertisement in N.30.
110
 319
tuned songs.” The international instruments are also presented in the following pages for
nullifying the “confusion” in the minds of the music followers. While the violin is approved
as a beynelmilel instrument-with an Occidental tuned system of note “A” and Western holding
style- the Ottoman violin the Kemençe is being rejected although it has the same structure that
the Violin has. The ney is also being rejected because of the existence of the same instrument,
the flute. Although the Kanun is “close” for making a polyphonic music, since it is hard to
learn to play it, it is also rejected and advised not being played by the readers. The Ud is being
presented as “deserted” (metruk) instrument and the readers are urged not to play it.320
As being the only music periodical in those years, the socio psychological effect of the
periodical on the readers cannot be denied. In the absence of a regular radio broadcast and
official Ottoman/Turkish music education institutions, I suggest that the periodical had been
an important source of sharing, teaching and music news platform. The amount of the shared
lyrics and music notes sent from various parts of the country proves this fact. Hence, it had
direct effects on the music life through those years. Besides, the extreme nationalist theme
displayed in the lyrics of the marches is also another issue to be taken into account. Through
the ethno racist marches in which the “blood of the Turk” is usually being praised the
periodical reveals the exclusionary face of the Turkish nationalism against the non-Turkic
identities. The “core” of the Turkish is usually being linked to a heritage of blood. The
militarist discourses used for drawing the panorama and the aim of the “music revolution”
also unfold the destructive secularization of the Kemalist ideology against the “ignorance” of
the Islam religion, where the religious songs of Mevlevihanes had become a symbol of threat.
The periodical is also a perfect example for the “Occidentalist Fantasy”. The Occident was
classified and presented as “ideal” and “utopia” of community in where the Turkish music
must be heard. The banned traditional Ottoman instruments are deemed as not being “heard”,
“understood” “liked” by the Occident. However, the “international” instruments are supposed
as the frequency channel to be heard by the Westerns. In an ironic way, although the goal is
to “fight” against the Allaturca music however the periodical had became a spreading source
of the music genre that it “fights” against. Till the revolution war declared, approximately one
year, significant amount of Allaturca songs were published in the periodical such as “Ölürsem
Yazıktır” and “Heybelide”. Another ironic incident is the Ud and Cümbüş lessons those had
been published through the entire publishing. Despite those instruments had been “banned” in

319
Mildan Niyazi, Nota, “Silah Başına: Ülkümüz Tahakkuk Ediyor”,13 December 1934, N.36, pp 153-156.
320
Nota,” Suallere Cevap”, 13 December 1934, N.36 p.89.
111
the “new music”, for the sake of fulfilling the “ambiguity of the present” the method notes
and educative informing articles about those instruments had existed through the entire
periodical till “war declaration”. Yet, as I wrote above, in the last number of the periodical
these oriental instruments had been banned for not being “internationally” used. The
“impatience” for being modern, the modernist fetish for making a rapid jump to the music
development, like in the other cultural fields as well, creates the “problem of present” for the
Turkish modernization project. As written in the Istanbul March, “we passed the centuries
within ten year period of time”. The centuries of the Occidental modernization was squeezed
into a ten year period of time by playing the Occidental instrument. “Condemning” the
oriental instruments and creating incentives for Occidental ones was deemed a sufficient
progress for catching the utopia of the West. Yet, the actual time, the present time was not
overrated, heeded for really searching for an appropriate “modern”. In brief, the periodical
both became a spread source of the popular Allaturca songs and the instruments of it till the
declared music revolution. However when the music war against the inferiority was declared
in the last numbers, the publishing of the periodical was just brought to a stand.

The Radio after the mid 1930s and in 1940s

The radio, since the initial five year of its establishment, had been the fabric source of
music production, as both being education and entertainment institution reaching to the hearts
of the people with the play records, live concerts performed by temporary music groups,
orchestrates and visiting artists. However, as being the “voice of the modern/nation state”, it
was deemed that this new technological innovation could be used as an ideological apparatus
for obtaining the “mass consciousness” in the society. By calling out to each citizen and
reaching to their hearts, the spaces that previously which was not combined, may be
connected and those previously absent linkages among the citizens could be obtained.
The process of the nationalization of the radio started after the 1930s and the
institution nationalized in 1937. As the previously provided information, the governance of
the radio was established under the framework of an anonym company called TTTAŞ, which
was founded by an agreement signed by the head of the state İş Bank, Mahmut Celal Bayar,
the Interior ministry Cemil Uybadın and member of Anadolu Agency council, Fatih Rıfkı
Altay. The radio broadcasted under the framework of this agreement signed in 1926 was
112
valid for ten years. This signed document also appointed the two parliament members (from
Siirt and Bolu) as director and vise director of the company.321 However, after 1930s, the
intelligentsia spokesmen of the nationalist ideology defended to increase the state role on the
Radio, pointing out to the examples of Italy, Germany and Soviet Union.322 The radio which
was criticized as being a “music box,” was now requested to be “nationalize” for using it as
an efficient “apparatus” for breeding. According to Ahıska, Atatürk‟s speech at the parliament
in 1935323 constituted and inspired the framework of this “cultural preparation.”324 The list,
in which the things that must be done for the nationalization of the radio arranged, includes a
line which defends the “betterment” of the Istanbul Radio, which had been broadcasting the
vivid music life of the city.325 By the law legislated in 18 August 1936, the administration of
radio was transferred to PTT, the state post and telegraph company.326 The properties of the
Istanbul Station were impounded and new directors were appointed to both stations.327 As the
1940s arrived with harbinger of the Second World War, the Republican Party had increased
its presence on the radio. On the fourth general congress of the Party, the party defined the
radio as a precious apparatus for “domestication” and the “breeding” of the society. The radio
had been an efficient propaganda apparatus during and onset of the Second World War
throughout the continent of Europe by the camping countries who sought to increase their
sphere of influence. For the sake of protecting the Turkish society from the “harmful”
propaganda injections of the outside radio stations,328 the Republican Party made a decision to
increase the quantity of radio transmitters by a state subsided system. 329 By the end of the
1939, number of the transmitter was 56.076 in the entire country and continued increase in a
rapid way in the following years.330 The technological facilities were also meliorated and a
new transmitter at Etimeskut/Ankara was settled and a new radio house with a more
professional staff came into service in 1938.331

321
KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), pp.12-13.
322
Yunus Nadi, Cumhuriyet,” Devlet İşi” 7 January 1936, cited in KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p.133.
323
Zabıt Cederesi, Devre.5, Ġçtimai 1, Birinci Ġnikad, Vo:6, p.3 cited in KocabaĢoğlu, p.133.
324
Ahıska, (2005), p.133.
325
Cumhuriyet, “Radyo İşi Nasıl Halledilecektir”, 8 March 1936, cited in KocabaĢoğlu, p.134.
326
KocabaĢoğlu,(1980) , p.135.
327
Ibid, p.136.
328
Throughout those years, usually there had been short wave broadcasting of news and conferences in foreign
languages for obtaining the social support from outside nations. For instance, BBC radio had broadcasted news
in Turkish language during the war years. See Ahıska, (2005), pp.155-203.
329
cited in KocabaĢoğlu (1980),p.116
330
Ibid, p.135.
331
Ibid, pp.151-152.
113
 The meds of 1930s, as I argued before was the years of “High Kemalism”, where the
state and party unification had intensified. Therefore, for connecting the center to periphery,
this technological apparatus was supposed to increase the linkages and intensify the presence
of the “grand” family in the imaginations of the people. Committed to this, the rise of the
populist democracies across Europe and their efficient use in new technological innovations
also inspired Kemalists. During those years the broadcast time of the radio increased and
became more regular. The conferences related with the Turkish history thesis and the
Language Study Community (Dil Tetkik Cemiyeti) appeared for the configuration of the new
nationalist identity.332 The time scope of the talk programs also grew up, especially the ones
targeting citizens in the rural side of the country such as “Agriculture Hour” (Ziraat Saati),
“Citizen Information” (Vatandaşlık Bilgisi) and school lesson programs under the title of
“Revolution Lessons” (İnklap Dersleri). Educative University Lessons such as “Economy
Hour” (İktisat Saati) were also included. The goal was to create a big family of nation, a
grand community of imagination, which share the same life style, preferences, do the same
thing in the line with the raising radio waves. This idealization was so exaggerated that
“Morning Sport Hour” in a militarist manner (the training illustrations were included in the
Radio periodical) and the “House Hour” (Evin Saati) a program that had been advisory on the
eating, cooking and cleaning habits of the new citizens were broadcasted. 333 With the increase
in the financial means, new radio transmitter stations were established in the various parts of
the new nation and the broadcast zone expanded, reaching from Ġzmir to the Eastern lands.334
From this panorama, it seems that the radio had been used in an efficient way for the
“imagination” of the new Turkish community. The detailed analysis and the critique of the
talk programs are beyond the scope of this research. However, I would like to include Meltem
Ahıska statement regarding the radio‟s efficiency in terms of nation identity configuration.
According to her, the radio had not been successful at obtaining a “mass consciousness”. She
says “Whilst the radio had been in a fantasy of talking to a mass, it avoided understating some
fragmentations within this mass and talking to them”. The assumption of reaching accessing
to the souls of the citizens was so romanticized that by augmenting the lessons such as

333
See various numbers of the Radio periodical since the year of 1939. In a similar program to which is called
“Economy and Care” (Tutum ve Bakım Saati), which is addressed to the women in the periphery, gives food
recipes for cooking Walnut Pastry, meatball potato, crooket, chips with cheese, potato pie, see Radyo, Vol.1,
N.7 15 June 1942, p.23.
334
See the map on p.151 in KocabaĢoğlu, (1980).
114
sociology, philosophy, history, geography, drama, it was advised to establish a “Radio
University” which could deliver diplomas by an exam hold in the entire country.335 However,
the statistical data, KocabaĢoğlu provides also underpins Ahıska‟s argumentation. In 1938,
%70 of the radio transmitters was located at three big cities, Ġzmir, Istanbul and Ankara. By
the end of 1945, this number was reduced to %53.6 percent thanks to the propaganda fear of
the world war. It is a noteworthy point that according to a survey made by the Statistical
Public Office (İstatistik Umum Müdürlüğü), %41.23 percent of the radio audience was the
state and military officers.336 In short, this technological innovation of the 20th century was
addressed to an idealized homogenized mass that was conflicting with the reality. Put
differently, the dominant and bureaucratic classes of Turkish republic were calling themselves
through radio, by ignoring the other fragmented sub groups of society. Furthermore, those sub
groups which were thought as if linked through radio to the center, was also materialized and
perceived as the nihilistic punch line in the minds of the ruling elites who idealized them as
the perfect blank slates to be fulfilled.
Ahıska says “The Occidentalist Fantasy constituted in the radio approves that the
whole demands the Western way of life as reality”. For instance, in a radio drama play about
an imagined family called Kimgil living in a village, was narrated as a family using limousine
on the countryside. Furthermore, she claims that the fact of the replacement between the
“reality” and the “fiction” can be observed in the paucity of the news agency and
documentary programs which reflect the “reality”.337 What she wants to underline through
this example is the Occidental Fantasy world that the elites had been living in. By limiting the
number of the news agency programs, they thought that they put space between the reality
and the public. They also thought that the fascinating feature of the Occident capitalism would
also establish the necessary obedience on the bodies of the people at periphery. Put another
way, the mass was assumed as a passive, inorganic and lifeless material, which absorbs
whatever received. It was thought instead of the transmitting the “reality” of the economic
catastrophe and depressing news of the war; the illusion of limousine in a village would create
incentives for the citizens to be in a “missing of Occident”.
I suggest that the Kemalists did not envisage that the community they are addressing
was selective permeable. It would be a great idealization if whole members of a family and
the whole nation do the morning training before leaving for work in front of the radio, or all

335
Ġ.H Baltacıoğlu, “Bir Radyo Üniversitesi Açalım”, 18 February 1937, N.164, p.2.
336
KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), p203.
337
Ahıska, (2005), pp.317-318.
115
the mothers unify to cook the same type of Western style food and prepare chick dinner tables
including serviettes under the tables, or the rural side children who follow the lessons of
philosophy and sociology that were broadcasted for them even though they hardly have the
skill to write and read. Indeed these facts unfold that the nation builders were also alien to the
Anatolian community that they addressed. They assumed that an idealization of the Occident
would trigger the modernization and Westernization process on their souls. Yet, it did not
happen in that way. Even though, the “Orientalist Fantasy” fact is also valid on the music
policy of the Radio, the picture is much more complicated and diversified from the one that
Ahıska displays.

From Istanbul to Ankara: The Transfer of Allaturca Orchestrate

As the time progressed into the 1930s, the radio had more acquired a professional
framework. After the nationalization in 1936, with the state supported meliorated facilities,
the quality of the music programs was also enhanced and the programs became more
scheduled and well ordered. Yet, the ironic incidents, such as the ones experienced by Safiye
Ayla or the musicians running in corridors endured. Fulfilling of the broadcasting time was
still a matter of issue on the agenda during the “professional times”. For instance, in a cited
personal musician memory, it is narrated, Müzzeyen Senar and Perihan Altındağ were doing
morning sports in the corridors of radio for warming up their voices in the early morning
before they perform on the live broadcast when the Turkish play records were rare. 338 In the
absence of Turkish play records, the live concerts were the only way to broadcast this
neglected music genre. Inevitably, such ironic pictures appeared on the radio corridors.
The transfer of the TTTAŞ to PTT did not have the same positive effects on the
Istanbul station, which had became a redundant institution in the 1940s, silenced till the end
of 1949. Despite, the station was able to make broadcast a few times. The traces of the
disappearance story of the Istanbul station can be followed from the changes in the music
staff. The Turkish music orchestrates of the old Ottoman Capital was decided to be moved to
new capital.339 Through this transmission, the inspection on the Radio was supposed to be
increased, unlike happened at Istanbul, where the power of the bureaucratic circle had been
less influential compared to the capital. Under the guidance of Mesut Cemil,-a musician
transferred from Istanbul- a new Turkish orchestrate was established and started performing at

338
See the interview made by Meral Özbek,(1991), with Orhan Gencebay, p.320.
339
Conversation made with Kozanoğlu Cevdet, 11 February 1976, cited in KocabaĢoğlu(1980) p.161.
116
the Ankara Radio station.340 The sympathy and support for the Western Art Music also
increased during these years thanks to the “National chief” Ġsmet Ġnönü who had been a more
enthusiastic lover of Western Art music. There was relative increase in the white Occident
music in 1940s compared to the initial years. The folk music also survived in an arcane way
in the radio throughout those times. After the lift of the Allaturca ban on the radio, the gap
was tried to be fulfilled by the folkloric songs yet the efforts of the Tanburacı Osman -who
had been playing Rumeli songs- was not enough.

Perihan Altındağ practicing at the Ankara Radio station before her live performance
(The photograph is taken from Radyo, Ses ve Saz Artislerimiz, 15 June 1942, Vol.1, N.7, p.10.)

KocabaĢoğlu‟s statistical research based on the related journals and daily newspapers341
unfolds that after the nationalization of the radio, the percentage of the Turkish/Ottoman
music decreased between the times of 1937 January and 1940 of August. The Ottoman

340
Baki Süha Edipoğlu, Radyo, “Mesut Cemil Tel ile Konuşma”, Vol.4, N.41 pp.12-13.
341
I was also able to find program schedules of Istanbul and Ankara radio stations in various periodicals,
journals and newspapers such was Milliyet, Cumhuriyet and the Radio periodical.
117
Turkish music programs and concerts had constituted %22.38 at Ankara and %20.35 at
Istanbul of the general music broadcast. By the same order, the folk songs had a portion of
%8.17 at the first and 6.72 at the latter. It is also a noteworthy point to touch upon that the
hegemonic ideology which had been configured around the excluding the “harmful” features
of the Western civilization, allowed the broadcast of the Western Entertaining music, at the
portions of %19.65, % 23.11 and broadcasted %42.93 and %39.31 Western Art music.342
Even though the revolutionist intelligentsia was worried about the spread of the Tango and
Jazz music, two new orchestrates were founded under the titles of “Tango” and “Jazz” as
being the sub groups of the Radio Lounge Orchestrate (Radyo Salon Orkestrası) which had
performed live Western Entertaining Music, besides the play records.343
Cemal ReĢit Rey‟s influence on the radio, who undertook the responsibility of the
Occidental music department, cannot be denied for explaining the increase of the Western Art
Music broadcasting. Another interesting issue is the Folk songs which still had least amount
of portion. The less broadcasting of the folk songs unfolds that there still had not been
sufficient amount of material at least to “reinvent” the tradition and broadcast it on the radio
after ten years. The second noteworthy point is as I touched upon the fact that, Turkish
nationalism had a paradoxical stance while drawing the obscure line towards the Western
civilization. The Turkish ethnie was the name of the border for preventing the dissolute
Westernization as had happened during the Tanzimat period of the Ottoman Empire. In the
context of music, shortly after the lift of Allaturca Music ban, Turkish songs were needed to
balance the “foreign” songs. Yet, in the absence of a rich folk music accumulation, for not
loosing border of the Turkish ethnie, Ottoman songs had been converged with Folk songs
under the program called “Turkish music and Folk songs” (Türk Musikisi ve Halk Şarkıları)
during the nationalization period of the radio.344 In brief, in the music field, the Ottoman
folkloric songs such as Western Thrace ones played by Tanburacı was needed to protect the
border of the Turkish ethnie. Put another way, this unfolds the fact that Turkish nationalism is
unsuccessful at obtaining an ethnically pure Turkish identity independent from Oriental
legacy. At least in the field of music, the Eastern cement was still used for the cohesion of the
ethnic Turkish identity. However by relegating it to a more “conservative” and stagnated
domain.

342
See table 16 at p.159
343
Radyo, “Müzik Hareketleri”, 15 January 1942, Vol.1, N.1, pp.18-19
344
See various program schedules through 1937-1938.
118
 The stance of the Radio towards music was declared as neither “Orientalist” nor
“Occidentalist” by a superior administrator, Ġzettin Tuğrul NiĢbay, as previously I explained.
However, he added, the institution was concerned and ready to serve for purpose of the
“Music Revolution”. In general, starting from the initial establishment, during the
unprofessional years (1927-30) and till the end of the 1940s, the “voice of the government”
and “the ear of the public” had never been on one side of the discussing polarity in the music
vortex, except the 20 months of ban period. I argue that this is pertained to the fact of
individual presences at the administrative cadres, at the music broadcasting offices (Müzik
Neşriyat Şefliği), and key manager positions, who were much more influential than the
Kemalist bureaucracy. Especially between 1927-30 while the TTTAġ company council had
been in charge in administrative task of the radio. During the initial “primitive” years, there
also had been a few technical staff working in the stations, not exceeding more than five345.
For instance one personal, the “music broadcasting director” was responsible for all the music
program. Veli Kanık, the assistant chief of the Presidential Orchestrate, appears as the only
responsible music director at Ankara station during those years. Mesud Cemil had been an
important authority in music broadcasting administrative both at the initial years of Istanbul
Radio and at the capital station346 yet with a more limited influential power, as only being the
director of the “Turkish Music Department”. His presence was drastic in determining the
programs of the orchestrates and the play record lists, especially at Istanbul Station. Under the
guidance of his authority, there had been a poised and equitable program sharing between the
Occidental and Oriental music.347 After his transfer to the Ankara Radio station, in a interview
published on the Radio Periodical, he is introduced as the son of Tamburi Cemil (Tambur
instrumentalist) and both Occidentalist and Orientalist musician, who “believes in the
development of the Ottoman Music”. In an ironic way, he speaks nothing about the music and
the hot Occidentalist/Orientalist conflict, only one of his poems is published with a smiling
photograph next to it.348 In fact, this incident displays abyss between Istanbul and Ankara
zones, and also the diversified Kemalist stance towards the Radio. Mesud Cemil who was the
sole authority at the Istanbul radio was not content to arrive at capital station where Kemalist
penetration can be felt in a more intense way since the nationalization. Neither siding with the
Occidentalists nor the defenders of the Ottoman music, Mesud Cemil tried to distance himself

345
KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), pp.112-114.
346
Cited in KocabaĢoğlu,(1980) p.33.
347
Radyo Alemi, “8-14 July Programs”, Vol.1 N.7,
348
Baki Süha Edipoğlu, Radyo, “Mesut Cemil Tel”, 1 May 1943, Vol.4, N.41 pp.12-13.
119
from this controversial environment by offering any comment on the debate. However, he was
an Ottoman musician at the abyss of modernism, who felt the relentless desire for
development of Oriental music, coupled with the anxiety to catch the Occident positivism.
As I touched previously, the radio had more become a matter of “national” after the
mid 1935s.349 The radio staff formation had become much more “professionalized” after the
mid 1930s. Through the creation of auditing commissions, such as Word Commission, (Söz
Komisyonu), Instrumental Commission (Saz Komisyonu), Press Public Office (Matbuat
Umum Müdürlüğü) started taking more control of institution, sharing its task with the Interior
Ministry.350 In line with the improved technical and infrastructure facilities provided by the
state financial support, the radio had acquired a more professional face after the mid 1930s.
The time length of the broadcast and the number of the talk programs also increased and had
become more ordered. The number of the working staff also augmented after the
nationalization. After the 1938, the music broadcasting department was separated into two as
Turkish and Western music departments, in which again Mesud Cemil and Cevdet Kozanoğlu
were active in the first, while in the latter, Cevat Memduh Altar, Ulvi Cemal Erkin were more
drastic artists and directors.351 Selim Sarper as the head of the Press Public Office, Vedat
Nedim Tör as the “radio fusion chief” (he was forced to resign in 1943), fulfilled effective
roles in the determination of the program schedules.352 On the onset of the Democrat Party
period, during the ġemsettin Günaltay government, the administrative staff formation of the
institution had become more chaotic, there had been nearly nine appointments in the Ankara
Radio Directorate during those years, including Mesud Cemil and RuĢen Ferit Cam after
1950s.353 During the years of the World War, the state elites wanted to get grips by the
increase of educative, informing and news programs for the sake of arousing a collective
national cohesion in the turmoil of war.
Hence, it is hard to claim that the Radio had a consistent music policy and served for
the purpose of the music revolution demanded by the center bureaucracy. In fact, the Radio
had become the source of Occidental/Oriental quarrel and in some ways; it caused a
consciousness of an “inferior” Ottoman Music that needed to be meliorated. For instance,

349
The upcoming anxiety of the WWII also played a great role within the Kemalists elites‟ increased interest in
the Radio.
350
KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), p.133.
351
Ibid, p.157.

353
Ibid, p.267.
120
discussion programs were held at the prime time nights about the quarrel, by the attendance of
the musicologists and musicians such as Cevat Memduh, Necil Kazım and Mesud Cemil.
Through, these kind of programs, the Occidentalist and Orientalist debate was unfolded where
the defects and the gaps of the Oriental music was discussed354 Nevertheless, at the same time
the institution and its periodical, acquiring a magazine journal taste after the mid 1945s,
undertook the role of the “defender” of the “real Turkish music” thanks to the presence of
Mesud Cemil and Cevdet Kozanoğlu. In brief, the personal sidings and ideas of the key
figures at the Radio was determinant in the Radio music broadcasting. In fact, this was the
thing that the modernism project required. In an arcane way, it was injecting the necessary
amount of the discourse into the personal argumentations, creating the necessary
controversial, chaotic environment for making the revolution and letting the individuals to run
the process freely without direct enforcements. Putting Mesud Cemil across Cemal ReĢit Rey
was an enough movement to initiate such a process. Put differently, the chain of the
Occidentalist Fantasy was realized by the help of the “Oriental defenders.” Ergo, both
clashing sides in the music debate were in the orbit of “Occidentalist Fantasy” and contributed
to the production of its discourses.
The portion of the Turkish Ottoman music between 1940s and 1946 was %29.66,
Turkish Folk music %6.13, Western Entertaining music %33.61 and the Western Classical art
music, %30.18. Although there had been many critiques regarding being a music box, with a
portion of %68.60 in the general broadcast time length, the music constituted the majority
even during the war years355. As I mention before, the national chief, Ġsmet Ġnönü who had
been more passionate lover of the Western Art Music, was influential with the directives and
the direct visits made by himself to the radio house. There had been an augmentation in the
Western Classical Music against the Western Entertaining genre compared to the 1930s,
committed to the intensification of the nationalist discourses in which the whole nation was
materialized as a military commodity under the administration of Commander (BaĢbuğ)
Ġnönü.356 The rise of the populist democracies in the continent of Europe triggered many

354
Radyo, “Radyomuzda Üç Aylık Yeni Program: Musiki Sohbetleri”, 15 September 1942, Vol.1, N.10, p.8.
355
KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), see table 24 at p.217.
356
In general, from the archive research that I had done, I had a impression that the Ġnönü era contained much
more intensified representation of the nationalist icons, themes and “sublime” stories compared to the 1930s.For
instance, the pictures of the commander was much more bigger in size and much more vivid on contrary to
Atatürk‟s ones. It is a noteworthy point to say that the pictures of Ġnönü had always been at the top of Atatürk‟s
one, in various magazines that I skipped. In addition, more pictures, caricatures and photographs had been used
in the nationalist narrations compared to the previous years that I believe had been much more effective and
inciting in the “imaginations” of the citizens.
121
different nationalist motions in the Turkish republic as well, on the road to the Wealth Tax in
1942. According to the prime minister of the time, ġükrü Saraçoğlu, “the removal of the
aliens” was necessary for handing the market to the Turkish bourgeoisie.357 Therefore, the
entertaining music of the “alien” bourgeoisie was also needed to be taken into control. Still,
the efforts were not enough for fulfilling the gap in the Occidental music. The play records
inevitably constituted a significant portion of the Occidental music broadcasting after the
1940s. During those times, the Ottoman music group, İnce Saz Heyeti, had also intensified
their live concerts.358 This unfolds that there is not a direct enforcement or imposition on this
music. Put another way, the presence of the condemned music genre was let in order to
legitimize the necessity of the revolution. In the abyss of this controversial music
environment, the harmonic, polyphonic folk songs of which Ziya Gökalp was so desirous for,
started to appear in the broadcasting. By the increase of the “scientifically” educated
musicians, such as Cemal ReĢit Rey, Adnan Saygun and the others, these new folk songs sang
with an “odd” dialect, not similar to the Turkish Anatolian ones, started to appear in the
broadcasting of the radio. In fact, the realization of this kind of the polyphonic songs was the
dream of the Occidentalists and a rescue boat for the Orientalists. It was assumed, the pressure
on the defenders of the Ottoman/Turkish music could be mitigated by the arrival of this “real”
Turkish songs. Accordingly, more free music space could be provided for the living of the
traditional Ottoman music. The polyphonic folk songs of Anatolia needed to be evaluated in
the context of a national representation space, where the ethnic, regional and religious themes
and patterns of the Anatolian folk songs were purged. It was believed that through the
realization of this purge, the dream of “singing altogether” could be realized. The polyphonic
songs folk songs supposed as the cultural dynamisms of an “enlightened”, “secular” modern
nation state. This fetishism for an opaque secularism which muffles up every cultural corner,
also diffused into the music reform discourses. For instance, Baltacıoğlu where he defends
the necessity of the polyphonic Western music education, says “The public houses, as being
the temple of laic culture” must be the mediator for the realization of this dream. 359 In brief, I
suggest that these spiritless, colorless polyphonic folk songs which died before given birth,
are the tunes and notes of a failed Kemalist modernization project.

357
Cited in Ayhan Aktar, Varlık Vergisi ve Türkleştirme Politikaları, Istanbul: ĠletiĢim Yayınları, 2000, pp.121-
122.
358
Baki Süha Edipoğlu, Radyo, “Radyoda İncesaz Programları”, 1 March 1946, Vol.5, N.51, p.16.
359
Ġ.H.Baltacıoğlu ,Yeni Adam, “Halk Evlerinde Müzik”, 10 February 1938, N.164, p.2.
122
 The polyphonic folk songs had become the wastes of the system that were swept way.
Put another way, their odd prosodies with the protestant music culture did not make the
excepted impact on the audiences. Music is mostly connected with the accumulation of
language structure of a particular community. Theories regarding the foundation of music
indicate that, only the “magical” rows of the words, sentences which are placed in
juxtaposition, can found a body of emotion such as frightening and exciting shrill sounds.
Pertained to this, music is mostly derived from the language that is spoken in the
community.360 There had been an important problem in the dream of the polyphonic folk
songs. In the polyphonic sound structure, the articulation of the Turkish words “sounded” in
an “odd” and “incomprehensible” way. As I touched upon from the interview made with Ruhi
Su, it was a matter of “discovery” singing the Turkish language in a harmonic structure. Ruhi
Su was not the only one searching for the way to sing the Turkish language in a polyphonic
style. As a musician searching for development, Mesud Cemil, publishing a poem of AĢık
Veysel, argues that “the injection of Occidental harmony” into these poems was necessary to
introduce our Turkish folk music on the “Occidental stages” pointing out to the examples of
Magyars, Spaniards and Russians. He also adds that he will write about the techniques for
singing the harmonized folk songs with “Turkish Accent”.361 As being in the Ottoman music
camp, Mesud Cemil was also in favour and willing to contribute to the realization of
polyphonic folk songs dream. However, the public found these songs as “alien” and “bizarre”.
In fact, Baltacıoğlu‟s comment on this issue illuminates how the public was alien and had
hard times in understanding “language” of the “art songs” (he refers to the polyphonic folk
songs here). He claims that a Western polyphonic music education is necessary for spreading
this “listening” custom, culture among the society.362 What this unfolds, the Occidental music
which was imposed from top to down layers was not given a kind reception by the “targeted”
public. Put differently, the society had a natural immunity to the “ambiguousness” of this
music genre. Another noteworthy point unfolding the ambiguity of this music genre is that
neither being Western songs nor Turkish songs, in an ironic way, these few polyphonic folk
songs were played under Occidental music program titles on the radio broadcast.363
Years between the 1946 and 1960, more or less had been the same panorama of
previous years on the institutional agenda of the radio. The political motions, the

360
Günay,(2006), p13.
361
Mesud Cemil, Radyo, “Armonize Halk Türkülerimiz”, 15 August 1942, Vol.1, (unspecified number), p.23.
362
Yeni Adam, 10 February 1938, p.2.
363
KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), p.64.
123
transformation of the one party system and the appearance of the Democrat Party, which had
a more close and soft socio political stance towards the periphery, indirectly caused some
changes in the music broadcasting. There had been an apparent decrease in the portion of the
Western Classical Music in general, decreasing from approximately from %20 to %16 portion
of the broadcasting time (including the talk shows). The Turkish Folk music scored more or
less the same levels not exciding the %10 percent. On the contrary, there was an increase in
the Western Entertaining Songs and Ottoman Music during those years compared to
preceding years. Actually, the arrangement Jazz and Tango songs, converted from foreign
lyrics into Turkish language constituted the augmented popularity of Western songs. 364 What
Kemalists frightened was the “measureless” Westernization as had happened in the late period
of the Ottoman Empire. The newly appeared bourgeoisie, who had been flourished onset of
the Democrat party government with the increase in the industrialization and urbanization
motions and who wanted to access to the Western culture in a more easy way, was the
harbinger of the night mares for the Kemalist elites. The Jazz and Tango entertaining
Occident music increased after the mid 1940s committed with the reflections of these new
socio political alternations within the nearly twenty year old Kemalist nation state.
The Democrat Party and its bureaucrats also benefited from the controversial music
surrounding and used the Radio as an arena of their cultural representation. The counter
critiques were also included in the radio periodical in order to nourish the political interests.
A critique displays how this had happened. It is said that using the monophonic music as a
“fishing line bait” is desperate as “giving permission to marry with four women”. In another
critique one, it is said that “for a few votes putting Dede Efendi against Beethoven is
immoral”365 Hence, the radio after 1950s became an arena of political interest conflict and the
music genres were used as weapons to fight. Therefore, the Occidental/Oriental controversy
saturated itself in the new dual political environment. The power of the discourses lost its
cortex but just changed its color committed with the Democrat Party. Put differently, the
discourses, narrations and statements regarding the superiority of the Occidental music was
now inherited by the new power holders but now started used as “agitation” against the
Kemalists‟ music policies. Ergo, the means of power shifted from Republican Party, favored
the Ottoman&Turkish music, but this did not ceased controversial conflicting environment on

364
KocabaĢoğlu, (1980), pp.297-301 and for a detailed statistical analysis, see table 37 at the page 297.
365
Bedil Sevin, Forum, “Radyoda Batı Müziği”6,1 August 1956, Vol.5, N.57 , p.20, Forum, 15 April 1957,
Vol.7 N.74, p.21 cited in KocabaĢoğlu,(1980), p.301.
124
the radio institution whatsoever. Indeed, there was a flaming discussion environment in the
radio periodical since overtake of Democrat Party in the state institutions.

The Radio having a heart to heart talk with its Audience:

In the various numbers of the Radio periodical, it is indicated that the institution takes
the audience preferences, desires and likening into consideration in forming both the music
and verbal talk programs. For Ahıska, the impression of having a “close” contact with the
audience does not necessarily mean that the radio was interested in the “mass” that it
addressed. On the contrary this kind of contacts with the audience serves to the illusion of
addressing to a homogenized united mass, regardless of their ethnicity, gender 366, regional
culture and personal differences. In the 1930s, “The Post Box” on the periodical had been a
discussing forum both responding to technical questions of the individuals and their
comments, desires regarding the radio programs. “Pouring out grievances hour” (Dertleşme
Saati) mostly dealing with lawful and social problems of the citizens and “The Post Box”
program on the radio were the live broadcasting contacts in which audience had been hearing
itself. There also existed similar kind of music program called “The Audience Desire Hour”
(Dinleyici İstekleri Saati) in which the audience desires and preferences were played by the
play records or by the live performance of the Ottoman/Turkish orchestrate (Fasıl Heyeti).
Although there had not been detailed information about the program, the comments regarding
it reveal that that the Fasıl Heyeti had only been the only live orchestrate of this program and
had been criticized for “replaying the same songs over and over again” committed to the
desires coming from the audience. The other critique is for reading names of the audiences in
prolonged times and mentioning their comments and desires in an “exaggerated” style and
tense.367 In fact, music as being mostly part of the intimate identity, it was also an area of free
moving space where the individualistic part of the identity may coexist with the common
identity that is the “national” one. The audience desire program had appeared as an arena of
this incident where it motioned. The audiences were let free to demand the songs that they
personally wanted. At the same time, they were criticized with their “disapproved” and
“unnecessary” personal “vagaries”. I suggest these kinds of illusionary liberal opening outs
366
For instance, in the “House Hour” program a program addressed to the women audience, instead of treating
women as a separated individual identity, their roles and obligation in the family had always been discussed and
talked about. Put another way, the hegemonic ideology did not interested in independent unmarried women mass
or the sorrows and problems of the married women with an individualist approach.
367
Yeni Adam, “Radyoda İstekli Saati”14 February 1941, N.321, p.5.
125
had been used as the channels for injecting the cores of the ideology‟s working principles into
the capillary veins of the society. Although the names of the audiences were read on the
program, I argue through this way they have been turned into “subjects” on the radio
broadcast. Hence, they had been conceptualized and codified as individuals demanding the
songs that they like but at the same time, they were turned into the subjects of the hegemonic
ideology under its scrutiny. The intolerance for reading the names where subjects may acquire
some degree of personality and cursing their musical preferences that breaks the “order” of
modernity unfolds the nature of these so called liberal declinations.
Althusser reminds us that the ideology transforms the individuals into subjects by
“hailing” and addressing to them and he provides illustration of the police shouting a man
while crossing the street. According to him, the individual is turned into a “subject” of state
by the call of the police.368 The individuals who are labeled as the “subjects” of state the now
becomes ready for the influence of ISA(s) of the state. For, Althusser, the ideological state
apparatuses do not purely function with coercion, like the state coercion apparatuses (the
army and state). The ISA, constituted of religious and educative institutions, family, media
and including cultural ISA such as literacy and fine arts (I add the music into this sub
category) merely function with “ideology” not “coercion”.369 Put another way, some kind of
an invisible consent mechanism works in the ISA. According to him, the ISAs are area of
class conflict, not merely dominance zone of the hegemonic ideology. The ideology needs
“controversial matters” for functioning he says, therefore, the area of conflict is the working
principle that runs the machine of the ideology.370 The arguments presented by Althusser, are
illuminative for understanding the working principle of the radio, as being the grand source of
music so for apprehending the stance of the Kemalist ideology towards it. As I explained
before, surveys, questionnaires, illusional open channels of contact with the public, were used
as legitimization sources for the ideological purposes of the nationalist ideology. The
“complex arrangements”, or in Bauman‟s terminology the “strange”, the “ambiguous” facts
and subjects were required for working self destructive machine of the modernism. Therefore,
the Ottoman/Turkish music, the Allaturca was a necessary condition for making the deemed
“music revolution”. Through this way, the ISA, the Radio of the Kemalist ideology do not
function as sole apparatus of the coercion, but appears as mechanism of consent which has a

368
Louis Althusser, “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses”, Lenin and Philosophy and other Essays, Ben
Brewster, (Trn), NY/London: Monthly Review Press 1971, p.163.
369
Ibid, pp.135-139.
370
Ibid, pp.140-152.
126
more effective influence on the souls of the individuals. With the appearance of the Democrat
Party on the social scale of the Turkish nation, the radio and music as ISA also acquired
feature of class conflict, that completes the picture of which outline is presented by Althusser.
Besides surveys regarding music made by Yeni Adam and Nota periodicals, I argue
that the one made by the radio periodical under the guidance of the Istanbul Press Public
Directory (Matbuat Umum Müdürlüğü) is the most detailed, “scientific” and comprehensive
one including answers from Cyprus and Bulgaria and is also a very apparent evidence where
the “consent” of the public was tried to be taken through an ISA mechanism. 6639 citizens
responded to the survey which was delivered through 4143 letters each composed of 29
questions regarding the broadcast of radio. It is also declared by the institution that, the survey
had been established under the guidance of Press Public Directory and performed in a detailed
manner for reflecting the audience likings, desires and preferences onto the programs. 371 The
survey is composed of many main frame and sub questions regarding the music and talk
programs on radio. The questions were asked in the form for revealing the audience opinions
and their concerns for alternations and changes in the already existing radio programs. For
instance, the questions were asked as: “Do you prefer to listen Allaturca music in the morning
or during the evening times”, “Do you wish to increase in the broadcast time of Yurttan Sesler
program” or “Would you prefer listening more Occidental live orchestrates”…The last
question was left blanket for giving free space to the audience mass about their personal ideas
and comments. Although Meltem Ahıska and KocabaĢoğlu mentioned about this survey with
a limited approach I argue that the subtitles of this research study could provide some hints
for understanding the political and social culture of the early republic era. There had been
many interesting and ironic answers sent by ordinary individuals for this survey. For instance,
the one which demands performing religious songs (mevlüt) for Atatürk at his day of death
and the ones who wish to hear the Ezan (melodic religious prays) from the radio. There are
also the ones who want anti propaganda programs against the Communist threat and who
demands more “cooking hour programs”. Among the answers for the talk show programs, the
most noteworthy one that I found is the one with 203 people who demand the removal of
“Occidental Music” from the “Children Hour” (Çocuk Saati) program. The answers to the
question regarding the talk show program of the Children Hour also unfold the discontents of
the audience and the “resistance” towards the effects of Occidental music on the children‟s

371
Hasan Refik Ertuğ, Radyo, “Dinleyicisizlerle Hasbihal”, January-February 1949,Vol.8, N.85-86 .
127
souls as being the souls of the new nation.372 The Kemalists hoped to sow the seeds of the
Occidental music into the souls of the children. It was believed that the children as being the
“grand individuals of tomorrow” would not suffer the difficulties of being stranger to this
Occidental music. However those the owners of these young bodies who had been grown up
with the lullaby whispered into ears had chosen listening to the Arabesk music of Orhan
Gencebay in the 1960s.
In general, most of the answers demand the augmentation of the Ottoman/Turkish
music‟s in the broadcasting. For instance, 1555 citizens demanded more Allaturca and
Turkish music on the radio. 427 request for increasing Allaturca music on the prime times.
In the sections related with the folk music, 215 people had confirmed that they like listening
folk songs performed by Neriman Altındağ. On contrary, only 31 people say they desire
listening AĢık Veysel. In the column related with play record programs, only 6 people desire
more Müzzeyen Senar records and 12 for more Minnur Nurettin Selçuk broadcasting. Another
noteworthy point that this survey underlines which I will elaborate hereafter is the mandolin
instrument. The mandolin had not been one of the traditional instrument of the Ottoman
Empire however, according to the survey 31 people ask for “national tunes” from the
Mandolin Orchestrate. The ideologically supported music, the folk music and the Sarısözen‟s
program Yurttan Sesler, are only being liked by 74 people. 39 people want hearing the tabor
(darbuka) and the flageolet (kaval) in the national tunes. These two regional instruments,
rarely mentioned in the periodicals, is an indication of how the political elites design a
national music absent from the essentiality of the Anatolia. The loud voice of the flageolet
and the incentive rhythms of the tabor are presented as the undisciplined and uncontrollable
facts of the Anatolian culture therefore never being mentioned and advised. However, people
demand to hear them on the radio and this demand is presented by the survey.
The traces and discourses of the “Occidentalist Fantasy” being heard and watched by
the Western world can also be found in this survey. The number of the audiences wanting the
Occidental music to be broadcasted on the short wave frequencies (international broadcasting
channel) and Oriental on the long wave is 33. In an ironic way, according to the answers to
this question, there had been anxiety to be heard and listened by the Occident. Besides,
ironically people were made to believe that this could be realized with having the Occident
372
The children had been a “national presence” for Kemalist during the early republic era. The pedagogic
education and breeding of the children is displayed as a national matter, especially in the programs made by
Selim Sırrı in the context of an “Occidental Fantasy”, as the children had been a matter of attention in the
Western world during those years. For Kemalists, the children meant breaking linkages with the past that needed
to be forgotten. See, Ahıska, (2005), pp.231-233.
128
listening Turkish Occidental music. However, the demand to hear the Oriental music on the
short wave perfectly reveals the successful discourse constitution of Kemalism in the field of
music. Even though people enjoyed this music, they were not so enthusiastic it putting on the
short wave. I argue that the reason beneath this is that the people were made to feel
embarrassed of the music genre that they liked. Another answer displays the reality of “Arab”
influence on the Turkish music culture. Although the throughout the ban period, the Egyptian
radio had been accused of being the source for the spread of the Arab Music, in a ironic way
only 1 person wants to hear Arab or Azeri music. However, this does not necessarily mean
that the citizens do not demand listening Arab music. The broadcasting of the Cairo radio
could be received through the short wave frequency. Hence, it was much easier to turn a
button to listen Arab music instead of demanding it from the national radio. Indeed, the lift of
ban on Allaturca music had already made the Cairo radio as a redundant frequency for the
audience.
Survey evidences unfold that %43.6 of the people were content with the “Ancient
Turkish Music” and %42.7 demand the increase in the İnce Saz group‟s live concerts. %6 of
the audience, 381 citizens do not like to listen to the Yurttan Sesler program. Although there
was complaints about the lack of interests in the “polyphonic national tunes” %16.8 wants,
%16.8 do not like and %39.1 like the national folk songs saturated with harmonic structure.
However with clashing style, in another section, only one person requests listening Adnan
Saygun‟s Yunus Emre Oratorio. In general, only 53 citizen demands increase in the
symphonic broadcasting. 190 want decrease in the Occidental music broadcast and 140 wants
the removal of it. In addition to this, 629 people demand the removal of the Chamber Music.
Various bureaucratic circles, elites and politicians had been complainant about the
melancholic character of the Turks. The creation of a “moderate happiness” in the
configuration of the national charter was an important common ground shared by everyone.
For instance, once Selim Sırrı in one of his radio sport programs said. “We, Turks, generally,
sedative, calm and quite people…and in some respect it could be said we were melancholic, we
have to learn how to be happy”373 In Yeni Adam, Turks at the Ferry, Tramway streets were
portrayed as lonely, absent minded, thinking subjects which is caused by a “hermetic” life
style. It is also believed that the new “société life” would bring happiness by its entertaining
zones such as balls, and big dance parties.374 The survey results display that the Turks had

373
Ahıska,(2005), p.237.
374
Yeni Adam, “Türkleri Eğlendirin”, 30 October 1938, N.212, p.2.
129
already been willing for being happy and dancing but not with the elegant and moderate ball
tango songs which Kemalist ideology “approves”. 1072 citizens are satisfied with the Dance
Orchestrate live broadcasting casting concerts. 1710 audience say that they want more Turkish
Tango record plays and live concerts.375 However, the desire in the Turkish Tango tunes and
the Jazz music is the cautions margin for the dominant ideology which is inclined to draw a
border between real Westernization and degenerated Westernization. However, a significant
number of the audiences were looking forward to listen to “degenerated” Turkish tango and
Occidental Jazz.
As I touched upon it before, the results of the survey, as declared by the institution,
were going to be taken into account and the programs were going to be reshaped according to
evidences observed. The “scientific” expertise of the Statistical Public Directory was also
displayed as a source of legitimization for determining the audience profile. Another reason for
performing such a research was the reopening of the Istanbul Radio station. It is said that “the
impossibility of meeting expectations of both Occidental and Turkish music audience was the
incentive for the institution to perform this “scientific” survey study. 376 Even though, it had
been indicated the audience and preferences were significant and also the return of the Istanbul
radio station is presented as “good news”, this incident shows, in Foucault‟s terminology, how
the “sovereignty” through “complex strategies” 377 reproduces itself in different time scales on
the lives of the people and how it continues to exists in a positive “creative” cortex.378 Even
tough, the Republican Party‟s sovereign power started slipping away through the end of the
1940s onset of the Democrat Party era, I do not take the narration, “reflecting the audience
desires on programs” is a sign of accepting, approving the reality of the Oriental music or
making a peace with the Istanbul and the society within it. I claim, this is the transition,
alternation of the “sovereignty” and the change of the old inactive fragmentations to a semi-
active form, a change from the impossibility of possibility to the impossibility of feasibility,
which is the coexistence of the Occidental and the Oriental between Ankara and Istanbul. Put

375
Radyo, “Radyo Yayınları İçin Açtığımız Anketin Sonuçları”,June July August 1941 ,Vol.7 N.79-80-81,
pp.3,39,46.
376
Hasan Refik Ertuğ, Radyo, “Dinleyicisizlerle Hasbihal, Hasan Refik Ertuğ”, V.8 N.85-86, January-February
1949, Vol.8, N.85-86.
377
Foucault claims sovereignty is not just a simple mechanism under the control of anyone or any social class;
therefore it is not a fact that can be lost. It exists over people through their entire life in a changing and
reproducing form. Sovereignty is not a institution, structure or property, is a “motional bobbles of unequal
relations” see the article, Michel Foucault, “Politics and the Study of Discourse”, The Foucault Effect: Studies of
Governmentality, Burchell G.(Ed), Gordon C,(Ed), Miller P,(Ed), Chicago: The University Press of Chicago
1991.
378
Vergin, (2003), p.134-135
130
differently, the enmity between the Occidental Music and Oriental music poles now comes into
the existence in a mitigated and in a different box of discourse, as the 1950s arrived. As it is
written, by pushing the button of radio, people could listen to which kind of music they prefer,
indicating the Occidental of Ankara or the Oriental of Istanbul. By mentioning this, the
diversified complex audience preferences and their fragmented personal likening in music was
now freed from “forcefully advised” classical Western music prison, yet was now shackled
with two poles, the Western music and the Allaturca music. By providing so called free domain
of selection between two poles, handing the choice to the people, the new and old cortex of the
sovereignty (the latter cortex is the one party system and the former one is the political
panorama appeared with presence of Democrat Party) converges with each other and continues
to exists by nourishing themselves in a mutual motion.
Generally, the survey marks the desire in the Allaturca music yet in an arcane way. At
the same time although a little piece of “resistance” towards the Occidental music is presented
under the sub titles due to the Democratic Party rule and its new form of “Governmentality”,
the impression that intended to be given was that the audience was getting used to listen the
Western music. Put differently, by creation of derivations of the former conflict each two
conflicting music poles were legitimized in the eyes of the people. At the same time, the
ancient “Turkish art” music that had been passionately defended by Ottoman music performers
and by the Western educated musicians who complain about the disappearance artistic
productions of the Ottoman music in 1930s, had more been loomed in front by the evidences of
the survey. Furthermore, both of these artistic music types, the Occidental and the Ottoman art
music, was now being labeled under the same stamp, “the ones to which the Anatolian public
is getting used to listen”. For instance, it is written in an article following the survey results,
the citizens in the rural side in small villages of the Anatolia, were more agog than the urban
mass, in fallowing the radio broadcast. “There was radio almost in each house” says the author
who is a survey taker and he adds “there was approximately 100-150 radio in a poor village at
Gelibolu”. The author writing about his experiences about the trips he made for the grand
survey says that “the unconcern” towards the Occidental music was lessened compared to
previous years. “People started getting content with the soft songs played by the Lounge
Orchestrate” and furthermore he adds “including our small villages, towns and big cities, the
listeners, especially the young generation started listening and singing the songs of Itri, Hamam
Zade, Ġsmail Dede Efend, Mustafa ÇavuĢ”. “This is the Radio‟s success, drawing the attention

131
to these ancient Turkish music songs”379. The article following the results of the survey
apparently supports my claim based on Foucault‟s sovereignty. The packs of discourses used
by Kemalists for legitimization were now converged with the alternations brought by the new
industrialization process and the appearance of the new bourgeoisie strata. In the musical field,
the imposition of the Occidental music was now legitimized and put in front of the people.
Through this way, the Ottoman&Turkish music was approved as an “externalized” music genre
and this unreality was codified into the social memory of the 1940s and 1950s. Shortly, the
discourses of the 1930s music debate acquired a new sense in the late 1940s as the Democratic
Party came into the rule as an alternative socio cultural ruling elites opposed to the Republican
elites.
Apparently, the institution was not satisfied with observations of the survey, the
personal narrations were also required for legitimizing the place of the radio in the hearts of
people. I argue that, the survey made by the Radio institution under the guidance of the State
Statistical Institution, is a valid example for Althussar‟s ISA argumentation. By giving voice to
everyone, the necessity of the music revolution was underlined and the antagonism towards the
Oriental music was unfolded. This dual edged motion also nourished the new cortex of the
sovereignty. Both, the necessity of the improvement in music was legitimized and the pubic
was codified as homogenized subjects who were supposed to have the same music preferring,
that is the national “high” art music. The “chaos” was again used as leverage by the hegemonic
ideology. The only way to provide the necessary “consent” was to empower the controversial
Western music/Ottoman music prison which is designed to nourish the Occidental music
among the society. Yet, the self creativity of the individuality had been carrying more voice in
the “intimacy”, in the hearts of the people than the manipulative sovereign design of the
surveys. Even though, there had been surveys made by various periodicals regarding the music
revolution, which gave freedom to the subjects to express their ideas in a liberal sense but with
a manipulated way, did not favored any purposely defended music genre and did not paved the
way to constitute a national folk music or a high cultural art music. Indeed if the hegemonic
ideology had succeeded in attaining this goal, there would not be any reason to perform a
revolution.

The Ethno Racist Tunes and Timbres

379
Baki ġuha Edipoğlu, Radyo, “Radyo Dinleyicileri Arasında”, May 1949, Vol.8 N.89, p.5.
132
 As I explained before my research‟s second objective is to reveal the ethno nationalist
aspects, faces, themes of the Turkish ideology, following the traces in the incidents themes
related with music and the reforms made on it. The inspirational take off point of this aim was
the Nazan Maksudyan‟s study in which she presents the ethno racist faces of Kemalist
nationalism in 1930s and 1940s, fundamentally focusing on the findings of the Anthropological
Journal. She has a metaphor in the initial pages that is useful to understand her theoretical
framework. She says “The racist canal which finds its path to flow into nationalist ideology
was strong enough to change/alter cores of the ideology itself? Or if the metaphor is reversed:
there were too many racist elements in the sea of Turkish nationalism that opened its canal to
380
carry the racist vein to its path?” I agree with Maksudyan where the latter metaphor, the
reversed one, is more valid in the case of the Turkish nationalism according to my observation
in the music debate.
Before the archive research I have done, I pre assumed that the only material to find
would be Ahmed Adnan Saygun‟s Pentatonic Theory, a few militarist marches and a couple of
articles presented ,for ideology‟s racist and militarist face in the music. But as the time
progressed I added other stuffs into the basket. What I have found out was the Occidentalist
Fantasy, that is echo of the Orientalist voice, had an ethno racist paradigm within itself.
Edward Said claims that the one aspect of Islamic Orientalism contains a racist sense towards a
“colored community”, towards Arabs; not acquiring a sense of “unity of human kind” always
marks the cleavages between the East and the West.381 According to Said, “Islamic
Orientalism” is racists because the Orientalist jargon is saturated from a superior culture
established on a “less” superior culture.382. The Islam being the “misguided version of the
Christianity” a codification intensified after 1450s,383 was also categorized into the sub section
of “race types”, next to languages colors and mentalities, a categorization established in the
Orientalist discipline after the 19th century.384 For the Kemalist intelligentsia, the “Arab
numbness” had to be abandoned and must be replace by the polyphonic “Western Dynamism”.
The Arabian part, “the inferior” piece and the alien Byzantium tunes of the cosmopolite
Ottoman music was the element which inspired Ziya Gökalp, for the idea of freeing the
Arabian/Byzantium, the Eastern yoke on the real Turkish music. Therefore, the core of the

380
Maksudyan, (2005), p.13.
381
Edward W. Said, Orientalism, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1995, p262.
382
Ibid, p.322.
383
Ibid,p.61.
384
Ibid, p. 222.
133
modernist desire in the field of music, during birth of the new Turkish nation, nourished itself
from Gökalp‟s Islamic Orientalist perception. In brief, the sparkles of the music revolution
were inflamed from an Islamic Orientalist perception.
As the nation building and the independence war process converged with the Turkish
cultural reforms, the cosmopolite mystical Ottoman music was more hit by ethno secular
arrows of Turkish nationalism. The Ottoman Music which had been nourished by religious
Jewish and Christian musicians‟ contributions, and the real sources of this music, the Islamic
religious houses were apparently not suitable for the secular nation state. Therefore, the
modernism desire in the Turkish music in the Republic contained an ethno secular aspect and
more destructive sense compared to the modernism desire in the late Ottoman Era, where all
music genres had been liked and supported by the palace.385 The Ottoman imperial music
amalgamated both the high center artistic/religious music and the low periphery entertaining
music mostly performed by the non-Muslim minorities. According to Aksoy, the pluralistic
elements in the Ottoman music reveal the fact that the center music had been nourished from
the periphery music. According to him, Ottoman music was the city music and composed of
cosmopolite elements that the palace supported.386 In a general social and cultural sense, the
cosmopolite polarity and the Arabic/religious essentials of this music were the “cleavages” for
Turkish nationalism for gaining the “popular support” that was required during nation building
times. On the path for breaking up the linkages with the past, the administrative and
representative institutions were ruined by the ideological policies. In the presence of weak
administrative and representative institutions, says Jack Snyder, “the easiest way route for
gaining popular support for building national institutions is often thought propagation of
exclusionary cultural or revolutionary themes.”387 The music as a cultural theme was inevitably
“propagated” and supposed as a “useful” tool for Kemalist elites for obtaining the necessary
amount of support and unity that they needed. In brief, with the merge of the Orientalist
perception, the music reform acquired a cultural exclusionary sense towards the non-Turks and
even towards its own history, the Ottoman history. Through the archive studies done, I came
across with many ethno militarist discoursing praising the Turkish ethnie and excluding the
minorities and other elements inherited from the Ottoman Empire. In the marches, in the
suggesting articles for the music debates or even in the interviews made with ordinary

385
Bülent Aksoy ,” Cumhuriyet Döneminde Musikide Farklılaşma Olgusu”, Paçacı(Ed), (1998), pp.30-32.
386
Aksoy, (2008), pp.33-38.
387
Snyder, (2000), p.75.
134
audiences and professional musicians, it was possible collect those arcane and limited amount
of discourses one by one.
The ethno secular themes and discourses in the Turkish nationalism regarding music
can be found on the personal narrations and experiences, which is my study‟s level of analysis.
The man at the top of the political hierarchy, who had been enjoying the Allaturca music in his
private life, had pointed out the necessity of development in the music. The officers around
Atatürk who was experiencing the controversy of Oriental/Occidental music within himself,
wanted to abate the destructive storm blowing around the Pasha. During the search phase for a
polyphonic Turkish music, Rasim Ferid Talay who had been seeking for the existence of
polyphonic song in Istanbul and went to Sir Manas, an Armenian musician educated at Rome
and lecturer at Dâru-l Elhan Conservatory. Talay demanded the polyphonic composition of a
religious song called Huseyni Saz Semaisi and a written note paper of the composition to be
played by a large orchestrate. Sir Manas fulfilled the request that was demanded and
recomposed the Semai in a harmonic form to be played by an Occidental orchestrate. After
song‟s presentation to the Pasha, the father of Turks looked into the eyes of the men around
him and asked about their opinions. Without receiving their answer he said “This is irtica388”
“I do not want Sir Tatyos‟s polyphonized songs, I want the new work of arts composed by the
Turkish children and reflecting their emotions”389 Apparently, for him the polyphonic
production by an religious Armenian musician was not approvable.
For Atatürk, the polyphonic composition by a “Turkish child” was much more
important than a composition by Armenian musician. For him, for the passionate defenders of
his ideology as well, they were much more concerned about the ethnic Turkish presence rather
the than composition of the indigenous polyphonic compositions. In the news, regarding the
Turkish composers at the Ankara radio, this anxiety, concern was perfectly displayed. The
articles addresses to the Turkish compatriots and announces that the Turkish “race” have
already understood its task on the music revolution, on the path for finding out “our” music
belonging to our former civilization. On the path of the art revolution, we always must walk on
straight. “Soon it will be possible to talk about the successes of the Turkish nation, the most

388
The “irtica” word in Turkish refers to a particular Islamic community, who is determined to make a counter
revolution against the modern republic and concoct a “regression” to the Islam past to remove the existing
secular system. This word is still highly usable in the modern political discourse among the Republicans and
their elite circles.
389
Interview with Necil Kazım Akses made by Ülkü Özen, Ankara 3.11.1995, Türk Tarih Vakfı ArĢivi, cited in
Paçacı (1998), p.23.
135
ancient and elegant kind of the human race.”390 Besides, in various articles, columns and news,
the days for witnessing and listening to the polyphonic compositions by “real” Turkish children
were regularly mentioned. It is very interesting that this perception was also shared by a writer
in Turkish Music Periodical (a periodical which defends the Ottoman/Turkish music against
the Occidental hostility as I have touched upon above). The article initiated with a message to
the Young Turks who “does not need to talk about their great nation” and the “race” which
they belong to. The only obstacle to the Turkish republic‟s fine arts is mentioned as the Islamic
tradition and the Ottoman civilization391, the civilization in which the three religions had been
coexisted with each other under the Ümmet system for centuries. Hence, the development in
the music had also been a matter of “ethnie”, a matter of praising the Turkish identity which
had been at a secondary place compared to the Ottoman overarching ruling identity during the
imperial decades. Therefore, the opera or operettas performances by the Westerns or
polyphonic songs composed by the minorities were not enough getting the place that Turkish
ethnie deserves among the Universal art arena. “The operas and operettas composed by the
Turkish children are very soon” declares the Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri periodical that had
been the voice of the hegemonic ideology in the field of art. However, the Turks had waited
more than 80 years to watch Il Barbiere di Seviglia, which is performed by the indigenous
Turkish artists.
The ethno racist discourses were also observable in other music discussion title such as
the instruments. Through the periodicals that I have searched, in the letters written to these
periodicals, in the pictorial introduction of amateur music groups from various parts of the
country and the music news published at the Radio periodical, I found out that, there had been
a great enthusiasm in the Mandolin, originally called Mandolina, an instrument originated in
Naples in Italy during the 18th century. There even had been music followers who wanted to
hear mandolin at both folk and Ottoman songs.392 As far as my findings verify, Ġzmir had been
the city in the spread of this “street instrument” which is easy to learn and play. In an article, it
is said that there had been many little children on the streets of Ġzmir who play mandolin and
demand money in return. There had been also a great demand to learn to play Mandolin and
Spanish guitar in the music schools and amateur education centers. 393 Previously I mentioned
about the establishment of a Mandolin orchestrate at the radio. While I was checking the grand
390
Radyo,”Radyo‟da Genç Türk Bestekârları”, 15 May 1942, Vol.1, N.6, p.16.
391
Dr.NeĢat Halil Öztan, Türk Musiki Dergisi, “Türk Gençliği ile Hasbihal”, , 1 November 1947, Vol.1, N.1,
p.12.
392
Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “Ankete Cevaplar,” 1 July 1948, Vol.9 N.1 p.14.
393
Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri, “İzmir deki Mandolin Modası”,June 1935, N.10, (page is not specific).
136
survey made by the Radio Institution, I have discovered out in the sub sections of the questions
that there had been a moderate demand for increasing the Mandolin Orchestrate‟s broadcasting
time and use of the instrument in other programs and live concerts394. Although, the mandolin
is an Occidental instrument, the organic intelligentsia was not content by the spread of it and
was anxious about the public‟s willing for it. In an article at the periodical Müzik ve Sanat
Hareketleri, Fikri Çiçekoğlu complains about the spread of the Mandolin and the Guitar on the
streets of Ġzmir. He tells about a little Greek boy, playing a song called “Tumalano Tumalano”
at Göztepe. He says he does find any practical reason why this boy sings in a language which
he does not understand. He compares the boy with another one that he had come across
previously, at a small village of Anatolia. “This clean boy that I met at Anatolia is similar to
the one at Göztepe. Yet I prefer listening Çarşambayı Sel Aldı from him instead of a worthless
one from the Greek boy” 395
Ġsmail Hakkı Baltacıoğlu was other elite who was not content about the spread of
Mandolin among the public. “When I hear the Mandolin sound” he says “I hear a crying
Italian”. The Mandolin incident is taken as so seriously that, in the brochure prepared by
Adnan Saygun in the name of the Republican Party for the Public Houses, the mandolin is
presented as “Wilderness” instrument and advised not to let to be played at the Public
houses.396
Although in legal terms, Kemalist nationalism takes a jus soli citizenship approach in a
detailed examination, especially in a cultural sense, the territorial belonging was not significant
as the Turkish ethnie or the “Muslim” identity, which was used as a melting pot during the
1920s, as I‟ve touched upon to this issue in the previous chapters. The exclusionary face of the
Turkish nationalism towards “nomadic tribes”, (The word nomadic in the republican jargon
was a euphemism for Kurds and occasional Gypsies, the only unsettled people in Turkey by
the late 1920s) can be found in the domestic resettlement law, adopted after the first one on 31
May 1926. The article basically authorized the Ministry of Interior in the “relocation of the
nomadic tribes” in Turkey. Through relocation, through assimilation, it was supposed that the
birth of the Turkish ethnie would be accomplished in a more homogenized “ordered”
demographic structure.397 According to Bauman, the nation states are “like all other self

394
Radyo, “Radyo Yayınları İçin Açtığımız Anketin Sonuçları” June July August 1941, Vol.7, N.79-80-81,
pp.3,39,46.
395
Fikri Çiçekoğlu, Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri, “İzmir‟in Son Yıllarındaki Müzik Yaşayışında İzmir Gençliği ve
Birkaç Hatıra”, 10 June 1935, N.10, (page is not specific).
396
Yeni Adam, “Mandolina”, 25 October 1943, N.461, p.3.
397
Çağaptay,(2002), pp 71-72.
137
perpetuating social groupings, past and future, territorial or non-territorial” determines
collective friends and enemies. Furthermore, he says, in the course of the time, enemies
become the other community “livable with”. He argues “the national state designed primarily
to deal with the problem of strangers” Through only this way, the necessity for a state
organization can be provided for eliminating or “stigmatizing” the “strangers”. Put another
way, nation state arises out of the need to make a sense of complex and social arrangement as
previously I cited from Breuilly. The Gypsies and the Kurds were not “enemies” and other
similar communities such as the Lazes were “strangers”, ethnically not Turkish but approved as
Muslims during the first influx into the Anatolia. Shortly, the unidentified minorities were
“strangers” for the newly founded Turkish modern nation states. From the perspective of the
music debate, the songs of the strangers were also a matter of question and “unidentified” issue
to be stigmatized. Thence, music of the strangers also needed to be taken into account in the
music revolution motion. Accordingly, minority songs inevitably were purged with the
language revolution and their entertaining music genres were cursed in the music circles.
According to Bülent Aksoy, there had existed two kinds of music at the Ottoman
Empire after the Tanzimat Declaration. First, the Ottoman Palace music mostly performed by
the Ottoman high music intelligentsia nourished by the musicians coming from Mevlevihanes
and also Christian recruited devşirme, such as Ali Ufki (Wojciech Bobowski) within the
palace.398 Second, the peripheral music was composed of regional folk songs and the
religious/non-religious songs of the Christian minorities which he calls the “Ottoman City
Music”.399 The Armenians, Greeks and the Gypsies at Istanbul, were the bourgeois community
of the Ottoman Empire, owners of the market music at the city out of the palace. They had
been the source of the entertaining music. Yet, as being “strangers” their music was a matter of
problem for the Turkish music modernization as well. “The Armenian and the Gypsy vulgar
bourgeois music” was condemned in an article published in Yeni Adam periodical. The writer
finds the “Occidentalism efforts of these communities” as “ridiculous” and suggests that their
singing in an impure Turkish accent must be banned. With a gender discriminative perspective
he adds “as if the women (the non-Moslem singers) who integrates themselves into the men‟s
sphere, now in a European fashion, a woman take her place on the stage and when it‟s her turn,
she jumps into the stage and starts singing with a terrible loud voice”.400 Apparently, he curses

398
For Ali Ufku‟s detailed biography see Behar Cem, Musikiden Müziğe:Osmanlı/Türk Müziği: Gelenek ve
Modernlik, Istanbul: 2005 YKY, pp.17-55.
399
Aksoy ,(1998) .p.30.
400
Asaf Halet Çelebi, Yeni Adam, “Todi Musikisi”, 20 November 1941, N.360, p.8.
138
the Ottoman City music enriched by the non-Moslem minorities. The mute of the gypsies, the
nomadic music and the purge of “Christian” songs meant the break of the linkages between the
central Ottoman city music and periphery folk music. The gypsies and the Anatolian Greeks
had transmitted the musical accumulation between the periphery and the center. According to
Bülent Aksoy, the presence of Anatolian rural instruments such as Mıskal, Çeng, Zurna, and
saz genres such as Iklığ and Repab at the Istanbul music was all proofs for this natural organic
linkage.401 The annihilation, the cursing of the roles of non Turkic elements in the music
meant the wrecking this convergence that paved way the distinction between center and
periphery in music which two genres have been displayed as two distinct departments at TRT
for years.
The Jazz was another music kind that made the elites anxious with its spread among the
community. Although, the country geographically located far away from the homeland of this
music kind, there had been a significant number of Jazz followers during 1930s and 1940s,
sending letters to the mail boxes of the Radio journal and demanding more Jazz music on the
broadcast. The radio had been the source in the spread of the Jazz music.402 Both at Ankara
and Istanbul station, for satisfying the music hunger on the radio, for fulfilling the broadcasting
time-the institution claims that these play records are not just for fulfilling the program vacuum
at the station they are also “beneficial” for listening -403 especially during the initial amateur
times when there had been inefficient technical capabilities, the cheap play records were useful
for the radio. Already at Ankara radio station, a program called Cazbant between 20.45-21.30
hours was put on the broadcasting schedule on the January 1930. 404 During the summer times,
when orchestrates had been on vocation, the play records, as described by KocabaĢoğlu
“unidentified songs” were the only music choices left for the institution405. Probably, taking
into account that the United States had been the motor country of the play record industry,
most of these “unidentified” play records contained Jazz songs. The demand to the Jazz music
was such amount that as I touched previously, Jazz and Dancing orchestrates for the live
performances were established at both Istanbul and Ankara station. The “ambiguity of present”
and anxiety for fulfilling the role of the radio provided a free space for the spread of Jazz.
However, what the ideological mechanism and the modernist desire itself spread became a

401
Aksoy,(2004) pp.56-58.
402
Meriç Mesut, “Türkiye‟de Caz: Uzun Bir Serüven”, Paçacı (Ed),(1998), p. 161.
403
Radyo Program, “Plak Yayımı”, Saturday 15 February 1936, Year.1, N.6.
404
The weekly program schedule of both programs can be followed through the periodical.
405
Radyo,1 July 1945, Vol.4, N.43 and also see Radyo, Hasan Refik Ertuğ, “Yaz mevsimi ve Radyo”, , 1 August
1945, Vol.4, N.44.
139
threat and a target to be removed after a while. It also produced ethno racist discourses towards
the item it created.
In an article at the Nota periodical, titled as “War in Music,” the author was calling for
a war against both Oriental and Jazz music. His narrations were so sharp, including words such
as “cocaine” and “morphine” for describing the Jazz music probably addressed to the
performers of this music kind, the Afro Americans at the United States. For finding the “pure”
Turkish music and for the protection of Turkish children from its harmful side effects, the
article defends the removal of Jazz music from the Turkish soil.406 Although the article
addressed to Afro Americans in an indirect and arcane, there had been others humiliating the
Jazz singers and their music in an apparent style. Ecvet Güresin is among one of those who is
very anxious about the spread of Jazz music among the youngsters and compares the Jazz to
the Allaturca. He says “the Allaturca incited the old youngsters to alcoholism and melancholy.
This new music, the expression of the cannibal souls of the negroes, is going to incite the new
youngsters of modern Turkey to wine, whisky, prostitution”. He also complains about the
American films watched by the youngsters and their willing to imitate the dancing style of that
they watch in these films.407
Although the new national character was determined as “happy” and “content”
individuals attending to the balls, getting inside the new “société” life, there had to be limits
and borders not be passed. The Jazz music, the Western entertaining music was the border not
to be passed into the “immoral” and “measureless” Western life style. In a paradoxical way,
even though the Turkish modernization opens channels for the new young people at the cities
who have moderately have high socio-economic, for integrating into the global entertaining
tradition, the Afro-American polyphonic improvisational music was not approved by the
hegemonic intelligentsia. Put another way, the white color of the Western art music was less
“threatening” compared to the black color of the Western entertaining music. The famous
Ottoman musician Cinuçen Tanrıkorur also points out the same “discriminative” approach of

406
Nota, “Meyhane ve Caz musikisine karşı harp!”, 1 July 1934, N.30 pp.143-144.
407
Ecvet Güresin, Yeni Adam, “Musiki Buhranı”, 23 October 1941, N.356 pp.10-11.
140
A jazz group from a rural city at Anatolia called “UĢak”.
(Photograph is taken from Nota Periodical, (date is not provided) 1934, N.33, p.152.)

Kemalist elites towards the Occidental music. He reminds us that for the republican
elites the Occidental music was limited with the Central European Art music, other Western
popular music genres such as Flamenco, Jazz were excluded from the scope of the hegemonic
ideology, so does from the public. 408
Shortly, Christian minority the songs and the instruments within music were cursed and
condemned Muslim minority music such as Alevi and Kurdish were all “stigmatized”.
Moreover, the ethno racist discourses in the music debate reached to the “Negro” Jazz music
beyond the borders of the nation. I suggest that this is due to the significant amounts of racist
elements in the Turkish nationalism already existed.

“Tunes from Homeland” and “Stigmatization” through Radio

408
Tanrıkorur,(2004), p.61.
141
 “We are learning a march” program on the radio was converted into “We are singing
together” within just 4 months. By this incident, the head officer of the Radio said “we learned
that there had “very few” national marches. Even though there had been a few, the lyrics, the
underlined discourses and the secret messages within these marches display the militarist
configuration of the national identity and provide the secret subtitles of the exclusionary face
of the Turkish nationalism. In fact the increase trend of the marches during the 1930s and
1940s unfolds how the nation building process was being perceived as “militarist
mobilization”. On the “music revolution” transition path from monophony to polyphony, the
marches were supposed as the shortest cut to go. The feasibility of less complex harmonic
modification in these simple tunes created incentive for composing marches. Therefore, by the
convergence of a desire to make a national repertoire for singing together, the marches were
suggested as simple tunes, which were easy to compose, to sing together and to plug
polyphonic structures. In most of the marches that I came across there were lyrics, there were
words and sentences related with the “Turkish pure blood” and direct exclusionary messages to
the ones who are not originally from “sublime ancient Turkish race”. Even though, these
arcane marches constitute a small part of the whole music debate, through the years of 1930s
and 1940s, they reached to the souls of the every citizen for different particular purposes.
Minority infants under the shelter of the national education framework were taught and sang
these marches which praises distinctiveness of the Turkish ethnie.409 Many of them were also
used by the Republican Party as propaganda songs during 1939s, 1943s and were sent to every
city across Anatolia and heard by everyone through the speakers put on the center of the
towns.410 The inside and outside threats to the “Turkish core” usually mentioned and Ankara
was being offered as the zone of the “invincibility”, a city that is more homogenized compared
to the other cities of the former empire.411 It is also a noteworthy point that most of marches
share a common defending ground that‟s the “immorality” of the Turks.412 The willing for
breaking away from the “inferior”, “shameful” and “dying” past always evoked in these
military marches in an indirect way. By reminding the “immorality” and “invincibility” of the
great Turks, the Oriental ill past ended with the heroic independence war, was always
reminded to the subjects addressed. Thus, through this way, the fear of going back to that
409
Füsun Üstel,1920‟li ve 30‟lu Yıllarda “Milli Musiki” ve “Musiki İnkılâbı”*, Paçacı,(Ed), (1998),pp.42-43<
410
Mehmet Ö. Aklan, “Bir Belge Olarak Plaklar: Plakların Sesiyle Yakın Tarihimiz”, 60‟lardan 70‟lere 45‟lik
Şarkılar (Eds), Istanbul: BGST yayınları 2006, p.60.
411
See “Ankara MarĢı” in Radyo, “Bir Marş/Türkü öğreniyoruz”, 15 February 1942, Vol.1 N.3.
412
See The “Flag March” (Bayrak MarĢı) in Nota, 1 July 1934, N.34 p.95.
142
“miserable” Ottoman era was kept fresh in the memories and a certain measure of “self pride”
was exchanged for balancing the fear of sustaining a defeat against the West again. Briefly,
these marches are perfect reflections of paradoxical, anti imperialist and Western idealist
configuration of the Turkish nationalism where the former way was preferred this time which
is the Occident were presented as a threat for drawing the panorama of the Turkish. Even
though these marches unfolds a willingness to break up with the past, by reminding the
catastrophic war times, the Oriental part of the history was always kept vivid in the lyrics of
these marches.
The measure of liberal declinations in the Kemalist ideology could also displayed in the
lyrics of the marches. The organic unification narration of the whole nation with the
“enlightening head”, as Atatürk, puts the citizen into a “body” of prison where they had to
subordinate everything that they produce, owe or create to the nation.413 The “corporatist”
Kemalist nationalist configuration had set a hierarchy of priorities for its subjects. The nation
was above all the priorities; the individuals who were “obligated” must dedicate themselves to
the nation. The family concept and the self existence come after the nation. For legitimization
of this dedication, the citizens are presented as “obligors”, to a “living” creature, the nation. Put
differently, a symbiotic organic linkage between the subjects and the “living” nation was
imposed and codified over the individuals. The lyrics in the “Independence March” perfectly
reveal the Kemalist perception of the fatherland that is described as a living creature of which
“bloods” may come out if “it is squeezed.” This symbiotic coexistence was established by the
“blood” and “souls” of the soldiers who died at the independence war. The roots of this
“biological Governmentality” were depended onto the consciences of the people through which
they enslave their liberty to their country with consent. Even in the sector marches such as,
“Agriculture March”, institutional marches such as “Conservatory Marches”, the lyrics indicate
the importance of the fatherland and where the communities, classes and members of particular
institutions were presented as the “servants” of the fatherland or the father leader. These sector
and institution marches also validate the bureaucratic elite‟s belief in the changing power of the
cultural superstructure upon the economical infrastructure. In these marches, a psychological
support is being presented to the workers and peasants in the absence of a real economical
revolution. The support is portrayed in the merge with the nation. Devotion to the nation and
its leader is offered as the solutions to every problem that exists. In one way, it perfectly
displays the corporatist Turkish nationalism. The assumption of a “classless” homogenized

413
For instance, see the “Ideal March” (Ülkü MarĢı) in Nota, 1 May 1934 N.26, p.14.
143
organic society was so amplified that Atatürk once was presented as the “Chief Farmer” after
the attributions such as, “the head teacher”, “the father” and the “the ghazi”. The Agriculture
March where “his voice” is described as a sublime call sign, evokes the farmers to work for the
“Turkish conceit”. The marches were not the only ones that present the sublime history of the
Turkish ethnie through musical means.
The pentatonic theory put forward by Adnan Saygun, was a musicological
argumentation, claiming that where a five pitches musical scale exists,414 in a song, it was the
proof of the Turkish “race” left on that composition. According to him, the pentatonic scales
are not shared by all races. It is a matter of race, a matter of Turkish race and where the
pentatonic sounds exist, the residences of that region is Turkish. Furthermore, he claims the
pentatonic scales provide a scientific observation field/map to follow the roots of the Turkish
civilization of which it ancestral father land is Central Asia. 415 The map that he drew was
compatible with the one provided for the Turkish History thesis. His argumentation was so
exaggerated that, the pentatonic migration roads reached to the deep costal sides of both South
and North America.416 Although Saygun admitted the scientific deficiency and lacking in his
417
argument in 1970s, his theory was inspirational for the Kemalist elites at various music
institutions through 1930s and 1940s. The radio was among these music institutions which
regularly remembered the “sublime” and “ancient” Turkish music to the audiences. 418 The
belief in Pentatonic Theory, belief in a Turkish world beyond the lands of the Anatolia enabled
the secular intelligentsia to select the songs and the marches that they arbitrarily choose to be
taught.
The dusts of the Turkish nationalism beyond the Anatolian lands can also be followed
at lyrics and names of the militarist marches composed at the late Ottoman Time. The
Sevastopol, The Salonika, The Dumlupınar, The Çanakale, marches were among the ones
reserved place at the columns of the Radio periodical and the ones thought by the Mustafa
Sarısözen at his program. As I explained before the, the Turkish nationalism had two big
nourishing vines, one from the migrated intelligentsia from the upper Black sea, the Caucasians

414
I witnessed the live play of a Pentatonic song by Fikret Karakaya, (musicologist, musician and instrument
craftsman, professor at Mimar Sinan University at the Musicology Department) at his office on 29th May 2008.
From a musicologist point of view, he said these five pitches notes scales can be found in every song from all
parts of the world, it cannot be a proof of “Turkish ethnie” on the whole music history of the civilization.
415
Saygun, (1936), p.6.
416
Ibid, p.19.
417
Personal conversation with Fikret Karakaya, Musicologist, Mimar Sinan Musicology Department, 29 May
2008.
418
Radyo, “Musiki İnkılabımızda Benliğimiz”,15 January 1943, Vol.2 N.12, p.4.
144
and the other one foster around the occupied Macedonia (Atatürk was born at Salonika in these
lands and became a soldier there), where the military officers who had been in contact with the
German army officers.419. Those marches reminding the heroic wars fought at those lands at
the late Ottoman Era were chosen for Mustafa Sarısözen‟s program to be thought. 420 However,
with some little modifications in some of the lyrics such as the sultan word was removed in
various parts of the “Sevastopol March.”421 The Sevastopol was also an important city for the
Crimean Moslems. In the radio periodical, in an article regarding the Saygun‟s Pentatonic
theory, it was written that this march had been sang in a passionate way nowadays, although
the Anatolian Turks had never been in those lands but had their ancestors. “This emotion”, it
writes nourishes itself from the Turkish civilization great presence at a geography reaching
from Central Asia to the Eastern Europe.422 In brief, the pentatonic theory and Turkish history
thesis were used as positivist legitimizing sources in the field of music. Arbitrarily, some of the
Ottoman marches were selected and modified for evoking the Turkish ethnie. Whilst the lost
parts of the Turkish ethnie during the catastrophic times underlined, the gained non-Turkic
parts of the Anatolia were not included. Indeed, this again perfectly reveals the cultural
exclusionary face of Turkish nationalism towards non-Turkic elements inside the Anatolian
lands. Indeed, marches regarding Anatolia were very few or nearly absent.
The foundation document of the Turkish Republic, Lausanne Treaty ensures a minority
definition in terms of religion. However, article 39 paragraph 4 also adds an ethnic dimension
to it as it bestows some privileges to “Non-Turkic origin” minorities423. The Moslem minorities
had been a matter of ambiguity, a matter of discovery for the Kemalist nationalism within these
years. The ethnic fragmentations within the new Turkish identity were against the idea of a
“classless” unified organic body of nation of that the Kemalist had targeted to obtain.
However, Anatolian‟s demographic structure was much more complex and diversified than the
ruling elites had expected and envisaged. Hence, the Non-Turkic minorities, such as Alevis,
Lazes, and Christian Arab Assyrians had been the “strangers” in the Turkish nationalism. The
nation builders had been remained blind for period of time to these minorities since their
presence was a “surprise” for them. The Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri periodical, as being

419
KarakaĢ, (2006), p.62.
420
Radyo, “Musiki İnkılâbımızda Benliğimiz”, 15 January 1943, Vol.2 N.12, p.4.
421
See the original lyrics at the live audio cd,from Muammer Karabey collection, Osmanlı Marşları, NTV Tarih
Dergisi, April 2007 and see the modified lyrics at the Radio periodical in the various columns called “We are
learning a March/Folk Song”.
422
Radyo, “Musiki İnkılâbımızda Benliğimiz”, 15 January 1943, Vol.2, N.12, p.4.
423
Personal conversation with Yüksel Ġnan, Senior Lecturer, Bilkent University, Department of International
Relations , 20 May 2008 Ankara.
145
hegemonic ideology‟s mouthpiece in the field of art, gave place to an article regarding the
Alevi minorities, their traditional arts and the cultural lives. The narrations perfectly display
how the elites were so alien to the communities within the republic and how they were so
willing to label these “strangers.” The author writes, after he had visited the Alevi community
of which “literature, customs, epics and music” had been “alien” to “ours”, he came to the
conclusion that there had been “Turkish blood” in the veins of the members of this community.
Although there had been a blood tie, he says he is not capable in explaining the “differences”
between this community and the Turkish ethnie. He defines the cultural artistic productions of
Alevis as the pieces of “secret Turkish music and literature”. The detailed personal experiences
regarding the folkloric dancing customs, the traditional music nights, literature history were
also included in the article and his “admiration” and “curiosity” was also worded. Furthermore,
he provides information about Pir Sultan Abal, the iconic folk poet of Alevi community and
claims that he had been one of the most famous “Turk” in the literature field and he attaches
one of his songs to the his article. He says that he is surprised that the written note he found
contained “dual sound” structure and claims that these kinds of songs are well suitable for
being the cements in founding out the polyphonic operas and operates.424 Even the top man at
the political hierarchy was not well aware of the cultural ethnic communities within his state
even though some rights were bestowed to them under the subtitles of the Lausanne Treaty.
The Pasha, Atatürk himself, was also curious about the traditions and music of the Alevi
community. Once he invited the Bektaşi sheiks to one of his dinners and he was informed
about the cultural traditions and music of Alevi and Bektaşi communities. He also demanded a
performance of a Bektaişi song played by his own music group and wanted the sheiks to sing
with them. Burhannedin Ökte says, the information regarding musical traditions and religious
nights of this community, did not make the Pasha content.425 Probably, the Pasha was not
satisfied with the religious spiritual aspects of the Alevi music and its incompatibility with the
“modern” secular norms.
Even though the top man at the political hierarchy was not content with them, the rich
but “alien” Alevi musical traditions is just offered as a “cement” a leverage for reaching to the
high levels of polyphonic “real” Turkish operas and composition. Hence, for the nationalist
ideology, the Anatolian folk songs, themes and emotional literature of these lands were not the

424
Vahid Lütfi Salcı, Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri, “Halk Musikisi ve Edebiyatını Nasıl Kurtarabiliri ?”Vahid
Lütfi Salcı, June 1935, N.10, p.19.
425
Burhannedin Ökte, Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “Atatürk‟ten Hatırlar: Atatürk ve Bektaşi Babaları”, ,V.1 N.6,
pp.8-9.
146
real reflection of the new Turkish music. Even, Baltacıoğlu, the passionate, romantic
nationalist, suggested that Anatolian folk songs are “old” Turkish songs the new ones must be
the reflection of the whole nation, including the periphery and the center. 426 The only way to
obtain the ethnically the pure Turkish music was the modernization of these songs by the
Turkish children under the guidance of Western musicians and instructors. The polyphonic
song composed by Sir Manas for presenting to the Pasha or the Alevi folk songs just as
themselves were not accepted as “satisfactory” or “useful” guides for modernizing the Turkish
music. Only way to accomplish this was to invite Western musicians and musicologists such as
musician German Paul Hindemith and Magyar ethno musicologist Béla Bartôk for improving
the educational infrastructure and creating a new national music. Another interesting point to
be touched upon is the visiting guest musicians to the radio. As far as the written news column
called Müzik Hareketleri (Music News) at the periodical verifies, there never had Greeks,
Armenians, Arabs or even “less modern” Italians guest musicians to the stations. Most of the
foreign visiting musicians on the broadcast were German, Magyar, Austrian, American and
British.427 I also did not came across with any indigenous folk performs who did play a
different instrument expect the Saz, which was determined as the national and “the most
suitable instrument for the harmonic music”. The Armenian Duduk was already approved as an
“inefficient” instrument, for playing at radio.428 On the other hand, “ethnically” Turkish
amateur musicians were put on the live broadcast as visiting musicians such as Faruk Kaleli
from Erzurum. Even though he does not know to play the Saz instrument or any other, just can
sing the folkloric songs that he memorized in the trips himself made around Erzurum he was
led to make a live performance on the live radio broadcast.429
The real cores of the Anatolian music or the spread of the musical skills among the
public was not satisfactory for the intelligentsia and the political elites. Many different kinds of
the folkloric instruments, tunes, sounds or songs were seen as the facts to be purged as the
discourses unfold till the end of the 1940s. The “undisciplined” “dissolute” “colorful” faces of
the Western music were also suggested as “threatening” illnesses of the Occidental music. Put
another way, as written in the Radio periodical, the Turkish youngsters must not prefer the
Jazz, “the Harlem negro/black music” but must listen the white art music performed by the
Central Europeans, such as Bach, Beethoven and other derivations. It is also another
426
Ġ.H Baltacıoğlu, Yeni Adam, “Musikide Türke Doğru”, 18 September 1941.
427
You can fallow the visiting musicians and indigenous guest musicians in the column called “Müzik
Hareketleri” in each monthly publishing of the Radio periodical starting from 1940s.
428
Radyo, “Radyo‟da Çalışmak İsteyenler Nasıl Bir Yol Tutmalı”, 1 July 1946, Vol.5, N.55.p.15
429
Radyo, “Erzurumlu Halk Sanatkarları: Faruk Kaleli Radyo‟da”, 15 February 1944, Vol.3, N.27, p.1.
147
noteworthy point that the all invited foreigners upon improving and making revolution in
Turkish music were from white Central Europe. Eugené Borel, Béla Bartôk, Paul Hindemith
are among the famous “white” names appeared on the history of Turkish music. What the
ruling elite envisaged was the discovery of the Turkish music by the “scientific” “objective”
and “educative” teaching methods of the “White Occident”. Instead of commonality, natural
tendencies of the public, (as in the case of mandolin and Jazz), or incline in the different
sources of music within the Anatolia and Istanbul, the Western harmonic music, born in the
Church chorus during the Renaissance Era, was approves as more “useful” and “impartial” for
discovering the real national music.

Turkification of the Folk Songs

Necdet Hasgül suggests the music policies-directed by the Westernization and
Turkification desires- applied for the sake of having a modern polyphonic music, meant the
“annihilation” of the regional and ethnic cultures within Anatolia.430 The compiling and field
researches performed since 1926 for establishing a national folk song archive were all done
with the written notation method, of which twelve note Western sound system was used. The
compression of rich, free performing folk songs into the tampere sound structure caused the
disappearance of the many ethnic and regional motifs tunes, improvisational plays and
performing on the instruments. Inevitably, the new systemization also required the adaptation
431
of a new order of lyric structure which must fit into the note frames. Hence, a standardized
performing style and a “stagnated” folk song archive appeared and thought to public in the
Yurttan Sesler program. During the compiling process all the folkloric songs in Kurdish,
432
Lazish, Greek, Armenian, were “Turkified” in the line with the national identity and
national language that‟s modified by the Turkish Language Institution Inquiry. The handicap
between the officially designed Turkish language and the Anatolian dialects can be perfectly
followed through Béla Bartôk‟s memories who made several field researches for the
musicological and compiling studies of the Anatolia Folk Music. Among one of his memories,
he mentions about some of the written text of the folk lyrics of which his translators were in
capable of understanding. He mentions that his translators were usually applying a “guess
method” in clearing out the lyrics.433 The TRT archives inherited from the ones made by

430
Hasgül,(1996), p.41.
431
Stokes,(1998), p.62.
432
Hasgül,(1996) p.43.
433
Bartôk, (1976),p.5.
148
Mustafa Sarısözen for the conservatory, did not include lyrics in other communal languages
such as Kurdish and Lazish. The alternation in lyrics revealed dramatic and ironic incidents in
some folk songs such as the one which was about a train voyage to Baku434 converted into a
sea voyage to Samsun, because of absence of an essential Turkish word for the “train”. In an
ironic and confusing way, in the further version of the folk song, the coastal city Samsun was
replaced by Iğdır, a city placed next to the mountain so the ship voyage destination was
converted into a city mountain.435
Although the Kurdish songs protected their essence and originality through the regional
intellectual initiations, most of these songs were also turkified during the 1930s and 1940s.
Mehmet Bayrak‟s study, an anthology of Kurdish folk songs reveals how the Kurdish culture
and its name had been tried to be assimilated in the folk songs collected during the compiling
periods. For instance, an incited cited from M.Ragıp Gazimihal‟s unpublished book called
“Yurt Oyunları Kataloğu”- professor in the Istanbul conservatory in 1926 and the member of
the “Classification Committee” (Tasnif Heyeti)- a song named as the “Kurdish Girl” was
converted into “Turcoman girl” or a narration “Hit to the Kurdish son” was changed to “Hit to
the Turkish son”.436 The convergence of Kurdish folk songs into the Turkish language
inevitably caused the disappearance of the original words, sentences and motifs. The direct
translation from Kurdish to Turkish was impossible because of the phonetic incompatibility of
these different languages. Hence, most of the Kurdish songs were detached from their core
meanings, emotions and phonetic structure and those are still performed by the Kurdish singers
with their “damaged” versions on present day.437
The Armenian folk songs were also among the ones converted into pure Turkish
language. In Muzzafer Sarısözen‟s column, I came across with the famous Armenian folk song
which is called in Turkish “Sarı Gelin”. The purified Turkish lyrics can be noticed at the first
glance. Yet, it is noteworthy to say that that these lyrics were less ordered compared to the
popular lyrics that is available now days and the older version “arranged” by Sarısözen
contained “invented” meaningless Turkish words.438 Another incident is related with ancient
Armenian folksong called “Kamança”, composed by Sayat Nova in the 17th century, that is

434
The lyric was: “Prahoda mindim sürdüm seyranaya” “Phrado” is a Russian origin word and the “seyranaya”
is an Arabic word.
435
Cited in Hasgül,(2006),p.43.
436
Mehmet Bayrak, Tarihsel Gelişimi içinde Kürt Kültürü ve Asimilasyon Politikası: Kürt Halk Türküleri
İnceleme-Antoloji, Istanbul: Öz-ge Yayınları ,1991, p.28.
437
Ibid, p.31.
438
See, Radyo, “Bir Halk Türküsü Öğreniyoruz”,15 October 1942, Vol.1 N.11.
149
known as “Çırpınırdı Karadeniz Bakıp Türk Bayrağına” in Turkish. One of the famous
musicians called Ahmed Sami Toker who also had been worked in the Radio orchestrates,
admits that that he had heard the song at Sarp city in a concert, in a small village at the far east
of the Anatolia. He says, after he wrote the notes he realized it was very “foreign” to Turkish
music “tonal mode”. Therefore, he claims that that the song is “probably” composed by Sayat
Nova an Armenian composer. In an ironic way, the song had been used as propaganda march,
with the lyrics written by Ahmet Cevat Ohuntzade, by the extreme nationalist/Turanist policy
makers and intelligentsia. And the essentiality of this Armenian folk song was also damaged.439
The folk songs and the Ottoman religious high art productions, being mostly
anonymous, were “Turkified” and this led to disappearance of their essence. Besides, Mustafa
Sarısözen, the various periodicals and institutions, Mustafa Kemal himself had also dedicated
himself on this duty for forming national Turkish folk music. Upon an invitation to Çankaya
Pavilion, Adnan Saygun says, “I found the Pasha on the dinner table with pens and papers in
accompany of Kazım Özalp…They were making reduction on the songs which contained
heavily Persian Arabic narrations and words. He gave one of the translated version of lyrics
and asked me to compose…I carried out the order and sang the newly composed song on
piano. Atatürk ask me to repeat the song over and over again. It was impossible to ignore that
in each time his excitement was increasing. Finally, turning to the visitors and guests on the
table he said “...those lyrics were Ottoman and the music of them is Ottoman. These lyrics are
Turkish and this music is Turkish music. New société new art!”440
The national folk music archive building or destruction periphery‟s polyphony?
Instead of objective musicological studies, essentials of most of the Anatolian songs
were altered sometimes due to the lack of the infrastructure in making a “collectivized”
archive, sometimes absolute and relentless belief in the “universality” of the Western notation
system and sometimes because of the arbitrary personal anxieties. The injection of “originally”
pure Turkish words into the veins of the folk songs was not the only discretionary alternation
made in the folk songs and Ottoman music. Indeed, the creation of new words arose out of
necessity for harmonizing the new sound structure obtained through the Western notation,
where the old regional dialectical lyrics were not any more incompatible with it. The real
“waste”, the real destruction of the modernism “dynamism” in music was the alternation of the
essential tunes, sounds of the Ottoman center and periphery music.

439
Hasgül(1996), pp.46-47.
440
Ahmet Adnan Saygun, Atatürk ve Musiki: Onunla Birlikte Ondan Sonra, p.45.
150
 For instance, in his book Martin Stokes, presents the modular alternation of the sound
moulds in the Blacksea region, where the most of the songs were played by Kemençe, the
regional instrument, In the musicological terminology, he says, it is an impossible and
infeasible fact to reflect the “diversified” rhythms of the Blacksea music into the Western
musical notation.441 According to him, the notes “imposes” a rhythmic modular structure to the
reader and when the performer plays a black sea song with a particular written source, it is
mostly performed in a different way from its original rhythmic closures.442 Therefore, the
Usul443 being performed with the written notes becomes different from the original one. In one
of the Blacksea songs, compiled by Sarısözen, he illustrates how Western music notation
system, converts the rhythmic structure of the songs is into a “singular mode”.444 As a
musicologist, after the field trip made to the Eastern Black sea regional, he provides the
illustration of the alternation in the songs such as Saat Kaydesi, Püsküllüdür Püsküllü of which
the original performing ways were much more different than the ways which can be performed
according to the written musical notes.445 According to him, the Kemençe instrument with dual
strings on it provides a natural polyphonic sound structure and dual rhythmic modes which
cannot be reflected on written music system, in which the Turkish music is assumed as
“monophonic”.446 In fact, when the Blacksea songs were played on the Saz instead of
Kemençe, inevitably they were performed in a monophonic sound structure. Hence, the archive
and collectivization studies did not convert the folk songs of Anatolia in terms of Turkish
ethnie, also relegated some of them to the monophonic sound structure, where the pre
assumption of the monophony of the Ottoman/Turkish music was “imposed” and “approved”.
The latter folk music archive studies made after the first ones under the framework of
Dâru-l Elhan, did not take into the account of the maqam and rhythmic structures of the
collected folk songs. In the first archive studies, the folk songs were mostly defined in
terminologies such as Aksak Hüseyn-i Makamı (Disorganized Hüseyni Maqam). However, the
latter studies, done in the blindness of the absolute belief in the “Occidental Scientific”

441
Stokes, (1998), p. 101.
442
Ibid, p.97
443
“The Usul system regulated the rhythmic component of all composed pieces. An usul is a repeating rhythmic
cycle roughly equivalent to the Western measure, but closer in the concept to the Tala of India”. Unlike the
Western measure, the usul is composed of more diversified and fragmented set of rhythmic components. See
Signell (1986), p.16.
444
He first provides an example at Stokes (1998), p.96, in song which was written in the Western note system
with the Usul (rhythmic modular) provided by Muzzafer Sarısözen.
445
For musciological illustrations, see, Stokes, (1998), pp.102-103
446
Ibid, p.102
151
 447
principles did not include such labels that can protect the originality of the Folk songs. The
Blacksea folk songs were not the only ones undermined from this “Occidentalist Fantasy”. The
squeeze of the Efe folks of the Aegean region, mostly performed by “improvisational” drum
rhythms, into the Western notation structure was also impossible. The Aegean songs saturated
with Greek tunes, played around Aydın, Muğla, Ġzmir and Denizli during the late Ottoman
period also cast their essentiality through modern collectivization process.448 In short, the
Anatolian folk songs were “standardized” and the individual and regional pieces in their
essentials were converted, adjusted to the style of singing in a mass and collective manner,
since Sarısözen and his partner musicians on Yurttan Sesler “did not have time”449 to reflect all
the colors of the Anatolia. Similar to other incidents happened in the music panorama and other
cultural fields, desire in making a swift fashion revolution or satisfying “broadcasting hunger
of the radio” paved way to a general destruction in folk songs.
Marketization and Popularization of the Ottoman Music
All the motions happened in 1930s and 1940s, favour in the Occidental high art music
and the contrary apparent stance towards Oriental music performers paved a new ground at
history of the Turkish music. The offended Ottoman/Turkish musicians, sometimes despised
by the head of the state sometimes at the radio institution where they were regularly examined
even though they worked under the title of “contracted officers” unlike their Occidental music
mates who were payroll employed, started searching new job opportunities in the market. The
closure of the Tekke and Zaviyes, the accumulation of the controversial environment in 1930s
and 1940s all laid the arcane factors for the marketization and popularization of the
Ottoman/Music. The musician in the absence of the state subsides searched for job at the
underground entertaining places, at the Gazinos and Meyhanes. The “music revolution”
deemed to be performed indirectly contributed to the fragmentation of the Ottoman/Music and
produced new genres reaching to recent times. There never appeared a high art ethnic Turkish
music with operas and harmonic folk songs except a few “cursed” productions made by the
Turkish Five. As the personal memories and the comments at various surveys and interviews
display, there also never appeared an audience enthusiastic in listening the white Occident
music. The music revolution perfectly completes the “Occidentalist Fantasy” picture. The
relentless desire to be “listened” and “approved” by the Occident or to book an honorable place

447
Öztürk, (2006), p.159.
448
For the musicological illustrations displaying the alternation in the Aegean Folk songs see Öztürk(2005),
pp.166-167.
449
See the interview made by Meral Özbek,(1991), with Orhan Gencebay, pp.318-345.
152
at the Western Art arena was tried to be performed by again by using the “mighty” technical
superiority of the West. The “inferior” Ottoman instruments, the traditional religious teaching
method and the monophonic spiritual Oriental way of performing music were left behind with
a fait accompli manner. As Atatürk said they cannot wait “400 years” to perform a music
revolution. Therefore, the material superior pieces of the Occident must be “imported” and, it
was assumed that the musicians, amateur followers and each citizen would annex them into
their souls to compose and perform ethnically Turkish productions. Yet, this fait accompli
manner also caused the subjects to forget whatever they were capable in music and codified
them as subjects to be “educated”. As I displayed in the radio examinations, some applicants
said they never learned solfegé skill even though they really knew it, at least the maqam
structures. The professional Ottoman/Turkish musicians also found themselves in a battle
ground to fight against the supreme Occidental materials of music. They and the top man at the
political power hierarchy Atatürk, all experience the burning sparkles and destructive motions
of modernism, where the “material” and “spiritual” pieces were fallen apart. The fight between
these two faces of modern art and modernism experience, as Berman‟s cited story regarding
Baudelaire unfolds, the “impossibility” of detaching the art from the material world, paved way
to the occurrence of an ambiguity, the ambiguity of presence. However, the ambiguity of the
presence perpetuated Ottoman/Turkish music on the radio and the top down penetrations
relegated this music genre to the market where it was fragmented and gave birth to new music
genres.

153
A picture of the Fasıl Heyeti under strict inspection of a radio officer
(The photograph is taken from Radyo, Müzik Hareketleri, Vol.4, N.37 p.18.)

154
CHAPTER 3: The shadows of the Past Over Popular Culture Music

Music is always in a state of formation. Similar to time

and its order, it grows by eroding itself, it gives birth
within itself and it dies with itself.

Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar, Şiir ve Pınar

There is still an ongoing discussion in the academic circles and musician forums
regarding the pros and cons of Kemalist cultural policies on the issue of music. The
defenders of “Music Revolution” such as Ġlhan UsmanbaĢ450, Ercüment Berker,451 depending
upon the Saygun‟s legacy of ideas, argue that the Atatürk‟s policies and reforms on music
were not carried on and applied in an “efficient” and successful way, especially after his
death. According to them, the reason of the “discontinuity” after Atatürk era, the erode of
modern music culture among the society and disappearance of the high art compositions of
harmonic productions or the miserable conditions of the popular music, all were due to the
inefficiency of generations after him. On the other hand critical remarks made by scholars
such as Cem Behar452, Murat Belge453, Füsun Üstel, Meral Özbek, Orhan Tekelioğlu, all are
unified on the contrary pole, claiming that fragmentation and demolition in the
Ottoman/Turkish music and the popular music culture was caused by the direct/indirect
Kemalist music policies. Moreover, it is commonly claimed that the Kemalist music reforms
during 1930s and 1940s were not able to spread Western music tradition in an “Oriental”
surrounding and failed to obtain a homogenized mass music audience. In addition, negatively
these reforms caused to the disappearance of Ottoman music.
Meral Özbek following the questioning put forward by Murat Belge regarding effects
of republic era on music culture, states some fabrics and reasons which relegated the
Ottoman Turkish music and their performers to the market and pertained to that, laid the
seeds of the popular music in Turkey. Özbek reminds us that the “tradition” was as ascribed
and labeled as “backward” under the Turkish modernization project. This discourse even had
effective and shaping effect on the Ottoman/Turkish music camp. According to Özbek the
“Oriental” music performers in Turkey were retreated to a more defensive position because
of their musical preferences and they embraced “traditionalist” and “nationalist” stances,

450
See, Ġlhan UsmanbaĢ, “Türk Müziğinde Çağdaşlaşma”, Paçacı(Ed), (1998), pp.36-39.
451
Follow his comments at various pages in Atatürk Devrimleri ideolojisinin Türk Müziğine Doğrudan yada
Dolaylı Etkileri.
452
See, Behar, (2005), (1998), and Klasik Türk Müziğe Üzerine Denemeler, Istanbul: Bağlam Yayınları, 1987.
453
Follow the discussions at various pages in Atatürk Devrimleri ideolojisinin Türk Müziğine Doğrudan yada
Dolaylı Etkileri.
155
statements to defend their music against the Occidental imposition. Indeed, my observations
obtained through the Türk Musikisi Dergisi periodical verify this argument. In various
articles, the “undisciplined” study, singing and playing methods of the “market” musicians
were condemned454 and aggressive nationalist narrations were used for proving that Türk
Musikisi was real the Turkish music.455 This incident perfectly unfolds already started
fragmentation on the Ottoman/Turkish music camp.
After the abolishment of Tekke and Zaviyes in 1925, the musicians inaugurated to
search for job opportunities on the market and their music productions were shaped
according to the necessities, preferences and appreciations of the audiences who were needed
to be “entertained.”456 These instructors also became redundant after the ban of Oriental
music in the official state music instruction institutions by legislation of an act in 1926 that
was lifted in 1976.457 The only free moving space left for them was the private music
courses, market and newly established music entertaining houses, the Gazino(s). It was time
for the new generation of musicians to demonstrate their musical skills on the public
entertaining arena, where the most “easiest” and “entertaining” performing genres were
suitable with the new market rules. The generation of 1930s, who was listening to the
Egyptian radio during the ban of the Allaturca music on radio, now started to unfold their
musical accumulations left from their social memories. For instance, Vedat Yıldırımbora,
who had written Turkish lyrics on Arab melodies between 1971 and 1974, says, “The Cairo
radio station was most likely to be listen in Ġzmir” during ban period. “Ûmmü Gülsüm was
one of the famous singers that I adore” says he.458 The Egyptian radio was not the only
source of spread of “Arab” presence on the marketing popular Turkish music. Persuading a
neutrality policy during Second World War, American movies 459 and the free market
Egyptian movies saturated with the songs of the leading actors, dominated imported film
market of the republic instead of Europe.460 The popularity of Arab films were so high that in
November 1938, during the première display of Damü‟al Hubb (The Tears of Love),(the
Egyptian singer Abdûlvahhab was the leading actor in this move) the traffic was stuck at the

454
Dr. NeĢat Halil Öztan, Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “Musikimizde Alaturkalık”, , 1 June 1948 Vol.1, N.8 and also
see Hakkı Süha Gezgin, Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “Musiki Davamız”, , 1 December 1947, Vol.1 N.2 .
455
Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “Türk Gençliği ile Hasbihal” ,1 November 1947 Vol.1,N.1, p.12.
456
Yalnçın Tura, “Cumhuriyet Döneminde Türk Musikisi”, Paçacı,(Ed), (1998), p.98.
457
Aksoy, (1998),p.31.
458
Interview made with Vedat Yıldırımbora by Özbek (1991), p.143.
459
I suggest that the spread of the Jazz music in Turkey that I mentioned in previous chapter is committed with
these American Films
460
Özbek, (1991), p.149.
156
streets and the windows of the cinema were broken by the spectators who were not able to
enter into cinema hall.461. Pertained to the increase fame of the Egyptian movies, the Arabic
songs of those movies also spread in the music market of the republic. Following this trend,
The Public Press Directorship prohibited the singing those songs in Arabic and a new market,
the arrangé market of Arab songs appeared. Hafız Burhan, originally coming from the
Mevlevi tradition, first arranged the soundtrack of the Damü‟al Hubb and realized the song
with Turkish lyrics that became best selling records of all the time of those years. 462 The
other famous singers who had produced similar types of converted songs were Minnur
Nurettin Selçuk, Sadettin Kaynak, Sadi IĢılay, Artaki Candan, ġerif Ġçli, Hüseyin ÇoĢkuner,
all musicians who had been in the chain of Mevlevihane tradition previously.463 This
dynamism in 1950s converged with the appearance of limited economic wakening paved way
to the appearance of same kind of Turkish movies with Zeki Müren and Müzzeyen Senar
accompanied with the soundtracks composed by Minnur Nurettin Selçuk and Sadettin
Kaynak. By the presence of magic of “popular” in the society, the Gazinos started flourishing
on the streets of Istanbul. In one way, it was the reawaking of Istanbul Entertainment life and
culture that was eviscerated by the modernist waves of Kemalist projects in 1930s.464
The very first use of “Arabesk” terminology came in the beginning of 1960s with the
incident of Suat Sayın‟s stolen “Arab” song called Sevmek Günahm. After it was revealed
that the song was originally composed by Abdûlvahhab, (it was published in various news
that an “Arab” was the composer of the song), the notion, the skepticism of “Arab music”
appeared. Those years, Sadettin Kaynak‟s performances with more than eight violins, the
complexity of his orchestra formations also contributed to the appearance of “Arabesk”
music notion. Inevitably, the very post popular culture figure of Turkish music history, Orhan

461
N.Özon, Türk Sineması Tarihi (Dünden Bugüne), 1896-1960, Istanbul: Artist Yayınları, 1962, pp.115-117
cited in Özbek (1991) p.150.
462
Yılmaz.Öztuna says till to the prohibition of Arab films in 1948, there had been over 130 Egyptian films were
on screen. See.Öztuna Türk Musikisi Ansiklopedisi, V.I, II (A,B), Istanbul: MEB, 1969, p. 341.
463
Öztuna,(1969), p.222.
464
Nebi Özdemir provides information about the entertaining traditions and culture both in Istanbul and around
the Anatolia in his book called Türk Eğlence Kültürü: Cumhuriyet Dönemi, Ankara: Akçağ Yayınları, 2005. He
mentions about the Meyhane tradition managed by the non-Muslim minorities and the socio political functions of
the Yaren Odaları, Sıra Geceleri. For instance, in the secret Yaren Odası communities, male participants are
carefully selected among the ones who accompany the songs being played, preferably the ones who can play
instruments, well educated persons who are able make contribution in political and social discussing issue also
had priorities to enter. According to Özdemir, this type of “free” but disciplined entertaining traditions provided
a way of education for the young musicians. According to him the music was an incident of entertaining
performed commonly for embellishing the environment. However, according to him the Republican revolution,
modernism dynamism and new way of modern living style and the “religion oriented prohibition” all damaged
these entertaining traditions, especially the Meyhane tradition, see. Özdemir, (2005), p.109.
157
Gencebay was also labeled as an “Arabesk” performer in the late 1960s. The “degenerated”
(Yoz) market music of the Gecekondus (shanty towns) and streets of Istanbul which appeared
in the late 1940s became a growing threat to be dealt with for both Occidental and Oriental
music defenders. Our great Turkish music was labeled as “Allaturca” and left to its own self
existing and now some groups with gecekondu musical visions are killing our music with
“incongruence” melodies, says Hakkı Süha in an article published in Türk Musikisi Dergisi,
defender of Ottoman Music.465
The black hole constituted by the penetrations of dominant classes in 1930s to the
music directly or indirectly caused the appearance of such genres of patched worked, “low
art quality” productions of the Ottoman Turkish music.466 However, Meral Özbek claims
establishing a mechanical linkage between the Arabesk and 1930s music policies is to deny
the cultural “searches” and “foundations” in the 1960s came after the accelerated
modernization process in 1950s.467 For instance, the urbanization in cities, the migration
from movement from East to West, the “stagnation” of these new migrants in the modern life
of big cities, are the all other factors which Özbek attaches to Orhan Gencebay popular
Arabesk music.

Modernization and Popular Culture

As I stated in the previous first chapter, Berman states that there is also the experience
of modernism and modernization process at individual and a sociological approach is needed
to investigate it. He mainly points out to the tense experiences, individual self feelings caused
by the controversy of socio economic face of development (the material world) and the
individual development (spiritual). For him, the modern art as seen in its evaluation from 19th
century to 20th is a perfect example that reflects the controversial experience of modernity,
either including a negative feeling of denying it or affirmative approving stance. Since the
modern thought appeared in times of Marx and Nietzsche, arts men were more inclined to
“grasp the modern life from which this (modern) art spring”. However according to him,
modern artificers of 20th century do not codify themselves as “protagonists” or participant of
modernism. Recently, “our thinking about modernity seems to have stagnated and
regressed.” The work of arts, ranging from painting, sculpture, poetry novel, to architecture

465
Hakkı Süha Gezgin, Türk Musikisi Dergisi, “Musiki Davamız”, 1 December 1947, V.1 N.2
466
I do not use the term “low art culture music” in a negative sense.
467
Özbek(1991), p.163.
158
all has lost their grip on modernism feeling.468 It is matter of philosophical art discussion
whether the modern art productions must be abstracted from the modernism phenomenon in
which they exist. Either having a vague stance towards modernism, like the 20th century art
men, or both approving or denying the modernism, is still an individual response to the
modernism and do not change fact of “contributing” to or nourishing from this phenomenon
or the “experience” of modernity as Berman calls. This chapter of my study focuses to unfold
the “experience of modernity” at the popular music culture that had flourished since the late
1950s in Turkey and aims to present the portrays of popular culture music figures and the
taste of their musical productions. Through decades after 1940s, the “masses”, the public, the
audience presence also started to carry voice since the capitalist market principles appeared
as determining factors in music industry committed to the innovations in the play record
technology and the influence of big hall concerts. I suggest that including the arrival of
popular culture in my research will complete the panorama, the continuity of modernism
experience at individual and social level, by which the dominant classes, the hegemonic
ideology faces a new challenge in making “reforms” and “transformations”. In this way, I
will chart the derivative discourse power of the nationalism in the field of music. In other
words, I will illuminate how the discursive formations, the discourses produced during the
“Music Revolution” in 1930s and 1940s by the hegemonic ideology, by the dominant classes,
infiltrated into the music life, motions and vortexes after 1950s. Especially after the 1980s,
by the arrival of the neo liberal trends and currents, I will touch upon the cases of popular
music scenes and try to display how the shadows of the1930s/40 at macro level music culture
and the discourses accumulated in those years, were reproduced at “iconic” and personal
domains. The inspirational source of this chapter was the “Modernist Nostalgia” book written
by Esra Özyürek and the theories offered by Stuart Hall for explaining the “popular culture”
phenomenon.
Stuart Hall‟s argumentations in popular culture are illuminating to explain the
relationship between the popular469culture and modernization process and also in the
constitution of class relationships on this ground where the culturally dominated low classes

468
Berman,(1983), p.24.
469
Although the popular seems a new, trend word invented committed to the music motions with the capitalist
market principles, it has many social, political cultural definitions backing in 1579, according content of the
Oxford dictionary.469 However, for the purpose of this study, popular “refers to a cultural form which is intended
for ordinary people‟ whether in terms of accessibility of mode of address, or of the facts of reception”. For
detailed information about terms of “Popular “see Morag Shiack, “The Popular”, Popular Culture: A reader
Raiford Guins(Ed) and Omayra Zaragoza Cruz(Ed), London: SAGE Publications, 2005, pp.55-57

159
find cleavages to leak into the veins of the cultural projects. In other words, the arena of
popular culture is a fruitful ground in observing the triangle of relationships between the
owners‟ hegemonic ideology, the dominated, ruled masses and the modernism experience.
According to Hall, “through the long march to Modernization”, regularly there had been a
struggle on the culture of dominated, poor classes and this process constitutes the basic
fabrics of studies regarding the popular culture. Furthermore, on the road to industrialization,
with the convergence of capitalist market principles, “one way or another, “people‟ are
frequently the object of „reform‟, often, for their own good, of course, „in their best interest”.
For him the “transformations” “the reforms” that are being motioned between the rulers and
ruled classed are “at the heart of the popular cultural” studies. “Transformation is the key to
the long and protracted process of the „moralization‟ of the laboring classes, and the
„demoralization‟ of the poor, and the “re-education‟ of the people”.470 Within this context,
the arguments presented by Hall verify Kemalist ruling classes perceptions of revolution(s)
and their notion of the public. In Chatterjee‟s terminology Kemalist revolution had much
more sense of a “Passive Revolution”, a revolution that prohibits the mass participation of
multitudes into the politics. Taha Parla also authenticates this face of Kemalist ideology. For
him, Kemalism is not a revolution but it had more components of a “transformation”, even
this fact was approved by Mustafa Kemal and his cadres, since they prefer using the word,
İnkilap (non-violent revolution) rather than revolution for defining the six principles of the
ideology.471 Hence, Kemalist „transformations‟ are perfectly compatible with Hall‟s popular
culture offerings. The Kemalist transformations in music (in various time they call it as
Music Revolution, sometimes as Music İnkılâbı), laid the fabrics of the popular culture
concept in Turkish music. And these transformations during 1930s and 1940s paved way to
occurrence of a very puissant and forcible popular culture of music and sometimes politically
subversive. In brief, the popular culture, the entertaining facet of music, which commenced
to constitute in the 1950s, is domain of transformation(s) where the class relations between
the dominant and dominated ones could be followed.
Foucault repeatedly reminds us that pleasure becomes a significant arena of political
experiences and a focus of control, through the definition what pleasures „are‟ and whether or
not they are permitted, and conversely, through resistance to that control.472 In Foucauldian

470
Stuart Hall, “Notes in Deconstructing” the Popular””,Guins(Ed) and Cruz(Ed), (2005), p.64.
471
Parla and Davison, (2004), p.92.
472
Stuart Hall, On Postmodernism, and Articulation, interview with Lawrence Grossberg, Journal of
Communication Enquiry, Vol.10, N.2 1986, pp.45-65.
160
terms, “popular culture”, relation to certain forms of „Governmentality‟ is a cultural motion
by which the bodies of urban population are managed and controlled through disciplinary
regimes of pleasure.473 Bestowing the fabric of argumentation to Foucault, Stuart Hall
elaborates the notion of pleasure, by taking into account the concept of popular and
popularity from a sociological perspective. “Popular culture” says Hall, “is neither, in a
„pure‟ sense, the popular traditions of resistance to these processes (transformations), nor is it
the forms which are superimposed on and over them. It is the ground on which the
transformations are worked”.474 Therefore, slightly differing from Foucault‟s statement, Hall
argues that popular culture also had “flux” of “resisting” stance towards the “disciplinary
control” of the culturally dominant ideology. Therefore the popular music in Turkey,
especially during the initial phases of the intensified industrialization in 1950s, may be
defined as manifestations of the transformations done on previously. The market songs and
the popular icons subsequently revealed between 1950s and 1980s were the reflections of the
ground of transformations which had a duality movement of “containment and “resistance”
in Hall‟s terminology. Put another way, the popular music in Turkey after 1950s is neither an
arena of “acceptance” of Kemalist modernist notions, the superiority of the Occidental
polyphonic music, nor the full rejection of rich harmony of Oriental tunes and sound
framework. It included both poles as the manifestation of the paradoxical Turkish modernism
was reflected on the popular music culture.
According to Hall, popular culture is important because in anthropological terms, it is
a motion constituted on ground which is more “close” to the mass culture. It is the very first
mass cultural “incorporation” existed outside the dominant cultural hegemony. In the field of
art, it is a response to the “educative” high art culture by the consumption of low art
products. The popular culture recreates itself with the convergence of different forms of
“traditions” in different timescales. Furthermore, it also has a sense of “market”, a reflection
based on the appearance of the commercial capitalist principles. Committed to this, it is not
entirely independent and “authentic” from the sphere of influence of dominant class culture.
He says “…there is not whole, authentic, autonomous „popular culture‟ which lies outside the
field of force of the relations of cultural power and domination…”475

473
David Rowe, “Popular Cultures: Rock Music, Sport and the Politics of Pleasure” ,Guins(Ed) and Cruz(Ed),
(2005), p.7.
474
Hall, (2005), p.65.
475
Ibid, pp.66-67.
161
 The popular music portrays and the productions circulating around commercial
market of music in Turkey clearly verify the statements presented by Hall. Meral Özbek‟s
published book regarding the Orhan Gencebay Arabesk and popular culture is mostly
constituted upon Hall‟s same theoretical framework.476 The personal conversation that I had
with Özbek regarding the applicability of Hall‟s arguments on other popular culture icons or
cases in Turkish music, was inspiring for me although she said there have not occurred other
popular cases or figures besides Orhan Gencebay that created a mass cultural wave in line
with the same or at least similar motions of socio-economic formations and alternations.
Furthermore, she said, by the differentiations of capitalist market dynamisms and social
formations after 1980s, Hall‟s arguments are hardly applicable in popular cases. 477 However,
this did not discourage my enthusiasm in applying Hall‟s arguments at least to whole history
of Turkish popular music culture with diversified music genres appeared within it. However,
before I would like to initiate my analysis with Orhan Gencebay case and the basic fabrics of
Özbek‟s study.

Orhan Gencebay Arabesk and Popular Culture

According to Meral Özbek, as Murat Belge cites Arabesk is “a way of life”. It is not
just a mass music consumption habit. It is a popular culture that has feature of articulating to
the hegemonic ideology as happened in the 1980s.478 Arabesk music genre was first
produced during the mid 1960 “when the Turkish music industry was in its infancy, a process
provided the avenue of creative expression for those excluded from the state control media
and culture.”479 Suat Sayın‟s incident that I alluded above was the first spread of the Arabesk
notion within the society and the music market before Gencebey. The augmentation of the
Egyptian music presence in the film industry, the increase of Arab influence in Turkish
music market and the arrangé songs from Arabic all paved way to the appearance of Arabesk
discourse on the Turkish music history. Gencebay as the first popular iconic production of
this music genre appeared on the scene in 1966 when he composed his first popular song
called “No raft in the ocean to hold onto” (Deryada Tutanacak Salım Yok)480. Alluding an

476
See Özbek, (1991), pp.75-93.
477
Personal conversation with Meral Özbek, Professor, Mimar Sinan University Sociology Department, 21 May
2009.
478
Özbek (1991), p.92
479
Meral Özbek, Arabesk Culture: A Case of Modernization and Popular Culture, Bozdoğan(Ed) and
Kasaba(Ed), 1997, in Turkish translation, see Türkiye‟de Modernleşme ve Ulusal Kimli, Istanbul: Tarih Vakfı
Yurt Yayınları, 1998, p.213.
480
Ibid, p.213.
162
argument of Lowenthal, Meral Özbek cites popular culture is an indication of the socio-
psychological moods of the multitudes at particular time and space. Committed to this, she
claims Gencebay‟s wave, appearance is the first non elite “mass of cultural act” from bottom
to up.481
Arabesk music leaking from the cheap quality entertaining music bars to the inside of
the minibuses (minibuses)482 and to the illegal music market benches, was the music of the
new rural migrants of the urban life who had troubles with the modern city life. It was the
music of a migration wave and urbanization process intensified after the mid 1950s with the
increase presence of the capitalist market principles. As Özbek cites, the ideological journey
of Arabesk during those years “can be broadly periodized according to its relationship with
the changing politics of capitalism in Turkey, from politics of nationalist developmentalism
to those of the transnational market orientation after the 1980s”.483 The lyrics written by
Orhan Gencebay as she calls in the interview with Murat Belge, the “abstract” narrations of
emotions such as, love despair, loneliness, being contempt, forbearance and amity, reflect the
“daily life struggles” and “adaptation” and “existing” efforts of the new rural migrants to the
Westernized urban life standards.484 Although most of the lyrics written by Gencebay retain
apolitical and secular character and narrations, idealizing the god as a living creature to
whom can be talked485 converging with complaints and “yields” about the sublimity of
“love”, depending on the authority definition provided by Geertz, are proofs for the
acceptance of a authority genre in Özbek‟s statements.486 The songs that revealed Gencebay
as the first mass popular icon, “Nobody is without Fault” (Hatasız Kul Olmaz) and “Give me
a consolation” (Bir Teseli Ver) in 1968487 or “Let the world sink, let this dream finish” in
1975 (Batsın Bu Dünya Bitsin Bu Rüya)488 perfectly unfold the lyrical basics of his music
genre and the endeavors of rural migrants who still holds to the traditions of periphery within
their hearts and minds.489 Özbek claims the utopian world and hopes, expectations offered in
Gencebay‟s lyrics all might be taken as the “approve” and “desire” of a modern life that is

481
Özbek, (1991), p.25.
482
Arabesk music is generally called as Minibüs music by the traditionalist circles and critical elites.
483
Özbek,(1997),p.212.
484
Özbek, (1991), pp.97-102.
485
Ibid, pp.192-202.
486
Ibid, pp.103-104.
487
Özbek, (1997)p.215.
488
Özbek, (1991), p. 198.
489
For instance in lyrics of Batsın Bu Dünya Bitsin Bu Rüya, “the dream of modernization” is being both cursed
and embraced, as the rhythmic “oscillations” in the song presents, and the god is presented as a talking existence.
163
constituted around the “money”, social “statute competitions and “the bureaucratic order”. 490
Hence, Orhan Gencebay Arabesk is both the reflection of “bending” and “resisting”. In some
aspects it is the emotional resistance of sub consciousness on the other and it is the musical
harmony for fixing the “discord”, the gap between the rural traditions and modern
necessities.491 In short, as Özbek says it is the “vague response” of personal experience on
dichotomy ground of modernism and modernization, as Berman points out.492
However, besides the deeper meanings and contents of Gencebay‟s lyrics, Özbek
suggests that the music genre performed by his electronic Saz mixing the Turkish/Ottoman
music and folk song tunes, timbres with “dynamic” Western rhythms are another aspect that
unfold the face of modernism and the reinvention of Classical Ottoman music in the modern
times. Studying the folk music archives performed by Muzzaffer Sarısözen, he was heavily
influenced by the folk culture and embarked himself with the task of “developing” and
“improving” the Turkish music, for proving to everyone that “every music genre” is playable
with the Anatolian instrument, in his words.493 However Özbek says, Gencebay‟s music
neither carries the Western “polyphonic” standards nor can be defined under the Turkish folk
music or Turkish Art Music categories with “recent” modern language and sound structures.
Although there has not been“polyphony” in Western context, Gencebay benefited from
electronic Western instruments (adapted his Saz with electronic technology) and persuaded
composing songs with the Western tonal system discipline.494 He also benefited intensely
from stringed instrument family, from violin in his productions which constituted the
“Egyptian” face of his music. According to Martin Stokes, Gencebay music also carries
“Indian and Persian” tastes in addition his composing and performing style is heavily
nourished by the Western music.495 Gencebay himself defines his music style (he is not
inclined to call his music as Arabesk), as “free performing style”496. From a more
sociological point of view, Özbek defines Gencebay Arabesk as a “Hybrid” music which is
the “reinvention” of 18th traditional Ottoman music.497 Furthermore she says, “The story of
Arabesk, therefore tells also a specific story about “Westernization” of the so-called Third

490
Ibid, p.118.
491
Ibid,pp.109-11.
492
Ibid, p.117.
493
See, interview made by Özbek with Orhan Gencebey, p.250.
494
Stokes ,(1992), p. 170.
495
Ibid, p.142.
496
Interview with Gencebay, p.259.
497
Özbek, (1991), p.113.
164
World, understanding Arabesk is crucial comprehending the contradictions and ambivalences
of the project and the process of Turkish Modernity”498
Whether the deep rudiment meanings of his lyrics committed with the motions
happened in the urban cities during 1950s and 1960s, or his rich, hybrid, karma music genre
that he plays and performs, Gencebay‟s Arabesk had an undeniable influence over the music
genres that appeared after him. His wave during those years inspired many subsequent
popular culture figures in the music industry and market, indirectly lead to the fragmentation
of new popular music genres and musicians499.
Özbek digs the socio political aspects of Arabesk music with the “denotation maps”
of the lyrics form the songs that she own self selected instead of a depending on specifically
determined methodological norms and principles. Furthermore, she is the one who fulfills the
inner pictures of Gencebay‟s lyrics of “denotation maps”. I believe this fragile aspect of her
study, provides me to extend Hall‟s arguments on other popular culture incidents, panoramas
and examples on the Turkish music history even though Özbek was critical about such an
argumentation as she mentioned during the interview that I had with her. This does not mean
that, there had been other popular culture motions same or at least similar to Gencebay‟s case
after him that was followed by grand masses500 that were dependent upon socio political
motions and upheavals. In addition, Özbek also suggests establishing a direct “mechanic”
linkage between the Kemalist cultural policies applied on music and the occurrence of
Arabesk music in 1950s and 1960s is to deny the cultural innovations and searches motivated
by the modernism phenomenon.501 For her, what was basically important is the new class
formations in 1950s came with urbanization and industrialization process.
I suggest the imprisonment; the squeeze of popular culture music into the Arabesk is
also the mitigation of the modernism dynamism on the individual soul. Put another way, to
some extent, it is the denial of modernism‟s diversification on personal feelings, emotions,
experiences and creations. In the field of music, it would be the negation of the all popular
music genres occurred after Gencebay. There had been the appearance of Anatolian Rock,

498
Özbek,(1997),p.212.
499
Ibid, p.124.
500
Raymond Williams states that the “mass” and the “mass culture” are controversial terms for social sciences
disciples. He says, “Mass is not only a very common but a very complex word in social description. In a
“positive sense” he defines the mass and the masses as the group of people belonging to some abstract or
concrete institutions, such as organizations, meeting movements. See Raymond Williams, “Culture and Masses”
Guins, (Ed) and Cruz, (Ed), (2005), p.32.
501
Özbek, (1991), p.163. Also during the personal conversation I had with Mrs.Özbek, we talked about the
triggered inspirational maelstrom, the creativity occurred on the human souls during the modernism process,
especially in the field of art.
165
the arrangé foreign songs converted from Italian, French and Spanish, the rise of
“reinvention” of Turkish Music with Sadettin Kaynak in the songs of Zeki Müren and
Müzzeyen Senar, the solidification conversion of the Turkish pop music with the appearance
of new city dweller musicians in 1980s, such as Sezen Aksu, Nilüfer, Kayahan or the
political contented protest songs of Edip Akbayram, Ahmet Kaya and Zülfü Livaneli. All
these trends, rising portrays, new faces, even though they are not converged with the same
socio political alternations as occurred during Gencebay‟s era, this does not mean they must
be excluded from the domain of the popular culture. Perhaps, these new version
fragmentations of popular music did not attract such a homogenized and definable mass of
groups, such as the Gecekondu habitants of urban cities yet some cases are very significant
with their sharpness and ambiguity towards the interests of nation-state, like Ahmet Kaya‟s
protest Arabesk genre. Besides, under the arcane apolitical umbrellas of some of the popular
figures, there had been heavily avant-gardes social messages, political subtitles, stances and
personal portrays as the Kurdish poet Kemal Burkay‟s lyrics, Gülümse became the most
admired song during the early 1990s, during the very early appearance of Kurdish problem.
Hence, following the path of the all popular culture with an overall perception in music
provides meaning maps about the consequence, reflections, indirect oscillations caused by
the Kemalist cultural project and is an efficient ground how the particular packs of discourses
of the hegemonic ideology runs the “broken” machine on social ground by constructing and
deconstructing these packs in different time scales and zones. Moreover, following other
popular culture cases are important in understanding how these packs of discourses fluctuate
within the private individuality sometimes by erasing, annihilating but sometimes reinventing
them.

The Pendulum of Popular Culture between Sadettin Kaynak and the Jazz
Theodor Adorno, one of the important scholars, having made significant, enlightening
studies on popular music and music sociology, determines a phase, an alternation from
“serious” high art culture music to popular music, a process that he calls “Pseudo-
individualization”.502 On contrary to Adorno‟s denote, mostly basing on the Western
dynamics of popular culture where the marketing process brings “standardization” of songs,
this genre of dynamism in Turkish popular music had not occurred till the mid 1980s, where

502
Cited in John Storey, Cultural Studies and the Study of Political Culture, Georgia: The University of Georgia
Press, 1996).p110.
166
both Arabesk and Western style pop music were amalgamated with each other by the
appearance of urban musicians who wanted to reach to the hearts of people in the periphery
with their heavily melancholic woeful songs, such as the productions given by Onno Tunç,
Attila Özdemiroğlu and Kayahan. Yet, I claim the Turkish music between the late 1940s till
early 1980s had became an arena of plentiful productions, such as Anatolian rock music, Jazz
and Rock‟n Roll oriented productions in the accompany of arrangé works and “free style” of
Ottoman music. Hence, unlike Adorno‟s argument, the pseudo-individualization process in
Turkish music, as being a voice directed towards Occident and searching its essential in the
echo over the voice, did not bring the standardization of capitalist marketing process but
paved to the fragmentation and diversification in popular culture. As stated by Özbek,
modernism dynamic in the “third world” is much more creative and productive compared to
West especially in the field of art, an issue also touched upon by Chatterjee with the provided
examples regarding the literacy and theatre in Indian post colonial nationalism. Therefore, I
suggest that the path followed by the popular culture music in Turkey is a thumbnail of the
whole modernism project and its current which overflows on the nationalism plateau. Put
another way, the popular culture motion in the Turkish music clearly unfolds social memory
on individual souls inherited from the whole socio cultural project initiated in the 1930s.
The “free performance” says Orhan Tekelioğlu “is more than synthesis, it is a
modernism style and it provides traces how the tradition transforms itself into the popular
trend in both musical and social grounds”503 The free performance style that he attributes is
the famous composer and singer Sadettin Kaynak, a Hafız (the volunteer grinder, memorizer
of Koran, reading it in a melodic style), who became unemployed after the closure of Tekke
and Zaviyes in 1925 and found himself on the market music, similar to his other confreres
such as Minur Nurettin Selçuk. Kaynak‟s style is mostly associated with Hacı Arif Bey who
composed significant work of arts in the song structure during the late Ottoman era, when the
marketization in music already started with the appearances of canto songs at Istanbul. When
the 1950s arrived, with the infiltrate of Egyptian film industry and American style of
entertaining into Turkey, Kaynak had earned a noteworthy statute in the music market with
his both own composed and Arabic converted songs at the Gazinos sang by Zeki Müren,
Müzzeyen Senar, Safiye Ayla and Hamiyet Yüceses. Tekelioğlu states that singing and
composing in “free style” provides a “breathing space”, a free space for the musician,

503
Orhan Tekelioğlu, “Ciddi Müzikten Popular Müziğe, Musiki İnkılâbının Sonuçları”, Paçacı,(Ed),(1998),
p.150.
167
through which the individuality can be displayed. The layout of the individuality provides the
leverage for the performer to be popular, to present the selfness to the audience and attracts
both the musicians and audience to the popular arena.504 The new free style of Ottoman
music with the melodrama Turkish films where Zeki Müren mostly acted, with the
appearance of cinema industry during those years, had been the raising popular culture
engines of Turkish music with locomotive of Kaynak‟s mass attracted songs in various
maqam structures such as Çile Bülbülüm Çile, (Ordeal My Nigthingale Ordeal) Muhabet
Bağına Girdim Bu Gece (This night I entered into the endearment orchard). Nevermore, the
free performing style of Ottoman music, which inspired the Orhan Gencebay‟s music, as he
stated to Murat Belge in an interview,505 was not the only polar where the modernism
pendulum have swayed.

A billboard displaying the vivid popular culture Gazino life of the early 1950s,

(The photograph is cited from Cumhuriyet „in Sesleri, p. 97.)

504
Ibid, p.150.
505
Murat Belge, Tarihten Güncelliğe, Istanbul: Alan Yayıncılık, 1993, p.45.
168
The years of 1920s was the first years when the Jazz music was introduced into the republic.
The Armenian musician, Lean Avigdor who was fascinated with this music during his trips
around Europe and America, initiated performing it on stage during 1930s on various stages at
Istanbul.506 Indeed, the Jazz music was the life buoy of the Radio institution during initial
amateur years, many Jazz play records were put on the play list for fulfilling the broadcast
time. The Jazz spread among the audience and musicians paved way to the complaints of
organic intellectuals by labeling it with an ethno racist title as “negro”. The Jazz enthusiasm
among the public was so puissant and passionate. For instance, Ġlhan Mimaroğlu, one of the
Jazz music instrumentalists expresses his memories in a concert on summer of 1944 at Moda.
He says “one of the songs that I did not pay attention was requested to be played for three
times, the audience was so vigorous during the drum solo performed by Erdem Buri, I was
very surprised”.507 As the time progressed, with the clearance of the cultural borders
committed by the Marshall Plan in 1947, NATO membership in 1953, with accompany of
Hollywood films, there appeared a young “elite” musicians who was seeking a third way
between the Oriental and Occidental music controversy. The city dweller children of Jazz
music now initiated forming orchestrates “inside the thick walls” of universities where they
converged the global Rock‟ n Roll wave, shaking whole the world with the Jazz music, they
had been previously hearing from the radio. Celal Ġnce, famed in wearing a smoking,
previously worked at the radio performing tango and jazz songs, became famous in the 1950s
with his own composed song called Kovboy Şarkısı (Cowboy‟s Song). According to Murat
Meriç, Celal Ġnce is the first man who initiated the popular Western music trend and opened a
new chapter in the Turkish history music. His success inspired many amateur musicians and
motivated them to form orchestrates.508 The very first rock and jazz orchestrates founded
during the mid 1950s are the Deniz Harp Okulu Orkestrası (Marine Navy School University)
under the leading role of Jazz musician Yalçın AteĢ and the Sextet SSS centered at Ankara
with musicians such as Atilla Özdemiroğlu, Yurdaer Doğulu, Berkant Kaynak Gültekin and
Selçuk Ural who put their marks on the Turkish popular music in the following years. In 1958
the Kuyrukluyıldızlar, inspired from the Everly Brothers vocal group, was founded by Oktay
Yurdapatan, ġanar Yurdatapan, Nevdet Bulut at Istanbul University science and literacy

506
Murat Meriç, “Türkiye‟de Popular Müziğimizin 75 Yıllık Seyrine Bir Bakış”, Paçacı,(Ed),(1998), p.132.
507
Ġlhan Mimaroğlu , Caz Sanatı, Istanbul: Yenilik Yayınevi, 1958, p.122 cited in Murat Meriç, Türkiye‟de Caz:
Bir Uzun Serüven, Paçacı(Ed), (1998), p.162.
508
Meriç,(1998) p.132.
169
faculty.509 ġanar Yurdatapan also became a glowing composer in the popular music through
fallowing years, with his song called Arkadaş (Mate), sang by Melike Demirağ for the
soundtrack of a the same named film directed by Yılmaz Güney a dissident film star and
director.
The “success” for these musicians was to perform “original” rock music and to
compose songs with the same standards done at the homeland of these music genres, at the
United States. Being influenced by the antagonism towards the Ottoman/Turkish music,
these musicians tried to open breathing spaces by showing references to a deniable music
culture of America. For the sake of protecting the originality of Jazz and Rock music, for
legitimizing art quality of their music genre, most of the songs composed by these era
musicians were in English. The ultimate aim for these musicians was to play their
instruments and perform their style identical with the ones performed at the West. For
instance, the leading figure in Kuyrukluyıldızlar jazz rock group, ġanar Yurdatapan narrates
that he trained himself by imitating the songs that he heard on the radio. 510 The vacuum left
by the Kemalist cultural policies in 1940s and 1950s, were tried to be fulfilled by the full
imitation of Western music. In the absence of gathering education system and an embracing
indigenous music genre, there left no other option for amateur musicians except to “imitate.”
Erol Büyükburç, the very first cult popular icon of Turkish music for instance became very
famous with one of his song called Little Lucy in 1961. His selling rates were so high that
any of the albums did not hit the same numbers for a long time. According to Orhan
Tekelioğlu, the popular music in the late 1950s and 1960s are the indication of the “failure”
of the “synthesis notion” between the East and the West at least at the popular culture
level.511 Indeed, this suggestion is very congruent as the Büyükburç‟s live concert repertoire
unfolds. In his repertoire, there had been Fascinations with Turkish covered lyrics, jazz tunes
with the songs such as “Summertime” and finishing his concert with Ottoman-Folk gypsy
tunes such as Hey Onbeşli and Kızılcıklar Oldu mu.512 Although, the jazz and Rock‟n Roll in
English were compatible with the album standards, the necessity of Turkish during live
performances paved way to the occurrence of arrangé songs and interest in the folk music
themes and melodies. In 1962 ġanar Yurdatapan with his new orchestrate became very
famous with folk song Kara Tren performed in accordance with Western instruments and
509
Metin Solmaz, Türkiye‟de Pop Müzik: Dünü Bugünü ile bir İnfilak Masalı, Istanbul: Pan Yayıncılık, 1996, p.
26.
510
Ahyan Akaya and Fehmiye Çelik, 60‟lardan 70‟lere 45‟lik Şarkılar, Istanbul: BGST yayınları, 2006, p.8.
511
Tekelioğlu, (1998), p.151.
512
Meriç, (1998),p.133.
170
sound framework. Kara Tren was also performed by singers such as Tanju Okan, Alpay and
Tülay German. The very first arrangé songs came from Fecri Ebecioğlu, Bak Bir Varmış Bir
Yokmuş, written on the original French song called C‟est écrit dans la ciel and the Her Yerde
Kar Var, originally named Tombe la Neige. These songs became very famous in the
performances of Ġlham Gencer‟s Jazz oriented orchestrate Los Chatikos in the accompany of
vocals such as Ayten Alpman and Ajda Pekkan. Tülay German and Tanju Okan‟s success at
Yugoslavia music contest with Burçak Tarlası a song with heavily folk music motifs paved
way to occurrence of a new music genre in 1970s, called “Anatolian Rock” or “Anatolian
Pop”513 Till the late 1970s, the arrangé songs with the accompany of the Turkish Anatolian
rock music had marked an era in the popular music and had produced significant musicians
in the Turkish music. Nevermore, as the Anatolian rock and the arrangé Turkish pop music
had converted, the former had become more politicized in the songs of two political wings,
left and right, in the voices of musicians such as Ahmet Kaya, Edip Akbayram and Selda
Bağcan, the later one had acquired a more “Arabesk” sense and became more successful with
the increasing popularity of songs composed by Onno Tunç and Attila Özdemiroğlu through
1980s.
Diffusion of Occidentalist Fantasy into the Popular Culture Music
As the time progressed into the late 1960s, the derivative discourse power of
Occidentalist Fantasy diffused itself into the Turkish popular music sometimes in an arcane
sometimes in an apparent way. The arrival of the music market industry and the free
breathing space opened for the musicians did not extinguish the West and the East conflict on
the music ground but converted it into a more fragmented and complicated form by
squeezing the discourse into the individual musician privacy. Since the 1960s, the notion of
inferiority of “Eastern” music flared up in the newly establish popular groups, in the stages of
famous singers and to the music competition arenas. The overflow of Occidentalist Fantasy
from the rooms of the radio stations, from the pages of bandwagon periodicals and journals
to the popular culture faded out the borders of the conflict. Even though the poles of the
conflict amalgamated each other on the popular ground, the discourses produced during
1930s and 1940s, retained its power. The Anatolian rock music appeared with the same
anxiety as the Kemalist utopia had that is the polyphonic folk music fantasy, to send the
signals and communication channels to the West for “singing” “we are here”. 514 One of the

513
Meriç,(1998), pp.134-135 and Solmaz,(1996), pp.25-30
514
Akaya and Çelik,(2006), p.8.
171
very famous Anatolian rock group Moğollar, is a good example where the Occidental
Fantasy found a new body at the popular culture.
Having a group name, remembering a geographical space outside the Anatolia, the
group and its members had been significant determinants of Turkish popular music during
1960s and 1970s. In an ironic way, the famous music group Moğollar, which has achieved a
reputation as an icon of resistance and “public intellectual” specially among the youth
generations with their marginalized humble fashion and styles on stage, are among the most
prominent figures in the Turkish popular music history, nourishing their musical existence
strategies from the necessity of improving the “Eastern” music. At the initial foundation
years of the group, they were in the track of the arrangé trend and two of their albums under
the titles of Eastern Love and Artık Çok Geç (It‟s already late) were realized in 1968s and
1970s. The group was awarded as the winner in the Golden Microphone (Altın Mikrofon)
competition and became rising Anatolian Rock group in the 1970s, after their decision
regarding their experiences on the grand Anatolian tour sponsored by the Golden
Microphone contest. One of the group‟s member, Taner Öngür in an interview published in
Hey periodical in March 1970s talks about their decision of change and says “The thing we
want to prove is that our Anatolian music might have polyphonic sprit…Besides the vicinity
between our popular and folk music, we want our inferior popular music to be incorporated
with convergence of the advanced techniques and our rich folklore. This is the aim of the
Anatolian pop music”. After this interview, their first Anatolian popular hit song, called Dağ
ve Çocuk (The mountain and the kid) was realized and seeded the roots of the Anatolian
music trend in 1970s.515
What inspired Anatolian Rock and the Orhan Gencebay Arabesk was the “inferiority”
notion directed towards the folk music. Since the radio times, as cited in Ruhi Su‟s interview,
the relentless desire and fantasy for harmonizing the folk songs diffused itself into the
popular culture arena and paved way to the occurrence of a new music genre called the
Anatolian Pop. Although the folk music genre had been the “protected” music genre by the
dominant elite class during the radio years, the “poor” and the “low music quality” of those
folk tunes were not able to be improved even after 20 years. The folk music songs prepared
to satisfy the hunger of the radio in the ambiguity of presence remained as a music genre to
be meliorated as the popular culture discourse displays. As I unfolded in the personal
comments and in the surveys, the idealization of the folk songs was so complex that it even

515
Cited Meriç,(1998), p.135.
172
did not satisfy the manipulating organic intellectuals. From statistical data provided by
KocabaĢoğlu, indeed there had been a poor broadcast time of folk songs. Hence, all these
motions paved way to the feeling of “rescuing” the “national songs” in the hearts of the
newly educated urban musicians and groups.
The Moğollar with leading role of Cahit Berkay has not been the only prominent
mark on this musical genre. Esin AfĢar, who was awarded as “national art envoy” by the state
for her successes at international contests and her album called Yoh Yoh during 1968s and
1970s, the Modern Folk Üçlüsü and Üç Hürel, all have been among the other stars of the
Anatolian Rock/Pop music during 1970s. Later on, famous names such as Cem Karaca, BarıĢ
Manço with his devastating song Dağlar Dağlar joined in this circle within the following
years.
The famous contest ground, The Golden Microphone competition, on which the
Moğallar had gained their reputation and so did many others, was another ground where
“search” for “development” in music was in process. Under the sponsorship of Hürriyet
newspaper, the contest had been held between 1965-68 and 1972-79, with determined task
and obligation that is; “to direct the Turkish music into a new way by using the rich technical
materials of Western Music and having performances with Western instruments”.516 This
competition with this determined objective gave birth to the popular names including Fikret
Kızılok, Cem Karaca, Erkin Koray and more on. All these names constituted the locomotive
of the music industry till the late 1970s and 1980s, when the urban dweller musicians such as
Nilüfer, Sezen Aksu, Nükhet Duru, intensified their presence in the music market with their
new merged music genre, Pop Arabesk. The popularity of the Anatolian music decreased
following the appearance of new alternating social and economic conditions onset of the
1980s committed to the international conjectures. Indeed, the Anatolian rock also leaked into
this vivid, apolitical, fruitful ground such as the songs reflected composed by BarıĢ Manço,
Can Bedenden Çıkmayınca (Even if I can‟t die) and Unutamadım (I could not forget) during
his separated years in the mid 1980s from his rock group Kurtalan Express.

The cycle of Allaturca in Popular music

516
Ibid, p.134.
173
 The Kemalist transformation in music at least had a project of synthesis in the high
culture music, yet did not had any offerings on the popular ground. The tango and the
operettas had undertaken the fulfilling role on the popular space for the synthesis task. Even
though, these music genres, mostly being originated from the Occident, the authoritarian high
elite culture did not “ascribe” them to the public that they addressed. The antagonism
towards Jazz could also be evaluated within this context. Indeed, as the time passed these
tango and operettas music genres had reappeared, in a more Allaturca and Turkish style. The
very first examples of the popular songs in the Ottoman Turkish music were the Kanto songs
originated from the Italian Canzone entertaining music form, acquiring a more Allaturca
sense and became the indispensable entertaining forms of Direklerarası music town in the
late empire and early republic times.517Among the very famous operetta composers, Naum
Efendi, had staged various performances in the Bosco theater in Istanbul since its foundation
in 1839, for twenty six years in company of Güllü Agop, Küçük Ġsmail and Minakyan and
their librettos. Neither reflecting a pure original tango core of the Occident nor having a taste
of a canzone, there had appeared a hybrid Turkish tango-canto music, revue entertaining and
theater plays, nourishing the popular culture during those years.518 Celal Ġnce‟s Turkish tango
composed songs which were broadcasted on the radio and demanded by the audience, could
also added into this panorama. In short, the very first imported Western entertaining popular
music of tango and canto had adopted a more indigenous Allaturca style with the prolonged
audience desire effect. As happened in the appearance of Turkish Canto incident during
1910s and 1950s, the audience likening and preferring seeking something more relevant with
the indigenous culture, also paved way to the leaking of Allaturca style into the popular
culture in the 1980.
The cycle of Allaturca once again appeared on the popular music but this time the
motion was about to be happen on the Western arrangé songs and Anatolian folk music.
When late 1970s and 1980s arrived, these blindly imported Occidental tunes were about to be
merge with Allaturca or Arabesk music accompanied with the hearts broken by the semi
military intervention in march 1971 and the 1980 coup d‟état.
During the late 1970s, the Anatolian rock was much more relegated to the lyric,
poetic Ozan style with process amalgamating the anti-imperialist left and nationalist
oscillations on the student and workers movements. By the appearance of the first communist

517
Tekelioğlu,(1998) p.150.
518
Bülent Aksoy, “Cumhuriyet Musikisinde Farklılaşma Olgusu”, Paçacı,(Ed),(1998) p.34.
174
party on the parliament in 1968, Cem Karaca initiated the trend of the political context songs
with his rising fame. Selda Bağcan, Edip Akbayram and the Moğollar were others who
followed the path opened by nationalist left political motions. During those years, the Minnur
Nurettin‟s son -an effective high art figure during the Kemalist period- Timur Selçuk also
contributed to this process with his own composed songs such as 1 Mayıs Payidar
(Forever 1 May) and Ekonomi Bilmecesi (The Enigma of Economy).519 Indeed, those years
perfectly validates the popular culture argument-which is the popular culture is both a ground
of “containment” and “resistance”-presented by the Stuart Hall. The anti imperialism
converged with the nationalist oscillations with the Cyprus intervention, there also appeared
elite city dweller compositions such as Bir Başkadır Benim Memleketim (My homeland tastes
different), sang by Ayten Alpman, former Jazz musician. The hopeless Arabesk of the late
1970s which is articulated with the hegemonic ideology in the mid 1980s could also be added
within the same basket. MüĢeref Akay‟s Türkiyem (My Turkey) song was forced to be
listened by the 12th September prisoners is another issue where the popular culture was used
as a legitimization tool by the hegemonic ideology. 520 In brief, the popular culture products
till the 1980s, display a picture of both resistance and approval towards the political
authority. There had been both dissident and embracing camps to the hegemonic ideology in
the popular culture since the late 1960s. Moreover, since the canto times of the early
republic, the “Allaturca” taste has leaked into the popular culture products in a vicious cycle.
Put another way, what was imported from the West acquired an “Eastern” face in compatible
with the market entertaining requirements.
According to Meral Özbek, the “hopeless” Arabesk of Küçük Emrah, Ferdi Tayfur
and Müslüm Gürses is also another musical ground where the Arabesk is “articulated” to the
hegemonic ideology. Unlike Gencebay Arabesk, in the fragmented Arabesk of 1980s, the
rational-practical easy choices are praised rather than the “emotional resistances” offered by
Gencebay. According to her, this unfolds how the notions, cores of the new hegemonic
ideology leaks into the masses. There appeared an Arabesk singer imagine shaking the
pagoda tree with a just an album, is a perfect reflection of the neo liberal opportunist market
principles.521 On the other hand, the left movement acquiring a militant, masculine passive

519
Akaya and Çelik, (2006),p.19.
520
During the Cyprus intervention times, there also had been an increase in the underground nationalist music, as
seen in the albums of Ali Avazın, Kafanıza Yıkarız Atinayı, (we could wreck the Athens), Ali TaĢkın‟s Kahpe
Yunanlı, (Fickle Greek). See, Aklan Mehmet, Bir Belge Olarak Plaklar, Plakların Sesiyle Yakın Tarihimiz,
inside 60‟lardan 70‟lere 45‟lik Şarkılar, p.71.
521
Özbek,(1991), p.129.
175
aggressive sense under the strict political motions of 12 March 1971 found a body in the
songs of Cem Karaca and in other similar Anatolian rock musicians‟ songs, where the whole
political system and the dominant authority were condemned under the arcane lyrics of the
songs, such as Ceviz ağacı (Walnut Tree).
The hardening economic conditions during the late 1970s committed with the global
economic stagnation and the military intervention in 1980s demolished all the musical
picture of those years. The economical demolition in music paved to the appearance of live
music entertainment which was performed at Taverna restaurants with one keyboard a singer
called pianist chanteur. Orhan Gencebay‟s Arabesk, accompanied with the heavy interior
migration waves during the 1970s from the southeast of Turkey, and was now fragmented
between those pianist chanteurs and in the hopeless songs of Ferdi Tayfur, Müslüm Gürses
and the Ġbrahim Tatlıses‟ Kurdobesk. These “fragmentation” motions intensified with the
arrival of Turgut Özal, with his converged neo conservative and liberalist socio political
approach committed with global neo liberal dynamics. The ANAP governance after the
1983s marked a new phase in the Arabesk debate with presence of music fond Turgut Özal as
the party leader. Depending upon the mass populist policies and addressing the votes from of
extreme rights, Islamists, center right and the social democrats, especially the Gecekondu
town centered votes of the urban cities, Turgut Özal also benefited from “populist” cultural
opportunities under the wrap of “making” peace with the Arabesk music and extinguishing
the antagonism towards it for constituting his mass neo conservative stance. The Gecekondu
dwellers and social democrats, mostly voted for the Republican at the 1976 and 1977
elections, were now the populist vote target for the new hegemonic ideology. Gradually, the
Arabesk music appeared on the state television channel TRT, popular musicians such as
Ġbrahim Tatlıses, Nükhet Duru displayed their performances under the TRT invented
category called “Turkish Light Music” (Türk Hafif Müziği). Showing himself on the screen
arm in arm with Arabesk musicians, singing the song named Samanyolu; Turgut Özal also
actively fulfilled the populist vacuums left by the military administrations, such as by
providing the return of exiled transsexual Turkish&Ottoman Arabesk singer, Bülent Ersoy.
The mighty power of “freedom” and “free choice” were also carried out in the popular music
by providing direct and indirect support. On the other hand, the party in charge, ANAP,
actively used the Arabesk songs during election propaganda seasons or in the political
narrations such as “the ones who do not love you die!” which is attributed to Özal during the
large party conferences both by his voters and party mates.
176
 Committed with a global sense where the “liberating” belief in Western style
modernism eroded, the Arabesk became more popular and fragmented. Besides, it acquired a
more sense of “containment” committed with hegemonic ideology‟s new market principles.
With the advancement in technological facilities and cheap costs at the record industry due to
disappearance of the trade barriers with the foreign market, a “homogenization” process had
appeared in Arabesk. The notion of “striking it rich”, identifying with opportunist Özal era
market principles oozed into the melodies and lyrics of the 1980s popular music. Unlike
Gencebay Arabesk between 1968-1978 where a significant degree of resistance towards the
“order” of the society and to the world was maintained, Meral Özbek argues that these new
Arabesk musicians were in the mood of “hoping the twinge” and their conception of “love”
relegated to an “utopia” that ever can be realized. In addition, committed to the technological
advancement in the recording facilities, there also appeared “specialization”, “division of
labor” on the music industry; the tenure of the “individualization” was eroded. Put another
way, Orhan Gencebay style of complete musicians disappeared who was his own producer,
composer, musician, poet and sound expert. Özbek offers a categorization of new future of
Arabesk musicians. Her categorization basically is: The folk Arabesk singers, the semi
original “father” figures such as Ferdi Tayfur, Müslüm Gürses, the folk Arabesk performers,
Ġbrahim Tatlıses, Küçük Emrah, Ceylan, taverna chanteurs, Cengiz Kurdoğlu, Nejat Alp,
Turkish&Ottoman music oriented ones, Bülent Ersoy, Zeki Müren, Metin Milli, Yıldırım
Gürses, revolutionary Arabesk under the flag of Ahmet Kaya and the pop oriented Arabesk
Sezen Aksu, Kayahan, Attila Özdemiroğlu, Özdemir Erdoğan.522
Meral Özbek‟s categorization and oversimplification of 1980s popular culture music
is done for solidifying Gencebay‟s “uniqueness” on this ground and is controversial within
itself. For instance, she is in capable of placing Ahmet Kaya‟s political Arabesk in the
panorama that also had been addressed to a “homogenized” audience mass similar to
Gencebay case in the 1970s. She resembles Kaya‟s music to the hegemonic ideology in
1980s which “utilized” Arabesk for obtaining the “mass support”. Her presented arguments
regarding Stuart Hall‟s popular culture theory‟s “inapplicability” to other cases is disputable.
Sezen Aksu phenomena supported by the Armenian composer Onno Tunç‟s musical
accumulation, erodes most of the parts of the arguments laid above. Meral Özbek
undervalues the prolonging dynamics, cycling factors and motions committed to the audience
preferences in the Turkish music history. By focusing on the economic determinant factors,

522
Özbek (1991), pp.119-136.
177
she misses the cultural discursive packs. As initiated by the first popular cycle during the
beginning of the 20th century when the Turkish cantos and tangos overcame the Occidental
canzone and operettas, the economic influential structures (of which are the determinants of
Gencebay music) were secondary in an agriculturally based small scaled trading empire.
Sadettin Kaynak free performing style also attracted masses to the Gazinos. The cycle of
Allaturca, or Arabesk now came over the “Western” oriented, Anatolian rock and arrangé
songs. Once again the mass social audience conscience, preferences, but accompanied with
the socio economic alternations of 1980s, favored the music genre that was to be removed by
the dominant ideology during 1930s, 1940s and 1960s.

Sezen Aksu and the mass approval

The eroding of the arrangé trend headed by Ajda Pekkan and the political Anatolian
rock encounters to the late 1970s, when Sezen Aksu appeared in the popular culture with her
own composed and written “love” songs during the socio political turmoil between left and
right poles in Turkey committed to the reflections of the flaming Cold War. However, the
marking success of Sezen came in 1982, when the song, regarding a story of city dweller of
woman, Firuze, became the best seller album of the military administration times. The song
composed by Atilla Özdemiroğlu, unlike being a sole utopian love themed one like the
arrangé songs of the 1970s, was among the very first examples of where the East and West
music synthesis converged with each other. In the following years, similar synthesis
productions were given by Sezen Aksu and Onno Tunç cooperation. The dream of a
polyphonic East and West synthesis, that was postponed by the label of İrtica by Atatürk, for
Armenian musician Sir Manas‟s polyphonic re-composition, was realized by another gifted
Armenian, Onno Tunç on the popular ground after sixty years. The maqam structures, which
were incompatible with the “twenty four interval” tonal system, became very compatible in
the popular songs such as Sen Ağlama, Geri Dön, Tükeneceğiz and others. Put another way,
in musical terminology, where the Arel-Ezgi studies were unsuccessful at reflecting the
Ottoman/Turkish music on the Western note system, such popular songs in 1980s
accomplished this “infeasible” task very successfully. In short, it meant realization of the
Kemalist dream of polyphonic synthesis between the Occident and Orient. Although, it was
the realization of a dream, the songs composed by Onno and Sezen musical cooperation were

178
“one by one” rejected for having “Arabesk” sense, by official state television TRT523 even
though, the ANAP government and the waves of neo liberal ideology had been augmenting
its presence on the cultural ground.
The works of arts presented by this musical cooperation were not the sole productions
of the “fragmented Arabesk popular culture of 1980s”. Names such as Nilüfer, Kayahan,
Nükhet Duru, Erol Evgin, were other rising icons of those times.524 However, there had been
a slight distinction between the “fragmented” Arabesk genres and Sezen Aksu‟s musical
style. The Arabesk in 1980s, were mostly about a hopeless search for easy passages within
the cleavages of the order and a “utopian” love, as Özbek states. The Arabesk was about the
things which cannot be lived and experienced, such as in the case of the utopian love. On
contrary, Sezen‟s lyrics were about the emotions which can be experienced or lived. Or at
least as she was feeling these passionate and the intense love for her “mass audiences” even
though some of them did not have chance to experience it.
Meral Özbek claims that the Orhan Gencebay case displays, focusing on the music
part, how his songs are more like an “ethos” that happened in a particular social motion and
had a “shaping” effect on the “human spirit and instincts” against the perspective of the
hegemonic ideology. On contrary, the 1980s Arabesk had easy sense of leaving everything
behind and portrays a “hopeless” human picture just looking for “salvaging the day”. 525 This
difference between the two different time scales, she claims makes the 1980s Arabesk
incompatible with popular culture framework. However, Sezen Aksu case during 1980s had
many parts which fall outside the scope this claim. Appearing as a woman figure, resisting to
“go” and “begging” for her love‟s return with an arcane and salient dominant appearance,
was inspiring for her other gender mates, who had been steeled by the family configuration
imposed by the Kemalist ideology in 1930s. Furthermore, she had been an encouraging hope
for the all despondent revolutionist generation of 1970s, that lost their belief in a “better
tomorrow” by the harbinger of the coup d‟état and hold the only thing left, the “love” to go
on living. Hence, her music genre is more than aesthetic song converged with a “utopian
love”. I claim it is the “ethos” of the 1980s socio political panorama, the reflection of a new
social motion where the collective excitements of 1970s were relegated to defensive
individual private emotion domains. Unlike other figures such as Kayahan, Ferdi Tayfur and

523
Can Dündar, Aynalar Documentary, SN Publishing and music official Internet site, 15 March 1997.
524
Bülent Aksoy, “Cumhuriyet Dönemi Musikisinde Farklılaşma Olgusu”, ,Paçacı,(Ed),(1998), p.34 and also
see Solmaz, (1996), p.36.
525
Özbek, (1991), p.127.
179
many others, mostly her songs have sense of “existing endeavors” as Özbek names for
Gencebay‟s case. But “the existing endeavors” in this case acquiring a more sense of
“individuality” was the true reflection of the social “motions” of 1980s, when the educated
city dwellers lost their belief in better tomorrows and the second and third born generations
of urban migrants ceased their struggles for living, “existing” in big cities. The only thing
merging these two separated social groupings and others was the “discovery” of love and self
awareness for holding onto the modern life struggle. In short, the struggle of existing in big
urban cities was replaced by the encounter against the competitive, merciless global neo
liberal motions. The only thing left for these new generations was the hope of love after the
military coup of 1980. Briefly, Sezen‟s music was an ethos, a reflection of the socio political
motions of 1980s of the individual souls.
Özbek‟s third argument is the “homogenized audience” of Arabesk between the years
1962-1978 and the originality, the uniqueness of Gencebay‟ music genre compared to other
figures during his time.526 She basically depends upon the classical Marxian assumption,
where the economic determinants (the base) have the sole influence on the “superstructure”
cultural values. The new appeared capitalist market order, principles, consumption habits
merging with the new life style attained in the urban cities, paved way to arise of a
“homogenized audience” by itself that unified in Gencebay music with“voluntarily” consent.
However, as David Rowe reminds us, “this theoretical position (the Marxian base-
superstructure metaphor) has paradoxical tendency to fetishize the economics”. The
allocation of popular culture from the “process of social and cultural reproduction that is
central to the activities of production, exchange, distribution, and consumption to the
determination of use and value, and to the institutional maintenance of the state and the
market” is a “mono casual” approach.527 Although, Sezen Aksu have never had a chance to
attain an “homogenized” audience with the same features and “qualities”528 during the late
1960s and 1970s, this is the overestimation of macro level consumption principles and
undervaluing a grand cultural panorama of the whole Turkish music storia, the “essentiality”
of prolonging cultural motions, and the common audience conscience that shapes the musical

526
Özbek, (1991), p.125.
527
Rowe, (1995), p.13.
528
The most noteworthy point in Özbek‟s argument is that her assumption in the Gencebay audiences and her
own determined qualities. According to her, the core reason in the formation of a homogenized Orhan Gencebay
audience is the “social consumption” habits and the cultural dimensions motioned committed with it. She
adduces that in 1980s, the social consumption paradigms acquiring a more “complex” panorama also effect the
“cultural dimension” and paved way to occurrence of a heterogeneous audience preferences. On contrary,
gradually music genres become more “standardized”
180
formations in a cyclic occurrence. Put another way, it is the overlook of the “cultural
production”.529 First, the appearance of “fragmented Arabesk” music genres in 1980s is very
much the continuation of the progress in the 1950s initiated by Sadettin Kaynak. This process
was interrupted by the 1960 coup d‟état, committed to the rise of the notion of the hegemonic
ideology in the music field, with a more individual and “liberal” declination, brought by the
new “liberal” constitution, reflected on the tunes and melodies of Anatolian Rock. Hence,
from a historical music sociology path, the rise of Arabesk music in 1980s, so does Sezen
Aksu music, encounters to the eroding times when culturally dominant ideology once again
lost its grips. Put another way, it is very much the rise of the audience conscience on the
music ground, reflected on the popular music market by the high selling rates. It was the
cycle of Allaturca just initiated by Sadettin Kaynak in 1950s. Hence, the marketization of the
Arabesk music was much more the reflection of a delimited imposed cycle not just cause of
the new socio economical era. For instance, although Sezen Aksu‟s albums were put
embargo by the only existing television channel, which was an influential source on the
album selling rates with its passive advertisement role during those years, all of them just
broke the records on the Turkish popular music history. Sen Ağlama album remained the top
selling album for fifty six weeks.530 In this sense, her case falls apart from the “mass culture”
notion to the “popular culture” where a degree of “resistance” is available under the arcane
layers against the dominant culture. Although, TRT under the Özal Era populist cultural
umbrella favored Yıldırım Gürses polyphonic Allaturca music against Onno Tunç
compositions, the results were much more satisfactory and successful on the latter side.531
The audience preferred listening to the polyphonic popular songs of Sezen-Onno cooperation
instead of the state supported one.
What makes distinctive Sezen Aksu music from other popular music figures and
genres during 1980s, was the reality of the selfness presented to the audience. Unlike her
music mates, mostly singing about unviable loves specially, an agitation utilized by the more
Arabesk wing such as Müslüm Gürses, Ġbrahim Tatlıses, Kayahan, at least she covered some
degree of “hope” for catching up with the speed of the new modern life and its afferents. In a
similar way in the case of Orhan Gencebay, the “love” is much more a real phenomenon,

529
Indeed, Meral Özbek do make allowances for the other “indirect” dynamics and factors in the rise of
Gencebay Arabesk such as the, the ban of the Allaturca music on Radio, the influx of the Egyptian film industry
and music into the Turkish market, the transpire of Sadettin Kaynak‟s free style. Yet, she is not inclined to
expand the scope of these factors to ground of Arabesk music in 1980s.
530
BektaĢ Türk, Hey Derigisi, “Duygularım Yorulunca Kötü Oluyorum”, 4 September 1986.
531
Solmaz, (1996), p.36.
181
producing a level of hope, rather than an unrealized utopian love. In other sense, her lyrics
were more practical and “real” for people coming periphery and center. For instance, despite
her colleague Ajda Pekkan, as a strong woman figure who is capable of banishing her man
with a strict directive-as her lyrics unfolds written on an arrangé named Bambaşka Biri-
Sezen charts a more real woman portray crying and begging for her love‟s return. Put another
way, the possibility of realization of this love was much more in the eyes of the public
compared to other Arabesk utopian loves. From the opposite perspective, she was also the
loyal passionate woman figure that every Turkish man desired. A desire of which possibility
is less painful compared to the other Arabesk cases, where the woman figure generally
breaks up with a sudden and enigmatic decision. In short, although she did not addressed to a
economically and socially homogenized audience, her figure‟s realization in front of the
public eyes paved way to the leaking for a grand ground reaching from the second-third
generation urban migrants, still having the cultural remnants of the periphery, to the new
externalized grand middle class of the urban dwellers. The merging ground of these two
domains was the realization of a real love that Sezen Aksu had depicted to them.
The leak of her musical genre from center to periphery is another distinctive feature
which put her along side with other “homogenized” Arabesk singers. Although cases such as
Ġbrahim Tatlıses coming from a small city of south east Anatolia, his image and story of a
construction builder famed with a song at one night, put him to the place of utopia in the eyes
of periphery audiences that can be hardly realized. Indeed, he acquired a very city dweller
style with the popular songs that he sang in the following years. On contrary, Sezen Aksu
being a city dweller singer was following the opposite path. As the Ünzile song unfolds, a
song about the peasant woman coming from the periphery that is forced to marry and breed
child before being adolescent, is an indication of marginalization of Sezen‟s musical genre.
These kinds of pastoral themed productions placed her on another ground compared to the
others. In the following year, in 1991 when The Gülümse (Smile) song and album was
realized, a song composed on the lyrics of sentenced Kurdish poet Kemal Burkay just sold
500.000 within just an hour.532 The album under the flag of the minority marks also included
a Greek converted song of Haris Aleksiu, a former Anatolian Greek whose family was exiled
from Ġzmir and Milas during population exchanges in 1920s and 1940s.533 In short, Sezen
Aksu, succeeding with an album covered with themes and tunes resisting against the cores of

532
Hürriyet, 01.06.1991,
533
Hürriyet, Ertuğrul Özkök “Haris Aleksiu ile Kulis Sohbeti”, 20 February 2005.
182
the Turkish nationalism, is totally different compared to the other Arabesk genres in 1980s. A
composition by Onno Tunç with a religious structure İlahi based on the lyrics Nazım Hikmet
(communist poet imprisoned during the early republican era); in the song called Tenna is the
peak point where the popular culture‟s “resistance” against the advocating notions of the
hegemonic ideology was challenged.

Sezen Aksu, performing at Kurdish populated city Diyarbakır in 2002

(The photograph is taken from SN publishing archives.)

183
 As the time progress, Zeki CoĢkun reminds us that, Sezen Aksu became the singer of
the “minority center”. The constitution of the country liberalism initiated by the Özal era just
accelerated the notion of an upheaval against the swallow-tailed coat icon of the Kemalist
ideology within the new center, whose elites have been traumatized since late 19th century.
Those new center acquired a spirit, a soul of search for essential core and origins. Işık
Doğudan Yükselier, (Orient Ex Lux), in 1995 is a perfect reflection of this process, in which
Ġsmail Daimi‟s poetic Ozan structured song of 1960s and a song called Allaturca with
heavily maqam structures were included. Zeki CoĢkun argues this is the process of the
marginalization and search for nostalgia of cores by both musician and audience masses.
Sezen Aksu being a city dweller singer, became a singer satisfying the modernism
“anxieties” of both herself and the new urban dwellers who were embarked for a search of
nostalgic cores for the sake of “being different” and discovering the wrapped, secret origins
which had became unforeseen by the modernism project laid since 1930s and the dynamics.
Sezen Aksu was not only one searching for essentiality for a path of nostalgia. Sertap Erener
singing religious maqam structured song named Makber of 1876 in pop rock style and NeĢet
ErtaĢ a folk singer living in Germany, whose albums of 1960s were enthusiastically followed
by the urban dwellers during the mid 1990s are other cases.534 These are the cases in which
the urban dwellers in the center, including the audience masses and individual performers
“marginalized” their musical preferences by merging the “wastes of modernity” that were
thrown away by the modernist fetish of the official ideology in a prolonged time.
Sezen Aksu has appeared as a mass approved and mass respected iconic pop star by
the late 1990s. Although this argumentation requires a detailed field research, her respected
self imagine that is approved by the all sub cultural groupings such as Kurds, Islamic groups
and non Moslem minorities is undeniable. In the concert series named as “The songs of
Turkey” (Türkiye ġarkıları) which was initiated on 30 August 2002, where she had a
repertoire ranging from religious Islamic İlahi songs to Armenian and Greek church songs
and minority Kurdish folk tunes, attracted many audiences from the diversified layers of the
society, including young girls with headscarf, young Kurdish and non-Moslem minorities.
Having a common approved and respected imagine from all sections of society, it puts her in
a unique position to be studied with a sociological perspective in popular culture research
area.

534
Zeki CoĢkun, Azınlık Sesleri, Paçacı,(Ed),(1998), pp.142-145.
184
 However, stated by Stuart Hall, popular culture in Turkey had also become an arena
of “acceptance” of Kemalist modernism project. Hitherto, I charted the maps of the cases of
musicians on popular ground with a charcoal of the audience mass following them, which are
generally are on the ground of “resisting” against the hegemonic ideology. Even though, the
Anatolian rock was nourished from the Kemalist discourses regarding polyphony, they fall
onto the ground close to “resistance”, where the “body of youths” is not subordinated to the
“homogenizing” dynamism of modernism cylinder.535 However, popular culture is eclectic
and is a “flux” system of motion. It is an “ensemble of pleasurable forms, meanings and
practices, whose constituents are neither static and nor unambiguous”.536 As Özbek denotes,
the fragmented Arabesk genres appeared during the late 1980s and the utilization of Arabesk
by the new cultural ideology is the initiation of the process where the popular culture have
slid to the domain of acceptance. Indeed, Sezen Aksu‟s very famous “pop”537 song called
Hadi Bakalım (Come on let‟s see), were utilized as the propaganda track by ANAP in 1995
country wide elections, is an indication of inclining from more conservatist pole of Arabesk
mass to a more “liberating” notion of new competitive market principles. Ironically, the song
was composed for ridiculing this new neo liberal “competitive” notion.538 Yet, consciously or
unconsciously the new ANAP administration under Mesut Yılmaz leadership, did utilized it
which ridiculed their basic political principles. The neo liberal oscillations of the mid 1980s
and the new socio political waves in 1990s did not just push the popular culture into to the
closer domains of resistance against the Kemalist ideology or to the “flux” grounds of new
market principles. The reinvention of Kemalist ideology within the popular culture musical
circles during 1990s is another path opened by “flux” motions by the popular culture. Many
singers “reinvented” Kemalist traditions, notions in music with an iconographic sense, which
is the indication of the resurrection of cultural sprit of the 1930s-1940s modernism and
exclusionary face of Turkish nationalism committed with the socio political upheavals of the
late 1990s and early 2000s. Yet, these “defenders” of Kemalist nationalism in the music
ironically were mostly the ones who would be possibly labeled as “melancholic”, “Allaturca”
, “cheap quality” by the elites of the ideology that they defend.

535
David Rowe compares two cases, the sport and the rock music in his study, claiming that sport as a popular
culture much more serves for the machine of modernism, presentment of “healthy bodies” for the service of
modernism. On contrary, the global rock music (including pop music), presents an opposite view of this notion.
See, Rowe, (1995), pp.8-10
536
Rowe (1995), p.7
537
I use the term pop here as easy quick consumable entertaining songs.
538
Dündar,(1997).
185
 Kemalist Nostalgia in Music and Reinvention of ethno nationalist tunes
Esra Özyürek points out to the alternation of Kemalist ideology and the notion of its
modernism project after the 1990s, basically charting its path in which it was relegated from
the state fended domain to the individual privacy with iconic materials and nostalgic personal
narrations. As per her theoretical fabrics, the Kemalist modernism project became an
“unrealized utopia” in the hearts of the people committed to international conjectural changes
and its reflections on domestic politics and social structures. The inflame of the Kurdish
ethnic nationalism after 1990s, the sharpening of political Islam by the mid 1995s, and the
dictations of IMF, United States-as appearing sole power on the international arena- and the
European Community‟s directions, regarding the human rights, political standards and
economic obligations to be performed; all augmented the variety of the threatening arrows to
the secular and nationalist principles of Kemalism. Besides, there had been already an
ongoing process in the market since 1980s where the Kemalist middle income functionary
strata was relegated to a lower economic statues by the slide of state underpin to the import
oriented trading bourgeoisie classes. The metamorphosis form state oriented modernization
to market oriented modernization weakened the state bents where the Kemalists had been
abiding against the eroding influences. Moreover, the Kemalist monopoly over the
bureaucracy and their respectful statues on these grounds were all mislaid. In the flu
formation of the public and private domain as legacy from the nation building years, the
former hegemonic ideology was relegated to the individual confidential privacy where it was
accepted as a weak ideology to be “protected” and “cared”. The nation building years of the
1930s when the whole nation with a “corporatist” fashion gathering around Atatürk for a
modernization battle appeared as stainless, pure “nostalgic utopia” that is ever going to be
realized. These nostalgic Kemalist compatriots539 embraced iconic small representations of
the ideology such as small Atatürk statues on tables, nostalgic portrays on the walls, tie pins
and decorative flags inside houses with a spiritual ritual sense and ambiance.540
The coming into existence of the 1930s culturally dominant state oriented ideology on
the individual domain is indeed very relevant to the concept of invented traditions of

539
Esra Özyürek, plied field research among the Kemalist compatriots, especially in the private domains of old
aged school teachers who present themselves as the children of Atatürk. Hiding the aim of the research, she
charted the iconographic reflections of the 1930s and 1940s inside the privacy domain of the ordinary citizens.
540
Esra Özyürek , Nostalgia For Modern: State Secularism and Everyday Politics in Turkey,Duke University
Press, 2006 pp.9-11, in Turkish Modernlik Nostajisi, Kemalizm, Laiklik ve Gündelik Hayatta Siyaset, Istanbul:
Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Yayınevi, 2008.
186
Hobsbawn. Commemorating the former hegemonic ideology in ritual and celebrating sense
displays how the ideology “reinvents” its discursive power even though it seems it is on the
edge of vanishing. “Invented traditions” says Hobsbawn are responses to novel situations
which take of reference to old situations or which establish their own by quasi obligatory
repletion”.541 He says that “invented traditions is essentially a process of formalization and
ritualization, characterized by reference to past, if only by imposing repetition” However, the
invented traditions had much more a symbolic sense rather than useful means as he illustrates
where a steel soldier helmet is being wore by the fox hunters 542 The symbolic ritualization of
Kemalist ideology and its survival with a nostalgic icons is called as neo Kemalism around
some circles.543 All the process cited by Özyürek was also observable in popular music
during 1990s. Afterwards of the 1980s when ascending of Arabesk music and popular culture
annihilated all bracings of Kemalism, the ideology resurrected its discourses on the same
ground in the defending stances and narrations of both high elite and popular culture
musicians.
Nostalgia for the “purity”, “uniqueness” for Kemalist nationalism and its “temperate”
Westernization modernism encounters to the mid 1990s when the pious Welfare Party (Refah
Partisi) marked its success in the regional elections of 1994 and 1995 country wide general
elections. The fear of the fundamentalist Islamic threat converged with ethnic separatist
Kurdish nationalism paved way to underpinning for the Kemalist principles and notions
among the Kemalist compatriots. Meanwhile, mostly composed of the high and low middle
income middle classes and the Kemalist youths had been in touch with easy and fast
consuming “pop” music in the 1990s. The yearning for the “virtuous” years of the one party
1930s regime, where all the nation were assumed as gathered around the their “father”
Atatürk in the common social memory, was postulated to be aroused by the Kemalist
bureaucracy and compatriots in the 75th year foundation celebrations of the republic. The
official stadium felicitations were supported by the mass public marches, ending on a grand
concert space, where a young pop start bided for the Kemalist youths and elders for
performing on stage.544 During the 75th celebration year in an iconic manner, with the 10th

541
Hobsbawn,(1983),p.2.
542
Ibid, p.4.
543
Özyürek, (2008), p.32.
544
Bağdat Street, a residential area of high income “pertinacious” Kemalist compatriots, have been iconic place
of Republic marches on the celebration days since 1996.There had awaiting many variety of pop singers at the
end of the concerts, such as Levent Yüksel, Murat Kekilli, Sertap Erener, Yeni Türkü, the ones which are
attended by myself.
187
year march by pop music singer Kenal Doğulu‟s rearrangement, a new chain of shackles was
set with the “modern” and untouched years of 1930s. Although there appeared a new one
after a composing competition for the 75th year, Kenan Doğulu‟s rearrangement march was
approved by masses with a video clip where he showed up himself as a symphony chief in
front of a Western orchestra. This rearrangement had been sang by all mouths and leaked into
the disco bars with its rhythmic arrangement where it was put on play list in an extremely
loud volume against rising “call for prays of mosques”. Zülfü Livaneli as being both active
politician and musician suggests that any other new composed March would not replaced by
the 10th Year. He cites even Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Îtri, Dede Efendi, the best musicians
of West and East would resurrect, would not be able to compose a new march in the same
sense. The reason for him is that the republic was “purified”, “believing” and “heroic” in the
1930s.545 According to Hikmet ġimĢek, an officer musician at the symphony, 10th March is
representation political protest against degenerated Republic opposites and the state officers
and singing the march altogether was a indication of “following the road of Atatürk and his
inkılâp(s)”546
The 10th Year march was not only iconic popular culture song against the
fundamentalist religious and ethnic separatist Kurdish nationalism. When Ahmet Kaya, as a
protest Arabesk singer, was awarded by the Magazine Press Institution in February 1999, he
declared that he desired to sing in Kurdish and looks for “brave” television channels which
would broadcast his video clip. The men wearing in swallow coat and tuxedo and ladies with
ball dresses initiated coming for him and throwing forks and knifes to Kaya. After this event,
Serdar Ortaç, another youth “pop” music icon, in his speech underlined that there was no
Kurds in Turkey and all of us were Turks. Furthermore he added “no one is sultan here, we
are all children of Atatürk” and began singing 10th March with all hall. The anchorman, Reha
Muhtar also accompanied to him afterwards with the coup song Memleketim that became
famous after Cyprus intervention in 1979.547
There had been other cases where the ethnic distinctiveness of Turkishness was
imposed upon the society through popular culture in the mid 1990s. Ercan Saatçi, always
presenting him as a loyal nationalist Turkish singer, is another sharpening figure to be paid
attention. His own composed song called Biz Hep Beraberiz (Always together) included
heavy ethno racist lyrics and references to the 1930s Kemalist nationalism when the chart of

545
Sabah, 30 September 1998, cited in Özyürek,(2008), p.222.
546
Ibid, p.223.
547
Ibid, 224.
188
the national identity had been constituted. Singing with other singers such as Burak Kut,
Hakan Peker, Seden Gürel, Ġzel, Kenan Doğulu, the Atatürk‟s verdicts about the Turkish
character, that are “assiduity” honesty” were once more underlined with a militant and
masculine singing style ironically in the accompany of frisky rhythms.
Ercan Saatçi was not the only who was in nationalist syndrome during the mid 1990s.
Zeynep having fame with her song called Memedim (the general name given for Turkish
soldiers), Çelik with her song Yüce Atatürk (Sublime Atatürk) in 1996, showing himself with
symphonic orchestrate at Anıtkabir (Atatürk‟s mausoleum) with a video clip recorded for
“Ata”, Mustafa Sandal in every opportunity making his audiences to say “The one who is
Turk is happy”, the rap group Kartel, whose lyrics include messages such as “We are not
Jews, we are Turks”, “Turks, Kurds are brothers, the ones who tries to distinct is traitor” are
other ethno racists popular culture examples.548 With the increasing of individuality by
features of neo liberal motions, the salvation of Kemalist was now relegated to the private
individual musicians, who also benefited from the fruits of the capitalist marketing industry
by their nationalist oscillations. These pop singers appeared as the self guardians of the
Kemalist ideology such as Kayahan, gifting Turkish flags to the spectators in his concerts
and putting iconic representations on his dresses, whose music and performing style would
probably be cursed because of being “Allaturca” and “reactionary” in 1930s, 1940s. The case
was not much differentiated in the state subsidized high culture arts. Fazıl Say, the Western
classical musician, who stands for that the music as a “breeding” apparatus for improving the
cultural basements of the public (avam), has been a passionate Orientalist republican
defender, who reminds that -as being a music authority- the oriental instrument Ney is
compatible with “superior” Western piano.549 He is also very well inclined to participate in
political debates with his opinions about current socio cultural problems regarding the
modernism in Turkey, similar to his colleague Adnan Saygun who had been an organic
intellectual of Kemalism in 1930s and 1940s.
In brief, the popular culture cases perfectly unfolds the reinvention of the official
ideology‟s discourses in different time scales and how perfectly proves how the “sovereign”
discursive formations are independent from any ruling class control, that would be expressed
in Foucauldian terminology. The popular culture was not the only area where the shadows of
a broken modernism project could be followed.

548
Solmaz, (1996), pp.61-63.
549
Hürriyet, “Fazıl Say‟dan Deniz Baykal‟a Mektup”, 01 April 2009.
189
The shadows of the past over the present
A comprehensive, amplified field research regarding the legacy of the 1930s and
1940s on the music culture of recent days, would take a prolonged time with a scrutiny work
of shop. Whereas, this fact was putting out my intention for a field research, I got glimpse of
a small private music institution and decided to enter without any determined particular
methodology and aim with on the spur of the moment. When I entered the classroom, I
received a very warm welcome by the staff, including a young lady with a bağlama
instrument on her knees. Disguising my basic intention, I denoted that I intended to attend
private solfegé and vocal lessons. The young lady with her bağlama, questioned whether I
was preparing for the conservatory examination or not, with a certain voice that implicitly I
should be, free from doubt. However, when I replied I was intended to attend these class for
the sake of improving my note writing skills and for singing in a proper way, they seemed to
surprise. The lady asked whether I were in hand for a music competition. I politely replied
that I was on the aim of attending courses for my own self development. With a persuaded
impression on her face, she questioned which kind of music genre I enjoyed singing. A reply
to improve my vocal technique in Türk Musikisi (the modern naming of the
Ottoman&Turkish music), genre songs, caused the people to look one at another by inside
room. After a silence, I elaborated that I enjoy “Allaturca” music and provided some song
names. This “bizarre” intention and the music genre that I enjoyed put smiles on the faces.
The young lady politely interrupted by saying that there is only one teacher who lectures
“Western” vocal lessons and techniques supported by solfegé courses. Moreover, she added
she can help me out singing Turkish folk songs and in forming a folk music repertoire.
Inferentially, she advised me to attend to a Türk Musikisi Cemiyeti (Turkish Music
Community), pointing out I can hardly found a Turkish&Ottoman music lecturer in private
courses. Indeed when I found a briefing space to check environment, a sole ud instrument
was glimpsed by my eyes, where it was abandoned on a dusty shelf. On contrary, a dozen of
bağlama were hanged on the wall in a well ordered cleaned way, as though for making a
prideful stance. However, with an undeniable certainty, the young lady expressed the
importance of using Western Vocal technique even in singing Allaturca songs and suggested
that first I should the Western vocal course she advised. Committed with the friendly

190
welcome I received, I created an impression that I was convinced about the necessity of
studying Western vocal technique and agreed to have my first lesson.550
The following week when I made an early arrival to the course before meeting my
lecturer, I found chance and time to chat with the young lady, named Sinem Öztürk 551. After
a chat about our personal backgrounds, her young aged students around their eights and
elevens starting coming to the course with their bağlama instruments, with an apparent
enthusiasm on their faces. The things that attracted my attention were the method repertoire
books under their arms with written grand letters, “Muzzafer Sarısözen Folk Music TRT
archives”. In fact in the following days, I discovered out Sarısözen‟s grand portray on the
wall placed next to the Atatürk, leaving an impression that he is the “father” of Turkish
music. In the following weeks, I had spectated that, those little children were learning the
folk songs which were archived by Sarısözen in the 1940s, with the lyrics beyond their
emotional and spiritual domains. The parents usually had accompanied to their children in
the mornings with a “prideful” stance that their children were on the right “track”. I found a
chance to have little conversations with some of them and asked why they preferred their
children to study the Turkish folk music but not others. With unanimity, most of them
claimed that the folk music is a “value”, “an old essential Turkish tradition” to be protected.
Their narrations presented that their children were on an obligated “task” and “duty” rather
than a notion which takes music as way of entertaining or embellishing the life. One of them
suggested that learning to play bağlama is an efficacious skill, through which his son would
be able to become a famous folk Arabesk singer in the following years, may be able to earn
money easy552, or maybe became as legend as Orhan Gencebay who were identified with her
electro bağlama, or at least become a lecturer at private course. In other words, the music
was also equalized with a matter of earning money in a competitive “relentless” capitalist
market.
On the narrations of the parents of the bağlama students, the Turkish folk music was
still appeared as a music genre to be “protected” and “rescued” as it had been in 1930s, but
with a slight difference, the individuals codified themselves as the “guardian” instead of the

550
The first lesson that I attened in the course was on 15 February 2009.
551
Sinem, a middle aged young lady, was a daughter of a second born generation of a migrant family form a
central Eastern Anatolian city. She was a talented bağlama instrumentalist with beautiful voice unfortunately
were unsuccessful in passing the conservatory examination. Yet, she improved her musical skills by attending
private folk music lessons and received a lecturer after a while. She also have performed in the orchestrates of
various famous folk Arabesk singers.
552
This fact, narration unfolds how the shaking the pagoda tree notion still survives in the 2000s and inspires
many other urban citizens who are in low sprits because of their socio economic status.
191
state. Roughly seventy years in the Turkish music history did not rescue the folk genre and
hand its “deserved”, “respected” place among other music genres. The private ordinary
citizens now embarked themselves with a “rescue mission” and incited their children to learn
the folk songs compiled by Muzzafer Sarısözen done with “inefficient”, “unsatisfactory”
techniques that puts the whole archive on position absent from representing the “sounds of all
Anatolia.” The legacy of the past that I observed through my research archive was evident in
remnants in this small music course. As the time progressed, I found myself in more in the
inner circles of the facts that I pointed out in my thesis.
After I met my lecturer Utku Çelik, who has been jazz pianist, graduated from
conservatory, performing under the pop jazz orchestrate of his famous brother Erdal Çelik, I
initiated my solfegé and vocal technique lessons with him. Although I underlined that my
basic aim was to learn to read and to write the note methods, the intense of solfegé in our
lessons decreased as the weeks progressed when I start singing in accompany of piano. The
very first song that I practiced after the initial lessons was called Çoban (Shepherd), a folk
song played in a polyphonic style in the piano, composed by Saip Egüz, a professor and an
“Occidentalist” musician who was educated in Germany in the fields of chorus and
symphonic orchestrates during the late 1930s and became instructor at various education
institutions in the 1940s.553 The song with heavy pastoral emotional lyrics telling about the
“loneliness” of a shepherd had a sharp Western melody, which made hard to pronounce the
lyrics. Each time I was warned by my instructor about the “prosody” problems and asked to
sing in a more “opera” style if possible. I also learned that the song was also among the basic
introductory songs to be learned at the vocal departments in conservatories and was usually
asked to be performed at conservatory acceptance examinations.
In the latter weeks, there had been other similar kinds of the polyphonic folk songs
that we trained during the vocal exercises. At various times during the exercises I was
warned to sing with an “opera sprit” for the sake of having an appropriate “prosody”.
Another point to be underlined was related with the solfegé part of the lessons. Even though I
had written musical notes in front of our eyes to be followed, we did not pay that much
attention to them and work out on the chart directed by them. The lessons had two separated
distinct hours. In the initial hours, we were making solfegé practices in the company of the
board on the wall and I was introduced the rhythmic structures and note signs through

553
Througout most of the lessons, I was inclined to interrupt and ask questions about the historical backgrounds
of the songs that I was trained. Utku Çelik patiently provided historical identities of the musicians and the songs
that we covered.
192
various short melodies. However, in the second part of class, in the vocal training part, the
written notes of the songs were paid less attention. The second hour of the class had much
more sense of a Meşk style where my lecturer advised me to follow the songs by making
rhythmic strokes on my knees, like the style done in the Mevlevihanes. Instead of a
methodological learning of the songs through written note papers, it was much more like
memorizing the songs in master-apprentice relationship, similar to the case cited by Cem
Behar. This fact became apparent as the lessons progressed in which we started covering
more “popular culture” songs. In a controversial way, I was trying to apply the vocal
techniques that I learned in the initial lessons on these popular songs, yet I was told it was not
“necessary” to use these Western techniques on these songs. I had kept up with the classes
nearly for five months. The more intimate relations that I established with staff the more I
found myself in the controversial environment of the East and West conflict. For instance,
my instructors were very scornful about my enthusiasm in Ottoman-Turkish music and
denoted that they cannot find any reason for such a “modern” boy to be enthusiastic in such
an old style music that is out vogue. The time in that I had in the private courses enable to see
the Occidentalist Fantasy from the eyes of the active musicians in these fields and was very
beneficial in many parts for my study.
Esra Özyürek reminds us that that the tripled categorization, market-civil society-state
division is problematic, so does the private public domains of duality in the Turkish case.554
She suggests that as a socio political legacy from the Ottoman Empire, Benthamian
panopticon way of Governmentality, leaked into Atatürk‟s spiritual iconic representations is
the main reason for this controversial air of social environment. According to her, the mortal
watchdog vision of Sultan, being inherited “quietly” to successors, became as an “eternal”
political power with Atatürk‟s death.555 Following neo liberal alternations after 1980s, when
the symbolic Atatürk representations diffused from the school and state institutions inside the
private domains of the houses, the process warped and fragmented the already problematic
private and state divisions of domain. She underpins her argument with cited experiences
from her field researches. For instance, she observed that the old aged school teachers,
usually granted her for the interviews, in the sitting seating rooms where the iconic
representations of Atatürk were displayed, as the nostalgic photos of the republican era were
placed next the family photos. The interviewed subjects, especially women, were dressed in a

554
Özyürek,(2007) pp.15,16.
555
Ibid,p.156.
193
proper, casual two pieced ensembles. Mostly, they acted with the impression that they were
in an official domain of a state institution rather than being in their “private” houses.
According to Özyürek, the “formality” of the public domain was replaced by the “freedom”
of the individual domain because of the feeling that Atatürk as a witness always has an eye
over his “children”.556
The case presented by Özyürek is also applicable to the cultural music heritage in
Turkey. For instance, the children at the private course of which I attended, were all dressed
in a proper style, sometimes in an exaggerated way, as an eight year old boy once wore a
jacket and necktie on his little body. Indeed, as denoted by their parents, they were attending
for particular significant “duty” to rescue the folk music as if a matter of national interest.
The children were practicing with the grand bağlamas in a disciplined way and trying to sing
the songs with serious and emotional way.
Another example where the state formality pushes entertaining individuality of music
aside is the state television TRT concerts. The concerts at TRT both before the 1990s and
subsequent years had dual sense, where Turkish folk and Turkish&Ottoman music genres
were separated. It is a noteworthy point that usually the latter ones were performed by the big
chorus in a Westernized manner, in the grand music halls with the attendance of a mass
crowed unlike the former where folk musicians perform with sole style in a silenced way in
the absence of spectators. All of the spectators attending to the concert are dressed in a
proper casual style and are expected to entertain and applaud in a moderate fashion where the
“excessiveness” may not be considered as a proper act, in a state institution, where the legacy
of Atatürk is needed to be respected. The, spectators accompany to the songs with a
“convenient” style usually display the portray of “bored” working officials with their casual
dresses. However, there had been a cleavage on the TRT ground since the mid 1980s when
the Arabesk and neo liberal eclecticism were realized.557 Arabesk singers such as Ġbrahim
Tatlıses turned up with casual jacket and neck tie with his Arabic folk oriented songs,
Kurdobesk, at the same time, always giving way to a “classical work of art” for solidifying
the respect to the state institution. Today, still the remnants of these traditions are visible on
the TRT screens.

556
For detailed elaboration of the field research observation see Ibid, pp.47-96.
557
Özbek, (1991),pp.135-136.
194
 The gloomy and “formality” of TRT was eventually eroded after the 1991 with
appearing profit oriented private TV channels.558 Although, the role of the panopticon
hegemonic ideology nullified, it “reinvented” itself in a new cortex, where the market
oriented music producers who keeps up with the profit maximization notion and the
“professional” musicians were on the hunt for “talented”, “trained” singers. Concisely, the
decisive, elective and selective of the state authority were now owned by the private
individuals in the music industry. The mighty decisive voice determining the ones who are
“capable of performing music” was now transferred from the cultural ideological state
apparatus to the individual authorities. The music industry owners seek “educated” and
“talented” singers who are capable of attracting masses after them. Among the easiest way to
take the attention of masses, nationalist agitations are praised even by the ones who performs
protest music against the order of the society, such as in the case of Kartel rap group,
constituted by the members coming originally from German migrant families. Mostly,
singers appear as the passionate defenders of the republican principles at one night, even in
unrelated situations, these comments come out of them as an instinct, to address and to take
the respect of the grand mass who has a pre approval towards Atatürk‟ “authority”. In sum,
the “children of Atatürk” are also presentable on the popular culture cases in music, and the
traditions created in the 1930s and 1940s are still a legacy in our social memories. Today,
still music is a still a matter of fact beyond the principles of pure art.
In brief, the way how the Turks entertain themselves was imposed from the outer
sources of power, as happened in 1930s, 1940s where the culturally dominant culture had
been prominently in effective shaping the entertaining spaces, traditions. Since the late
1940s, the radio with its staff embarked with this mission and had been effective source of
cultural power, in determining the ways of “entertaining”. Indeed, the music had always been
approved as a matter of “breeding”, “domestication” apparatus and a leverage that could lift
up the lower classes to a domain where they can merge with the high elites on their dominant
spheres. Consequently, the borders of entertaining and racy had to be charted by the
hegemonic ideology. Throughout this part of the Turkish national ideology‟s configuration,
in Foucauldian manner, the entertaining zones were relegated from semi socio political
communities of Yaren Rooms, Kahvehanes and Sıra Geceleri to the neutral domains such as
the vessel transportation lines at Istanbul where symphonic music were broadcasted and Ball

558
Solmaz, (1996), pp.66-67.
195
nights at Ankara.559 Within the context of modernizing nation-state, music and dance, in
other words entertainment or “sources of pleasures” are “convenient” and “morally”
appropriate ways of asserting defiant difference.560 Yaren Rooms, having a socio political
structure where the intellectual eligible males from every strata of the society, contributing to
the communal Fasıl singing and offer enlightening ideas regarding the political cultural
561
problems, Köy Odaları (Village rooms)562 at the periphery zones, Sırageceleri of Urfa563
(The traditional of South East Anatolian meal, drinking and singing nights) Kahvehanes564
especially at Istanbul, Meyhanes managed by the non Moslem minorities, were all other
similar social institutions and groupings founded naturally in which everyone could listen,
learn and practice music in an immaterial and free sense. These social groupings, where the
individuals merge with others, eat, drink alcohol, sing and dance, were also the domains of
the exchange of ideas regarding the current prominent problems which were done under the
political debating forums. However, all these entertaining traditions and spaces were
dissolved during the 1930s when the Kemalism diffused itself into the veins of the society,
by the pressuring “religious” sanctions.565 The organic elites and bureaucratic circles,
running over all the cultural institutions and social groupings for preventing every possible
source of defiance, with the cylinder of modernism, also annihilated all those socio political
music groupings and entertaining zones. The music as the probable source of defiance
converged with a vivid political environment at those social institutions was all cracked
down by the Kemalist nationalist project. In a prolonging time after, there appeared a
moderate, demure spectator profile who attends to the concerts under the panopticon
reaching possibility of the state and on the stage there appeared a prototype of carefully
selected musicians who were capable of Occidental solfegé lessons who were embarked to
“lift” the ordinary people to the place of high culture. Throughout the 1950 and 1960s, when
the high art music did not take the attention of the public, the Gazino music halls occurred as
the tutelages as if they had a pedagogic role both on spectators and the performs. Even today,

559
Tekelioğlu, (1998), p.147.
560
Stokes, (1994), p.12.
561
Nebi Özdemir denotes, Yaren Parliaments were opened up for every male from every part of the society,
from shepherds to doctors, who could make “valuable” contribution to the community by the musical skills or
intellectual personal accumulations., see. Nebi Özdemir, Cumhuriyet Dönemi Türk Eğlence Kültürü, Ankara:
Akçağ Yayınları, 2005, pp.143-144.
562
Ibid, p.101.
563
Ibid, p.252.
564
Ibid, p.104.
565
Nebi Ödemir, probably points out the ban of alcohol during the republican era here. For a detailed chart of his
argumentations , see p.109
196
in the discourses of the recent singers who had previously performed on the Gazino stages,
upbear the “high quality”, “educated” spectators and “respectful”, “high art” performances of
the singers. This cultural legacy of “moderation” survived in TRT years till the mid 1980s.
The only way to become a “respected”, “qualified” musician and performer were equalized
with having a conservatory education at the state universities, (in the absence of
Ottoman&Turkish music departments till 1975). These “high art” musicians had performed
to the high elite spectators who are equipped with the customs inherited from 1940s and
1950s, which are accompanying to the concerts in a devout and sober style for showing the
respect to the state authority that gifted music and the customs to listen to it. The neo liberal
capitalist market oscillations handed the control from the political circles to the owners of the
music industry yet this did not opened the “freeing” paths as it had been in the late Ottoman
era.
In short, both the high art music and popular “high art” music were never opened up
to a space within the scope of the public reach both by the spectators and performs. Even
today, except free public concerts organized by local municipalities or the state institutions,
the music lovers with a low income socio economic status, are not capable of witnessing the
live concerts of the musicians that they adore. On the other hand, the popular culture music at
the musician and performer level was also affected from these dynamisms. Most of the
popular singers, being far from sphere of influence of the public that they addressed, mainly
have “copied” the world market music and have given easy consumable songs which only
targets profit at the music market, that do not make any contribution in the creation of an
original Turkish genre, such as Flamenco of Spain, a music genre that is constituted by its
own socio political motions.566 The marketing dynamisms have not brought up the quality
and freedom on the journey of the Turkish popular music yet. Moreover, the high art music
has already in a miserable condition since the foundation of the republic. The white Western
music has never taken the attention of the public as the Kemalist policies targeted during
1930s and 1940s. There never attained a constant, assiduous audience masses attending to
Western classical concerts with a great enthusiasm even if these were performed by Turkish
artisans. Today, Güher-Süher Pekinel sisters‟ classical flute concert‟s successes across the
world are not concerned as much as popular figure Tarkan‟s rise in the world music market,

566
For a detailed information about the Flamenco music see, William Washabaugh, Flamenco: Passions, politics
and popular culture: Explorations in Anthropology, Michigan: Berg Publications 199), in Turkish, Flamenko:
Tutku, Politika ve Popüler Kültür, Istanbul: Ayrıntı Yayınları, 2006.
197
with a tolerance to his state of being a fugitive of army obligation. 567 In this context, the
popular music has become as a matter of pride for the Turkish community. For instance the
Eurovision pop music competition appears as a matter of national interest, an opportunity to
book a place within the Europe‟s art borders with a mark of Turkish ethnie, not very differing
from Atatürk‟s desire in 1930s. In the absence of a romantic national music genre, the
audiences and spectators cuddle to the productions of “pop” music industry mostly directed
by profit maximization desires. Within this context, the Turkish&Ottoman music was also
codified as a music genre to be rescued and protected by the traditionalist musicians of this
genre. It is not surprise that today, a transsexual performer Bülent Ersoy, in a conservative
Moslem society is being praised with her “high art” Ottoman music performances, even
though she at the same time sings popular “Arabesk” songs. Today, Ottoman&Turkish
music is labeled and codified as Turkish Art Music, also putting it at a domain separated
from “entertaining”. Although Orhan Gencebay and other similar cases contributed to some
degree of development, the maqam music since the mid 1990s is at decline compared to the
increase of “pop” music. Today, the music in Turkey still misses a widespread romantic
music genre which can be performed and listened by each member of the society. I argue
that, although there had been the colorful, productive material for a creation of a successful
genre, today the music in Turkey still in search for something else.

567
Metin Solmaz, Türkiye‟de Müzik Hayatı: Başarısız Projeler Cenneti, Paçacı,(Ed),(1998), p.15.
198
CONCLUSION: Rethinking Turkish Nationalism, Modernity and Music

As soon as one starts to discuss music, one enters the

realm of thought, and no power on earth has right to
silence this.

Theodor W.Adorno, Essays on Music

In his article, Tanıl compares Turkish nationalism‟s paradoxical configuration to

Hobsbawm‟s proto-nationalism568 that is constituted in the context of religion. According to
him, these paradoxical cements, cores in the Turkish nationalism are good examples of
Hobsbawm‟s argumentation, verifying how those controversial elements “perfectly” actuate
the nationalism machine.569 Moreover, he reminds us that, similar to the German, Indian and
Arab nationalism, Turkish nationalism “seeks its own way”, its own destiny as well.
Furthermore, he says the Turkish nationalism still remains in a form of Sonderweg, a
controversial destiny to follow a unique course separated from Europe. Put another way,
Turkish nationalism very much on the same philosophical bases with German nationalism, is
on the search to find out its own breathing space within the framework of Western
nationalisms
As I suggested in the first chapter, bestowing the term to John Breuilly, the Turkish
nationalism is basically formed within the “complex arrangements” which pave way to the
necessity of “social engineering”. If those paradoxical, controversial, clashing elements in
Turkish nationalism have not existed, it would be unnecessary to manifest a modernism
project for correcting these so called “deficient” running parts of the mechanism. The fabrics
of those controversial arrangements were based upon the “Eastern” perception of the identity
configuration which as if required to be abandoned. The “Occident” civilization is either set
to be the target to be attained but at the same time as a “one teethed monster” to be defended,
as the national anthem‟s lyrics display written by Mehmet Akif Ersoy. The only way to
accomplish this mission is to open up its own original space within the domain of the Europe,
as the German nationalism also intends to do. However, there are additional essential parts in

568
Hobsbawm states that “religion is a paradoxical cement for proto-nationalism, and indeed for modern
nationalism, which has usually, (at least in its more crusading phases), treated it with considerable reserve as
force which could challenge the „nation‟s‟ monopoly claim member‟ loyalty.” Indeed, the cases he provides
besides, the Irish and Orthodox Russian examples, are mostly middle east nationalisms merged with Islam. See,
Hobsbawm (1990), pp. 67-73
569
Tanıl Bora, İnşa Döneminde Türk Kimliği inside Toplum ve Bilim N.71, 1996, p.170.
199
Turkish nationalism compared to the German case. The principles and traditions inherited
from the French political history and philosophical fabrics.
The Tanzimat reforms initiated by Sultan Abdülmecid in 1839 for the sake of
achieving civilizasyon (the French reading form of word civilization), put the Ottoman
political institutions into a continuously institutional modernization process. However, the
French political principles spreading among the military officers paved ways to see the
incompatibility between Western materiality and Eastern spirituality and did not bring the
stability to the state structure as excepted. The Young Ottoman movement, under a triangle of
ideas stretching from conservative Islamists, to moderate liberal Islamists and to the secularist
militant cadres, was under influence of the French political readings and inclined to label
every political and spiritual aspect of life in order to solve the discrepancy between West and
East cultural codifications.570 As the notion of Ottomanism failed onset of the Balkan Wars,
the Unity and Progress‟s vision of harsh secularism gained favour against the other poles of
the triangle for the sake of protecting the durability and interest of the central state. The
legacy inherited by the Kemalist cadres, mostly originated from the nucleus of this
organization acquired more Jacobin sense, as the fractions within these militarist elite cadres
ceased by the 1920s. As being the sole and undeniable leader of the independence movement,
Mustafa Kemal himself also enjoyed reading Rousseau notion of political philosophy during
the times he had been soldier officer. In general, for the nation builders, the idea was to
provide the “just” order for the mass of the society. The mission failed during the late
Ottoman era. What Mardin, calls this process is the reproduction of “just discourse”
committed to the changes in the socio political surroundings.571 A discourse that is being
reproduced for solving the East and West discrepancy and determining what is “just” and
“unjust”. In brief, the rigorous secularists and cosmopolitan notions of French nationalism
were also articulated to the Turkish nationalism in an increasing sense as the time progressed
into the 1930s.
Indeed, AyĢe Kadıoğlu also points out the same face of Turkish nationalism
depending upon the Chatterjee‟s statements. She says, “It (Kemalist nationalism) contained
elements of both a cosmopolitan French nationalism and an organic, anti-Western and anti-
Enlightenment German nationalism.”572 “Both French and German models of nationalism and

570
Namık Kemal, Yusuf Akçura, Ahmet Vefik Pasha, are the leading names under this umbrella.
571
ġerif Mardin, The Just and the Unjust, inside Daedalus, Journal of the American Academy Arts and Science,
Vol.120, No.3 Summer 1993, pp.113-29.
572
Kadıoğlu,(1996), p. 184.
200
the nation-state deeply influenced the character of the rising nation states everywhere” says
she. “The paradox of the Eastern nationalism stems from its attempt to combine the missions
of both the French and the German models”.573 In the contravention of this argumentation, it
reduces the Turkish nationalism into the Smith‟s “imagined community” perception that takes
nationalism as a singular form, as a body of singularity that is approved and shared by each
one. Yet, I claim that this static approach to the nationalism is a deficient way to analyze its
inner dynamics. Approving the fact Turkish nationalism‟s hybrid structure in between French
and German versions, in this study my aim was to demonstrate the inner dynamics of the
hegemonic ideology. The ultimate intention in this study was to chart the reflections of the
“imagination” process on the individual souls.
Heading back to Tanıl Bora, his narration is illuminative to understand how the
nationalist mechanical system runs the Turkish case in a prolonged time of scale. He
resembles Turkish nationalism to a nebula in which diversified stratums and dynamics are
being owned by different nationalist discourses and nation designs. He argues that this
disassociation and disunion on the socio political panorama completes the role of the Turkish
nationalism.574 Put another way, the gas coming out of this nebula is the catalyst which runs
and paces the Turkish nationalism engine. In this sense, we could talk about configurations of
Turkish nationalisms more than one, sometimes competing, sometimes articulating and
sometimes destroying and reinventing each other. In both creative and destructive motions,
the discourses accumulated around these different variants of the over arching ideology,
nourish each other and establish a mutual mechanism to preserve their existence. As cited by
Günay Göksu Özdoğan, Kemalist nationalism‟s carrot and stick strategy towards the more
extreme Pan-Turkism, committed to both domestic and foreign dynamisms, could be
evaluated within this context.575 What this reveals is that the Turkish nationalism is much
more like a “community of destiny” rather than an “imagined community”. In other words, it
is more than a static singularity which is just “imagined” in a particular time. The
omnipotence of it comes from the notion of a shared journey to find a particular place rather
than a “mere sense of similarity of destiny.” On the contrary to modernist camp‟s dependence
upon the capitalist market‟s binding and homogenizing effects on a particular region
demographic structure, Otto Bauer points out the natural forces of people‟s character that

573
Ibid, p.179.
574
Bora, (1996), p.171.
575
Özdoğan, (2001) p.25.
201
places them on the same path of destiny.576 Bauer adds a socio psychological perspective to
the theory of nationalism. The emotional attachment to something, individual sharing of a
common experience naturally constituted precedes the logic of a binding effect of an
“imagined community”. For instance, a soldier combating in a war for as if for his nation,
much more concerned about the first his life and fires the bullets to protect his life than the
life of the men next to him, who are his fellows rather than compatriots, for his family and
relatives who awaits at home to be protected. Therefore, instead of fighting for a singular
form of an “imagined” nation gingered by world material icons such as flags, maps on the
walls, the mutual shared destiny flames the armies of nation states, so does the whole
nationalism phenomenon in every related part as well. The reason of these socio
psychological aspects of nationalism phenomenon, I included the personal history narrations
in order to chart the pictures of the individual in this “imagination” process or the
“community of destiny” motion.
Together with this, the “community of destiny” narration is much more applicable to
understand the music journey in the Turkish republic. What unified or disunite camps in the
Turkish music debate, or what foreclosed or eased for the establishment of a mass national
music genre, was being the coexisting in a “destiny” which was codified by the Kemalist
discourses in the 1930s and 1940s. The desire to invent, to create an advanced national music
embracing all social classes of the society, was shared by each member around the music
circles who were in the maelstrom of the Occidentalist and Orientalist controversial air of
environment. The destiny, the debate launched by the Kemalist elites with an Orientalist
discourse was inherited by the popular music cases. The evidences of this inheritance could
be seen in the free performing style of Sadettin Kaynak, Anatolian Rock, Gencebay‟s and
others popular music productions. What saturated all of these dynamisms was the
“inferiority” notion of the Turkish&Ottoman music and the necessity to search for a more
developed, progressed musical genre which can be given ear by both the Western audiences
and the essential periphery audiences. I suggest that the discourse such as what is more
modern, what kind of rhythmic and tune structures are more competitive with the superior
Western music, nourished the productions of the musicians in the 1950s and 1960s. In short,
in the Turkish music history, the desire to create a national music genre that reaches to every
soul of the citizen did sparked controversial environment which created a common shared of

576
According to Bauer, a working low income German working class of people has much more commonality
and mutual interests with the same socio economic status English men, rather than high elite German
compatriots. see Bauer, (1996), pp.49-51 .
202
domain or destiny. Therefore, this study focused on this journey which is motioned by
“complex arrangements” rather than the discussion of failure or the successes of national
music of an “imagined community” at particular time and domain. In this context, this long
dureé approach I suggest is more efficient approach to investigate the cultural formations,
motions of the Turkish nationalism that is saturated by both Occidentalist and Orientalist
discourses.
Indeed, Turkish nation builders apparently failed to design a national folk music. As
Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar says “the romanticism is already archaic in Turkey1.”577 The
essential and primary reference source of the Turkish history and Turkish culture tries to
establish a connection with a very far distanced geography (Central Asia) and with a sublime
ancient history. However this effort does not provide an opportunity, a mean for a popular
romanticism especially in the music field where the Western superior materials are imposed
for creating a national culture.578 The folk songs fall very far away from the idea of national
songs enthusiastically listened and liked by each member of the society regardless of their
age, gender and social status. Within this context, the Anatolia appears as a mystic,
unromantic, vain and dried geographical domain and the folk songs do not go beyond this
inevitable, indigent codification. My archive studies verify this fact. Even though there had
been many efforts to set up a national folk archive of songs for the whole nation to listen, as
the surveys -although most of them are manipulated for particular aims to support the
hegemonic ideology‟s music policies- indicate and KocabaĢoğlu‟s statistical analysis
regarding the radio broadcast display, the folk songs were not diffused into the souls of the
people. Furthermore, instead of some exceptions, the leading names such as the man at the
top of political, Mustafa Kemal or organic intellectuals such as Baltacıoğlu were not apparent
supporters of the folk music genre. Baltacıoğlu who had been an influential figure on the
music policies579 and having ethno racist ideas, for instance declared that he is against the
spread of “ancient” folk songs. Apparently, he declared that he is in favour creating “new”
national music genre. Besides, Atatürk himself was only enthusiastic about the Western
Thrace folk music. That is the music genre of the region where he was born in.

577
Ahmet Hamdi Tanpanır, Yahya Kemal, Istanbul: Dergah Yayınları 1995, p.112 cited in Bora(1996) p.186.
578
Bora (1996), p.186.
579
Later on the mid 1945s he became a parliament member from the Republican party. Throughout his speeches
at assembly, He passionately kept on defending that the music and radio were the state apparatus and needed to
be used for breeding and culturing, see Ahıska ,(2005), pp.333-338 a parliament discussion among the deputy at
22.5.1945, cited by Cemal Yorulmaz under the the title of “Bizde ve Öteki Memleketlerde Radyo”.
203
 The failure in creating a mass followed folk music archive is also illuminative in
revealing the drifting linkage between the nation building elites and the folk people at the
periphery.580 Generally coming from the center lands of an imperial empire, the Kemalist
cadres had been strangers to the lands of the Anatolia and to its people. Mustafa Kemal
himself, a military officer who was born at Salonika, spending his years of service around the
Western Thrace, was very keen on knowing the Alevi sect and their music traditions. As I
displayed in ney instrumentalist Burhannedin Ökte‟s memories with him, many times he
showed himself up as a teacher to question cultural backgrounds of his citizens. Apparently
his intention was to better know his “children”. Throughout this acquaintance process, the
public was treated as a singular material soul. The comments, the news and the articles of the
intellectuals mostly at the radio journal and others about music reforms, all included such
narrations, discourses and words where the public appeared as idealized souls of an organic
body who is hungry for the “modern reforms” to be applied. Yet, the reality was very
different as seen in the case when the polyphonic folk songs on radio, that did not take the
attraction of the folk masses. Even the presence of regional Ozan folk musicians on live
broadcasting and in the Köy Enstitutileri (Village education centers) such as AĢık Veysel, was
not enough to establish a cordial and real linkage between center and the periphery. Already
in the absence of technological innovations of the 20th century, the folk songs were not
capable of moving beyond the locality. The elites, who were on the hunt for linkages with the
periphery, were unsuccessful in their missions. Indeed, they were on the purpose of co-opting
the periphery to the center rather laying the paths to reach them. A children folk song being
broadcasted on radio in 1930s and 1940s perfectly portrays the inner cores of the Kemalist
peasant and public principles of the six arrows. The song‟s lyrics say: “There is a village far
down there, that one is ours even though we have never been there and even if we never
visited there”.581 The cultural polices were enforced in a manner of “try and see” approach as
the periphery being supposed as a far distanced geography from Ankara. Converged with the
“Occidentalist Fantasy”, the elites codified an idealized a passive folk population in their
minds and assumed that the periphery would enthusiastically commence being accustomed to
the traditions, the tunes of the protestant polyphonic church music. On contrary to the efforts
to enforce the Occidental music tradition, the per se Jazz music which grew out of the
580
As ġerif Mardin points out, when the Islam cement was nullified, there had been left no linkage to combine
the periphery and center. The nation builders more turned their face to the cultural formations to form the lost
path in between them and their subjects. See, ġerif Mardin Projects as Methodology, Some thoughts on the
modern Turkish Modern Science, Bozdoğan(Ed) and Kasaba(Ed), (1998),pp.64-65.
581
Ahıska, (2005), p.321.
204
necessity to fulfill radio broadcasting time, the spread of Egyptian radio, the enthusiasm in
“unidentified” instruments such as Mandolin, are the cases where I try to demonstrate that the
nation building project is beyond the volition, enactment of the elites who were supposed to
be in charge of mission. The appearance of the Rock-Jazz orchestrates and the free
performing style of Ottoman music on the popular culture are other aftermath indicators that
display how the elites have no full of control on the so called nation “project”.
The Occidentalist Fantasy argumentation presented by the Meltem Ahıska regarding
the radio broadcasting years of the early republic era was the other significant fabric of
argumentation that I tried to present in my study. In the codified historical dichotomy of East
and West, the “undeniable” material superiority of the latter one, is used by the elites to fulfill
the historically established gap between two domains. The pre approval of the polyphonic
Western music‟s technical superiority paved way to the unquestionable import of Western
music materials, such as the instruments, the symphonic orchestrates and the “modern” music
note writing and teaching techniques. The Kemalist elites and the intellectual circles assumed
that through the import of these material patches, the Occident world would initiate listening
“real Turkish music” that was intended to be replaced by the “alien” Oriental Ottoman music.
The basic aim was to be approved, given ear by the Occident. Put another way it was to open
up communication channel through which Turkish ethnie can be introduced on the Western
art arena. With the establishment of a polyphonic Turkish music, the historical reflection of
the “inferior” East mirrored by the West, was supposed to be nullified. Yet, the import of the
material aspects of the Western civilization does not necessarily reduce Turkish modernism
project to a model or copy. I argue that the Turkish case neither resembles to the reactionary
modernism in a former colonial space like India or to the full fledged modernism committed
to West. Having an imperial Ottoman legacy, a colonial empire within itself, the Turkish
modernism is complicated within the context of Occidentalism or the inversed version
Orientalism of Said. Although this essentialist approach is deep well to be lost, it is better to
accept this pre condition for understanding the modernism motion in Turkish case. The
significant part of my study is that I attempted to display, the whole Turkish modernization
project was not an imitation, or as Ahıska says a “copy” of the West. On contrary, the
Occidentalist governance discourse is much more complicated than either a sole desire to
become a part of the Occident or a simple antagonism towards it. The Occident configuration
is being reinvented and reshaped on a flux ground committed to the alternations in different

205
time scales.582 As the elites and the ordinary people being in a space between two mirrors of
Occident and Orient, when they renewed their positions in each movement, two
corresponding mirror showed different views on the individual souls and each time there
appeared a necessity to pose a new stance. The praise in the Western white polyphonic music
in 1930s and the antagonism towards the American Jazz music in the late 1930s, or the racist
attributions to Italian and Balkan operas could be evaluated within this context. A fully
fledged submission to Western modernism was rejected depending on the moral grounds and
cultural protection necessities. Thence, whilst the “useful” aspects of the European cultural
materials were approved, the immoral, degenerated parts such as the Jazz music, or Italian
canzone, were cursed and excluded. On this flux of ground the Occident appears as a fantasy
that is ever to be realized. By the courtesy of this Occidentalist utopia, the Turkish modernism
machine has been finding its fuel to keep going on, even in the recent years.
The second aspect which I tried to reveal within Occidentalist framework was to show
in political terms how the “modernist” approach basically clogs the natural cultural evaluation
of East by imposing the things which must be important from West. The death of the Ottoman
high art music and the disappearance of its traditions, spiritual aspects, instruments,
performers through modernization process was the main case that I stick upon. In this
context, at least I tried to demonstrate how a possibility of an alternative modernism in
Turkish music history was battered or totally destroyed. Hence, this study also intends to
contribute to the critiques of the universal linear path notion of modernism and aims to
present the possibilities of alternative modernisms.
The reason that I included the popular cultural cases in my thesis was to denominate
the responses of East towards West, where the former one is presented as a muted entity in
Edward Said Orientalist perception of East. As I touched upon on the previous chapter,
Meral Özbek says the Arabesk is the response of the third world towards a Western based
modernism project. According to her the capitalist system diffusing itself into the cultural
factors, become catalysis through merging instead of a solvent liberticidal as it is on the
Western World.583 She takes this response at the individual art level as a “creative instinct”
that is absent in the Western World where vicious cycle of capitalist market life homogenizes
individual productions and life preferences. Indeed, the imposition of the Western sound
structure over the Ottoman music paved way to the occurrence of the free performing style

582
Ibid,p.307.
583
Özbek, (1991), p.45.
206
popular Ottoman music. In some aspects this is an indication of creativity but in some aspects
it is controversial, stressed process at the individual art experience. For instance, reminded by
Chatterjee, the imposition of the European Western principles onto the Bangladesh or Bengal
theater, did not exposed a “modern” Calcutta theater stage with the European principles, but
revealed a controversial environment to be resolved.584 Depending on Chatterjee‟s statements
and examples on Indian Art, I also suggest that in some aspects parallel deductions could be
observed in the Turkish music debate. The imposition of the Western norms and standards did
not lead to the occurrence of“creativity” at the individual art level but a tensions environment
among the music performers to be resolved. From one perceptive, this shackled the rise of a
romantic widespread approved, respected and performed music genre such as Flamenco,
South African Reggae music, or Jazz music. Indeed, Meltem Ahıska suggests that the sound
of the East (in her analogy, the sound is the audio of the radio that is used by the elites to
make call to the Western world and to configure national imagination on the minds of the
citizens) directed towards West is not a “liberalizing” expression of the East.585 I also claim
that the popular Arabesk music in 1960s and 1980s are not mere sense of an artistic response
of the East directed towards West. Özbek also having more sociological perception towards
the issue undervalues the essential musicological motions of the Ottoman&Turkish music. I
claim the free voice of the Eastern music is still out there to be discovered.
In general, the modernist theories mostly having a macro level methodological
approach ignore the essential inner dynamics of the cases, such as the Turkish modernism.
Even though the Turkish modernism attracts modernist scholars in recent years due to the
eroding universal freeing notion of modernization processes, there are few studies regarding
the individual experience of modernism inside the minds and hearts of the people. Besides the
essentiality of the modernism at the macro level, in this study I tried to present the micro level
experience of modernism on the souls of individual, inspired by Marshall Berman analogies
of various intellectual portrays such as Charles Baudelaire experiences in urbanizing Paris,
Goethe‟s character Faust and his story. Similar experiences, sensations, feelings were also
shared by the individuals who experience the Turkish modernism, stretching from the
political leader, Atatürk, to the intellectuals offering comments about music, officers and

584
Partha Chatterjee, “Whose Imagined Community?”, Mapping the Nation, Gopal Balakrishnan,(Ed),London:
Verso Publishing, 1996, p.219.
585
See Ahıska, (2005), p.309 In her study, Ahıska investigates the radio theater plays, the talk programs and the
BBC archives regarding both reciprocal broadcasting during the war time years. Throughout these sources she
claims that there had been “diological leaks” of the East towards West but she is not inclined to name them as
“freeing responses”.
207
musicians at the radio stations and the ordinary citizens who were in the middle of this vortex.
The archive study which I made helped me out to see the tensions experience of modernism
within the privacy of individual souls. The man at the top of the political hierarchy, his inner
psychological war as being the leader of a reforming modern nation and a ordinary individual
enjoying Allaturca music, the professional musicians‟ anxieties for making a modern music
that could keep up with the Occident music, all display that the individual level of experience
of modernism is also a significant factor in contributing to the whole manifestation of the
modernism on society. These experiences were more intense coupled with the fact being in a
socio cultural surrounding, domain that is hanging on a flux of windy stream between the
East and West. Indeed, Berman‟s narrations regarding the modernism experience at St.
Petersburg help me out to see the different perceptions of the process, a lieu configured as a
window to be opened up to the West.586 With giving way to the individual experiences, I was
also intended to move beyond the classical history narration of political science and broaden
it with the tools of sociology, social psychology and musicology. Notably, in a case like
music where the individuality is more concerned than the mass national perception, I hope
this study also makes contributions to the Turkish music history writing.
Another aspect that I indented to display was the ethno racist elements in the Turkish
nationalism sticking onto my study ground, music. Tanıl Bora reminds us that even though
Turkish nationalism has a universal humanist face, it is a cultural racist ideology. He points
out to the lyrical part which was omitted from the national anthem, Independence March.587
Bora asserts that the Kemalist nationalists try to bury its ethno racist face. He is not the only
scholar who tries to reveal the ethno racist paradigms and themes on the culturally hegemonic
ideology. Besides Nazan Maksudyan who focuses on the anthropological racist oscillations,
Füsun Üstel investigating the notion of the citizenship since the late Ottoman Era is another
scholar portraying the extreme ethnic fascist parts of the ideology. Her theoretical framework
is mostly about the national identity configuration, following it on the national education
sources. Shortly, she claims that the cultural citizenship during the republican era is
telescoped with the national identity and the measurement of being an appropriate, good
citizenship was directly linked to protect the national values in non-emergency times.588 Since
my findings regarding the scope my research, I also came across with the exclusionary
cultural aspects of the dominant ideology in the field of music. The folk music songs of

586
For detailed narration of St. Petersburg city see Berman, (1983), pp.223-287.
587
Bora, (1996), pp.179-183.
588
Üstel, ( 2004), p. 320-333.
208
Anatolia which were arbitrarily converted into Turkish during 1940s, and 1950s losing their
essential, today still being sang in peculiar prosodies on TRT screen in the folk music songs.
The mark of the Turkish ethnie on the folk songs today is far away to represent the whole
tunes of the Anatolia. Besides the marches that have ethnic references, used by Ġsmet Ġnönü
during the election propagandas in 1939-43, there had been other ethno racist folk songs and
militarist marches such as Milli Türkü (National folk song) and Künyemi Yazdım Taşa( I
wrote my tag on the tag)589 which had exclusionary arcane lyrics towards non-Turks whom
were messaged. The very note worthy point on is that the music reforms were performed
under the framework of references to the only one domain, which is white central European
high art music. For instance, the belief in the Italian superiority during the late Ottoman
period when Donizetti was invited, was replaced with a notion of crying Italian with
mandolin. The Balkan and Italian polyphony was regarded as something to be cross over to
reach to the White European music. In this sense, I suggest that the Occidentalist Fantasy
have categorizations of European identities, in which the Central European ones are selected
as the targets to be attained at least in the field of music. I claim these kinds of dynamisms in
Turkish nationalism arouses out of the Occidental Fantasy, where the far white West is being
selected as a dream to be realized instead of the near West of the Mediterranean, a
geographical domain which is more merged with the Oriental Ottoman history. Shortly,
“ethnographic relativistic” anxieties were common in the Turkish music debate.
For the Turkish identity configuration, the “others” or the strangers of modernism as
Bauman says were mostly the Ottoman identity and its historical legacy, preceding the non-
Moslems, the Kurds and others.590 The Eastern parts of the identity, the black Arab, the
Persian and the ancient Byzantium were the ones that were tagged as the wastes of modernity.
Indeed, in general the music reforms were being done in a feeling to arise the lost Turkish
pride, to create a music that the Turks would be proud of in the Western art arena. The desire
was to create a non-Eastern music that could take the attraction of the Western audience. This
Orientalist perception, I argue that, depending upon the Edward Said, have a racist
perception. The colorful Eastern face of the Ottoman&Turkish music presented as a shameful
legacy to be left. The spiritual meditative slow motioned Ottoman music which was identified
with the numbness of the “Arab” appeared as a target to be wasted. On the other hand, the
strangers such as Anatolian Greeks, Armenians as if falling inside to the civic comprising

589
Mehmet Ö. Alkan, Bir Belge Olarak Plakların Sesiyle Yakın Tarihimiz,Akkaya(Ed) and Çelik,(Ed), 2006
p.60.
590
Bora, (1996), pp.183-184.
209
citizenship notion, were other figures on the Turkish music to be wasted. Nourishing the
music reforms with unquestionable Western positivism and secular principles paved way to
put “reactionary” label tag to the polyphonic re-composition of Armenian music master Sir
Tatyos. In general the whole music revolution was performed with a manner of “war” as if
there was a state of emergency. The music revolution appeared as a matter of national interest
and prestige and carved those into the social memory of the public. Today, still the European
music competition Eurovision is a significant matter of national interest for the whole wide
nation and perceived as an arena to gain the respect of the Europe and make head over
them.591 The neo liberal alternation path of the Kemalist ideology after 1980s on popular
music, with the pop singers dressed in the orchestrate chief style, as the representation of the
Kemalist music revolution, singing their nostalgic militarist marches or recent fashion pop
songs with heavy ethno secular lyrics is also another part of puzzle completing the iconic
cultural racism of ideology‟s discourse in the modern times.
The Kemalist revolutions unfortunately accelerated the death of the spiritual Ottoman
music which indeed would not resist to the modernist cylinder of the materialism. Today, the
musicological academy circles in Turkey are in dire of necessity to study this lost music genre
and traditions to revive it. Unfortunately, in the absence of a written note tradition, there only
left remnants of this Oriental music genre and the studies to revive Ottoman music both
requires sociological, anthropological supports to help the musicological research. I hope that
through these studies some basic material ground could be obtained for both academic and
popular musicians to find the true destiny of the Turkish music that which was interrupted,
jammed by the Kemalist music revolution. From the dusts of remnants, a true Oriental music
and its tradition could be realized and this could make a slight contribution to the “alternative
modernization” notions.

591
Although music intellectual circles always complain about the exaggerated national feelings towards this
competition unlike the Europeans, I was doubtful about their rightness. When I asked about one of my amateur
musician Italian friend at abroad about his ideas related with the Eurovision music competition, I was shocked
that he even did not know there had existed such a music competition across Europe.
210
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INDEX
Abdülhamit II, 15, 48
Adorno, 166, 199, 213
Ahıska, 23, 35, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 73, 86,
96, 101, 113, 114, 115, 116, 125, 128,
130, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 213
Ahmet Demirel, 5, 30, 78
Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar, 155, 203
Allaturca, 29, 48, 68, 71, 72, 74, 76, 79,
80, 86, 87, 88, 89, 91, 92, 93, 95, 101,
102, 105, 106, 107, 108, 110, 111, 116,
117, 119, 127, 128, 129, 131, 135, 140,
156, 158, 174, 175, 178, 181, 184, 186,
190, 191, 208
Althusser, 126, 213
Ambiguity, 3, 67, 73
ANAP, 176, 179, 186
Anderson, 24, 28, 44, 68, 214
Ankara, 8, 14, 30, 39, 44, 45, 49, 50, 51,
52, 56, 57, 58, 60, 61, 62, 63, 67, 77, 78,
82, 84, 85, 86, 88, 91, 92, 93, 94, 96, 98,
110, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 121,
131, 136, 139, 142, 145, 157, 170, 196,
205, 212, 213, 214, 217, 218, 219
Arab, 11, 17, 24, 29, 39, 42, 46, 48, 65, 79,
91, 105, 129, 134, 146, 156, 157, 162,
199, 210
Arabesk, 16, 19, 23, 29, 41, 59, 67, 128,
157, 158, 162, 163, 164, 165, 167, 171,
173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180,
181, 182, 185, 187, 189, 191, 192, 195,
198, 207, 218, 219
Atatürk, 16, 17, 33, 37, 40, 42, 44, 45, 46,
56, 57, 58, 62, 63, 70, 71, 72, 76, 77, 78,
79, 80, 81, 87, 89, 90, 91, 93, 106, 113,
122, 128, 135, 136, 143, 145, 146, 150,
153, 155, 179, 187, 188, 189, 191, 194,
195, 196, 198, 204, 208, 212, 213, 215,
220
Baltacıoğlu, 71, 83, 101, 102, 104, 115,
123, 124, 137, 147, 204
Bauer, 29, 202, 214
Bauman, 33, 38, 39, 72, 73, 127, 138, 210,
214
220
Berman, 11, 15, 16, 36, 42, 72, 153, 158,
159, 164, 208, 214
Bernard Lewis, 35
Beyoğlu, 49, 69, 82, 85
Bora, 26, 199, 201, 202, 203, 209, 210,
214
Bozdoğan and Kasaba, 35
Burhannedin Ökte, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 89,
146, 204
Cem Behar, 51, 63, 155, 193
Cemal ReĢit Rey, 57, 84, 88, 89, 90, 102,
109, 118, 121, 122
Chatterjee, 27, 28, 36, 55, 160, 167, 201,
207, 215
Corporatist, 41, 218
Çankaya Pavilion, 77
Daydreaming, 28
Direklerarası, 174
Dolmabahçe Palace, 46
Duduk, 98, 147
East, 11, 22, 23, 28, 33, 35, 43, 49, 50, 58,
72, 84, 134, 158, 171, 179, 188, 193,
196, 200, 205, 206, 207, 208, 216
Eisenstadt, 33, 34, 215, 217
Ethno Racist, 133
Fasıl Heyeti, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 95, 97,
102, 103, 126, 154
Folk, 20, 43, 58, 61, 73, 83, 85, 90, 94, 99,
102, 107, 118, 122, 124, 145, 148, 149,
152, 171, 173, 191, 214
Foucault, 13, 69, 70, 74, 108, 131, 132,
160, 215
Governmentality, 74, 108, 131, 161, 215
Gönül Paçacı, 12, 49, 60, 102, 214, 215,
216, 217, 218, 219, 220
Günay Göksu Özdoğan, 43, 202
Hobsbawm, 24, 44, 81, 199
Identity, 9, 12, 17, 18, 19, 27, 34, 42, 43,
214, 216, 217, 218, 219
ISA, 126, 127, 132
Istanbul, 8, 11, 12, 14, 15, 17, 19, 20, 23,
29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41,
42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 51, 52, 53,
56, 57, 59, 60, 61, 63, 65, 66, 70, 76, 77,
 78, 80, 82, 84, 85, 86, 88, 89, 90, 92, 96,
98, 100, 103, 106, 109, 110, 111, 112,
113,鱈115, 116, 118, 119, 122, 127,
130, 135, 139, 142, 148, 149, 155, 157,
158, 162, 167, 168, 169, 170, 174, 187,
196, 198, 203, 212, 213, 214, 215, 216,
217, 218, 219, 220
Ġsmet Ġnönü, 93, 117, 122, 209
Kadıoğlu, 42, 201, 216
Kemalists, 11, 12, 17, 22, 29, 35, 40, 45,
56, 86, 103, 114, 116, 120, 124, 125,
128, 132, 187
KocabaĢoğlu, 70, 71, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85,
87, 88, 90, 91, 92, 95, 113, 114, 115,
117, 118, 119, 120, 122, 124, 125, 128,
140, 173, 204, 217
Kurds, 40, 43, 138, 185, 189, 210
Language, 41, 44, 45, 46, 47, 114, 149
Maksudyan, 40, 46, 133, 209, 217
Mandolin, 129, 137, 205
Mardin, 53, 201, 204, 217
Martin Stokes, 9, 10, 54, 59, 67, 151, 164,
219
Meral Özbek, 19, 65, 67, 116, 152, 155,
158, 162, 176, 177, 178, 179, 181, 207
Mevlevi, 41, 157
Modernism, 3, 15, 22, 33, 36, 48, 67, 69
Modernist, 48, 159
Modernity, 4, 10, 11, 18, 33, 34, 35, 38,
89, 165, 199, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218
Modernization, 33, 34, 35, 36, 41, 158,
160, 162, 215, 216, 217, 218
Musicology, 144, 213
Mustafa Kemal, 42, 79, 89, 150, 160, 201,
204
Müzik ve Sanat Hareketleri, 58, 71, 136,
137, 146
Müzzeyen Senar, 116, 128, 157, 166, 167
Nationalism, 4, 13, 17, 24, 25, 27, 30, 32,
33, 39, 42, 44, 46, 199, 214, 215, 216,
218, 220
Nationalist Ideology, 29
Nebula, 26
Nota, 53, 66, 71, 72, 105, 106, 107, 108,
109, 110, 111, 127, 140, 142, 143, 212
Occidentalism, 3, 22, 23, 67, 73, 139, 206
Occidentalist Fantasy, 23, 28, 43, 52, 57,
64, 68, 72, 73, 81, 83, 86, 91, 96, 100,
221
109, 111, 115, 121, 129, 133, 152, 153,
171, 194, 205, 210
Orhan Gencebay, 19, 29, 41, 65, 116, 128,
152, 158, 162, 163, 168, 173, 176, 177,
179, 181, 182, 192, 198, 218
Orientalism, 22, 23, 133, 134, 206, 218
Ottoman Empire, 11, 30, 42, 49, 50, 52,
62, 68, 95, 100, 106, 119, 124, 129, 135,
138, 194, 219, 220
Ottoman Music, 33, 37, 67, 73, 102, 120,
121, 124, 134, 152, 158
Ottoman&Turkish, 23, 63, 66, 75, 80, 83,
125, 132, 191, 197, 198, 208, 210
Özal, 176, 177, 182, 184
Pan Turkism, 26
Pasha, 31, 45, 48, 72, 74, 78, 79, 80, 87,
90, 135, 146, 147, 150, 200
Passive Revolution, 55, 160
Perihan Altındağ, 116, 117
Peyami Safa, 88, 91
Popular Culture, 3, 155, 158, 159, 161,
162, 166, 171, 216, 218, 219, 220
Radio, 23, 52, 58, 61, 68, 70, 81, 82, 83,
84, 85, 86, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 98,
101, 102, 103, 112, 113, 114, 116, 117,
118, 119, 120, 121, 125, 127, 130, 132,
137, 139, 142, 145, 147, 148, 150, 169,
181
Russian Five, 57
Said, 22, 133, 134, 206, 207, 210, 218
Sarısözen, 47, 61, 62, 94, 95, 129, 145,
149, 150, 151, 152, 164, 191, 192
Saygun, 14, 43, 44, 50, 56, 57, 58, 60, 64,
88, 122, 130, 133, 137, 144, 145, 150,
155, 190, 212
Sezen Aksu, 166, 174, 178, 179, 180, 181,
182, 183, 184, 185, 186
Sociology, 9, 18, 65, 162, 213, 216, 217,
219
Soner Çağaptay, 39
Survey, 129
Tamburacı, 90, 119
Tanzimat, 15, 48, 49, 119, 138, 200
Tekelioğlu, 12, 29, 48, 49, 155, 167, 171,
174, 196, 219
Tekke and Zaviyes, 64, 153, 156, 167
TRT, 13, 47, 52, 62, 65, 70, 73, 75, 82, 91,
96, 139, 149, 177, 179, 182, 191, 195,
197, 209, 217
Vedat Nedim Tör, 58, 85, 88, 94, 96, 121 Yurttan Sesler, 47, 61, 72, 93, 94, 127,
Yeni Adam, 14, 70, 83, 88, 95, 101, 102, 129, 148, 152
103, 104, 107, 123, 124, 126, 127, 130, Zekai Dede Efendi, 51
138, 139, 140, 147, 212 Ziya Gökalp, 11, 24, 30, 41, 59, 102, 122,
Yunus Emre Oratorio, 50, 64, 130 134

222
Poyraz Kolluoğlu

MODERNISIM IN OTTOMAN&TURKISH MUSIC AND THE

YEARS OF 1930s, 1940s: Modernist and Occidentalist
Anxieties

223