During the last century of the Ottoman Empire, between 1826 and 1924, emperors and dynasty members were personally interested in Western music. The Janissary, which was the military class and the infantry component of Kap?kulu Ocaklar?, dependent on the emperor, was abolished by Mahmud the Second in 1826 through the event named “Vaka-? Hayriye,” which means “beneficial event.” After that, the attempt was made to establish an army in the Western style. The Muzika-i Hümâyûn is based on the earlier Mehterhane and Mehter music. It was decided to find a new muz?ka for the new army in Western order and uniform instead of the muz?ka (band) of the Janissary. Thus, in June 1826, Muzika-i Hümâyûn was established and this date has been accepted as the foundation date of the Presidential Symphony Orchestra, the official orchestra of the Turkish Republic. Having been founded as a military band in the Western style, Muzika-i Hümâyûn performed in various venues such as opera, operetta, orchestra, and theatre. Therefore, European polyphonic music gradually started to displace Turkish maqam music in the Ottoman Court.

Muzika-i Hümâyûn included the court orchestra, the court opera orchestra, the court operetta orchestra, the court chorus, various salon and chamber music ensembles of the court, the military court band, the music teachers of the court, as well as all the orchestras performing at theatres and concert halls outside the court and the whole teaching staff of the conservatoire. It had, also, a Turkish style (ince saz) division. It employed a total of five hundred musicians in its golden age, though Sultan Abdülhamit the Second reduced this number to three hundred and fifty, and after the Balkan Wars the number decreased to one hundred and twenty musicians.

Upon the 700th anniversary of the foundation of the Ottoman Empire, Y?ld?z Technical University, under Professor Ruhi Ayangil’s musical direction, prepared the “Be?ibiryerde” (Five in One), a CD set consisting of five discs, the fourth of which contains the songs of Muzika-i Hümâyûn, composed of thirteen works (twelve songs and one taksim). This project, entitled “Muzika-i Hümâyûn ?ark?lar?,” covers an important period of the European polyphonic music movement in the Ottoman Empire, when songs written polyphonically by classical Turkish maqam composers and Muzika-i Hümâyûn teachers and members such as lutist Haf?z Cemil Bey, Ziya Pasha, Hac? Emin Bey, R?za Efendi, Merkel Efendi, Mahmud Celaledd?n Pasha, Ekrem Bey, Giriftzen As?m Bey, Haf?z Mehmed Efendi and Civan Agha. Also, the polyphonic arrangements made by Zati Bey, Furlani, Guatelli, teachers or members of Muzika-i Hümâyûn, were vocalized by Asl?han Eruzun Özel (kemençe) Özgül Özbilen (soprano) and Özlem Yavuz (piano).

Özbilen’s traditional song style, affected by her conservatoire education, makes use of ornamentation elements present in Turkish maqam such as acciacatura, portamento, glissando, vibrato, trill, grupetto, falsetto, staccato, and morda. In the vocalization of the songs, interpreted with few changes in the notation, a chord structure suitable for her voice is preferred because of the monophonic nature of Turkish maqam. Kemençevi (kemençe player) Asl?han Eruzun Özel joined the three-stringed kemençe, which was peculiar to Ottoman maqam music, with the vocal style she obtained from blake drummer Cemil Bey and her teacher ?hsan Özgen into a synthesis of her own identity; elaborately vocalized koma (microtonal) pitches that cannot be heard on piano. In her first maqam music work, pianist Özlem Yavuz played the arrangements made by the teachers and the members of Muzika-i Hümâyûn such as Zati Bey, Furlani, Guatelli and elegantly shared koma sounds missing in the piano with the kemençe. In the arrangements for piano, a tempered instrument, the maqam scales approach tonal music in Hicaz, Ni?aburek, Nihavend, Acema?iran and Rast, and are outstanding; so too with the maqams that include koma pitches and often change their frequencies such as Hüzzam, Beyati, Karc??ar, U??ak, Rast, and Suzinak. These sounds are heard with the pianist remaining in the background and the solist and the kemençe coming forward to sound these koma pitches.

The piano arrangements of the songs generally have classical period harmony style, with 1-4-5 harmonic progressions, and the right hand generally accompanies the vocal part in unison. Wherever the harmony is appropriate, the right hand plays the dominant chord and the left accompanies by pushing the tonic chord. The left hand is generally a bass accompaniment made up of the tonic chord with rhythmic repetitions. A fugal writing style is found where the piano plays alone. A harmony which was less advanced in the other arrangements and which emerged from the use of chromatics, grabs attention, especially in Guatelli’s arrangements (tracks 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, 12). While most of the works are sung as Adagio, Adagio sostenuto, Adagio ma non troppo e molto cantabile, and Afflitta (tracks 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 10, 11, 13), a style reflecting the glorious and solemn lifestyle of the Ottoman Empire, there are also more joyful and lithe interpretations in the form of Allegretto vivace, Agitato, Agevole and Allegro appassionato (tracks 5, 6, 8, 12). This repertoire, arranged in the period of Muzika-i Hümayun when the first modernisation was carried out in the nineteenth century, has been recorded for the first time on this CD.

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[Review length: 856 words • Review posted on September 5, 2007]