Aşk şarkilari (Love songs)
Yakaza Ensemble, Fairuz Derinbulut, Aynur Doğan, Burhan Öçal and Istanbul Oriental Ensemble Presented by hosts Danielle de Picciotto and Alexander Hacke A "Century of Song" concert
The second part of the gala of Turkish music presented by Danielle De Piciotto and Alexander Hacke will be opened by the Yakaza Ensemble. The sound artists from Istanbul present a hypnotic multi-media show giving Sufi mysticism a contemporary interpretation. Fairuz Derinbulut, another music project from the city on the Bosporus, build bridges between such diverse styles as rock, dub, arabesque or reggae and can get any audience dancing. The Kurdish singer Aynur Doğan is another protagonist from Fatih Akin’s film Crossing the Bridge. She was born in eastern Anatolia and moved to Istanbul with her family in the early 90s. She first received public recognition for her 1994 album release Keçe Kurdan, a collection of Kurdish and Turkish popular songs, supplemented by new compositions. The work was initially banned because one of the songs allegedly encouraged women to participate in the Kurdish separatist movement. Aynur herself, by now a star both inside and outside Turkey, claimed that the song was much more concerned in calling on women to defend themselves against male patriarchy.
The evening concludes with the Istanbul Oriental Ensemble led by Burhan Ocal. The percussionist and singer is one of his country’s foremost musicians. His artistic activities are an attempt to create a dialogue between the traditional music of Turkey, the methods of improvisation used in jazz and the West’s art of classical composition. The Istanbul Oriental Ensemble consists of brilliant instrumentalists who belong to the Roma minority. It has committed itself to the preservation of Turkish gypsy music from the 18h and 19th centuries and for the last 15 years has been at home in all the great concert halls of the world.
The series Century of Song has been produced by the Ruhrtriennale.