37 f I
n this context, Aynur, it seems to me, has to handle various conflicting pressures – to be a cultural advocate for Turkish Kurds; to be a successful entertainer with a developing career, and to be an artist who cares deeply about the music she chooses to perform. And folk music is not intrinsically any more commercial in Turkey than it is in Britain, Kurdish folk music even less so, as it has little appeal to the great majority of Turks who don’t speak a word of Kurdish. With that, together with my untiring interpreter and transcriber, Vahide Gök- taş, over to Aynur… About Rewend: “I worked with my own team for this album. Including a friend, Cemil Koçgiri, who also plays tam- bura and baglama on stage with me. Kalan have just released his new album. The concept and repertoire of Rewend is entirely my initiative. We brought togeth- er all the dialects and musics of the differ- ent regions in which Kurds are living. Kurds don’t know the dialects from other regions, but there are common meanings and we tried to bring them together.”
“Apart from a song which I wrote, all the songs are traditional. We tried to fol- low the tradition of the songs and use them in their original structure. Moreover, it makes no sense to invent arrangements for the traditional songs. They’re raw. For example Ahmedo is a song sung by a dengbêj [a Kurdish bard who sings ‘long song’; in my view the most unique and extraordinary music in Anatolia, thanks to its prioritisation of timbre – including what I could call ‘foggy overtones’ – as carrier of its expressive content]. It goes just like it is. The only arrangement possible is the one made by the dengbêj.”
“I chose these songs because I love them. According to the concept of the album, we tried to go into the common meanings of Kurds who live in different regions. Most of the songs are well-known. If I sing a song from my region, Dersim, everybody there knows it. But most of these songs haven’t surfaced, haven’t been arranged and sung by the new generation before now, though they’re all well-known by the local people.”
“On this album I sing in four different Kurdish dialects: my mother dialect, Kur- manci, as well as Zazaki and Sorani, and also the Chorasan dialect of Persian [the Kurdish and Persian languages and dialects form one Indo-European language group]. Also, as I am living in Turkey, there’s a Turkish song on the album.”
“For a people which hasn’t been in control of its own destiny, its own identity, music is a way to express their emotions and souls. Traditional songs consist of their stories. People identify with and hold on to their songs, their laments, their clans. For them the best way to express them- selves is through music.”
“Culture, tradition, language as carried by dengbêjs and the clans isn’t given by anybody. We’re a fast-developing nation; you can find out what’s happening on the other side of the world in a click. The new generation faces West, and doesn’t know its own history. This generation isn’t inter- ested in its own language and culture, so we brought together the traditional songs with something like a Western approach. How can the new generation meet in the traditional songs? It’s our task.”
“Traditional songs are collected mostly in the villages where modernity hasn’t entered. Over the last 30 years, most village
Kurds have emigrated to the cities, partly because of the war. Kurds who lost their children, their family, during these years still have their traditional culture. With the exception of a few songs heard from archive recordings and records, most of the songs I sing I first heard from old people, in archives which I’ve collected. For some of them, we went to the regions and recorded them there. In Turkey, Kurdish music still hasn’t taken root. At Sony we can put the album on the international market, but nothing changes when it comes to Kurdish music, it remains outside.”
One obvious difference between Sony and Kalan is that at Kalan there’s Hasan Saltık [see fR325], a man with a strong per- sonality, with a lot to say about all records on the label.
“As Kalan is mostly working with folk music, it’s good for artists like me. I think at Sony I’m the only one making tradi- tional music. Normally traditional music is a hard genre with which to reach people, because the broadcasters are always more open to pop and rock – which Sony is mostly focused on. For my music though, Sony is better for the international side. Here I’m not under pressure to deliver a commercial album. It’s me making the album, the sound is what I choose, I work with the people I want to work with. Kalan is working much more according to the company’s initiative. For example,
“I
Hasan was mostly working as the produc- er. It’s the other reason for me to choose to work with Sony. Here I’m choosing the people, studio, sound, style with which I want to work. At Kalan, I had to be more dependent. I can say that this album is one I wanted to make. It’s very important for me that I decided the repertoire, the sound and character. It’s different from the Kalan albums. We adapted this album much more to Turkey. The base of the album is more modern. We added more drums and acoustic bass. The other albums are more traditional. In this album the songs are closer to pop. It’s a new start for me, but I forgot it after it was released last year!”
n Turkey there are no longer any album sales. For Kurdish music it’s even more difficult, there’s no space in the market. On the
TV, on the radio, at concerts, Kurdish music doesn’t figure at all. No-one wants to sponsor concerts of Kurdish music. These issues greatly affect the artists, but we’re trying to learn. We shot two videos for this album. One by Fatih Akin [the excellent, German-Turkish film-director] for a social responsibility project in Hasankeyf [the ancient Kurdish city in South East Turkey due to be largely sub- merged once the money-first, history-last Ilisu dam is completed].”
Photo:
sedatmehder.com
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