Reconsidering “Anadolu Pop”

ABSTRACT

This article is an attempt to place and analyze the multifaceted case of “Anadolu Pop,” a musical movement that originated in Turkey during late 1960s and faded away by the late 1970s. Coinciding with the folk revival and later the psychedelia movements in Western popular music, this first significant movement in the history of Turkish rock music brought together various rock music styles and the folk music of Anatolia. This fusion would also be legitimized by the ideological tendencies that were embedded within the originating ideals of the Turkish Revolution of 1920s. Such inner dynamics would bring along their own complexities.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. For the development of Arabesk music in Turkey, see Tekelioğlu.

2. Many of these developments are covered extensively in Dilmener (31–207), Meriç (155–258), and Akkaya and Çelik (7–25).

3. Barış Manço and Fikret Kızılok went to French Galatasaray High School (Taksim); Erkin Koray graduated from German Highschool (Taksim); Murat Ses – the founding member of Moğollar – from Austrian Highschool (Taksim); Cem Karaca from American Robert’s College (Beşiktaş); Mazhar and Fuat from two neighboring schools of Kadıköy/Moda, Kadıköy Anadolu Lisesi and Saint Joseph French Highschool; Cahit Berkay (of Moğollar) moved to Istanbul in his early teens and went to the prestigious Kabataş Erkek Highschool (Beşiktaş); and Selda Bağcan, although originally from Muğla, went Ankara University to study Physics Engineering.

4. Elsewhere during an interview in 1972, Cahit Berkay (of Moğollar) presents a similar definition: “Anadolu Pop is a style that combines Turkish folkloric themes, instruments and poems with the electronic capabilities and the systems of pop music” (qtd. in Hasgül 60, author’s translation). It is interesting that one does not come across such a serious pop/rock divide, which would become more strongly established later, in Turkish popular music during this era.

5. In an interview, Okay Temiz, a famous musician from the era, heavily criticized his generation’s alienation due to relying primarily on notation rather than going directly to the “folk” and experiencing the music locally (see Solmaz 30). In another interview, Cem Karaca tells how he was introduced to Turkish Folk Music while he was in military service, and heard one of the other soldiers from Anatolia playing bağlama (an Anatolian folk-lute) in the evening (Ok 73). Similarly, Tireli mentions that Erkin Koray got acquainted with the folk music of Anatolia during his military duty period (69).

6. Recording and archiving folk songs; mapping the musical terrain of Anatolia; and making compilations of transcriptions and notated anthologies in order to create a new Turkish Identity that was stripped off from its Ottoman background, formed one of the grand cultural projects of the Turkish revolution of 1920s – a project that was still a work-in-progress as of the 1960s. An important source was Muzaffer Sarısözen’s compilation books of folk songs as Yurttan Sesler (Voices from the Nation) and Seçme Köy Türküleri (Selected Village Songs). It should be noted that, since Anatolia is home to many different ethnic groups, folk songs often had similar versions in different geographies, and there were differences in terms of language as well as musical style; however, during the grand compilation project many of these differences became filtered, and their languages translated into Turkish. In other words, the “roots” themselves were getting “Turkified” as well, as part of the country’s own cultural project.

7. Today Moğollar, Barış Manço, Cem Karaca and Erkin Koray are generally considered as “the Big Four” of the Anadolu Pop era. On the other hand, Fikret Kızılok, Selda Bağcan, Edip Akbayram, Üç Hürel, Timur Selçuk, Selçuk Alagöz, and Mazhar ve Fuat were also major figures at the time, and just a few names from a much longer list of important artists who were part of the movement.

8. All that said, for starters a basic playlist from “the Big Four” can still be recommended: Moğollar’s 1971 LP Danses et Rythmes de la Turquie-d’Hier d’Aujord’hui, which won the French Academie Charles Cross prize, has a total of 17 songs, seven of which use melodies from their compiled repertoire; however, these are not simple arrangements of folk songs, but rather traditional themes that are used as compositional materials with which the group develop a psychedelic progressive sound. Cem Karaca’s most-known songs with the Apaşlar band are “Emrah” (1967), “Hudey” (1967), “Resimdeki Gözyaşları” (1968) “Tamirci Çırağı” (1968), “Namus Belası” (1968), yet his less-known 1978 LP Safinaz (considered the first Turkish “Rock Opera”) with the group Dervişan has many hidden treasures as well, reflecting Karaca’s multifaceted vocal talent. Barış Manço’s songs “Flower of Love,” “Kirpiklerin Ok Ok Eyle,” and “Kol Düğmeleri” are his most known pieces from his collaboration with Kaygısızlar in 1968. His 1970 song “Dağlar Dağlar” includes as a guest Turkish Traditional Art Music artist Cüneyd Orhon, who played the classical kemençe, whereas his first single with Kurtalan Ekspress in 1972 brings together a rock band (extended with percussion and yaylı-tanbur) with a Turkish Fasıl Ensemble (Turkish Traditional Art Music Ensemble), including a string section, kanun (Turkish zither), and Turkish clarinet. That single includes “Ölüm Allah’ın Emri” and “Gamzedeyim Deva Bulmam” a Turkish Traditional Art Music piece from the nineteenth century. His 1975 LP titled 2023, a psychedelic-progressive quasi-concept album, was one of the most experimental recordings of the era. Erkin Koray’s 1974 LP Elektronik Türküler and his 1977 LP Erkin Koray Tutkusu showcase Koray’s versatile character, ranging from his own rock-and-roll pieces (some of which are in English), to his Turkish renditions of Anglo/American as well as Middle Eastern songs, and experimentations with various genres, all molded within a distinctive psychedelic style.

9. Electro-Bağlama was a product of collaborative musical experimentations by Erkin Koray and Orhan Gencebay – one of the pioneering stars of Arabesk in Turkey – during the 1960s.

10. Iklığ is the Turkic name for the bowed-string instrument kabak-kemane; Moğollar (or “the Mongols”) preferred calling the instrument by its Turkic designation.

11. For example, “Dağlar Dağlar” by Barış Manço is similar to Uşşak Makam; “Cemalim” by Erkin Koray to Kürdi Makam; “Dadaloğlu” by Cem Karaca to Hicaz Makam; or folk songs such as “Uzun İnce Bir Yoldayım” or “Gesi Bağları” that were performed by many artists to Hüseyni Makam.

12. This is a very neglected area of analysis in Turkish popular music studies, and still open to much investigation. There are a few unpublished graduate theses that analyze the melodic structures of these works in the context of makam theory, such as those by Orhan, Alpar, Karakaya, Yılmaz and Güner. Among these analytical investigations, Güner’s research also reveals the unique approaches to the harmonizations of these melodic structures that have makam characteristics.

13. Toto Karaca is an Armenian artist; her real name is Irma Felegyan. In two recent interviews, Nurhan Damcıoğlu, a popular kanto performer of ’70s and ’80s, mentions that the first kanto performance she saw was by Toto Karaca (Cumalı; Tatlıbal).

14. Similar to “Russification” in Cushman (51–4), signifying a ‘“colonization’ of Western musical syntax by [local] linguistic and poetic conventions.”

15. Much has been already written about the cultural reforms, starting from the nineteenth-century Ottoman era to the reforms of the Turkish Revolution of 1920s and 1930s, and their consequences for Turkish society and musical culture (as discussed in Ayas; Erol; O’Connell; Özbek; Signell; Stokes; Tekelioğlu). Most of those analyses build their framework around a discussion of the development of Arabesk in Turkey, though some briefly mention Anadolu Pop as well. Here, I will give a brief summary of what has been already covered in these works, in order to build the grounds for discussing the examples I will be presenting in the following section.

16. Although there were a few exceptions, such as the 40 Yıl Sonra (40 Years Later) album by Modern Folk Üçlüsü from 1974, as well as Barış Manço’s rendition of “Gamzedeyim Deva Bulmam.” These however are exceptions within the movement.

17. There is a popular myth about the rejection of Barış Manço’s instrumental piece “Tavuklara Kışt De” due to the “obscene” sound of his electric guitar.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ozan Baysal

Ozan Baysal is a faculty member at Istanbul Technical University, Turkish Music State Conservatory, Musicology Department since 2012. His main areas of research are music analysis, music history, history of music theory, music/time perception, and temporality studies. Prior to his current position, Dr. Baysal had taught various courses in musicology, popular musicology, and music theory at different universities in Istanbul.