Ottoman Empire on Music Theory Print

Haig Gudenian

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Hayk Kyutenyan (Armenian: Հայկ Կիւտէնեան), anglicized as Haig Gudenian (19 May 1885 – 12 May 1972), was an Armenian American violinist, composer, and author. He left his home city of Constantinople in 1904 and went to western Europe where he studied music and violin under Vítězslav Novák, Otakar Sevcik, César Thomson, and Mathieu Crickboom. Playing a rare 18th-century Spanish violin in his concert performances, he was known for his virtuoso skill as a violinist, and for introducing Middle Eastern music, especially that of Anatolia and the Caucasus, to European and American audiences; almost all of his numerous compositions were inspired by the diverse cultural heritage of the region. Among his compositions are works such as “The Armenian Shepherd”, “Armenian Love Song”, and “The Arabian Boy”, that depict the lives and ideals of the Armenian people. Violinists Jascha Heifetz and Max Rosen, as well as pianist Percy Grainger, included various works of his in their repertoires. Early years Born in the city of Kayseri (Caesarea) in the Ottoman Empire, Gudenian attended the Turkish University of Constantinople, then moved to Brussels in 1904, where he studied violin under César Thomson a

Hammamizade İsmail Dede Efendi

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Hammamizade İsmail Dede Efendi (9 January 1778 – 29 November 1846) was a composer of Ottoman classical music. Biography He was born on 9 January 1778, at Şehzadebaşı-Fatih in Istanbul, and started studying music with Mehmed Emin Efendi, at the age of eight. He attended rituals and learned to play the ney at the Yenikapı Mevlevihanesi, a place of Mevlevi dervish gatherings. He studied with Ali Nutki Dede and became a “Dede” himself in 1799. Dede Efendi’s music was appreciated by Sultan Selim III and he performed his works at the palace. He composed hundreds of songs and mevlevi rituals. In 1846 he made the pilgrimage to Mecca but contracted cholera in Mina and died. His grave is now in Mecca. His music Dede Efendi gave lessons in Turkish music to Hamparsum Limonciyan who developed the Hamparsum notation, the dominant notation for Turkish music. One of the greatest Turkish composers, he created masterpieces in all forms and modes of Turkish music. He also developed the composite musical modes of “sultanî yegâh”, “nev-eser”, “saba-buselik”, “hicaz-buselik” and “araban kürdî”. His greatest works are the seven Mevlevi pieces for Samah. More than two hundred of his compositions are avail

Hampartsoum Limondjian

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Hampartsoum Limondjian (; 1768 – 29 June 1839) was an Ottoman Armenian composer of Armenian church, inclined to composition of classical music and Ottoman classical music. He was a musical theorist who developed the “Hamparsum” notation system used as the main music notation for Western Armenian and Ottoman classical music until the 20th-century introduction of European notation systems, and is still in use by the Armenian Apostolic Church. Limondjian was referred to as Baba Hamparsum (Father Hampartsoum) in Ottoman imperial court music circles. The name Համբարձում, transliterated as Hampartsoum in Western Armenian or Hambardzum in Eastern Armenian, means “ascension”. Biography Early life Hampartsoum Limondjian was born in 1768 on Çukur Street in the Pera (Beyoğlu) district of Istanbul. His father Sarkis and his mother Gaderina, who had recently moved to Istanbul from Harput, were poor, and could only send their son to primary school. After primary school, Limondjian started working for a tailor. His love for music was eminent, and as a kid, Limondjian started attending Armenian churches where he received his music lessons for free. Marriage and children Hampartsoum Limondjian marr

Hasan Rashid

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Hasan Ahmad Rashid (: also spelled Hassan Rasheed; July 10, 1896 – May 25, 1969) was an Egyptian composer and operatic baritone. He was part of Egypt’s first generation of classical composers. Biography As a youth, Rashid studied violin and singing in Cairo. He went to England in 1914 to pursue studies in agriculture at Durham University. While there, he continued his studies in violin, composition, and singing, occasionally performing in University concerts as a violinist and a baritone. He returned to Cairo in 1918 where he began to compose vocal music to Arabic texts. He was part of that nation’s first generation of composers to produce classical music. Rashid’s work culminated in his sole opera Masra’ Antonio (Antony’s Death), which has an Arabic text, based on the first part of Ahmed Shawqi’s play Cleopatra’s Death. The work was influenced by Italian opera, yet Rashid’s melodic invention is not without originality. It is the first opera to be composed by an Egyptian. Parts of the work were produced in 1942, but a full staging was not mounted until 1973 by the Egyptian Opera Troupe at the Cairo Opera House. However, the Egyptian public found it difficult to accept the conventio

Koharik Gazarossian

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Koharik Alis Gazarossian (Goharik Alis Łazarosian, ) (21 December 1907 – 29 October 1967) was an Armenian composer and pianist. She was born in Constantinople (Istanbul) and entered the Paris Conservatory in 1926 where she studied with Paul Dukas and Lazare Lévy. After completing her studies, she performed as a concert pianist in Europe and worked as a composer. She died in Paris. Life Koharik Alis Gazarossian was born on 21 December 1907 in Istanbul. was an Armenian composer and pianist. She studied the piano with Professor Hege as a child, and composing with Edgar Manas and Rudolph Leibovitch. Works Gazarossian composed piano, chamber and vocal works, and often incorporated liturgical or folk songs into her compositions. 3 pieces for violin and piano: *“O fille ta mere est morte” (O girl! Your mother is dead), a slow funeral moody piece announcing to the young lady that her mother died. *“La lune de la nuit” (The moon at night) *“O fille ton nom est Chuchan” ( O girl! Your name is Chouchan), a very vivid Armenian dance. References

Komitas

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Soghomon Soghomonian, ordained and commonly known as Komitas (; 8 October 186922 October 1935), was an Ottoman-Armenian priest, musicologist, composer, arranger, singer, and choirmaster, who is considered the founder of the Armenian national school of music. He is recognized as one of the pioneers of ethnomusicology. Orphaned at a young age, Komitas was taken to Etchmiadzin, Armenia’s religious center, where he received education at the Gevorgian Seminary. Following his ordination as vardapet (celibate priest) in 1895, he studied music at the Frederick William University in Berlin. He thereafter “used his Western training to build a national tradition”. He collected and transcribed over 3,000 pieces of Armenian folk music, more than half of which were subsequently lost with only around 1,200 now extant. Besides Armenian folk songs, he also showed interest in other cultures and in 1903 published the first-ever collection of Kurdish folk songs titled Kurdish melodies. His choir presented Armenian music in many European cities, earning the praise of Claude Debussy, among others. Komitas settled in Constantinople in 1910 to escape mistreatment by ultra-conservative clergymen at Etchmia

Kristo Kono

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Kristo Kono (17 July 1907 – 22 January 1991) was an Albanian composer and recipient of the People’s Artist title in 1961, the highest artistic recognition title during the communist era. He was one of the early contributors to Albanian music and opera who spent all his life in their service; one of the symbols of the cultural traditions of his hometown of Korçë, same as other musicians as Tefta Tashko-Koço, Jorgjia Truja, and Kristaq Antoniu; Early life and work Kono was born on 22 January 1907 in Korçë, back then still part of the Ottoman Empire, today’s southeastern Albania. His interest in music showed up at a very early age. He followed the “Vatra” orchestral band in order to learn how to play the clarinet. In the 1920s he would start to compose songs and small instrumental parts. Rise as a composer After World War II, Kono’s artistic creativity intensified. He went deeper in the study of folk songs and patriotic songs. His big jump in fame came with the composition of major choral and instrumental works: instrumental poems and cantata. They were the first of their kind in Albania. The best known were the instrumental poems Borova (Borova) and Labëria (Labëria), and the cantata

Lorenc Antoni

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Lorenc Antoni (23 September 1909 – 21 October 1991) was an Albanian composer, conductor, and ethnomusicologist. Early years Lorenc Antoni was born on 23 September 1909 in Üsküp (now Skopje), in the Kosovo Vilayet of the Ottoman Empire (present-day North Macedonia). Three years later, the region with which we would be associated for the rest of his life came to be first part of the Kingdom of Serbia and later Yugoslavia. He was raised as a Catholic in the Albanian Catholic community of Skopje, and is the cousin of Agnesë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu (Mother Teresa). Since a child, he was active in various musical ensembles of the Albanians. He studied music privately in Skopje and Belgrade. After completing his education at the Faculty of Philosophy in Skopje, he relocated to Ferizaj. Career In 1941 Antoni began teaching music in Ferizaj, Prizren, and Pristina. In 1948 Antoni established in Prizren one of the Josip Slavenski music schools of former Yugoslavia for beginners and intermediate music performers. He led and conducted the choir of the school. He also conducted the Symphony Orchestra of the city of Prizren. In the study of folklore, Antoni wrote a seven-volume work on Albanian folk musi

Mohammed Abdel Wahab

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Mohammed Abdel Wahab (), ; 13 March 1902 – 4 May 1991), was an Egyptian singer and actor best known for his romantic and Egyptian patriotic songs. He was known for his Egyptian nationalist and Arab nationalist and revolutionary songs like “O Egypt, Happiness Is Here”, “The Call of Duty”, “The Greatest Homeland”, “The Rising Generation”, “Egypt Called Us and We Have Answered”, “Tell Egypt”, “Patriotism Is My Obligation”, “Voice of the Masses”, “O Breeze of Freedom”, and “Arms from My Country”. He also composed the national anthem of Libya, which was adopted from 1951 to 1969, and again since 2011. in a neighborhood called Bab El-Sheriyah, where there is now a statue of him. He began his singing career at an early age and made his first public performances at age seven at local productions. He was 13 when he made his first recording. Mohamed Abdel Wahab was a very close friend to compatriot singer Abdel Halim Hafez. Film career In 1933, Abdel Wahab began composing his own style of Egyptian film musical after visiting Paris and familiarizing himself with French musical film. He introduced a lighthearted genre of musical film to Egyptian culture eventually composing eight musical comed

Necil Kazım Akses

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Necil Kazım Akses (6 May 1908 – 16 February 1999) was a Turkish classical composer. Life Akses studied music and composition at the Musikakademie in Vienna with Joseph Marx and at the Prague Conservatory in Prague with Josef Suk and Alois Hába. He helped co-found the Ankara State Conservatory with the composer Paul Hindemith and served as director of the institution for a while. Together with Cemal Reşit Rey, Ulvi Cemal Erkin, Ahmet Adnan Saygun, and Hasan Ferit Alnar, Akses belonged to a group called The Turkish Five, who were the first Turkish composers to adapt their homeland’s musical tradition to the techniques of Western classical composition. (Their name alluded to the Russian Five.) In 1949, Akses entered the service of the Turkish state. He worked as the Turkish cultural attaché in Bern and Bonn, among other posts. Akses composed orchestral works, chamber music, and pieces for piano. His most famous work is his Violin Concerto (1969). Works Operas * Mete, opera in one act. Libretto: Yaşar Nabi Nayır (1933) * Bay önder, opera in one act. Libretto: Münir Hayri Egeli (1934). (First performance: 27 December 1934-Ankara-Conductor: Adnan Saygun) * Timur, opera in four acts. Libr

Palokë Kurti

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Palokë Kurti (1858–1920) was an Albanian composer, performer, and singer. A native of Shkodër, he was a musical amateur who composed the Unity of Albania March (Bashkimi Shqipnis) in 1881. Kurti took his first piano lessons from the Italian musician Giovanni Canale. During his youth he was in contact with the aheng groups from which he learned their way of singing and also how to compose verses in the bejtexhi style. He joined the Shkodra band in 1878 and two years later became its bandmaster. After the Bashkimi Shqipnis March he also composed several marches, polkas and mazurkas in the Mittel-Europa tradition. However the compositions related to national music are the ones that will make him important in the history of the music of Albania. Kurti composed two potpourris on Shkodrane urban popular songs called “The Musical Entertainment of our Forefathers”, the second of which is in F Major. In this potpourri he uses an entirely diatonic modal language and a tonal harmony (unlike in Potpourri 1 which uses non-diatonic modes of the makam type). According to Koço he is doing this on purpose so that the local music was purged of Oriental sounds, but sounded more Western. Kurti compose

Petros Peloponnesios

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Petros Peloponnesios (“Peter the Peloponnesian”) or Peter the Lampadarios (c. 1735 – 1778) was a cantor, composer and teacher of Byzantine and Ottoman music. He served as second domestikos between his arrival about 1764 until the death of Ioannes Trapezountios, and it is assumed that he became lampadarios (leader of the left choir) between 1770 and 1778 at the Great Church of Constantinople, after Daniel the Protopsaltes became Archon Protopsaltes. Large parts of the monodic chant sung in several current traditions of Orthodox Chant are transcriptions of his compositions. He wrote these as a teacher of the “New Music School of the Patriarchate”. Life Petros was born at Tripolis, Rumelia Eyalet between 1730 and 1740. According to Georgios Papadopoulos he was educated in monastic communities of Smyrna. In 1764 he came to Constantinople to study with Ioannes Trapezountios, the Archon Protopsaltes, while Daniel like Ioannes student of Panagiotes Halacoğlu was Lampadarios at the Great Church of Constantinople. Petros could serve there as second domestikos who was usually in charge to notate the versions sung by the cantors with the higher ranks. Between 1770 and 1778 he served as lampad

Schahan Berberian

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Schahan R. Berberian (; 1 January 1891 – 9 October 1956) was an Armenian philosopher, composer, and psychologist. Biography Early years Berberian was born in Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey). Shortly thereafter, along with his parents Retheos and Zaruhi and his elder brother Onnig, Berberian moved to Geneva, Switzerland to escape the atrocities against the Armenians perpetrated by the Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II from 1894 to 1896. Returning to Constantinople, Berberian enrolled at the Berberian School, which had been founded by his father Reteos Berberian, in Kadıköy, a district on the Asian side of the city. At that time, he started taking private lessons on the violin, but soon quit playing the “insufferable instrument” (allegedly throwing it into the fireplace to burn it). Instead he took up piano lessons although this venture was also rather unsuccessful. Berberian graduated in 1906. The first job of the fifteen-year-old young man was to teach literature and natural sciences at his alma mater but in 1908, he left for Paris where he studied at the Sorbonne and the Collège de France, taking classes in philosophy and metaphysics with Henri Bergson, psychology with Georges D

Sirvart Kalpakyan Karamanuk

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Sirvart Kalpakyan Karamanuk (; 1 December 1912 – 20 October 2008) was an Armenian composer, pianist and teacher, living in Istanbul. Early life Karamanuk was born in the Üsküdar district of Constantinople, Ottoman Empire. She began studying the piano at the age of five with Stepan Papelyan, and later graduated from the Istanbul Municipal Conservatory (now Istanbul University State Conservatory) in 1939, where her principal teacher was Ferdi Statzer. She also took classes with Cemal Reşit Rey, Ahmet Adnan Saygun and Licco Amar in music theory, history and chamber music. Subsequently, Karamanuk took private lessons in piano with Lazare Lévy and composition with Jean Roger-Ducasse for a short period. Career Karamanuk composed numerous songs, choral works, large-scale compositions for chorus and orchestra (Akhtamar and The Song of Bedros Tourian), a children’s operetta (Tomorrow’s Artists), children’s songs, piano compositions, and arrangements of liturgical chants. Her works have been performed in several countries and recorded by distinguished soloists and ensembles. Concerts devoted entirely to her compositions have been organised in Yerevan’s Aram Khachaturian House-Museum and Aram

Suphi Ezgi

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Mehmet Suphi Ezgi (1869 – 12 April 1962) was an Ottoman-born Turkish military physician who specialized in neurology, and a musician, musicologist and composer. He is best known for his studies of Ottoman classical music. ,

Tigran Chukhajian

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Tigran Chukhajian (; ; 1837 – March 11, 1898) was an Ottoman Armenian composer and conductor, and the founder of the first opera institution in the Ottoman Empire. Biography Tchouhadjian was born in Constantinople. He studied at composer Gabriel Yeranian’s class, then had classes in Milan. Along with other Armenian intellectuals of that period he fought for the development of national culture, organized Armenian musical societies, theatres, schools, papers and free concerts. In 1862, he took over publication of the Armenian musical journal Armenian Lyre.In his works, Tchouhadjian used the elements of European musical techniques and eastern music elements He is an author of pieces for piano, songs and romances, chamber and symphonic works, operas. His most successful opera was Leblebici hor-hor agha (1875), it was premiered at the French Theatre in Constantinople, it was so successful that during the season it was performed more than hundred times and during the month Ramadan it was performed every single night (Zemire, 1890) etc. He died in Smyrna (now İzmir). Chukhajian is buried in the Armenian cemetery of İzmir. He created the first Armenian opera, Arshak II (1868, partially sta

Wasif Jawhariyyeh

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Wasif Jawhariyyeh (; 14 January 1897 – 1972) was a Palestinian composer, oud player, poet and chronicler. He is known for his memoirs, The Diaries of Wasif Jawhariyyeh, that spans over six decades from 1904 to 1968, covering Jerusalem’s turbulent modern history, including four regimes and five wars. British Member of Parliament Layla Moran is his great-granddaughter. Biography Early life Wasif Jawhariyyeh was born to Jiryis and Hilana Barakat on 14 January 1897 in Jerusalem. The Jawhariyyeh’s practised Eastern Orthodox Christianity. His father was an active member of their community, as a member of Jerusalem’s municipal council and served for a time as tax assessor. He would later pursue a career as a silk farmer, cafe proprietor, skilled icon maker. He also was an amateur musician. His father, Jiryis (Girgis), was the mukhtar of the Eastern Orthodox community in the Old City (1884) and a member of Jerusalem’s municipal council, serving under the Mayors Salim al-Husseini and Faidy al-Alami. Trained as a lawyer he was well versed in Muslim Shari’ law and commanded several languages, including Greek, Turkish and Arabic. He worked briefly as a government tax assessor, but later turned

Yusef Greiss

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Yusef Greiss (; (December 13, 1899 – April 7, 1961) was an Egyptian composer of classical music, part of that nation’s first generation of such composers. Greiss was of Coptic heritage. He composed orchestral works and chamber music. His patriotic work for orchestra entitled Masr (1932) is considered the first orchestral piece composed by an Egyptian. As of 2008, the Egyptian musicologist Haig Avakian is editing and preparing Greiss’s complete works for publication. Performance Solo violin and piano compositions are major parts in Greise’s compositions. He wrote 23 solo piano compositions, 14 solo violin three solo flute, six lyrical compositions with piano, and 10 orchestra compositions. Works First: Solo piano compositions * The Sudanese, 1932 * Nile Boatman, 1932 * La Galerien, 1932 * Good Luck, 1932 * A Boat Burns, 1932 * How Are You, 1932 * Truth, 1932 * Little Palestinian, 1932 * Happiness, 1932 * A Night in the Boat, 1945 Second: Solo violin compositions * The Bedouin No. 1931 of 1932 * The Egyptian Village, No. 22 of 1932 * Dance of the Palm Valley * Souvenir, No. 25 of 1932. * Son of the Valley, 1943 * Bedouin Singing, 1944 * Company of the Nile, 1944 * Desert Songs, 1944