The archaeologist Ulrich Mania’s eye is usually trained on the ruins of ancient Pergamon. Here he records a deserted Istanbul
By Ulrich Mania | April 27, 2020
On a dark Saturday morning in March I set off on my bicycle to explore a silent, empty Istanbul. But my enthusiasm for the idea of experiencing the normally bustling districts of Taksim, Sultanahmet and Üsküdar with
no people around quickly gave way to a realisation: how difficult it is to...
The second in a series of articles on the French chanson
By John Shakespeare Dyson | April 18, 2020
This is the second part of
Mélodies, a serialised blog that is intended to keep people’s minds off their troubles while they are in isolation. Just like the first part (which was about Reynaldo Hahn), this one focusses on a composer who wrote
mélodies – French art songs – in...
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Music & Performing Arts, - Classical Music, - Musical Shares
By Kim Erkan | April 17, 2020
April 2020, Kuşadası: I was alone in Aydın when quarantine was announced. My family, concerned at my being alone, sent a driver to take me to Bird’s Island Farm, on the hills of Kuşadası, to stay wth my grandson, Alican Ozbaş, his wife, Chantal, their two small sons and my...
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Good causes, Nature
The first of a three-part series in which our music correspondent finds gentle escape in the French Chanson
By John Shakespeare Dyson | April 1, 2020
Mélodies: Debussy in Pamphylia, Fauré in Isfahan, Reynaldo Hahn in Istanbul. This new series of blogs is designed to provide a welcome distraction from for those in isolation, while at the same time introducing them to music that may be new to them and will give them pleasure. It is...
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Music & Performing Arts, - Classical Music, - Musical Shares
By Thomas Roueché | March 18, 2020
Marina Abramović is one of the world’s most famous living artists. Her iconic 2010 retrospective at MoMA in New York,
The Artist Is Present, is perhaps one of the best-known exhibitions of the past decade; one of very few that can be said to achieve such a level of fame....
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Contemporary Art
‘Creating the real out of the ideal’
By John Shakespeare Dyson | March 18, 2020
That the latest in the series of Istanbul Recitals was given is, in itself, remarkable considering… My companion and I boarded the boat that leaves Eminönü at ten past six and spent an hour watching the shores of the Bosphorus sweep by on a cloudy, overcast afternoon that was turning...
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Music & Performing Arts, - Classical Music, - Musical Shares
By John Shakespeare Dyson | March 14, 2020
On Wednesday (March 11) I attended a concert given by the Avrasya Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Rengim Gökmen, at the Zorlu Performance Arts Center. This was part of a series entitled Vestel Gururla Yerli Konserleri, organised jointly by the Performance Arts Center and ‘BKM’, which I assume stands for ‘Beşiktaş...
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Music & Performing Arts, - Classical Music, - Musical Shares
By John Shakespeare Dyson | February 29, 2020
February 20: I made my second foray into the Touché jazz club, located in the bowels of the Zorlu Center in Zincirlikuyu. The occasion was that of another concert by Gilad Atzmon, the Israeli saxophonist I'd seen in January 2019 – when he was accompanied by Sarp Maden on guitar,...
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Music & Performing Arts, - Jazz, - Musical Shares
By John Scott | February 29, 2020
This perfectly formed exhibition is a fitting tribute to the influential art historian Marcell Restle. Staged by ANAMED and the University of Vienna's Digital Research Archive for Byzantium (DiFaB) – and happily extended to April 5 – the show at ANAMED's Merkez Han on İstiklal Caddesi offers a beguiling portrait...
By John Shakespeare Dyson | February 26, 2020
The Istanbul Recitals series continued on February 14 with a concert by violinist Soyoung Yoon (photo: soyoungyoon.com) and pianist Mario Häring (photo: Stephan-Röhl) at The Seed in Emirgan. Like last month’s recital by the cellist Alexander Chaushian, this one featured a stringed instrument – though this time with piano accompaniment....
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Music & Performing Arts, - Classical Music, - Musical Shares
The Istanbul Art and Antiques Fair is back, and a good thing too
By Cornucopia Connoisseur | February 22, 2020
Back in the naughty 90s, the Istanbul antiques fair was a highlight of the Istanbul arts calendar. Çigdem Simavi's Küsav foundation served up a brilliant blend of high art and high society, most memorably in the Armoury of Yıldız Palace. It was a mix of the flash and the famous,...
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Contemporary Art, Fine Art
By Lauren | February 20, 2020
Photograph by Ara Güler There are two exciting opportunities for Turkish artists and musicians who wish to study and develop their performance and creative skills this summer. The Berklee College of Music is hosting <b>Aspire: Five-Week Music Performance Intensive</b> from 11 July to 14 August 2020. From one-on-one instruction with...
By John Shakespeare Dyson | February 5, 2020
The latest in the Istanbul Recitals series at The Seed, the concert hall attached to the Sakıp Sabancı Museum in Emirgan, featured a solo cellist – quite a departure from the usual run of pianists, pianists and more pianists. Ms Nazan Ceylan, the co-organiser (with Mr Mehmet Şükûn) of these...
The superb sensitivity of Finghin Collins
By John Shakespeare Dyson | January 5, 2020
© Mateusz Zahora, courtesy Istanbul Recitals The third of the season’s Istanbul Recitals was given by the Irish pianist Finghin Collins at The Seed, the concert hall attached to the Sakıp Sabancı Museum in Emirgan, on December 20, 2019. After the previous recital, I frankly did not hold out...
Nikolai Demidenko at the Istanbul Recitals
By John Shakespeare Dyson | November 24, 2019
© Marco Boggreve, Courtesy Istanbul Recitals The second of the season’s Istanbul Recitals was given last Friday by the Russian pianist Nikolai Demidenko at The Seed, in Emirgan (photograph by Natalie Lafranchi). And what a contrast to the previous performer, Valentina Lisitsa! Where Ms Lisitsa was flamboyant, Mr Demidenko was...
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Music & Performing Arts, - Classical Music, - Musical Shares
A new book from France on Istanbul’s ‘Latin Quarter’
By Rose Shepherd | November 10, 2019
Just a day before the long-anticipated opening of the spectacular new Arter in Dolapdere – relocated from its original home on bustling İstiklâl Caddesi – a French-language book,
Istanbul Rive Gauche, by Timour Muhidine, hit the bookstores, a timely reminder, should we need one, that Istanbul’s subversive Left Bank has...
By John Shakespeare Dyson | November 2, 2019
© M. Boggreve, courtesy Istanbul Recitals And so the new season gets under way in the Istanbul music scene.
Hayırlı olsun (‘May it be productive of good’ – and no broken fingers, cracked clarinets, or wrecked pianos.) 2020 is a real snorter of a year from the astrological point of...
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Music & Performing Arts, - Classical Music, - Musical Shares
By John Scott | October 20, 2019
Koranic Instruction, signed and dated Osman Hamdy Bey 1890, is the latest painting by unmistakable Orientalist, pupil of Gerome and founder of the Istanbul Archaeological Museum to come to auction In London in the past few weeks. The estimate is £3–5 million. The setting, meticulously drawn, is the Yeşil Cami...
The Wandering Ney, by Drake Mabry
By Lauren Davis | October 5, 2019
Two new albums of original compositions adapted for the ney have been released by musician Drake Mabry. Mabry studied under the famed neyzen and teacher İsmail Hakkı. The ney, a end-blown long reed flute, has a long history that spans at least 3000 years and is a traditional component of...
By Cornucopia | September 29, 2019
In a recent BBC radio programme,
Istanbul's Factory of Tears, Isabel Finkel examines the story of Arabesk, kitsch, melancholy, popular, sad. Strongly recommended.
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Music & Performing Arts, Talks and Lectures
