Ahmet Adnan Saygun's publications on ethnomusicology caught the interest of Béla Bartók, who traveled with Saygun in Southern Anatolia to transcribe folk music.
Composer Biography
Ahmet Adnan Saygun, a Turkish composer, translated numerous harmony and counterpoint textbooks from French to Turkish by the age of 15.
Composer's Artistic Vision
Atatürk, the president of Turkey, believed that the lack of polyphony in Ottoman-influenced Turkish art music symbolized cultural stagnancy and had a 'depressive effect' on the population.
Performer Biography
Ellen Jewett, the violinist on this album, was a member of the prize-winning Audubon Quartet for eleven years, which was critically acclaimed by The New York Times.
Composer Biography
Ahmet Adnan Saygun, a Turkish composer, studied in Paris from 1928 to 1931 and became one of the first composers in Turkey to work in a Western classical style.
Compositional Technique
Saygun's Violin Partita, Op. 36, incorporates folk elements often expressed by melodies built on a fourth, which is the tuning of the kemence, a Turkish fiddle.
Historical Context
Following the War of Independence in 1923, Turkey's president Atatürk initiated a modernization and nation-building effort, emphasizing 'Turkishness' and disassociating from Ottoman influences in language and music.
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