Resistance and Adoption Towards Written Music at The Crossroads of Modernity - Gradual Passage To Notation in Turkish Makam Music

A. Ergur – N.
Doğrusöz: Resistance and Adoption towards IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174

Written Music at the Crossroads of Modernity:
Gradual Passage to Notation in Turkish Makam Music
Ali Ergur2 – Nilgün

Doğrusöz3
Resistance and Adoption
Galatasaray University
Ortaköy
towards Written Music Çıraǧan Cd No: 36
34349 ISTANBUL
at the Crossroads of Turkey
E-mail: aergur@gsu.edu.tr
Modernity: Gradual Passage UDC: 781.24  7.033.3.9
to Notation in Turkish Original Scientific Paper
Izvorni znanstveni rad
Makam Music1 Received: April 23, 2014
Primljeno: 23. travnja 2014.
Accepted: March 18, 2015
Prihvaćeno: 18. ožujka 2015.
Abstract - Résumé
Turkish makam music was
at its origins, an orally
123 transmitted, learned and
performed tradition. The
Introduction passage to written music
started a hot debate that
Music is a sound world of significations that caused a sharp division
among musicians, between
actors attribute to its specific social context. In this the defenders of the meşk
conception, music acquires a status of polysemic system and those who are
for writing both the contem-
language as socio-cultural phenomenon, which porary works and the older
inserts into it a symbolic function. (Green, 2006: 202) ones. We analyze this
apparently technical issue
Adorno stresses that music without signification, a as a sign of modernization
»phenomenological coherence of the tones would in Turkey. The rising need
resemble to an acoustic kaleidoscope.« Nevertheless to write music and to
consume written music
the opposite side, the fixing of signification on have been considered, in
specific musical units would mean the end of the our view, as explicit manifes-
tations of modern attitudes
music, even of the musicality. (Adorno, 2002: 114) related to rationalization
Besides the part of the production of social abstrac- and standardization. We
tions, musical symbolism begins with its codifica- stress that the evolution of
the Turkish makam music
tion in its own ontology, through technical reveals a series of indica-
standardizations that can appear in written or tions for situating
modernization in Turkey.
Keywords: Turkey
1 • modernity • Turkish
This article is an outcome of the project 15.502.001 sup- music • Ottoman music
ported by the Scientific Research Fund of Galatasaray University. • makam music •
modernization in music
2
Professor, Galatasaray University, Department of Sociology.
3
Professor, Istanbul Technical University, Turkish Music • written music •
Conservatory. cultural change
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A. Ergur – N. Doğrusöz: Resistance and Adoption towards
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
unwritten forms. Music need not to appear in written forms in order to transmit
significations through sounds. Nevertheless writing seems to be a rising need as
a culture modernizes. As Western Europe began to move toward an industrial
society starting in the fifteenth century, a variety of measures became standardized
along the way. Music and its technical tools have gradually rationalized through
well-calculated and spatially expanded standards. This was a natural conse-
quence of two principal disembedding mechanisms of the modernity at institutional
level: (1) The proliferation of symbolic tokens into the everyday life; and (2) recon-
struction of the social on expert systems. (Giddens, 1992: 22) Money plays a crucial
role in such a transformation of human relations through a comprehensive insti-
tutionalization of the value, which continuously converts them into anonymous
exchanges, due to symbolic token’s (money) ontology that is structurally inde-
pendent from the essence of things that it valorizes. (Simmel, 1999: 116) Just as
currency and measurements such as distance, time, and weight became
standardized, the technical components of music have also been standardized.
The diatonic scale system, codified in the seventeenth century, became a matter of
convention. Although most of the critics of the Turkish modernization ascribe
modernity to a European or Western project, similar sociological developments
have been observed in Ottoman Empire and republican Turkey, even if the
historical dynamics were quite different. Indeed the Ottoman society experienced
a modernization process from early eighteenth century onward. During the
second half of the eighteenth and the entire nineteenth centuries, two opposing
forces were observed in Ottoman society: at the same time that state political
power was dramatically declining, cultural change and institutional renovation
were also in play. Especially in urban areas, modern life forms emerged.
As it has been the case in Western Europe, music also has been subject to a
rationalization process. According to Weber, notation is one of the most salient
characteristics of the rationalization in Western Europe. Weber notes that notation
is not exclusive to Western music. Different cultures have made use of some
notation systems, yet either they remained technically limited, or they vanished
because historical forces annihilated them. The growth of polyphonic music in
Europe necessitated the development of a system to communicate a polyphonic
musical conception began to rise, as a projection of slowly growing commercial
logic, the systematic need to express nuances and the indispensability of fixed
pitches, scales, durations, accents, etc. as well as musical nuances. Thus, for prac-
tical reasons, ‘measured notation’ was progressively expanded. (Weber, 1998:
117-121)
Although the historical path of the modernization in Turkish Makam music
did not follow the same socio-economic steps, a similar rationalization process
took place from the 18th century on. Besides the hidden temperament of the
sound system, other signs of a significant change have been observed since that
time. The reduction or simplification of rhythmic patterns is a stunning indicator
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A. Ergur – N. Doğrusöz: Resistance and Adoption towards IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
of such a technical change, which in fact represents a more comprehensive social

one that animated it. Although, rhythmic patterns (usûl-s) have been played more
slowly, a contradictory movement accompanied this transformation: the melodic
expression became denser than its older forms, in order to fill this musical void,
creating more virtuosic compositions, instead of emphasizing the repetitive
character of the melody. (Feldman, 2002: 122-128) There again, we observe that,
through modernization, the simplification of some basic forms or tools of expres-
sion enabled the emergence of individuality and originality as artistic and popu-
lar qualities. Thus agility in musical performance, as well as in composition was
given precedence, particularly up to the end of 18th century. Similarly, the passage
to written music has been one of the most significant signs of modernity. Since
then, different systems of notation have been used to write music, and to record
musical heritage. While both the formal music education system and a majority of
traditional composers and performers still support written music and music
literacy, debates around the idea of writing in makam music still perpetuate.
Today, makam music, is known rather under the ambiguous (because ever chang-
ing) and popular title Turkish Art Music, fulfilling a nostalgia-value (Stokes, 1997:
682) in the historical imaginations of its performers as well as followers. In this
article, we argue that such a decontextualization of this traditional art is a tendency
to modernity, instead of a rupture with it, given that a modern worldview is not
a historically, culturally and conceptually fixed phenomenon. This is the reason
why we preferred to follow the traces of modernization as a cross-cultural and
cross-temporal sociological fact. We try, in this article, to point out that the passage
to written music in makam tradition is a sign of modernity, and interpret the
musicological evidence in a more multidisciplinary perspective to refute a clichéd
point of view, while trying to place it in a more dialectical axis.
The question of passage to written music in Ottoman context has already
been studied by some scholars. In an essential article of comprehensive scope,
Ayangil presents historical initiatives of writing Ottoman makam music in the
Western system, together with an analysis of their musicological functions
according to musicians of the time. (Ayangil, 2008) Although this study furnishes
a substantial framework for all further studies around the same topic, its method-
ology emphasizes musicological and technical aspects of the passage to written
music, rather than the underlying sociological causalities. From a social scientist
perspective, Karakayalı constructs a meaningful and useful comparison between
the historical trajectories of West European and Ottoman musical life, for indicat-
ing the contextual character of each knowledge-engendering and technology-
creating milieu (‘assemblage’ as a sum of incessantly connected actors acting
rather as ‘mediators’, following Latour’s thesis [Latour, 2010: 189-191]). Instead of
taking Western notation tradition as an essential a priori, he presents it as an ideo-
logical operation of the standardizing forces mobilized by centralizing political
authority, in both the Carolingian reign in 8th and 9th centuries, and by the
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IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
reformist era of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the 18th century. Although
Karakayalı evaluates the Ottoman experience in a comparative sociological
perspective, he rather emphasizes the link between the political power and the
transformation of cultural assets. (Karakayalı, 2010) Our study, while drawing on
these approaches, insists on the correlation between the modernization process as
a sociological fact and the motivations of musicians to adopt or to resist written
music. We thus show how the adoption of some techniques and values depend on
the rising social demands as well as political will.
As a methodological choice, we preferred to write names of persons or
technical terms in contemporary Turkish language (e.g. makam instead of
maqam). Although we believe that the most correct form of a personal name is its
formulation in the original language and alphabet, we are debating here some
topics not as pure musicological facts, but rather their perception or conceptual-
ization in the socio-political sphere of Turkey, and in the cross perspective of
several disciplines. Nevertheless by following Turkish wording, we tried to respect
original language’s pronunciation (e.g. Hampartzum instead of its currently used
Turkish saying Hamparsum), and if necessary to write with extra-Turkish word-
ing for the letters or sounds that do not exist in Turkish alphabet (e.g. Christos
instead of Hristos). We also gathered all the technical terms and names of persons
in the Glossary presented at the end of the article, which gives both the Turkish
spelling and its English pronunciation. We preferred to use the word ‘Hellenic’
instead of ‘Greek’ for several reasons. The identification of contemporary Greek
language with the ancient Greek culture is a doubtful and confusing expression,
which is more ideological than technical and linguistic.4 We are aware that this
linguistic deviation is a gift of the 19th century modern and nationalist point of
view for both Western Europe and Turkey, together with a Euro-centric revivalist
tendency that adjusted its historical and ideological genealogy to reflect ancient
Greek civilization. Thus we preferred to use the word ‘Hellenic’, at least for the
language, and ‘Rum’ for Greek people of Turkey today as well as in Ottoman era.
Written Music as Sign of Modernization
The concept of ‘modern’ has been identified, in social sciences as well as in

other domains of the everyday life, exclusively with the ‘new’, ‘original’, ‘actual’
and ‘progressive’. While these words may be attributes of ‘modern’ they do not
completely define the term. As a much profound concept, modern, at least in the
4
The problem becomes much more complicated in the Turkish context, where words ‘Grek’,
‘Yunan’, ‘Rum’, ‘Elen’, (even ‘Greek’ directly borrowed from English in pronunciation as well as in
writing) coexist in a desperately confused manner. Finally the inhabitants of the actual Greece call
themselves as ‘Ellines’ (Έλληνες) people and their country as ‘Ellada’ (Ελλάδα).
148
limits of sociology, corresponds to a world view based particularly on a secular

conception of life. Modern culture which ontologically promotes individualism is
considered a release from the care of an order or of the Church. (Simmel, 2010:
702) With the progressive rise of capitalism in Western Europe, since the 13th
century, the logic of the feudal social organization was gradually replaced by a
commercial reasoning in every field of the social action. Feudal relations necessi-
tate a strictly established set of social statuses and roles, organized around an
agricultural division of labor, which implies a general immobility of social classes
and means of production. Capitalist activity, on the contrary, needs a dynamic
and variable social action, in the search for ever-gliding and spatio-temporally
unfixed profit. In the world of agricultural societies, standards are assured by
imposing and coercive traditions, which progressively become less normative
cultural heritage, instead of being mechanisms of social order. Commercial
activity engenders an instrumentally simplified life organization, while its
constituents become multiplied and diversified, through which different social
forces evolve into conflicts and articulate opposite socio-economic dynamics.
Consequently, progress is the fundamental principle that animates such a moving
social milieu. Although emerging in a variety of economical and historical
circumstances, the need to put into writing what was once expressed as oral form
seems to be an ineluctable phase in the evolution of societies. (Escarpit, 1993: 15)
In other words, when social life becomes too complex, and the elements of a
system are so diversified that it becomes impossible to assure their constant inter-
connection, its material and immaterial means are systematically simplified, from
the industrial organization to the cultural expressions. (Luhmann, 1995: 24)
Modernity develops thus, after the formation of a secular life conception, a stand-
ardization process that functions according to the rational measurement of the
nature, and not the traditional, cyclic, unprogressive regime of knowledge. In
such circumstances, record becomes an important need to organize social life
through a precise system of redistribution of resources. For example, particularly
from 15th century on, the utility of the (Latin) alphabet played a major role in the
proliferation of writing throughout Western Europe, in parallel to the rise of a
capitalistic conception of the world, giving it a status of virtue. (Christin, 2001: 25)
Therefore numerical precision, calculated behavior and exactitude emerge as
characteristics of the modern attitude. (Sombart, 1928: 19) Thus written culture
characterizes one of the most important pillars of modernity. Indeed the prolif-
eration of printing was a precondition for the standardization of information in
15th century. According to Barthes, writing is the source of freedom, nevertheless,
since it serves to concretize memories of a certain period or context, it is always
historically anchored. More precisely, writing is situated between freedom and
remembering, thus between change and fixity. (Barthes, 1972: 18-19) In Derrida’s
terms, the rise of the writing can also be interpreted as a dissimulation of the natural
presence of the meaning, which in turn generates an intrinsic violence in the soul as
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IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
unconsciousness. (Derrida, 1992: 55) As virtue or as violence, writing accomplished,

at least in the history of Western Europe’s modernity, a crucial role to fix, and
therefore standardize meanings, facilitating a maximum of capitalist profit.
As for the music, without standardization, which meant essentially a passage
to written expressions, there would certainly be no integration of spatial and
temporal units, therefore a commonly convened system of musical notation as
well as the inventorying of the historical heritage. This process has long been
thought of as an exclusively West European experience of modernity. Yet several
recent analyses argue that modernity is not merely a historical fact, developed in
some specific economic and cultural circumstances, but is rather a set of categor-
ies and a fundamental framework of perception of the world. Indeed, the rise of a
dynamic urban life was indicated by Georg Simmel, as both a source of and a
precondition for modern culture. In close relation with the rise of the individual-
ism, the metropolitan life engenders a stimulating milieu for modern man, who
develops there a protection mechanism against the uprooting effect of his/her
intellectual ability. In urban conditions where life is essentially based on calculus
and exactitude, culture becomes a dynamic process through which new syntheses
are constantly made around a monetary economy. (Simmel, 1989: 234-237)
Developments in the Adoption of Notation for Makam Music
In accordance with this theoretical perspective, the case of the transformation

of Turkish music presents an excellent example, through which the social forces
that boosted modern culture in Turkey can be detected. Indeed, particularly the
last quarter of the 18th century in Ottoman Empire has been the scene of signifi-
cant social transformations in concert with institutional reformations. Although
Ottoman political elite estimated a revival and strengthening of the traditions,
during the reforms, time was revolved and the once triggered off transformation
has been calibrated itself on terms of modernization. (Karpat, 2006: 33) The most
enriching aspect of the reformist movements, especially the Tanzimat (regula-
tions) decree promulgated in 1839, was that elites of the period have had the
sufficient consciousness to consider that in modern world peoples were not only
living history but rather they were making it. Consequently, the Ottoman elites
realized the importance of critical thinking in progress. (Ortaylı: 1999: 264) The
categorical absence of such an intellectual life and education system has kept the
Ottoman society out of the industrial revolution. One of the principal causes of
such a retardation was not, as it is often thought, the absence of a bourgeoisie
which could accelerate the commercial dynamism able to synchronize Ottoman
society and the West European countries. Although such a mercantile class existed
in Ottoman Empire, it was constituted by majorly non-Muslim capitalists, who
150
were not allowed to be articulated into the State apparatus. (Timur, 1989: 62)
Consequently, reforms came with considerable delays and with an unplanned,
panic-driven palliative characteristic, in the most symptomatic field, the military
capabilities. First initiatives to rehabilitate the army which was degraded along
centuries towards Western Europe’s industrial growth, were realized in the 1770s.
First temporary ambassadors have been sent, at the beginning of the century, to
main European capitals to take contact with the rising forces and to explore
different appearances of the modern culture, as for example the art of opera.
(Rado, 2006: 52-58) European style military schools have been inaugurated,
together with the founding of a new army organization (Nizâm-ı Cedid, New
Order). (Berkes, 1978: 87-92) But the transformation process had not been limited
to military domain; social life and cultural practices have been gradually affected
from this changing social milieu, which can also be characterized with a rising
needs and possibilities of social communication. (Mardin, 2004: 145)
Economic growth, as it was the case in the European context, also triggered
off popular needs, particularly with the emergence of middle-classes, for musical
production in written music as well as in commercialized performance. (Martin,
1995: 226-227) Music was one of the most directly affected fields of modernization
in Turkey. Indeed a series of indicators about the change in traditional music
(Turkish makam music) help to describe the social orientation to modernity from
18th century on. Such indicators include significant and relatively rapid changes
in the sound system (reduction of makams as a hidden temperament), attempts to
establish parallelisms with modes5, rhythm patterns (simplification of usûl-s),
adoption of Western tempered instruments, and commercialization of music
together with the rise of capitalistic popular culture.
One of the most salient aspects of such transformations is observed in the
passage to written music. Although Turkish makam music was basically organized
on the oral transmission, script has been longtime excluded from its practice.
Nevertheless, several theoretical treatises written throughout centuries explored
systems of symbolic representation for musical expression. (See figure 1) As far as
is known, any kind of musical notation system did not exist during the 15th and
16th centuries. Considered as the classical age of the Ottoman state, this period set
up both a bureaucratic state apparatus and a social order. In contradiction with
what one should expect from this political apogee, the intellectual life presents a
relatively stagnating scope. As Karakayalı shows, when a political power is on the
way to set out its foundations, it needs standardization in culture, as it is the case of
Charlemagne’s orders on the adoption of a notation system across his territory. We
5
E.g. identification of Rast makam with G Major or the recalibration of the makam scaling
according to a basic tone by the theoreticians Ezgi-Arel, at the beginning of the 20th century, who
accepted the Çargâh makam, which is structurally the most similar one to European major scale.
(Signell, 1986: 24)
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IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
Figure 1: Safiyyüddin Urmevi

Notation (Sezgin, 1984:92)
agree on that point with Karakayalı who conceptualizes the status of the notation in
music as a »political technology«. (Karakayalı, 2010: 355) Some Anatolian theoret-
icians as Şirvanî and Ladikî of the 15th and 16th century showed tablature notation
and definitions of makam. Other Anatolian theoreticians as Kırşehrî, Hızır or Tirevî
were not interested in any notation in their works.
A musician of the 17th century court, of Polish origin, Ali Ufkî (Wojciech
Bobowski) was the first to use the staff notation system for makam music by
reversing the line (from right to left), in conformity with the Ottoman Turkish
language (written with Arabic letters). Ali Ufkî also compiled a collection of
Turkish musical works of his time, as a mixture of vocal and instrumental pieces,
including all genres he listened to in the imperial palace. (See figure 2) »These 505
pieces that make up Mecmua-i Saz ü Söz (Collection of Music and Lyrics)(…) Ali Ufki
had had a considerable amount of music training in the West before he was
captured and brought to the Ottoman court, that could be perceived from his
mastery in dictation (notating the music heard with correct rhythms and inter-
vals) and decipheration (performing by reading from notation without memori-
zation)« (Ayangil, 2008: 403). This first attempt of notation was appreciated only
in a limited circle. In the following century, Nâyî Osman Dede and Dimitrie
Cantemir (1673-1723) also created their own notation systems, with a similar
152
Figure 2: Ali Ufki Notation (Elçin, 1976:243)
result, though they remained less theoretical and relatively more frequently used
by musicians. Osman Dede (d. 1730), who was sheikh of Galata Mevlevi Lodge,
used a kind of alphabetical notation system in his book. (See figure 3) Dimitrie
Cantemir, Prince of Bogdan, wrote his theory book called »Kitab-u İlmi’l Musiki
‘ala vechi’l-Hurufat«, and he used an alphabetical system as well. (See figure 4)
The alphabetical notation system is different from the »ebced« system, in which
the pitches are shown by the letters that remind the performer of the name of the
pitch. Osman Dede’s and Cantemir’s general principles of notational systems are
the same, but some letter combinations are different. On the other hand there are
also some combinations using the same symbols, for example, in Osman Dede’s
musical notation, the letters »‫ «ﺯﺭﻙﻥ‬used for nikriz pitch, the letters »‫ «ﺕﺵﻭک‬used
for geveşt pitch. Cantemir has different names of pitches for example, uzzal instead
of nikriz pitch and rehavi pitch instead of geveşt. Therefore these pitch symbols are
changeable. Both notational system used some of the same letters used for the
»dügâh« pitch etc. Such sequences include examples of two instrumental genres in
the collection of Cantemir, peşrev and semai, and specific pieces in both would also
have been included in two other and quite distinct repertories. (Wright, 2000: 7)
At the end of the 18th century, the technical features of the Turkish makam
music and the social tastes that surrounded and shaped it were changing more
rapidly. The most prominent names of that period in musical notation were
Neyzen Mustafa Kevseri (d. 1770) and Abdülbaki Nasır Dede (1765-1821). Kevseri
used a notation system by combining Osman Dede’s and Kantemir’s systems.
(See figure 5) The collection comprises 539 instrumental compositions in total.
(Ekinci: 2012: 18) Osman Dede’s grandchild, Abdülbaki Nasır Dede, created a
system based on »ebced« notation by the order of Sultan Selim III, and wrote his
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IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
Figure 3: Nâyî Osman Dede Notation

(Doğrusöz, 2006:59)
Figure 4: Kantemiroğlu
Notation (Tura, 2001: 196)
154
Figure 5: Kevseri Notation (Doğrusöz, Figure 6: Abdülbâkî Nâsır

Uslu, 2009:14) Dede Notation (Doğrusöz-
Uslu, 2009:149)
book »Tahririye«. (See figure 6) This enterprise was in full conformity with the
reformist attitude of the Sultan Selim III, who, during his reign, tried to institute a
series of structural changes in cultural life as well as in state organization. Bearing
in mind that Kevseri was attached to the Mevlevi order, and that a highly revered
Mevlevi musician and scholar, Osman Dede, had recently developed a notational
system, it is puzzling to see him employ the Cantemir notation. According to
Wright, in a quite speculative psychoanalytical consideration, he must have
consciously selected the superior authority, for Cantemir’s theoretical treatise is
definitely more advanced and comprehensive than that of Osman Dede, his
master. (Wright, 2007: 12) Yet, although this observation is correct, one cannot
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IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
Figure 7: Hampartzum Notation (TRT Archive Leon Hanciyan Collection)
make comparisons of the same order between the two notational systems, which
are in fact so similar to each other that one may suspect interaction or imitation in
their creation.6 (Ekinci, 2012: 17)
By the 19th century, two main notation systems had come to be used in
Turkish music. These were Hampartzum and Western staff notation. Hampart-
zum system was named after its developer, Hampartzum Limoncuyan (1768-
1839), developed around 1820. (See figure 7) The Rum Chrisantos of Madytos
(1770-1846) reformed the Byzantine ecclesiastical notation and simplified the
Medieval neumatic system. (See figure 8) The Western staff notation was introduc-
ed in Turkey by Giuseppe Donizetti (1788-1856), who was assigned to create a
new and European kind of military band in Ottoman Empire. The first students
6
Selim III is a typical representative of cultural synthesis manner against the traditional purist
one, since he tended on the one hand to keep some fundamental aspects of the Ottoman culture, while,
on the other, he didn’t hesitate to start an ambitious transformation project. As a composer and ney
player of makam music, Selim III encouraged musicians to adapt the existing heritage to a modern
perspective. In contrast with his pacific character of artist, he presented a vigorous posture of a force-
ful monarch who took severe measures on the way to transform the existing state apparatus, particu-
larly the army. As a composer of the Selim period, Nasır Dede notated the Mevlevi Ayin in makam
Sûzidilarâ (which is also created by Selim III) composed by Sultan Selim III. This is the first Mevlevi
Ayin written in the period it has been composed. This is again an indication to the musical reformism
of Sultan Selim III.
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Figure 8: Karamanlı Music

Notation (Bardakçı,1993: 74)
of Donizetti were the Turkish members of the band, »Muzika-yı Hümayun«, and
these members learned, adopted and disseminated the staff notation. Unlike the
earlier notation systems, both Hampartzum and Western systems were used
widely. But by the 20th century, the Hampartzum system disappeared and a
modified version of Western staff notation became dominant. Therefore we can
argue, from the evolution of notation systems in Turkish makam music, that
technical innovations become only socially legitimate when they acquire concep-
tually functional status and needs in accordance with the necessities of everyday
life practices. Notation initiates into the existing musical system, including the
need to link memory and foresight, when social sphere in which it dwells supports
objectification. (Adorno, 2006: 159-160) When traditional systems of protection and
solidarity dissolve under the pressure of capitalism, musicians have to obey
demands configured in the market relations (Adorno, 1994: 212), which imply
structurally the proliferation of standardized methods, tools and code systems.
Modern life experience implies thus the emergence of standardized categories
and criteria, which meant, in the context of Ottoman musicians, a shift onto a new
paradigm of perception as well as of practice.
Forms of Resistance and Practices of Adoption
Although the first steps in written music were welcomed among some
musical authorities, the general tendency of musicians was quite cautious towards
the possibility of abandoning of the oral tradition. Yet the gradual spread of the
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IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
written music did not cease, at least in urban musical practices, and the three
decades from 1790s to 1820s is considered by several historians to be a transfor-
mation phase of the Ottoman social and cultural spheres. Indeed, during this era,
musical life underwent several changes, including the general adoption of the
Hampartzum notation system, even though oral transmission also continued
among instrumental performers and singers. During the modernization process
across the 18th and 19th centuries, the vast variety of makam-s used in Ottoman
music were reduced into a limited number, and complicated rhythmic structures
(large usûl-s) were simplified. As musical performance evolved from the rather
private sphere of the court and its circles to a commercial activity, instruments
with louder timber replaced those with weak ones, shorter and simpler forms as
şarkı (song) were more appreciated, and new theorization of the makam music
was constructed onto a Western twelve-tone staff music schema. (Ergur&Aydın,
2006: 95-97) The progressive adoption of the notation in Ottoman music is one of
the most significant signs of such a modernizing process.
Besides the progressive expansion of the need to write music, there had always
been diverse foci of resistance to adopt written music. Makam music was consid-
ered to be a genuinely oral culture that could not be fixed, and also had strong
roots as a musical practice. In this context, memory was conceived as the very basis
and founding quality that made makam music valuable. Great masters and virtuosi
in makam music were appreciated for their capacity to memorize musical works.
For example, Hacı Arif Bey (1831-1885), one of the most talented composers of the
19th century, has been renowned by his ability to recall a musical work, only
having listened to it once. This valorizing of the memory as musician’s best quality
was not only a matter of tradition nor a pragmatic technical preference, but also a
part of a culture surrounding the imagination, creation, education, performance
and sharing of the music from master to pupil as rings of a chain. Besides its
cultural, even ideological meaning, memory has also an economic value. Learning
of the music through oral tradition (meşk) usually necessitated a long period of
education, which in turn guaranteed regular revenue to the teacher. The passage
to the written music was naturally threatening such an economic cycle. As it was
the case in 19th century in Europe, the learning as well as the practice of music
became a matter of capitalistic activity in the world of makam music in the Ottoman
social sphere, though it does not fully constitute an ordinary good that acquires
exchange value in market relations, because of its immaterial characteristic. (Attali,
2001: 118-122) Traditional masters who exclusively built their ability on oral prac-
tice fervently defended the necessity to keep music as unwritten. Therefore the rise
of an idea of written music provoked, among traditional musicians, a generalized
resistance towards all attempts to write music.
Notacı Emin Bey, who was the first music publisher, translated a story between
an unknown master and his pupil. The pupil asked him if it wouldn’t be more
accurate to use written expressions for learning music. The master answered that
158
learning by written material would result with more difficulty in learning and
‘colder’ style in performance. (Notacı Emin Bey, 1885/1305: 13) Musical notation
has gained ground particularly in the imperial palace, with the encouragement of
the reformist sultans, like Selim III and Mahmud II. The founding of the first
European-type court band (Muzika-yı Hümayûn), which evolved into a
symphonic orchestra accelerated also the need for written music that engendered
the birth of a second tendency in written music, by an adoption of the European
staff notation. Thus Hampartzum and staff notation system coexisted through
decades, which means that it doesn’t correspond, as some would think, to a
division between European-type musicians and traditional musicians. During
this period of transformation in music as well as in every part of the social life,
practices of performance constituted an important divide as old and new Fasıl
conceptions (Fasl-ı Atik – Fasl-ı Cedîd). Although this separation seems to be a
sharp polarization, in practice, both styles were often combined. Same musicians
took place in old and new performance styles, though western instruments and
lighter genres were introduced into Fasl-ı Cedid formations. Indeed the Hampartzum
notation was adopted among court makam musicians. Moreover, the Hampartzum
notation served also as an articulation mean to facilitate the passage to staff
notation. When Giuseppe Donizetti, brother of Gaetano Donizetti, was nominat-
ed as the master chief of the imperial court’s band, he taught European dance
forms such as marches, polkas, foxtrots, waltzes, and had to learn the already-
practiced Hampartzum notation. This was not only a practical way to instruct
Western system to the Ottoman musicians, but also a more productive method for
Donizetti to understand the makam music. (Aracı, 2006: 64)
We can illustrate the tension between the defenders of the superiority of the
memory in makam music and those who tried to expand the written music, with
an anecdote from the early nineteenth century. The inventor of the Hampartzum
system, Hampartzum Limoncuyan wanted to notate the Beyati Peşrev of İshak
(1745-1814), a Jewish Ottoman composer. İshak refused this proposition, because,
according to him, makam music cannot and should not be written. His pretext
was that such a notation would need too much time, because it is too complicated.
After this refusal, Hampartzum addressed to a close friend, in whose house music
performances were taken including İshak himself. They made a plan according to
which İshak would again be invited in one of those performances, and Hampar-
tzum, after having hidden in a secret place of the house, would write down the
lively played work. Indeed the plan worked and Hampartzum succeeded in making
a written copy of the Peşrev, in a short time. The landlord asked to İshak if he had
already played this work to anyone. İshak said »no«. The friend said to him that
there was nevertheless someone who could play this music. At this moment Ham-
partzum appeared and played the piece correctly. This made İshak extremely
angry and incited him to leave the house, shouting, »you stole my art!«
(Kerovpyan&Yılmaz, 2010: 95) Other examples like this illustrate that the tension
159
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
between defenders of the memory and those who try to spread out the written
music was still continuing.
In sum, in contrast to the generalized opinion on the adoption of European
musical system in Turkey, we argue that this was neither an absolutely imposed
top-down cultural transformation nor a matter of strict opposition between East
and West. Instead it is possible to analyze such a change as a dialectical process
including both the rising needs of accelerating urban life and reformist political
interventions in culture. Written music as a distinct sign of modern culture
evolved in these circumstances, throughout an interpenetration of different
attitudes among musicians. It is thus possible to assemble them in a typology with
three principal attitudes: Traditional conservatism in defense of the oral musical
learning and performance as a force of resistance; inner reformism of the makam
music which becomes visible with the adoption of the letter-based notations,
especially the Hampartzum system; and finally outer reformism which consists of
the adoption of the tempered twelve-tone system and its technical expressions,
particularly writing on the staff. Traditional conservatism was not only an ideologi-
cally conditioned reactionary positioning towards a relatively quickly transform-
ing Ottoman musical sphere, but also rather a state of mind mostly animated by
the sorrow of losing the lifeworld commanded by the tradition, including the val-
ues, relations, morals, hierarchy and economy of doing music on a well-defined
ground. Although traditional conservatism seems to be in full antagonism with
other types of attitude, it would be erroneous to argue that musicians in this
lineage were completely isolated from the changing cultural environment. Some
composers tried to understand the sense of the transformation to written and
Western based music practices. More or less unconsciously, they were affected by
the new music’s sensual as well as technical properties. Some tried to compose in
emerging popular forms and styles, though they were valorizing older ones as
essential. The debate around and then the ideological split throughout the adop-
tion of the written music was seemingly the most rigid façade of reactions towards
new musical tastes, styles and practices. Given that the musical sphere was not a
small field, most of the musicians had close relationships and exchanges, there-
fore these attitudes were connected. Especially inner reformism can be considered
as a motivated strategy of adaptation among traditional music circles. Although
changes in style and techniques were relatively invisible components of the
modernization, notation, on the contrary, constituted the most visible side and
the most sensitive point on which conflicts were crystallized. While discussing the
uncertainties about the period of transformation, Ekinci underlines that until the
mid-eighteenth century no meaningful changes were noted in style or the techni-
cal specificities of Ottoman music. He stresses that, though some scholars pretend
quite the contrary, there is no strong musicological evidence that a real transfor-
mation in style, including the definition of makam-s and ûsul-s preferred by the
composers lived between Ali Ufkî’s time (mid-17th century) and at least the
160
second quarter of the 18th century. The famous controversial and somehow mys-
terious treatise, Kevserî Mecmuası, presents a series of contradictions of that
special period. By adopting the principals of Ali Ufkî’s and then Cantemir’s times,
Kevserî7, represents, in the eyes of Ekinci, either an indication to a gradual and
slow passage to notation, even the coexistence of different systems, or an example
of a traditionalist attitude which can be translated as resistance towards new tech-
niques and styles. (Ekinci, 2012: 224-225) However, the emergence of a more or
less generally adopted system of notation can be conceived as a turbulent process,
albeit seemingly evolutionary, implying conflicts and exchanges between the
actors of the musical milieu. Even outer reformism ought to develop modalities of
articulation with the existing musical practices and actors, instead of trying to
promote a tabula rasa through a radical rejection of older forms and styles as out-
fashioned ones. In spite of constituting absolute antagonistic forces, these
tendencies were articulated through mixed forms, for example, the usage of
Hampartzum notation by Donizetti in his first years of teaching, and transposi-
tion of the makam music into staff notation directly from oral tradition or
Hampartzum notation. The evolution of written music in the Ottoman-Turkish
cultural sphere engendered several technical forms that assured refinement in
expression.
Reconfiguration of New Forms of Written Music through

Cultural Pluralism
As has been already discussed, the adoption of writing in music was not a
sudden passage in Turkey. Instead, it gathered a functional intersection of letter-
based systems and Western staff notation. Nevertheless, this process was neither
linear and tranquil nor enforced and imposed. Besides, contributions from
different cultural and ethnic sources to the process of passage in music were
important for diversifying forms of exchange between musicians. The first half of
the nineteenth century was particularly a period of cultural encounters in musical
circles, due to the transitory nature of the era, during which old and new tenden-
cies melted into the same cultural sphere. Representatives of the traditional artis-
tic or aesthetical codes were confronted with newly emerging ones. Especially with
the founding of the Imperial Music Institution (Muzika-yı Hümayûn) in 1826, the
Western music system was spreading out among some musical circles, though a
series of reactionary attitudes persisted in several others. Musicians of the tradi-
tional meşk system were reacting not only to the promotion of the Western music
by the court, but also to the progressive adoption of the techniques of writing
7
We know nearly nothing about Kevserî, unless the approximate period in which he lived
(probably died c. 1750).
161
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
music. In addition, this highly agitated period was also the beginning of contacts
with European cultural products and values, which consequently were engender-
ing a multi-cultural and dynamic intellectual milieu. Finally, this was a period of
change in the Ottoman social order as well as in the political system. Therefore
conflicts and contradictions projected onto an artistic domain were giving rise to
fruitful artistic inventions, particularly in music. Attempts to write music were
progressing at that time, by two principal lines: (1) Hampartzum’s notation
system on the Armenian alphabet; (2) Chrisantos’s notation system based on the
Greek alphabet.
Although he is known as the sole creator of the notation system renowned by
his name, Hampartzum Limoncuyan was not its sole designer. Instead, a series of
known and unknown actors collaborated to create a notation system with Arme-
nian letters. More precisely, the house of the Family Düzyan at Kuruçeşme was a
privileged cultural milieu where a group of musicians regularly assembled not
just for playing and singing, but also, more importantly, for discussing theoretical
problems of makam music, and to shape a specific letter-based code of notation.
As the latter was finally systematized and disseminated by Hampartzum Limon-
cuyan himself, it became known as the ‘Hampartzum system’. There again, we
see that a work of art is a result of a collective action as Becker underlined, even if
it seems, at first sight, associated to the personal talent of an ‘exceptional artist’.
(Becker, 1984: 14) Works of art are rather joint products of actors cooperating in an
art world, in accordance with some socially approved conventions. This is why it
would be erroneous to attribute the passage to written forms in Ottoman makam
music to the special gift of one artist, who is thus considered more privileged in
comparison with other members of the society. (Becker, 1984: 50) Indeed, the
name of Hampartzum remained associated with this system of notation, although
Father Minas Pıjışkyan (1777-1851), Andon Amira Düzyan (1765-1814), Hagop
Çelebi Düzyan (1793-1847) who equally contributed to the shaping of the system
are forgotten. (Kerovpyan & Yılmaz, 2010: 91-92) In the year 1808, Father Pıjışkyan,
who had already worked on the new notation system, and Hagop Çelebi Düzyan,
who had studied European staff notation in Paris, collaborated with other musi-
cians to create an advanced version of the Armenian alphabet. Discussions around
the formation of the system of notation were finalized in 1812. (Kerovpyan &
Yılmaz, 2010: 89) Although the Hampartzum notation system was fixed as a more
or less standardized system among musicians, during the reign of Sultan Mahmud
II, discussion continued in the period of Sultan Selim III, who had close relation-
ships with the influent Düzyan family. Nevertheless the real adoption of the
Hampartzum notation system in musical circles was realized between 1830-1833,
after Limoncuyan was nominated as the chief-instructor of the Armenian
Patriarchate. (Kerovpyan & Yılmaz, 2010: 92) We should also note that this cultural
synthesis was also sparked by the reformist ambiance of the reign of Mahmud II
162
(1808-1839), a leading figure in Turkish modernization. These more or less

disparate changes were mostly systematized particularly during the reign of
Sultan Abdülmecid (1839-1861).
Around the 1820s, Nikos Chrisantos, a Rum musician, developed another
letter-based system of notation by developing the Hellenic alphabet. As the case
of Hampartzum, Chrisantos was not the unique creator of the system; he had
close relationships with Hurmuzios Chartofilakis and Gregorios Protopsalsis,
who helped to shape this system. Those who developed this system were mostly
from the Karamanlı community whose tradition played a major role in the amal-
gamation of makam music from diverse cultural backgrounds. As an apparently
confused domain, the Karamanlı culture was, per se, a bilingual form of expression.
Indeed, Karamanlı language is none other than a Central Anatolian Turkish
dialect written in the Greek alphabet. As a non-Muslim Turkish community, the
Karamanlı people were also known for their ability to use Arabic letters. »As for
the documented musical literature of the 19th century the secular songs recorded
in Armenian new notation had the Turkish lyrics written with Armenian charac-
ters. A similar method was applied by the Karamanlı Greeks, a Turkish speaking
population of Anatolia, who used to print materials written in Karamanlı Turkish
with Greek letters. The Karamanlı publications of musical scores and lyrics con-
tinued to be available throughout the first part of the twentieth century«. (Popes-
cu-Judetz, 2002: 10) An important contribution to the trend of musical accultura-
tion through notation is due to the Karamanlı Greeks of Anatolia. From 1830 to
about 1914 the Karamanlı publications printed Greek and Turkish melodies with
Greek script. In principal the publications were bilingual and bi-musical. The
bulk of the Turkish songs were şarkı-s, then beste-s and few yürüksemai-s authored
by composers mostly from the second half of the eighteenth century and the nine-
teenth century. (Popescu-Judetz, 1996: 44) (Bardakçı, 1993: 29-61)
Replacement of the Letter-Based System by the Western Notation
Although it served as an important component during the transformation

process of the makam music in Ottoman Empire, around the end of the eight-
eenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, the alphabetical notations,
particularly the Hampartzum system, gradually lost ground and were nearly
totally replaced by the staff notation in the 1830s, even if a minor tradition
survived until recent times. In the first years of his residence, Giuseppe Donizetti
used Hampartzum notation for facilitating the passage to the tempered twelve
tone system. (See figure 9)
Nevertheless, after a short period of adaptation, he began to include staff
notation in his teachings. Donizetti’s attempts to rehabilitate the musical environ-
ment gave birth to both a systematic adoption of Western music, especially at
163
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
Figure 9: Donizetti Notation (Gazimihal, 1939: 103-Aracı, 2006: 61)
Fig 10: European

Notation, TRT
Repertory, İsmail
Hakkı Bey
Collection
164
institutional level, and an acceleration of the inner evolution of the makam music.
Musical works already notated by Hampartzum system were translated into staff
system. Yet Hampartzum notation remained in some limited circles of musicians.
Although staff notation was accepted as the dominant system, some technical
problems arose in compositions as well as in translations of alphabetically written
works. First of all, given that the Ottoman Turkish was written from right to left,
the Western staff system engendered the emergence of a reverse logic in notation
on staff in makam music. This contradiction necessitated (1) a constant opposition
in writing music on staff with Arabic letters; (2) an artificial division of syllables
in contradiction with the logic of morphology of Arabic letters. (See figure 10)
Another discrepancy of the passage to the staff system in makam music was
its insufficiency to represent micro-tones. A whole tone in the European tempered
twelve-tone system is divided into two half-steps, while makam music uses
smaller intervals within the same distance. This meant that existing accidentals
(sharp and flat) were not sufficient for expressing makam pitches. The staff nota-
tion was designed for twelve tempered tones of whole and half-step distances.
Consequently different theoreticians of Turkish music proposed different addi-
tional signs together with different pitches, for adapting makam music into staff
notation. (See figure 11)
Figure 11: Atalay, 1984: 934
165
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
The pretended superiority of the memory as a virtue in the practice of makam

music was perceived as outdated by the representatives of reformist tendencies.
Instead they were trying to reconstruct a new conception of memory based on the
recordable character of musical heritage, namely a modern attitude. Consequently
all written and published materials have been considered necessary tools of such
a modern conception of the memory. Most of the composers of nineteenth century
favored the use of written material in music. Among other documents, lyrics col-
lections (güfte mecmuaları) occupied a privileged place during the expansion of
written music in different social spheres. The number of lyrics collections pub-
lished during the nineteenth century was around 500. (Uslu, 2001: 167) These
popular publications helped also to transform genres of traditional makam com-
position. Kâr and beste which were the most long-lived genres across centuries,
were replaced by şarkı (literally ‘song’) as a highly popular form in the nineteenth
century. This tendency has evoked, until today, a şarkı-centered perception of the
makam music, rather than the older divisions into vocal and instrumental types.
Actually persons who identify themselves as lovers of makam music (popularly
known as Türk Sanat Müziği/Turkish Art Music) are categorical listeners of şarkı
genre. Beside such inner transformations of the makam music, new genres
emerged as the Ottoman society received other cultural influences.
The rise of published musical material as a response to a public demand in-
cited the formation of a score and lyrics market. A culturally dynamic urban life,
the emergence of new Western-oriented life-styles among elite classes, the relative
rise of the literacy rate in cities due to the adoption of modern policies of educa-
tion, the growing of the contacts established with the world played major roles on
the proliferation of the interest in learning and playing music, through written
material. More the urban life entered into a commercial logic, more the demand
for cultural market rose. Some composers began to fully or partially think of their
own compositions as commodities which could acquire exchange value in this
emerging market. Haşim Bey is one of the best examples of this market-based
conception of music. In his lyrics collection entitled ‘Haşim Bey Collection’ he
estimates that the lyrics of several şarkı-s that he gathered had a high potential to
be published and sold as European (‘Alafranga’) scores, with low prices. (Hâşim
Bey, 1864: 87) Although his prediction never came true, music became in nine-
teenth century a matter of marketing, implying technical simplification of music,
as popular tendencies spread. The adoption and use of European staff notation
played a major role in the expansion of popular music, through the high demand
for lyrics collections. The European staff notation began progressively to be
adopted and institutionalized in makam music as a practice of consumption as
well as a process of learning, particularly during the last quarter of the nineteenth
century, given that scores were systematically published after 1875. At the turn of
the 20th century, notation was extensively adopted by musicians as an important
performing tool, as well as an indispensable method of learning music. İsmail
166
Hakkı Bey, a composer and member of the classification board at Dârülelhan,

underlined, in his book entitled Mûsıki Tekâmül Dersleri – Courses of Progress in
Music published in 1926, the crucial place of music literacy in music education. He
established a parallel between language learning and music learning, emphasiz-
ing that reading and writing are vital tools for both of them. He stressed that one
who is perfectly competent in a language but lacking the ability to read and write
should be considered ignorant. As in the case of the language, music, in the eyes of
İsmail Hakkı Bey, has the same status, since »it is a language and science« (au-
thors’ emphasis). (İsmail Hakkı Bey, 1926)
Conclusion
In today’s modern world conception, music is usually thought of as insepa-

rable from its written expressions. Yet writing music was not a widely admitted
prerequisite for its reception and performance. Much of the world’s music has
been performed and transmitted exclusively through oral forms. Even in today’s
global cultural exchanges, there are several musical practices based on oral
performances. Nevertheless, the development of systems of notation in different
musical traditions was largely developed as part of a socio-historical process of
articulation towards modernity. Indeed, Ottoman/Turkish makam music evolved
according to such a modernization process, as part of an overall social transfor-
mation rather than as an isolated technical issue. Starting from the end of the
eighteenth century, notation began to become an internal need of music circles.
An accelerating and complicated urban life necessitated, as in other experiences
of modernity, the rise of more rational, therefore productive and simplified forms
of expressions. This passage was certainly not a linear and consensual process. On
the contrary, several forms, motifs and actors of resistance appeared in the process
of standardization and the adoption of written music throughout the nineteenth
century. The most emphasized argument for this resistance was the oral character
of makam music, which cannot and therefore should not be expressed in written
forms. This argument is still hold by some makam musicians. But there were also
invisible economic and ideological reasons of such a resistance, as, for example,
the education period was naturally shortening by written material. In spite of
several forms of resistance, written music spread out along the modernization
process in Turkey. The dialectics of social need and institutional resistance can
best be observed in the period of transition between 1790s and 1820s, which
consisted on contradictions between musicians of different artistic vocations, and
interpenetrations between alphabetical notations and the European staff system.
By an interdisciplinary and critical perspective, we evaluated the process of
passage to written music in makam tradition, as a dialectically paved way with
contradictions as well as integrations, instead of artificially dividing concepts,
167
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
facts and actors of the modernization process as binary oppositions. This old
debate on writing music in makam tradition is still continuing. Even though it has
been marginalized, defenders of an exclusively oral tradition represent the inner
variety of a music practice, but certainly not a socially supported mainstream
cultural preference. The basic characteristics of over-all modernization of Turkish
society are thus reflected upon cultural forms diffused into everyday life. Music
occupies a privileged place between these cultural forms and practices due to its
high penetrating capability. Its technical transformation to more simplified and
rational forms is no other thought than an explicit indication of modern concep-
tion of life, with its practices as well as its concepts.
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TURA, Yalçın (2001). Kantemiroğlu, Kitabu İlmü’l Mûsikî alâ vechi’l-Hurufât,Yapı Kredi
Yayınları, İstanbul.
USLU, Recep (2001). Türk Müziği Eğitim Tarihinde Güfte Mecmuaları ve İnceleme Esasları
Üzerine Tespitler [Lyrics Collections in the History of Education of Turkish Music and
Some Considerations on the Principles of Study], Müzikte 2000 Sempozyumu, Kültür
Bakanlığı Yayınları, Ankara, pp. 158-168.
WEBER, Max (1998). Sociologie de la musique, Les fondements rationnels et sociaux de la musique
[Sociology of Music, The Rational and Sociological Foundations of Music], Métaillié,
Paris.
WRIGHT, Owen (2000). Demetrius Cantemir: The Collections of Notations, Vol. 2, Pennsylva-
nia State University Press, Ashgate.
WRIGHT, Owen (2007). Mais qui était ‘Le compositeur du Péchrev dans le makam Nihavend?’
[But Who Was ‘the Composer of the Peshrev in Makam Nihavend ?’], Studii Şi Cercet. Ist.
Art., Teatru, Muzică, Cinematografie, serie nouă, 1 (45), Bucarest, pp. 3–45.
GLOSSARY
Turkish letters and their pronunciations:

C: j or dj
Ç: ch
Ğ: ygh as the letter gamma (γ) in Greek
Ö: rounded o, as it is used in German
Ş: sh
Ü: rounded u as it is used in German
»^«: Sign for extending the sound of the letter on which it is placed.
Technical terms used in the text:

Makam: Scale of microtonal steps and its logic of melodic construction.
Nizâm-ı Cedid: Nizâmi Jedid (New Order) (1) The generic name for the conse-
quences of a reformist era at the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th
171
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
centuries. (2) The specific name of the newly founded army during this peri-
od, in accordance with modern military organization principles.
Usûl: Preconceived rhythmic pattern in makam music.
Ebced: Ebjed. Litterally alphabet. A technique of ciphering written expressions in
arts with a letter-based system.
Ney: Ney or nay. A wind instrument of seven holes, made of reed by emptying
the interior with hot iron. Ney is a typically mystic-timbered instrument in
makam music. It is also the most persisted instrument across periods. Indeed
all instruments were replaced by others during centuries with the sole excep-
tion of ney.
Nâyi or Neyzen: Ney player.
Mevlevi Ayin: An equivalent of suite form in makam music. It consists of a suc-
cession of music pieces composed in the same makam, for accompanying
whirling dervishes in the Mevlevi order (followers of Rumi).
Muzikâ-yı Hümayûn: Imperial Orchestra or Court Band. Founded circa 1828,
though the exact date is unknown, by Giuseppe Donizetti, as part of modern-
ist reforms for teaching and performing the European music. Today, the
Presidential Symphonic Orchestra in Ankara, and some military bands can
be considered as its continuation.
Şarkı: Sharqi. Song. A Turkish makam music form with lyrics and relatively short
duration, often destined to a larger audience, with popular themes and musi-
cal language.
Meşk: Meshq. The fundamental method of learning music with oral repetition
from a master. It consists on a transmission of musical and cultural heritage,
and not only a technical learning.
Fasıl: Fasl. A package of makam music forms composed in the same makam per-
formed in pre-reformist era mostly in friend circles.
Fasl-ı Atik: Fasliatiq. (old fasıl) The musical ensemble of Turkish makam music in the
Ottoman court. Pieces in fasıl are given in a specific order (taksim, kar, beste etc)
in different forms using traditional instruments (tanbur, ud, kanun, etc)
Fasl-ı Cedîd: Faslijedid. (new fasıl) The musical ensemble of Turkish makam music
in the Ottoman court with the endorsement of Sultan Mahmud II. The ensem-
ble consists of both European instruments and Turkish traditional ones.
Peşrev: Peshrev. Instrumental prelude.
Beste: A vocal form in the fasıl.
172
Yürüksemai: the last piece of the fasıl having a rhythmic pattern in 6/4.
Güfte Mecmuaları: Gufte mejmualari. Books in which lyrics of Ottoman music
are collected.
Dârülelhan: Litterally the gate of melodies. The musical school founded on mod-
ern education principles, established in 1914 in Istanbul, where teaching of
the makam music was made with contemporary methods. It gathered best
makam musicians of the time.
Alafranga: The Turkish saying for ‘Alla Turca’.
Dede: Sufi master.
Kitâbu İlmi’l Musikî ‘alâ vechi’l-Hurufât: The Book of the Science of Music Ac-
cording to the Alphabetic Notation). Moldovian Prince of Demetrius Can-
temir, known as Kantemiroğlu in Turkish. The book contains music theory
(makam-s, usul-s, genres, explanations of his notational systems) and collec-
tion of notations. The book preserves 352 works (315 peşrev-s and 37 instru-
mental semai-s) known in his period, the 18th century.
Tahririye: In relation with writing. The book is about the rules and regulations of
Abdülbaki Nasır Dede’s »ebced« notation. Nasır Dede notated the Mevlevi
ayin in makam »suzidilara« (which is created by Selim III) composed by Sul-
tan Selim III using »ebced« notation as well as instrumental compositions for
this ayin.
Bey: Mister. As the family name did not exist in Ottoman period.
173
IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174
Sažetak
Otpor i prihvaćanje pisane glazbe na raskrižjima moderniteta:

postupni prijelaz na notaciju u turskoj maqam glazbi
Čini se da glazba nudi razne znakove promjene mentaliteta i vrijednosti na putu razvo-
ja prema koncepciji modernoga svijeta. To je bio slučaj turske maqam glazbe koji se dogo-
dio u zapadnoj Europi tijekom uspona kapitalizma i moderniteta. Iako su rijetki prvi pokuša-
ji primijećeni u sedamnaestom stoljeću, glazbena notacija nije bila dominantna karakteristi-
ka maqam glazbe koja se bitno temelji na usmenoj predaji melodije i njezinu poznavanju.
Tijekom procesa modernizacije Turske od osamnaestog stoljeća nadalje glazbenici su ra-
zvijali različite sustave glazbene notacije. Unatoč tomu što se radilo o teorijskim pokušaji-
ma s ograničenom uporabom, već je sama pojava ideje zapisane glazbe i registriranja
baštine njome bila znak modernog svjetonazora. Ustvari, tek su noviji pokušaji privukli širi
interes glazbenih krugova, i to upravo onda kada je društveni život postajao ubrzaniji, ori-
jentiran na trgovinu, dakle moderan u sociološkom smislu. U ovom radu autori nastoje
izložiti oblike otpora i usvajanje sustava glazbene notacije kao pokazatelja promjena u ži-
votu osmanskog/turskog društva na osi modernizacije, od zapadne notacije Alija Ufkija do
sadašnjih praksi notiranja, s posebnim naglaskom na povijesne uloge Abdülbakija Nâsıra
Dedea i Hampartzuma Limonciyana, kao i važnost drugog rukopisnog i objavljenog mate-
rijala, kao što su primjerice recenzije stihova (güfte mecmuaları).
174

Resistance and Adoption Towards Written Music at The Crossroads of Modernity - Gradual Passage To Notation in Turkish Makam Music

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A. Ergur – N.

Doğrusöz: Resistance and Adoption towards IRASM 46 (2015) 1: 145-174

Ali Ergur2 – Nilgün

of such a technical change, which in fact represents a more comprehensive social

Written Music as Sign of Modernization

The concept of ‘modern’ has been identified, in social sciences as well as in

limits of sociology, corresponds to a world view based particularly on a secular

unconsciousness. (Derrida, 1992: 55) As virtue or as violence, writing accomplished,

Developments in the Adoption of Notation for Makam Music

In accordance with this theoretical perspective, the case of the transformation

Figure 1: Safiyyüddin Urmevi

Figure 2: Ali Ufki Notation (Elçin, 1976:243)

Figure 3: Nâyî Osman Dede Notation

Figure 5: Kevseri Notation (Doğrusöz, Figure 6: Abdülbâkî Nâsır

Figure 7: Hampartzum Notation (TRT Archive Leon Hanciyan Collection)

Figure 8: Karamanlı Music

Forms of Resistance and Practices of Adoption

Reconfiguration of New Forms of Written Music through

(1808-1839), a leading figure in Turkish modernization. These more or less

Replacement of the Letter-Based System by the Western Notation

Although it served as an important component during the transformation

Figure 9: Donizetti Notation (Gazimihal, 1939: 103-Aracı, 2006: 61)

Fig 10: European

Figure 11: Atalay, 1984: 934

The pretended superiority of the memory as a virtue in the practice of makam

Hakkı Bey, a composer and member of the classification board at Dârülelhan,

In today’s modern world conception, music is usually thought of as insepa-

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GAZİMİHAL, Ragıp GAZİMİHAL (1939). Türkiye-Avrupa Musiki Münasebetleri [Turkey-

GREEN, Anne-Marie (2006). De la musique en sociologie [Music in sociology], L’Harmattan,

KARAKAYALI, Nedim (2010). Two Assemblages of Cultural Transmission: Musicians, Po-

KARPAT, Kemal H. (2006). Osmanlı’da Değişim, Modernleşme ve Uluslaşma [Change,

MARDİN Şerif (2004). Türk Modernleşmesi [Turkish Modernization], İletişim Yayınları,

POPESCU-JUDETZ, Eugenia (1996). Meanings in Turkish Musical Culture, Pan Yayıncılık,

SIMMEL, Georg (1989). Philosophie de la modernité, La femme, la ville, l’individualisme [Phi-

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SOMBART, Werner (1928). Le Bourgeois, Contribution à l’histoire morale et intellectuelle de

Turkish letters and their pronunciations:

Technical terms used in the text:

Otpor i prihvaćanje pisane glazbe na raskrižjima moderniteta:

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