Turkish TV channels air Armenian music video

Turkey’s leading private music TV channels as well as the country’s state-run broadcaster have broken new ground in airing the first Armenian music video on popular stations in the nation’s history.

"Namag" (Letter) by Sibil Pektorosoğlu, an Istanbul Armenian, has been gaining mainstream popularity and can now be heard echoing from shops along the city’s iconic İstiklal Avenue. The lyrics were written by master Armenian poet Hovhannes Şiraz while the singer’s music video was produced by one of Turkey’s most famous directors in the field, Özkan Aksular.

Pektorosoğlu said it was like a dream to release her album and broadcast her music video on Turkish television. "When I hear my songs on İstiklal Avenue, I cry," she recently told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review.

"Music is universal, it is above all identities. I can’t breathe without singing; this is why this album is loved that much by my listeners," she said.

The song was the result of collaboration between Armenian and Turkish artists, including Mercan Dede, an international star famous for mixing Sufi music and ambient electronica, as well as Göksel Baktagir, a master of the "kanun," a zither-like stringed instrument. Released on the Ossi Music label, the Pektorosoğlu’s album was arranged by Cenk Taşkan, an important figure on the Turkish pop music scene for more than 40 years.

"I made the most of my 40-year experience for this album and it has reached its goal," Taşkan, who recently returned to Turkey on a visit from his current home in Canada, told the Daily News. "I am very pleased to be a part of this first-time work in Turkey, too."

The works of Taşkan, who was one of the leading names in the revival of Western-style Turkish pop music at the end of the 1960s and the beginning of 1970s, have represented Turkey at the Eurovision Song Contest many times.

Istanbul is inescapable

Even though he moved to Canada during the difficult aftermath of the 1980 coup, Taşkan said he often came to Istanbul and continued working with Turkish artists, adding that he had created many new grounds for the country’s pop music.

"Istanbul is my life, my everything; I can’t imagine a life without it. I have even composed a song titled ‘Istanbul Istanbul,'" Taşkan said.

Also an Istanbul Armenian, Taşkan’s real name is Majak Toşikyan; asked why he chose to use a Turkish name rather than his birth name, he said: "Turkish artists, as well as many foreign artists, do not use their own name. Changing my name does not mean that I have changed my soul."

Referring to events between the Turkish and Armenian people in the past, Taşkan said: "We have lived together for thousands of years. As a life philosophy, I’m interested in the future; it can remove the traces of the past. It is necessary to open a new page. Otherwise, even in 3050, people will still be talking about the same things."

Addressing the arguments between Turkish and Armenian people as to the artistic ownership of a number of Anatolian songs that are now sung by both nations, Taşkan said: "We have been the people of Anatolia for thousands of years. No nation has its own music; instead the land has its own music."


/Hurriyet Daily News/