meagre Turkish | broken English

Karanlık Ufuktan Güneş Doğmadı

2010-02-03T23:50:00.007+03:00

Karanlık ufuktan güneş doğmadı

Gözüm yaşla doldu, sabah olmadı

Yanık bağrımda sensiz açan laleler

Gözüm yaşıyla bir bir sulandı, solmadı

The sun never rose in the dark sky

My eyes filled with tears; the morning never came

The tulips that opened up on my aching chest while you were away -

they haven't wilted: my tears watered them one by one

In my view, this is the best Zeki Müren had ever sung.

This piece is quite intricate and does a great justice to his singing talent.

In fact, if one listens to something else by Zeki Müren right after they've listened to this, they will probably think that he simply hasn't been using about 50% of his true vocal abilities throughout most of his singing career. (But he's been sounding pretty damn good anyway, so indeed: why strain himself???)

Arabesk and Baudrillard

2010-01-05T02:18:00.008+03:00

Here's an interesting draft paper on "Mediterraneanism, Realism and Hypergender"--or rather on Zeki Müren and Bülent Ersoy--by Oxfordian ethnomusicologist Martin Stokes.

Some quotes:

Zeki Müren's Turkish was of an elevated quality, of a kind that has no counterpart in spoken Turkish except in poetic recitation, marked by slight swells and tremors (marking heightened emotion), particular attention to consonants normally swallowed or elided in spoken Turkish, and a tendency to exaggerate the distinction between 'back' and 'front' vowels. Words can indeed be clearly heard throughout Zeki Müren's songs; when they are blurred or violated, this has a clear expressive and dramatic purpose.

Yes. And he always observed the glottal stop in Arabic words.

'Good Turkish' connotes class, status, and prestige, despite the fact that nobody would imitate the way Zeki Müren spoke in everyday life; but more importantly, 'good Turkish' connotes empathy with the goals of Atatürk's revolution. In Turkey, as elsewhere, language was the master signifier of the modernist revolution, evoking clarity, functional communicative efficiency, democracy, and, of course, ethnic homogeneity.

Interesting points.

By analogy with Umm Kulthum, one could almost say that Zeki Müren was the Turkish language. Even people who told me they intensely disliked his music would invariably add 'but I do love the way he speaks'. He instilled notions of 'correct pronunciation' in ways which few other people could. His cassettes carried 'good Turkish' into homes and hearts in ways in which Turkish primary school teachers in remote Kurdish villages, and the neologism-laden jargon of state television news broadcasts in the 1980s could never hope to do.

I also like the term that was chosen to designate sanat müziği - "light classical" (Stokes also equals it to "nightclub" music, which sounds pretty... unusual. Hurray to Turkey, its [light] classical music and its night clubs. :-)

There are some things I can't agree with, though. The fact that Zeki Müren, as the author puts it, once "likened himself to the medieval Anatolian mystic Celaleddin Rumi and his partner to Rumi's constant companion and inspiration, Sems", definitely does not mean that he "rendered [himself] respectable through comparison with the male-male partnerships canonized in classical Sufism". This was a private conversation with some foreign lady, not a deliberate statement for a TV interview. Likewise, when he says that "Zeki Müren was living openly with his male partner in semi-retirement in Bodrum"--what does "openly" actually mean? "Out of the closet"? I don't think so. Many Turkish people still fiercely maintain that Zeki's outfits, make-up and mannerisms were "merely a part of his stage image" and that he "lived alone" throughout his entire life (the latter is something that Zeki Müren kept reiterating in his interviews and writings so as to ward off all further questions--"loneliness is my fate"). The interesting thing here is that many straight male fans love Zeki Müren too much to acknowledge the truth.

...Also, this article opened my eyes to an almost 30-minute song called "Kahır Mektubu" ("The Letter of Grief"). I had never particularly liked this song because I thought it was... pretty boring. I never regarded it as an attempt to follow the Arab classical style by subtle means of language and recitation, rather than by using excessive vocal ornaments and bringing out the "suffering" in one's voice to the fullest like most Turkish arabesk singers do. If I had looked at "Kahır Mektubu" from this angle, I would have seen that it was a pretty sophisticated piece of "art music". Zeki Müren's singing style is very reserved until a very deliberate climax where the underlying emotions get unleashed.

Here is the final portion of the song:

I've been waiting for you to appear from behind that corner

I waited, and I waited - I'm tired of waiting

The ship of my sorrows has arrived and dropped the anchor

I loaded it, and I loaded it - I'm tired of this load

I tried to stop the world from turning to make you take a look

I became addicted to fortune-telling, hoping maybe something [good] would fall

Hoping maybe I'll find you at the end of the way

I added up, and I added up - I'm tired of adding.

...I am hoping that maybe you will come to me

Although I also know you may be very far away

Destiny has put me into the shackles of fate

I had been saying to myself that you would come

I am still waiting

...I wrote a poem for you

I made a song for you

My happy day, my everything,

try to understand me!

I keep carving your name on table surfaces

I keep rewriting this letter of grief a thousand times

Whenever I try to write a couple of lines,

I always write for you, write of you, write of us

Whenever I take a glass in my hand,

I drink to you, drink you, drink us

Chorus:

Every night I'm in sorrow

I drink non-stop

I sowed love in my heart

It's loneliness I'm reaping

On a more personal note: my interests usually get hold of me in bouts, one at a time. Throughout December I've been having a bout of 80s music. Yesterday, I had a minibout of the 60s. And today, I know I'll be having a lengthy bout of Zeki Müren. To celebrate the fact, here is another (quasi)arabesk song rendered in a similar manner, tasteful and reserved. It's called "Dudaklarında Arzu" ("Desire On Your Lips").

Hayat Harcadın Beni

2009-12-12T02:57:00.009+03:00

There is one Turkish folk song called "Ayağında Kundura".

She’s wearin’ shoes [now that’s a useful piece of information]

Oh, she’s wearin’ shoes

I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die, oh woe!

I’ve wasted that young life of mine

Beating my chest all along

And now I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die, oh woe!

I’m a poor guy in love! Oh woe, I’m gonna die!

etc.

They say this song is primarily associated with İbrahim Tatlıses who allegedly “made it famous”--with his rustic macho image and whatnot.

Well, ~~bollocks~~ -- I mean, not for me.

“Ayağında Kundura” is the first song on a Zeki Müren album called “Hayat Harcadın Beni” (“Life, You Wasted Me”). I love this album because it is as close to actually having a concept as a Turkish traditional music album can be. Your mind pictures a 1) drunken, 2) cross-dressed Zeki Müren sitting in some Rumelian tavern with a glass of rakiya in his hand, recounting his experiences.

This song is followed by other fine songs like “Esmerim” (“My Dark-Skinned Brunette”) and “Odam Kireç Tutmuyor” (“Can’t Paint My Room With Lime”, whatever that means).

Recently, Turkish recording industry finally graced us with a LIVE Zeki Müren CD called “Lunapark”. I won’t give a link to the front cover on the grounds of public decency, but I can tell you that it pictures Sanat Güneşi wearing one of his mini skirts and a pair of platform boots. So we have a cross-dressed Zeki Müren apparently performing in an amusement park… (OK, not really: “Lunapark” seems to be the name of a night club after all.)

The date of the recording is unknown. And, as usual, the material has been maliciously tampered with: the applause got reshuffled for some reason, and selected pieces of it are reappearing over and over again at most inappropriate moments.

So here we have a hoarse-voiced, tipsyish and окончательно укатившийся куда-то по наклонной плоскости Zeki Müren singing songs from “Hayat Harcadın Beni”.

An example of total abandon :-D:

The угар continues with this:

And here’s how the whole thing ends:

ZE-Kİ!!! *clap clap clap*

"Oh woe". :-)

2009-11-13T22:15:00.002+03:00

When George Michael was 18, he wrote "Careless Whisper".

When Zeki Müren was 17, he wrote this little thingie:

Zehretme hayatı bana cananim
Elemlerle doldu benim her anım
Kederimle yanıp sönse de canım
İnan ki ben sana yine hayranım

Well, look, it's an acrostic! Sweety sweet.

And guess what, dear diary: I've been actually receiving comments, which means that somebody else reads this, not just me (and Sanat Güneşi, who undoubtedly monitors his fan activities through his Cennet Wifi Telekom). But I can't get Blogger notify me about comments, though, so please kusura bakmayın if I don't reply in a timely manner.

However, friends, I have a question.

Do any of you have mpegs or avis of Zeki Müren movies? (Except "Düğün gecesi", "Kırık plak", "Beklenen şarkı", "Gurbet", "Katip", "Hindistan cevizi" and "Kalbimin sahibi", almost all of which I'm currently sharing through my Emule.)

If you do, then please, please upload them to Megaupload or ifile.it or your Emule or whatnot and share. Please do.

YouTube is so not enough; I think you agree.

"Kırık Plak" / "The Broken Disc" (1959)

2009-10-26T02:53:00.005+03:00

OK, I've watched "Kırık Plak" many times, but now is the first time I've noticed that Zeki Müren apparently didn't know how to play the piano (2'14'' and onwards):

What's the big deal, anyone might think? But I'm shocked, because__ do you know Mahsun Kırmızıgül? The arabesk guy who (they say) can barely talk, just as the other arabesk guy, İbrahim Tatlıses, (they say) can barely read or write? Well, I actually saw Mahsun Kırmızıgül playing "Moonlight Sonata" in the "Aşka Sürgün" series. I mean, he was putting his fingers on the right keys all the way through! So... does this mean that Mahsun Kırmızıgül can play the piano, and Zeki Müren couldn't? That can't be true, can it?!

...Talking about "Kırık Plak" -- here's some more drama:

Note the changing time on the clock and the sound of fabric being torn at 3'44''. Ouch. (According to the story, this evil woman blackmails Zeki into being her sex slave. This is especially sinister because she's already married to someone else--the guy between 3'58'' and 4'02''--who is as evil and scheming as she is.)

Funny thing: Turkish cinema audiences seemed to be mostly male, and whereas in some cases they were queuing up to see a sex flick, in this case Osman Seden wants us to believe that all those tough guys go to the movies regularly to have some tears jerked out of them by Zeki's singing and similar stuff. 1'53'' -- "Your heart is made of wood, you brute!" one man says angrily to another's cynical remark (I don't understand the meaning of their entire dialogue, though; I wish someone could clarify it for me).

...Why do tearful Bollywood melodramas, for example, get a huge male audience in India, Pakistan and Afghanistan? Do men like to see beautiful leading actresses with loose hair showing cleavage and striking "suggestive" poses, plus muscular male leads to identify with? They probably do. I'm not sure whether they're equally attracted by sentimental storylines.

As for Turkey, the males there saw this kind of characters in their movies too, but they also saw something very different: sensitive and submissive men being ordered around by tough women. Maybe Zeki Müren tricked his male audiences into liking this--with his singing. I mean, he made 18 movies, so they must have been hits... But there's a lot to explore here.

Peki Zeki Müren de bizi görecek mi?

2009-10-18T00:53:00.008+04:00

Today, someone left a comment and a smiley in my YouTube profile. The comment translates from Turkish as "Will Zeki Müren see us as well?"

I thought this was some quote I didn't know about, so I did some googling and it turned out I was right: it's indeed a quote from a lovely Turkish movie called "Vizontele" (2001) which I've just watched. It takes place in 1974, when no one in Southern-Eastern Turkey apparently knew what TV was.

When the mayor of one of those remote villages ıs addressıng the entire village population gathered on the main square, the dialogue goes like this:

People: What is this "vizontele" thing, Mr Mayor?

Mayor: It's like radio with pictures.

P: What do you mean?

M: Zeki Müren sings on the radio, right?

P: Right.

M: Now, you'll be able to see him as well!

P: Will Zeki Müren see us too?

M: I'll be honest here: I don't know.

P: What if you're wearing your underwear? You wouldn't want the great Zeki Müren to see that.

Member of the council: Well, never mind Zeki Müren, he's a singer. But what if the prime minister appears on the news? Will we have to sit around the house wearing ties?

Mayor: Don't be ridiculous. Can actors see you at the cinema?

Member of the council: Can't they??

This movie was a box office hit in Turkey, and "will Zeki Müren see us too?" has apparently become something of a proverb, which some people compare to Nazım Hikmet's "If you love apples, do apples have to love you back?".

There is another great little scene which I especially liked. The mayor is listening to Zeki Müren's "Muhabbet Kuşu" on the radio, and then says dreamily: "This would be great with pictures."

I'll elaborate on "Muhabbet Kuşu" next time, when I'll write a post on the Closeness to Perfection.

P.S.

Thank you, YouTube commenter. :-)

Gurbet, p. 2

2009-10-13T02:05:00.006+04:00

Continued from the previous post.

(Oh, and don't read on if you actually want to watch this movie now 8-)

…After that, Zeki and Aliye decide to get married, but Aliye overhears police asking about her and runs away from home. Zeki finds her of course, and here’s the reunion scene with a dramatic confession and a heartfelt rendition of “Torna a Sorrento”. After that, two guys from the draft office appear very conveniently to remind Zeki of his military duty. By this time your brain is almost completely eaten.

Zeki leaves for the army, making Aliye promise she’ll go and turn herself in to the police. Then we see him in his uniform writing a letter to Aliye, saying that “they didn’t cut my hair because they found out I had sinusitis” (I swear I didn’t make this one up). Aliye is in prison, surrounded by slags with peroxide hair, waiting for her verdict. She walks free after all, but Zeki doesn’t come back on time: the army doctor finds out he has gall problems (along with that sinusitis), which requires an urgent surgery and a recovery period.

At this stage, the screenwriter makes Aliye go and visit one of those peroxide slags from the prison--who had earlier offered her some kind of a “decent job”. Our heroine is too innocent to understand what it’s all about, notwithstanding the fact she has been in jail after stabbing a sex offender. Completely unexpectedly, she finds herself in a seedy flat together with a bunch of prostitutes. Luckily, the police raid the place and arrest all the gals. Aliye now has to go through a mandatory hynecological exam. We see the close-up of a menacing-looking metallic thingie with an iodine(?)-soaked swab on the end. Scary. Next thing we know, the doctor tells Aliye: “Here’s your virginity certificate, and don’t you mix with those bad women anymore.”

Aliye walks out of the door--and runs into Zeki, who calls her a slut and spits into her face. Aliye is so shocked that she totally forgets she can make the movie 15 minutes shorter by showing Zeki that certificate of hers: in fact, the piece of paper falls out of her trembling little fingers. Later this evening, in Zeki’s house, she remembers and says: “Believe me! I even have a virginity certificate! Wait a minute… *starts searching in her bra* …I lost it!”

“You lost it, ha!” Zeki says, beats Aliye up and goes on a drinking spree that apparently lasts three days. He also has to sing “Kınalı keklik”, of course:

(The credits say he wrote this song himself. Why didn’t he memorize his own lyrics, then?)

When he comes back home from the tavern, Aliye is not there: she went to visit her prison slag friend again, hoping that maybe this time she would offer her something decent.

Very soon, Aliye is lying on a bed somewhere, struggling from under a bad guy and screaming: “Zeki, please hurry or you'll be late!” Zeki forces the door open, punches the already standing bad guy in the face, looks suspiciously at Aliye who is still lying on that bed, and walks out.

The next day, Zeki puts his stuff into a bag and leaves for the railway station. After saying a sad goodbye to his buddies, he enters his train compartment—and finds Aliye there. Passionate kissing -> happy ending.

Phew.

…Oh, and why is this movie called “Gurbet”, which means “A Faraway Land”? I have no idea. Because Zeki went to the army, I guess.

Gurbet (1959), p. 1

2009-10-12T13:02:00.008+04:00

So I watched Gurbet a few days ago, and there’s certainly a lot to write about.

I know of a black-and-white Bollywood movie that starts with the same girl-becomes-boy premise, but I’m not sure whether it’s a remake, because what follows is quite over the top for an old-fashioned Hindi flick.

Mualla Kaynak plays a housemaid named Aliye who is fleeing from police disguised as a boy, having stabbed her boss with a screwdriver for making sexual advances. She is pretty convincing in her metamorphosis.

Zeki plays one of those Istanbul fishermen who sell fried fish off their boats. (And I love it how his voice becomes almost normal as he makes vague and sporadic efforts to sound like a working-class guy in his movies x-D). His character’s name is Zeki, as always.

/Oh, and somewhere in the 8th minute they have a still from the wrong movie! How did Jean Marais get in here?!/

Aliye, who is now a street urchin called Ali, decides to earn some money by helping Zeki with his fishing, and falls for him right away. And here’s where this movie starts eating your brain.

Ali/Aliye is all over Zeki, throwing longing glances at him, “accidentally” touching him and following him everywhere. She also procures good football tickets for him and his two sidekicks. Having found out that she stole them, Zeki gets mad and gives Ali/Aliye a thrashing, saying: “I don’t wanna see you again, ever!” (Before that, his friends beat Ali/Aliye up for stealing money. Further into the film, Zeki will get mad again and hit her with his belt. Not your usual Osman Seden fare, what with all the abuse and exploitation.)

However, Zeki soon feels sorry for the poor orphaned boy and takes him to live with him in his quaint little house. And here’s when he founds out the truth--watch the drama:

/Do decent girls usually behave like that in old movies? Do they, I ask you? No, they don’t./

Later, though, they have a nice little party with a crate of beer, stuffed mussels, meatballs and a goose that Aliye stole—yet again—from Zeki’s neighbour.

The sense of well-being is so great that Zeki takes out his lute and they all sing a song called “My Handsome/Beautiful Doctor”, looking as mad as hatters. (Fellow foreigners can read more on the word “civan” in Orhan Pamuk’s “İstanbul: Hatıralar ve şehir” 8-).

To be continued--because if you thought this was all, you couldn't be more mistaken.

Chalk and cheese

2009-10-11T00:47:00.008+04:00

A few days ago I came across this photo:

At first I thought I was mistaken, but no, that's Yılmaz "The Ugly King" Güney himself.

Seeing Zeki Müren and Yılmaz Güney in the same picture, standing next to each other like this, is... weird. Just weird.

I mean, imagine Tarkan and Ahmet Kaya at an afterparty, having a friendly chat. Not that it couldn't happen, but...

Bahçede miş miş

2009-10-10T02:20:00.012+04:00

Another türkü with a tricky lyric which originates from Gaziantep; this is probably why it sounds so... bellicose (but how do they always know precisely where every türkü comes from, anyway?)

Bahçede miş miş
Sararıp yere düşmüş
Sevdiğim komşu kızı
Aklıma düşmüş

Amanım vallahi
Severim billahi
Çekerim silahi
Vururum tallahi

Bahçede bal var
Sende bir hal var
Anama yalvar
Onda çok iş var

Bahçede iğde
Dalları hep yerde
Sevdiğim komşu kızın
Aklı da kimde

Amanım vallahi
Severim billahi
Çekerim silahi
Vururum tallahi

Like most folk songs, this one features obscure artefacts not unlike the English "green sleeves" and the Russian "решетчатые сени". What on Earth is that "iğ" thing, and if it's a spindle, what does this have to do with the fact that "[tree] branches are everywhere"?

Also, folk songs are very unclear regarding who does what to whom and for what reason. When he says "Go beg my mother; she's got a lot of stuff to do", what does he mean? (I'm not even sure I want to know.)

Anyway, here's the lyric in a nutshell: "The apricots in the garden are getting ripe and falling to the ground, and I like the girl next door, but I suspect she might be thinking about someone else, so I swear to God I'm gonna take my gun and bloody kill [her?/ someone?/ everyone?]".

The song also features some theatrical sounds of gunshots--I wonder what kind of props they used :-)--and appropriately scared-sounding back vocals. (Back vocals are pretty unusual for the early Zeki Müren.)

I think that the protagonist of this song is the "Bahçevan" guy from the eponymous song --

-- gone mad among his peaches and pomegranates. (Ahhh, the original vinyl version, no infernal drum machines from the 90s. Bliss.)

Also, it's very obvious that "Bahçede miş miş" and the famous "Rumba" were recorded at the same session:

Allı turnam bizim ele varırsan

2009-10-09T20:25:00.014+04:00

Discovered a new song today:

My crimson crane, if only you could make it to our land

Say "sugar", say "cream", say "honey"

My rose, my rose, my wing is broken

Oh cranes, I can't hold [on]

My rose, my rose, my ağa

My rose, my rose, my paşa

My rose, my rose, my love

My rose, my rose, girl

Oh cranes

If someone asks about us,

Tell them, my love--your head bowed, suffering burning inside--

My rose, my rose, my wing is broken

Oh cranes, I can't hold [on]

Crimson crane, what are you doing going about in the air?

My wing is broken, I had to stay here

What a hapless creature I am in this world [thanks go to Murat who helped me translate this line]

Let the evening come, fly back [home], my beautiful [lit.: "telli" = "adorned with golden threads"] crane

My rose, my rose, my ağa

My rose, my rose, my paşa

My rose, my rose, my love

My rose, my rose, girl

Take away the vocals, and this melody could be from almost anywhere; such a sweet low-key rendition combined with modern arrangement. They probably added the synthesizer in the 90s, though. Luckily, it doesn't sound as hideous as it usually does when they tamper with old tracks, which they did on the entire "Dünden Bugüne" series, butchering 150+ songs. "Allı turnam..." is also included in this series under the wrong title "Katip arzuhalim yaz yare böyle", which belongs to another great türkü.

...I'm quite sure I also heard another Z.M. song done in the very same style: mellow guitars, no oriental instruments. I can't find this song in my collection, so it's probably vanished somewhere in the depths of YouTube. I must try and remember what it was.