MESHK ENSEMBLE

Rumis Legacy

As a remarkable group of whirling dervishes, the Meshk Ensemble,

come to the UK, Simon Broughton investigates Mevlevi music
in Turkey, its history and the ensembles special take on it

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121

W W W . S O N G L I N E S . C O. U K

W W W . S O N G L I N E S . C O. U K

the skyline of old Istanbul.

It was built by Suleiman the
Magnificent who conquered
Constantinople in 1453
and re-named it Istanbul.
It has one of the biggest
manuscript collections in the
world with books in Arabic,
Persian, Turkish and more.
Arabic was the scientific
language, while Persian,
in which Rumi wrote most of his poetry, was the artistic
language. In a small room in the library we have come to view
some of the few surviving manuscripts of Mevlevi music.
A librarian brings in a cardboard box, puts on white gloves
and takes out a black-bound book and opens the pages. The
music for the sema ceremony is called an ayin and this is a
collection of about 30 ayins written down by a musician called
Emin Dede in the early 1920s. evikolu opens it on the Ayin
in Makam Rast by Osman Dede, who was one of the greatest
composers of Mevlevi music. So this is music composed in
the early 18th century that had been passed down orally for
200 years and only written down in the 1920s. What were
looking at is a sort of palimpsest, music of different layers
and interpretations that has passed through several chains
of transmission. Mevlevi music, like all classical music of
the Ottoman period, was transmitted orally and not written
down. Emin Dede probably notated these ayin to preserve
them for posterity as president Atatrk, with his modernising,
Westernising agenda, closed the Sufi lodges in 1925.
Ny Osman Dede was a ney player and head of the Galata
lodge from 1697-1729 and is buried in the cemetery beside
it. The manuscript belonged to the Galata tekke, but was
moved to the Slemaniye Library when the lodge was closed
in 1925. The music is neatly written and exquisitely beautiful,
but with its dots and squiggles, totally unintelligible unless
you understand the Hamparsum notation in which it is
written. Hamparsum is named after the Armenian musician
Hampartsoum Limondjian who was asked to devise a form of
notation for Turkish and Armenian music by Sultan Selim III
in the early 19th century. evikolu traces his gloved finger
along the line and sings the melody; immediately the music

ISSUE 121

SONGLINES

27

Simon Broughton

Bill Deg
irmenci

26 S O N G L I N E S

ith a sudden crack, the dervishes strike their

palms on the wooden floor. They get up from
their knees, cast off their black cloaks and, with
a blessing from the sheikh, one by one they
start to spin, their white robes billowing. The dervishes hold
their right hand upwards to receive blessings from God, and
turn their left hand down to transmit them to the world. These
Mevlevi Sufis are popularly known as whirling dervishes, but
that name suggests something much wilder and impassioned
than this esoteric ritual taking place in front of me. The music is
calm and sedate Ottoman classical, but it has a curious power
and a fascinating history, which Im here
in Istanbul to uncover. Is this anything
like the ritual would have been in Rumis
day? How has it been transmitted and
preserved from then to now?
The Mevlevi were followers of
Jalaluddin Rumi, the 13th-century
poet and mystic who lived in the city
of Konya, then the capital of the Seljuk
Empire. The music features the haunting
and breathy ney (reed flute), plucked
tanbur, bowed kemenche, and kanun
(zither), rhythmically underpinned by
two kudum (small kettle drums), played
with a pair of sticks. The ney is an important symbol in Rumis
poetry, its plangent tone lamenting its separation from the reed
bed from where it was plucked and metaphorically echoing
mans separation from God.
Im in the Galata tekke (Sufi lodge or meeting place) in
Istanbul, the most atmospheric place to see the sema, the
whirling dervish ceremony, because it was purpose built.
Founded in 1491, it was the first Mevlevi lodge in Istanbul and
is surrounded by a small, but atmospheric cemetery of Ottoman
tombstones where the sheiks and dervishes are buried.
Inside the octagonal hall, the sema ceremony is principally
for the benefit of those taking part, although it also has a
powerful effect on those that come to see it. Visitors to Istanbul
have been fascinated by it for years, and its through the
accounts of historical travellers that we get useful information
about the ceremony and instrumentation.
The Mevlevi describe their turning not as a dance, but as a
prayer. There are four sequences selams of whirling in the
sema ceremony and Mevlevi musician and historian Timuin
evikolu briefly outlines them: The first selam is called
shariat (observance) and is the mundane practice of religion
without thinking. The second is tariqat (the path) when you
find the way and the third selam, hakikat (realisation), is when
you find the meaning and you fall in love with it. The music
for the third part is faster and more joyful and uses three
rhythmic cycles, one of which is waltz-like and may have led to
the whirling dervish description. The fourth selam is marifet
(accomplishment), he continues. You reflect on the meaning
of what youve accomplished and absorb it into your life.
Im meeting evikolu (pictured above) at the Sleymaniye
Library, which is attached to the vast mosque that dominates

MESHK ENSEMBLE

MESHK ENSEMBLE

Mustafa (1640-1711), better known as Itri, who worked at

Yenikapi and left about 30 surviving classical pieces, but just
one ayin; Osman Dede (1652-1730), who composed four ayin
and Ismail Dede (1778-1846), who composed six.
These pieces, and a few others, form the bulk of the Mevlevi
repertoire. They are performed by the ensembles doing
performances in Istanbul and the state-supported Konya Sufi
Music Ensemble. The latter has around 25 musicians and
singers, influenced by Western orchestras, which seems a
far cry from the small chamber ensembles that would have
performed Mevlevi music in the tekkes and the sort of thing
that Meshk are emulating.
Going back to Rumi, there are some shorter pieces that are
attributed to his son, Sultan Veled, but personally I dont think
they are his work, says evikolu. And even if it was a piece by
Sultan Veled, I dont think hed recognise it if he heard it today.
But in London we plan to perform his Niyaz Ilahi as an encore.
The Meshk group are visiting the UK for the first time for
the Barbican Centres Transcender Festival in October. One of
their specialities is the performance of so-called lost ayins,
outside the regular repertoire. They will be performing a
piece that was thought to be lost and only recently discovered
by evikolu. Its called Ayin in Hicazkar and was found in
another manuscript collection from a musician called Mustafa
Cazim. Cazim never completed the 1,001 days of training to
be a dervish, but he was the son of a sheikh and clearly knew
a lot about Mevlevi music. Around 1900 he sat down with Raif
Dede, the head kudum player of the Galata lodge, and wrote
down 27 ayin compositions from his repertoire and also Ayin
in Hicazkar, which he composed himself. He notated them
not in Hamparsum, but in Western notation (pictured right),
which hed probably learned from Italian musicians who
worked with the Turkish army bands. The melody is notated
in G major with added A and E flats, which approximates to
the makam (mode) Hicazkr, but to perform it properly you
clearly need to know the makam. These are the earliest known

PROMOTED YET BANNED

SUFI MUSIC IN TURKEY

Yenikapi tekke,
one of the most
important centres
of Mevlevi music

Kemal Atatrk banned Turkeys Sufi orders in 1925 as he felt

they were backward-looking and against his idea of a
Westernised secular state. Some of the tekke, like Galata, were
preserved as museums and others fell into ruin. When the
American ambassador visited Konya in 1952 he asked where the
dervishes were and an ensemble was hastily put together. Since
then the whirling dervishes have become a popular attraction in
Konya and Istanbul. They are frequently promoted in tourist
pictures and videos, but as a spiritual practice Sufism is still
banned. Its thanks to people like evikolu, keeping the music
and the network alive, for
many years underground,
that it has survived. Its ironic
that Turkey, as one of the
more liberal and democratic
countries in the Middle East,
notwithstanding the
crackdown after the recent
coup attempt, is one of the few
that outlaws this peaceful and
pluralistic form of Islam.

ayin compositions in any manuscript form either Western or

Hamparsum. And at the turn of the century Cazim wouldnt
have been writing them down because the tradition was
threatened, as it was in the 1920s, but just because he thought
they were so artistically valuable.
A unique thing about Ayin in Hicazkar is it sets a whole
section of Rumis most celebrated poem, the Masnavi, whereas
normally composers pick selected verses from here and there.
evikolu feels that the mood of Hicazkr evokes perfectly the
search for hidden meanings beyond the visible in the poetry.

Simon Broughton; Bill Deg

irmenci

comes to life. Hes had years of practice. Since I was 15, there
isnt a day when I havent done research into this music, he
chuckles. Its musical archaeology.
Hamparsum notation is written left to right. The top line
with dots, slurs and ticks indicates the rhythm and length
of the notes, the middle line, derived from Arabic letters,
indicates the pitches and the red signs below indicates the
syllables of text, if its sung. There is no information in the
score about instrumentation, which is why paintings and
historical accounts of the music are so important.
evikolu leads a Mevlevi music group called Meshk (Mek
in Turkish) its the name of the traditional training system,
the chain of transmission. When you are learning from a
master you are doing mek together, he explains. He studied
kudum and ney with a student of the son of the last sheikh
of the Yenikapi lodge, eyh Abdlbak Baykara. That chain of
transmission, Cevikolu believes, is very important. And the
Yenikapi tekke, founded in 1597, close to the Mevlana Gate in
the Byzantine walls of Istanbul, was one of the most important
centres of Mevlevi music. Many of the great composers worked
there. When I was making the TV documentary, Sufi Soul, in
2005 it was locked and in ruins. Now its been restored and
belongs to the Fatih Sultan Mehmet Vakif University, and
occasionally it hosts sema performances once again.
But how does the music performed by Mevlevi groups today
compare with what was played at the time of Rumi or over the
intervening years? Music in an oral tradition is passed on by
Chinese whispers so it doesnt stay still. The Mevlevi music as
performed today cant be anything like what Rumi knew.
evikolu thinks that the music probably reached its current
form in the 18th century. The oldest ayin compositions we
know come from the 16th and 17th century. We call them
Beste-i Kadim (The Old Compositions) but we dont know who
composed them. The oldest ayin whose composer is known
is the Beyati Ayin by Kek Dervi Mustafa Dede who died
around 1683. Other important composers were Buhurizade

Of course youve got to be something of a specialist in

Mevlevi repertoire to distinguish a known from an unknown
piece. But the energy that goes into rediscovering the music
also translates into Meshks performance, so its not like a
museum piece, but a voyage of discovery. This music was
inspired by Rumi, explains evikolu, but it belongs to the
whole of humanity. These days, Turkey has moved very far
from Rumi, but it is our duty to bring this culture back.
+ DATE The Meshk Ensemble conduct a workshop and perform
at Londons Barbican Centre on October 1 as part of the
Transcender Festival, see www.barbican.org.uk for details

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