A new impulse on dengbêj culture
BATMAN (DİHA) - Artist Mizgin Tahir who joined opera with the dengbêj culture aims to give a new impulse to Kurdish music together with Kurdish youths at Hasankeyf Orchestra.
Dengbêj are traditional Kurdish storytellers reciting long epic songs, generally without musical accompaniment. Their epics contain a variety of Kurdish history, love stories, and the struggle of Kurds against suppression. Dengbêjs do not sing for entertainment only. They have also played a vital role in transferring oral Kurdish history to the new generations, especially against assimilation policies of the sovereign states ruling the Kurdish land.
Artist Tahir who continues to create new projects by composing ancient epics from Mesopotamia defends there is a close relation between the dengbej art and the opera of the western music. Tahir points out that the "reduction of women to silence" has been the major obstacle to the extensification of the dengbej culture as much as opera, and adds; "I am sure the Kurdish music would have reached very different level had women not been forgotten about. It is needed to give weight to production by women". Deniz Oguzsoy spoke to Mizgin Tahir about the relation between the dengbej art and opera, the Hasankeyf Orchestra and the Kurdish music.
* Opera is a music form the Kurdish people are not very familiar to. What was the first reactions?
Opera may seem unfamiliar to Kurds in the first place but it is actually not. In old times all communities would voice their epics with music, just like what Kurds did with dengbej in Mesopotamia and what they did with opera in the west. There is however a difference between two music forms; the art of opera has undergone a change and moved with the times while the dengbej art and culture failed to do so, because of the ban imposed on the Kurdish language and the continued repression of Kurds in the daily life. In addition, the singing of women was banned and was considered as a sin, women were reduced to silence and put between four walls because of the repression of the dominant culture.
* You joined opera with the dengbej culture. What contribution has this made to the Kurdish music and what new has this work introduced into opera?
In the first album, I performed six songs in the opera form. My purpose was to show the fact that any song could be sang in the Kurdish language and also to introduce the Kurdish music to the world, to convey to people other than us our good old stories and the strans (ballads) I have listened from dengbejs since my childhood. I think I have partially accomplished my purpose. It should however be decided not by me but by music critics and the audience what new this form has brought in. One other deficiency we have is music critics to comment on and evaluate these works. I had received very positive criticism from Italian artists with whom we run joint projects in Aleppo while we were in Syria.
* Which musical performance is Hasankeyf Orchestra currently working on?
We are now working on a new project which is about Şahmiran, a young woman, a daughter of a king, who was abducted during a war, and represents the peaceful side of women and and the parallel influence this has on freedom. As Hasankeyf Orchestra, we adapted this epic into opera and we are planning to have finalized our preparations by February.
* What would you like to say about the efforts of Kurdish artists to keep Kurdish classics alive against the dominant market in the field of art in Turkey?
I think people have grown away from the dengbej culture and the ties with the dengbej culture has been severed. We should be able to perform old works without harming their nature and losing their feeling, otherwise any work and performance will cheapen and lose meaning in the market. There is a problem with creating something new, which means we cannot create works as good as those of the past.
(nt)
