A world of music in Bahçelievler

I crossed Tarlabaşı Boulevard and boarded a crowded bus at the height of rush hour. We crept slowly toward the Golden Horn, a dark, empty slice between faintly lit hills encrusted with faceless buildings. The graceful minarets of Süleymaniye, Fatih and Yavuz Selim and, farther away to the right, the cemetery stretching uphill from Eyüp Sultan guided my eyes across the landscape. How could one ever grasp İstanbul’s unfathomably dense agglomeration of humanity? At Fatih I abandoned the bus and walked through the small park past the ruins of St. Polyeuktos and down to Horhor, where the smells and sounds took me briefly back to Antakya and Gaziantep. From Aksaray, the metro plied its course toward Bahçelievler past the factories of Bayrampaşa and outlet stores of Merter.

The Bahçelievler Cultural Center is a 15-minute walk from the metro stop. I arrived minutes before the concert began and took a seat in the balcony. The audience and performers appeared to be one great big family, a feeling that was enhanced by Gözder General Director Bülent Kelleci’s perfect balance of warm and convivial yet ceremonial welcome. Dursun Ali Şahin, the kaymakam (district governor) of Bakırköy, spoke with an effortless cadence that culminated in the recitation of a few lines of poetry. Another speaker emphasized that people with physical disabilities should stick together and support one another.

The Gözder Music Ensemble, (four female and three male vocalists, plus an orchestra of percussion, bass guitar, mandolin, acoustic guitar and keyboard) was formed in 2008 by Selim and Kerim Altınok, two lawyers and life-long musicians. (Selim plays the mandolin and Kerim classical guitar.) They performed a sampling Turkish classical, folk and pop music, as well as “Go Down, Moses” and “Those Were the Days.”

There I sat in the balcony. More latecomers drifted in; the balcony is always the place for noisy people. The musicians performed, conversations continued, but not loud enough for me to catch the words. Soon, however, a group of male youth filled the empty seats around me and began talking loudly. Finding myself paying more attention to their boisterous talk than to the music, I asked them to be quiet. “Where are you from?” one of them asked affably. I told him to show respect for the music. They and everyone around me fell silent for a while. Then a boy on my left leaned toward me and started speaking loudly to the guys on my right. I turned abruptly and told him to shut up. He sat back, quiet and stunned. Now I could listen to the music without distraction.

Eventually I realized that everyone around me was related to one another. The women, who intermittently turned and smiled at the boys, were obviously aunts and mothers. The girls, who climbed on the seats with lollipops, were sisters, nieces or cousins. A grumpy expat in the middle of a happy clan. Everyone was having fun, enjoying the music and good company. With time, of course, the youth started talking again in those deep, boisterous masculine voices that never stoop to whisper. Why sit back and listen when you can take part in the music?

It could have been a wedding or a meyhane, and the entire audience interacted with the performers. They clapped, sang, laughed and cheered. Female vocalist Ferda Öztürk silenced the crowd with “Güvercin” (Dove), a song she wrote and composed. She followed it with “The Spanish Tavern” (lyrics by Ümit Yaşar Oğuzhan and music by Timur Selçuk). The guys were slightly less attentive during “Kalamış,” a more classical sounding piece by Münir Nurettin Selçuk, but Kerim Altınok’s interpretation of Kemal Çağlar’s lyrics was magnificent and absorbing. Soloist Bekir Buğra Kurtuluş roused the audience with “Jarnana,” a Bulgarian song with vaguely Celtic motifs and African resonances. Singing for hundreds of family members and friends, Kurtuluş and the ensemble generated considerably more excitement than their impressive performance on TRT 1, but the clip is worth searching for on the Internet.

Pop legend Muzaffer Uludağ came on stage to close the concert. “Bravo, Muzo!” “Sing it, Muzaffer!” Is it possible that my young neighbors enjoyed the concert as much as a soccer match? It was a terrific evening. Exhilarated and light-hearted, I left the concert hall with no recollection of the exhaustion I had felt earlier in Beyoğlu. On the way home, I began reading Selim and Kerim Altınok’s memoir, “Karalığın Rengi Beyaz” (The Color of Darkness is White). How many worlds can a city hold?