Composer, music researcher (B. September 7th,
1907, Izmir – D. January 6th, 1991, Istanbul). His full name was Ahmet
Adnan Saygun. His father was writer Celal Saygun, who was a mathematician from
a well-established family of Izmir, that even knew religious knowledge such
that he could be an imam. At the same time, Celal Bey was the manager of the
National Cinema of which the income was given to National Library. Ahmet Adnan
learnt the first religious information from his father, took the first music
lessons from Ismail Zühtü. At the age of three he learnt to read, at the age of
four he began to elementary school in the Ittihat
ve Terakki Mektebi in Izmir. While he attended Izmir Ittihat ve Terakki
Idadisi (High School) he took theory lessons from Ismail Zühtü, piano
lessons from Rosati and Tevfik Bey. In 1922 he became the student of Macar
Tevfik Bey. In 1925, he created a big “Musiki
Lügati” (T.N. Dictionary of Music) by translating music-related articles
from the French La Grande Encyclopedie. In 1926, after having taken an
examination in Ankara Musiki Muallim
Mektebi (Ankara Music Teachers' College), he was appointed as a music
teacher to Izmir Erkek Lisesi (T.N. Izmir Boy’s High School), he was a public
servant at the National Library as well.
Ahmet Adnan Bey, who was sent to Paris on a
state scholarship in 1928, was interested in composers Bach, Beethoven and
Wagner the most. He studied composition with Vincent d'Indy in Paris, fugue and
harmony with Eugene Bozzel, counterpoint with Paul le Flem, organ with Amedee
Gastone, Gregorian Chant, and Souberbilelle. He also composed his orchestral
work named “Op 1 Divertissement” when
he was in Paris. That composition of
his won an award in a composition contest
in Paris in 1931 and was performed in Paris and Warsaw. Thus, that work became
the third Turkish orchestral work that was performed abroad after the two works
of Cemal Reşit Rey performed in Paris in 1925.
During Ahmet Adnan’s student years in Paris, visiting
the museums, galleries, churches, and concerts filled his all time. He began to
play the organ after piano. Thus, he was acquainted with the music of the
church that was the foundation of Christian culture. Thus, he knew well the
church music which was the basis of Christian culture. He was interested in
plastic arts in addition to music. Halil Dikmen, Refik Epikman and Hamit
Görele, who were Turkish painters that were studying in Paris in those years,
became his close friends. Burhan Toprak, with whom Ahmet Adnan Bey established
friendship with previously in Turkey, and his common interest was Yunus Emre. In
Paris they talked and discussed about a two-volume book regarding Yunus Emre that was written by Burhan Toprak.
As soon as Adnan Bey returned to Turkey in 1931,
he was appointed as music teacher at Ankara Musiki Muallim Mektebi. After he
returned to Turkey, he also continued his works as a composer,
ethnomusicologist, and composition teacher. He was one of the prominent
musicians in the construction of polyphonic music, which was led by Mustafa
Kemal Atatürk in the founding years of the new Republic of Turkey.
He took a great opportunity in the preparation
days of welcoming the Persian Shah, who was going to visit Turkey in 1934. The
libretto that was written by Münir Hayri Egeli was composed by Saygun within a
month, which was a very short time. This opera was expressing the birth of
Turkish nation and the brotherhood of Persian and Turkish nations that was based
on old history. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who witnessed the delay of the rehearsals,
discharged Zeki Üngör from the conductorship of the Presidential Orchestra and
assigned young musician Adnan Saygun in Zeki Üngör’s position.
As well as teaching and
conductorship, Saygun did researches and reviews on Turkish Folk Music. He
carried out works for opening ethnomusicology divisions in state
conservatories. However, despite those works were supported by Ataturk, they couldn’t
be realized by relevant institutions. In 1934 he composed “Taşbebek” opera also at Ataturk’s request. In this opera, he told
the birth of the person of the new Republic. Later, Saygun, who fell from favor
and was pushed into complete loneliness after Atatürk's death in 1938, was
willing to do small duty assignments.
Saygun, who went to Istanbul for
treatment of the sickness in his ear, returned to teaching in Istanbul
Municipal Conservatory in 1936 and remained in this position until 1939. Then
he entered into a period of inactivity that was going to last until his famous
masterpiece “Yunus Emre Oratorio” was
performed. In Ankara there was a work of founding a new conservatory. However,
these studies were pursued by the supporters of the concept of universal music,
not the ones who supported the idea of cultural nationality that Saygun agreed
with. Adnan Saygun accompanied Hungarian composer and ethnomusicologist Bela
Bartok in his Anatolian trip in1936. The compilation of studies around Osmaniye
in particular was published with the name “Bela
Bartok's Folk Music Research in Turkey" in English language by the
Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 1976. Saygun was appointed as the inspector of
Halkevleri (Community Center) in
1939.
Saygun, who got married twice, had
an interesting story of meeting her first wife. In 1938, women’s chamber
orchestra of Budapest that consisted of eight people, came to Ankara to give a
concert, returned to Hungary with five people. The three soloists of the
orchestra; Salayi Iren, Lili and Nanasi decided to stay in Turkey due to Nazi
oppression in their country. All three of them graduated from the high
virtuosity section of Academy of Music. Salayi İren (Nilüfer Saygun) was
virtuosa of singing, Lili (Mm. Statzer) was a violin virtuoso and Nanasi was a piano
virtuoso. All three of them had great marriages and lived happy lives in their
new country. Nanasi married to a pharmaceutical industrialist, Lili married to
a famous Austrian pianist and pedagogue Ferdi Statzer and İren married to Adnan
Saygun (1940).
Saygun’s hundreds of compositions were
performed in concerts abroad. He had 75 compositions in Classical Western Music
that were given opus numbers. He published articles regarding discipline and
education of music, translation of music texts, the Western music publishing, and
Community Centers and music. Between 1946 and 1982 he presented declarations by
attending to six music congresses abroad. He published seven book translations
and a book of declarations. “Yunus Emre
Oratorio”, which he completed in 1942, was performed in Ankara in 1946 and
obtained great success. This oratorio, which was deemed as his most significant
work, was performed later in Paris and in New York in 1958 for the anniversary
of the founding of the United Nations under the direction of famous conductor
Leopold Stokowski.
With his composition "Yunus Emre Oratorio", A. Adnan
Saygun carried the deep-seated sounds of Turkey extending from traditional to
national, to Europe and America, under the umbrella of United Nations, and
later to the five different languages in which the work was going to be translated.
In addition to his around 30 principal compositions that he composed since 1930
until 1989, he had music-related books that were published. He was the first
artist who was given the title of State
Artist in Turkey (1971). The artist died of pancreatic cancer on January 6th,
1991.
WORKS:
Türk Halk Musıkisinde Pentatonizm (1936), Gençliğe Şarkılar (for Community Center and schools, 1937), Rize - Artvin - Kars Havalisi Türkü - Saz ve Oyunlar Hakkında Bazı Malumat (1937), Halk Türküleri: Yedi Karadeniz Türküsü ve Bir Horon (1938), Halkevlerinde Musıki (1940), Yalan (Art Talks, 1945), Karacaoğlan: Yeni Bilgiler - Bir Rivayet - Melodiler (1952), Lise Müzik Kitabı I-II-III (with Halil Badi Yönetken, 1955), Musıki Temel Bilgisi I (1958), Mod Öncesi Ezgilerin Sınıflandırılması (1960), Musıki Temel Bilgisi II (1962), Musıki Temel Bilgisi III (1964), Musıki Temel Bilgisi IV (1966), Toplu Solfej I (1967), Töresel Musıki (1967), Toplu Solfej II (1968), Bela Bartok’s Folk Music Research in Turkey (Budapest 1976), Atatürk ve Musıki: O’nunla Birlikte O’ndan Sonra (1982).