Tag Archives: Tolga Sağ

18th Pir Sultan Abdal Etkinlikleri (Festival) 2007

15 Wednesday Jun 2011

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Some photos from the last Pir Sultan Abdal Şenlikleri (Festival) that I attended in June 2007. The location is the village of Banaz, north of Sivas.

General view of the performance amphitheatre on Ziyaret Tepe above the village.

View of Yıldız Dağı from the amphitheatre, with banners.

Banazlı aşık İsmail Şimsek opening the performances with Banazlı turning the semah.

Mercan Erzincan performing with group.

Pınar Sağ with backing group.

Aşık Garip Kamil and semah turning.

Dertli Divani

Tolga Sağ and Erdal Erzincan late on Sunday afternoon.

Lokma kurban preparation on Topuzlu Baba

Kul Himmet ‘Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek’ (Düaz-ı imam)

23 Sunday May 2010

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Istanbul Maarif edition cover 1966While working on a chapter of my PhD devoted to identity issues concerning Kul Himmet and Kul Himmet Üstadım for the thesis it seemed a good time to introduce Kul Himmet to the blog. Kul Himmet ranks with Şah Hatayi and Pir Sultan as the third in the triumvirate of great lyric and didactic Alevi poets. Even less about Kul Himmet is known than of Pir Sultan and certainly Hatayi (Shah Ismail). We do generally understand from the internal evidence of the deyişler that Kul Himmet was the murid (disciple) of Pir Sultan and provides the connection to another great aşık of Alevi ritual culture, Kul Hüseyin; also that he was educated. I will leave the issue of Kul Himmet Üstadım for another day.

This düaz-ı imam is another favourite of Alevi expressive culture. In performance it is sung to a powerful and deeply mysterious melody, somewhat unusually for Alevi music using a garip tetrachord for the lower part of the melody; although this modulates to the hüseyni ayağı for the third, sixth and ninth verses. The tune can be heard in the opening of the unbearably tragic film Journey of Hope.

The main difficulties in translation arise from names and some specific Alevi concepts that are reluctantly translated. For example, what to do with ‘erenler‘? My instinct is to leave as Erens, but I try a translation of ‘enlightened‘. A good translation for ‘vird‘ continues to elude. I have succombed to ‘prayer’ but not happily. This düaz goes beyond the twelve imams and brings in other identities such as Kanber, Salman and Fatma and the especially interesting Bibi Shahrbanu (Şehriban). Will perhaps add some explanation later.

Interestingly the earliest printed version of this text in Besim Atalay’s Bektaşilik ve Edebiyat (1924; republished in modern Turkish translation by Vedat Atila in 1991) does not take the form of a düaz-ı imam and does not include reference to the twelve imams though it does retain the references to Fatma, Şehriban and İmam Hüseyin. The text translated here is from Cahit Öztelli’s Pir Sultan’ın Dostları (2nd ed 1996) with one change to the order of the verses. The verse beginning “İmam Zeynel paralandı, bölündü” appears in Öztelli as the second last verse. Following the recordings by Arif and Tolga Sağ I have moved this to the fifth verse where it makes more sense logically and chronologically in respect to the invocation of the imams.

Kul Himmet ‘Ali bir Muhammed Ali diyerek’ (Düaz-ı imam)

Translation: Paul Koerbin

Every morning the birds sound together

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

The nightingale begins a lament for the rose

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Our fate shall turn upon the direction we face

Veysel Karani went to the land of Yemen

We are bees and we fly off for almighty manna

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Let us endure mourning for the Imams

Hear the true voice of the enlightened

Imam Hasan drank the poisoned challice

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

The one who seeks is sifted through a fine mesh

The one who believes turns to the True way

Shah Hüseyin was soaked in scarlet blood

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Imam Zeynel was torn to pieces and portioned

Humble respect was given to the Imam Bakir

The essence of direction was given to Cafer-i Sadık

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

The heart is a bird’s ramshackle nest

The Shah’s desire become our prayers

The prayer of Kâzım, Musa, Ali Rıza

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Shah Taki and Naki went on as light

Hasan-ül Askerî went on as the brave

The Mehdi went on mysterious in the cave

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Kanber, Salman, Fatma stood for the prayer

Shahrbanu was stripped and mounted on the camel

Jesus was distressed and passed unto the air

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Four books were written and passed to four faiths

The Kuran became Muhammed’s prayers

Kul Himmet passed to the sorrow of his saint

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

—————————————————————————-

Original text from Cahit Öztelli Pir Sultan’ın Dostları (2nd ed. 1996)

Her sabah her sabah ötüşür kuşlar

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Bülbül de gül içün figana başlar

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Kıblemizden kısmetimiz verile

Veysel’kara gitdi Yemen iline

Arıyız uçarız kudret balına

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Biz çekelim İmamların yasını

İşit gerçek erenlerin sesini

İmam Hasan içdi ağu tasını

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Tâlib olan ince elekden elendi

Mümin olan Hak yoluna dolandı

Şah Hüseyin al kanlara boyandı

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

İmam Zeynel paralandı, bölündü

Ol İmam Bâkır’a yüzler sürüldü

Cafer-i Sadık’a erkân verildi

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Gönül kuşun Kalb evinde yuvası

Virdimize düşdü Şah’ın havası

Kâzım, Musa, Ali Rıza duası

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Şah Takî’yle Nakî nur oldu gitdi

Hasan-ül Askerî er oldu gitdi

Mehdî mağarada sır oldu gitdi

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Kenber, Selman, Fatma durdu duaya

Şehriban soyundu, bindi deveye

İsâ kahreyledi, çıkdı havaya

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Dört kitap yazıldı, dört dine düşdü

Kur’an Muhammed’in virdine düşdü

Kul Himmet pîrinin derdine düşdü

Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek

Thesis work: Tolga Sağ performance at the Pir Sultan Abdal Etkinlikleri (Festival), 2002

23 Tuesday Jun 2009

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Tolga Sag Banaz 2002Have been analysing a performance by Tolga Sağ that I recorded at the 2002 Pir Sultan Abdal Festival in Banaz. The festival that year took place over the weekend of the 22nd and 23rd June.  Sağ did two performances, the first on the Saturday was an hour long performance and the second on the Sunday was a half hour performance. I am studying the first, longer performance most specifically. The work so far has been trying to identify all the songs performed. The set consisted of the following deyiş and türkü.

1. Dünya arsızındır fırsat pirsizin. This deyiş is from Davut Sulari whose daughter, Edibe was killed in the Madımak Hotel during the 1993 Pir Sultan Abdal Festival in Sivas.

2. Yarim için ölüyorum. A türkü associated with Nesimi Çimen who was also killed in Sivas in 1993.

3. Medet ya Muhammet medet ya Ali. A deyiş from Pir Sultan, with the mahlas form of Abdal Pir Sultan’ım. This song was included on the first Muhabbet recording (1984) sung by Tolga’s fatehr Arif Sağ.

4. Rehberim Ali’nin devri yürüye. Another Pir Sultan piece with the mahlas form Abdal Pir Sultan’ım. The words are somewhat altered from the published versions of this deyiş, which usually goes under the first line Hazreti Ali’nin devri yürüye. The wording changes emphasise the rebellious qualities of the deyiş.

5. Türbesin üstünü nakş eylediler. Another deyiş from Pir Sultan; sung on the 3rd Muhabbet recording by Arif Sağ.

6. Medet Allah medet (duaz-ı imam). Famous duaz of Aşık Muhammet and associated with Dertli Divani and the Urfa (Kısas) cem.

7. Short açış then Sağ sings the first verse of an uzun hava from Sivas beginning with the line Bu nasıl işidi bu nasıl hışım. Interestingly Sağ  performed this same piece at the same festival five years later in 2007. 09_bunasil_uh

8. Oğul (Gömdüm oğul seni toprağa gömdüm). Written by Mustafa Atıcı. Tolga Sağ sings this on the first Türküler Sevdamız recording.

9. Dilo (Yüce dağbaşında). Written by Mehmet Koç and the opening song on Sağ’s first solo recording Yol.

10. Semah based on Muhlis Akarsu’s Açığım yok kapalım yok dünyada. Muhlis Akarsu was another to die in the Madımak Hotel in Sivas in 1993.

11. Urfa semahı. Two semah from Dertli Divani, Başım açık yalın ayak yürüttün (Aşık Sıtkı baba) and Kerbela çölünden sakin mi geldi (Dedemoğlu).

12. Gurbeti ben mi yarattım. Deyiş from Muhlis Akarsu.

13. Mevlam gül diyerek iki göz vermiş. Deyiş from Aşık Mahzuni Şerif who had died only a month before the 2002 Pir Sultan Abdal Festival.

14. A deyiş from the Diyarbakırlı poet Aşık İhsani, renowned in the 1960s as a leftist poet and who appears as the zakir in the 1973 Remzi Jöntürk film staring Fikret Hakan, Pir Sultan Abdal. The song is Ben ölüyom sen ölmüyon. It appears on the second of Yavuz Top’s three Deyişler albums with the music credited to Top. Strangely, Sağ’s performance includes the mahlas Ruhsati rather than İhsani; not sure if this is deliberate or just a mistake. Ruhsati was the famous 19th aşık from Deliktaş near Kangal.  16_ruhsati

15. Eşeği saldım çayıra. Deyiş from Kazak Abdal, a 17th century aşık from the Balkans (Romania).

16. Bacacılar yüksek yapar also known as Karam. Sağ moves into halay mode now with song from the playing of the influential musician from Ürgüp, Refik Başaran (1907-1947) who made a number of recordings in the 1930s and 1940s.

17. Kostak yeri. Tolga Sağ’s ‘hit song’ from his album Yol. It is a türkü from Niğde – probably the most renowned folksong from that area. Sağ’s arrangement on his album introduces some brassy jazz inflections.

18. Mor koyun. Another türkü – and by this stage of  the performance people had moved from to dancing the halay rather than semah – which Sağ recorded on the first Türküler Sevdamız recording.

19. Sağ ends with a potpori of halaylar in 6/8 rhythm beginning with Göleli gelin from Kars-Ardahan (and included on his recording Yol) followed by the Ağrı halay Şu dağlar karlı dağlar.  21_Budaglara