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Aynur Performs at Lotus

https://iaunrc.indiana.edu/news-events/news/aynur-at-lotus.html

The Inner Asian and Uralic National Resource Center at Indiana University recently welcomed Aynur to Bloomington, where she performed at the Lotus World Music and Arts Festival on September 28 and 29. Aynur’s performances showcased the emotional depth of the Kurdish folk music tradition as interpreted in an engaging contemporary style. Her performances in Bloomington are part of an active touring schedule that since the beginning of the year has included appearances across the United States as well as in Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Morocco, Norway, and Singapore. The Center’s sponsorship of Aynur’s performance is the latest example of the Center’s long-term cooperation with the Lotus Education and Arts Foundation to bring Inner Asian and Uralic cultural programming to south-central Indiana.

A Kurd from Turkey, Aynur is a vocal artist who specializes in infusing Kurdish folk music with a contemporary sensibility influenced by Western music. Her success in the music world has allowed her to become a prominent representative of Kurdish people in Turkey and throughout the world. The Lotus Education and Arts Foundation acknowledged Aynur’s efforts to unite people through music by selecting her as this year’s Kat Domingo Memorial Artist, an honor named for an advocate of the power of music to build bridges and community. In 2017, Aynur received the Master of Mediterranean Music Award in the category of “Mediterrannean Women in Action” from the Berklee Mediterranean Music Institute. This award recognized Aynur’s efforts to preserve and reinterpret Kurdish folk music, which has transformed her into an influential role model for other women artists on the Mediterranean music scene who are seeking to share their voices.

Aynur’s soulful style reflects the life and suffering of the Kurdish people, especially Kurdish women. She has explored the Kurdish folk tradition in five albums since 2004, including her most recent release entitled Hawniyaz (2016). In addition to earning accolades in the Turkish and international press, Aynur’s music has received the acclaim of fellow artists. Aynur has collaborated with numerous musicians, including Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, Kayhan Kalhor, Javier Limón, Kinan Azmeh, Mercan Dede, Salman Gambarov, Cemil Qocgiri, Morgenland All Star Band, Nerderland Blazers Ensemble, and Sertab Erener. Her engaging performance style was evident to the large crowd she attracted to the Buskirk-Chumley Theater during her two evening performances. Subdued, jazzy laments gradually yielded to ebullient celebratory refrains as audience members began to sing along, eventually rising from their seats to dance in the aisles.

Aynur Dogan gets Americans to sing her tune

Read more: https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2018/10/aynur-dogan-comes-to-us-on-tour.html#ixzz5xPrEXxeu

“In the US, unlike Europe, many in the audience heard Kurdish music for thefirst time,” says Aynur Dogan, a Kurdish-Alevi musician from Turkey, after her tour.

October 23, 2018

Author: Pinar Tremblay

Kurds are by now a part of the American political news, but their place in America’scultural news is limited and few Kurdish singers are known there. Last month, music lovers in New York were introduced to Aynur Dogan, a Kurdish Alevi music diva from Turkey — and one of Al-Monitor’s list of 50 people shaping the culture of the Middle East — who completed her Sept. 14-30 US-Canada tour with a concert in New York. The tour included various US cities in California, Indiana, Iowa, New Mexico and Wisconsin, and in Ontario, Canada. Dogan, known as simply “Aynur” to her fans, was accompanied by a group of musicians from Syria and Azerbaijan, as well as a German-born Turk. During and after each of her concerts, fans would post short clips, photos and praise on different social media platforms expressing how impressed they are with the Kurdish tunes.

“It was a crucial tour that brought Aynur and her trio to diverse American audiences,including college students and art circles. Kurdish music, specifically Anatolian and Alawite music, reached a global audience through Dogan’s emotion-laden voice,” Mutlu Civiroglu, a Washington based Kurdish affairs analyst, told Al-Monitor at

Aynur’s New York concert. Citing “Rewend” (Nomad) as his favorite song,Civiroglu pointed out that fans waited in the cold just to get a glimpse of Dogan. Another fan who attended the concert was 78-year-old who gave her name only as Hatice from Diyarbakir, who has been in self-imposed exile in the United States for the last 58 years. She said, “Today, for the first time in the United States, I felt my roots. The scent of the home I was born in, the colors of the town [Diyarbakir] I grew up in all came back to me. I cried with happiness. A woman’s voice singing our stories in our language 20 minutes away from my house.”

Hatice said that when she left Turkey, it was illegal to sing Kurdish songs in public.“This music has been with me all my life; now, Aynur has made it all come full circle. I am Kece Kurdan [the name of a song meaning “Kurdish Girl” in the Kurdish language of Kurmanji,” she said. Fifteen months after “Kece Kurdan” was released in 2004, a Diyarbakir court bannedthe album, saying that the lyrics of the title song had encouraged separatism, though the decision has been annulled a few months later. The album was the third released by this young singer from Cemisgezek, an obscure village in the southeast Anatolia. Aynur had studied music in Istanbul. The controversy got her a significant amount of attention both in the Turkish press and the global press. Aynur’s photo was also on the cover of a supplement in the “The Times” on March 21, 2005, issue, with the headline “The Cultural Wealth of Turkey.” Modest, straightforward and warm, Aynur told Al-Monitor over the phone that she felt sorry that her whirlwind tour in the United States could not include more cities, but she was delighted with the audience’s reaction.

“My audiences all around the world share similar qualities; they are receptive and accustomed to global tunes. We share the same emotions; gathering us together from such far corners of the world is art. That is the power of music,” she told Al-Monitor by phone. “What is unique for the audiences in the United States is that you get people from all nations [and] ethnicities. While on stage, we realize that all of the world’s populations can live together; they can sit down in the same room and share the same emotions. There were scores of people who drove for 12 hours or took a plane.” Multicultural musicians accompanied Aynur to the concerts. Piano player Salman Gambarow, who lives in Azerbaijan, has been performing with Aynur since 2012.

“He is a unique jazz pianist but also is so familiar and open to the music and tunes ofthe east,” said Aynur. Tanbur player Cemil Qocgiri is from a Kurdish-Alawite family from Turkey, but he was born and raised in Germany. Aynur said that he was like a bridge in the sense that he could “get together and work with diverse groups of musicians from all cultures.”

“His music’s reach is clean, minimalist, patient and relaxing. The connectionbetween each note he plays and his feelings can be felt clearly. Hence it is rather mystic. He is a valuable musician with important albums and projects — particularly on the Zazaki language [which was classified by UNESCO as a language threatened with extinction],” she added.

For the New York City concert exclusively, she was joined by clarinet player KinanAzmeh, a native Syrian who is based in New York. “In the United States, most of the audience listened to me live for the first time; frankly, there were quite a few who have never heard Kurdish music before the concert,” explained Aynur, when asked to compare the American audience to Europe, where she has given many concerts. “In Europe, there are many people from Turkey who are familiar with Kurdish, Turkish music and culture. Fans in Europe come to concerts to enjoy the show; they know the songs and most likely they are repeating audiences who have already watched my performances,” she said. But Aynur is no totally unknown in the United States, where she gave concerts before. In 2017, she was given Berklee College of Music’s Mediterranean Music Institute Award, which did not only cast the spotlight on the young singer but on Kurdish music as well. “[Kurdish music] is not a well-known genre, like Fado or Flamenco. But it is not a music that people view as alien neither. When you bring together an elderly Spanish flamenco singer along with dengbej (“bard” in Kurdish), there are so many similarities in their music. Even their intonations are not that different,” Aynur said. Asked about the difficulties in the use of the Kurdish language in Turkey, Aynur said, “Kurdish music has experienced similar problems at all times. We had a few relatively better years, but it was never easy to hold concerts or appear on television or radio. Kurdish performers did not receive much in government support, so whatever they achieved they did it by their own means. This is not unique to Kurdish music … it can be seen in other ethnic music as well.” But she expressed faith in the oral tradition for Kurdish music. “It is rather strong; that is why, despite all pressures, it has survived up to today. The more art, music gains strength and the more it produces [in any language], it will be able to resist assimilation and bigotry. Music is like a medicine and above all identities,” Aynur concluded.

Correction: Oct. 24, 2018. An earlier version of the article incorrectly said that theban on Aynur Dogan’s “Kece Kurdan” was lifted in 2015.

©2019 Al-Monitor. All rights reserved.

Reprinted with permission

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MMI Honors Aynur at Concert that Brings Crowd to its Feet

Published on 11th of May 2017
By Berklee

Kurdish vocalist Aynur Doğan, whose stage name is Aynur, received the Mediterranean Music Institute Award on March 16, becoming the first woman to earn the honor since the its inception in 2014. Immediately upon winning the award, she dedicated it to the resilient women of her homeland.

“It’s a big honor for me. I grew up with the voices of women who lamented war and the children they could not raise. Day after day, lamentations have grown but not sons or daughters,” she said. “I dedicate this award to our women who, despite violence and oppression, do not bow their heads.”

Born in Dersim, eastern Turkey, and raised in Istanbul, Aynur sings music that is based on traditional Kurdish folk songs, many of them at least 300 years old. Her lyrics are about the life and suffering of the Kurdish people, especially Kurdish women.

She accepted the award during the MMI’s annual concert at the Berklee Performance Center. As part of the event, the MMI announced that it was launching the Mediterranean Women in Action (MWIA) Initiative, which celebrates and reinforces the power of Mediterranean women in the arts, seeking to raise awareness and promote gender equality in the Mediterranean music scene.

Flamenco guitarist Josemi Carmona, double-bassist Javier Colina, and percussionist José Manuel Ruiz Motos kicked off the event with their song “Bandolero” and other tunes from their new album, De Cerca. Student violinist Tania Mesa appeared on stage with them for the song “Historia de un Amor.”

Aynur opened the second half of the concert, accompanied by MMI artistic director Javier Limón on guitar, with “Ehmedo.” For the next tune, the traditional Kurdish song “Heyder,” she was joined by the MMI Consort, a band of 11 students under the musical direction of Turkish students Elif Çakmut and Mahir Can Küçük, the winner of the MMI Student Achievement Award this year. The third tune, “Rewend,” one of Aynur’s most famous compositions, featured solos by Iranian student Farzin Denghan on kamancheh and guest balaban player Alp Akmaz of Turkey. The fourth song, “Malan Bar Kir—Berivane” (“Displaced from Home”), a Kurdish folk song, inspired the audience to sing along and dance down the aisles of the Berklee Performance Center. The crowd kept singing and dancing through “Keça Kurdan,” the call to Kurdish women, and “Min Digo.” It stayed on its feet for a standing ovation.

Watch Aynur’s performance of “Rewend”:  

 

Aynur Receives Prestigious Award for Excellence

Published on 15th March 2017 by Rudaw

Kurdish vocalist Aynur Dogan who has achieved a prominent place in the Kurdish music since she released her first album Kecha Kurdan (Kurdish girl) more than a decade ago. Photo: Dogan’s official website.
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Kurdish vocalist Aynur Dogan is to receive the Master of Mediterranean Music Award on Thursday in the United States from Berklee College, the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world.

Launched in 2014, the award recognizes excellence in the Middle Eastern music.

Dogan born in the Kurdish city of Dersim and raised in Istanbul has been a rising star in Kurdish music.

She has sung her songs based on the Kurdish folk music, many of them hundreds of years old, with a focus on the life and suffering of Kurdish people, and especially women, according to the Berklee College which will honour her work tomorrow as part of its annual spring season concert.

She released her debut album Kecha Kurdan (Kurdish girl) in 2004, and has since worked with local and international musicians, including the world famous international Silk Road Ensemble, initiated by the Chinese American cellist Yo Yo Ma, whose group earlier this year won a Grammy for Best World Music featuring renowned Kurdish musician Kayhan Kalhor.

Dogan and Kalhor both have collaborated with Yo Yo Ma Silk Project which brings together dozens of musicians of different cultures from around the world.

The artistic director of the Mediterranean Music Institute of the Berklee College said this will set an example for women musicians.

“By recognizing great talents such as Aynur, who has overcome many difficulties in her career and has persevered in her quest, we try to set an example of a new generation of women musicians,” Javier Limón, said.

The institute will also announce Women in Action initiative that will last through 2018, which seeks to raise awareness of female artists and to promote gender equality in the Mediterranean music scene by helping female musicians from the region to develop their music and professional careers.

The institute noted that Dogan not only has preserved the Kurdish folk music, but she also blends the music of Kurdish and Alevi heritage with modern Western styles “to create a sound of her own”.

Mediterranean Maestros

Aynur is featured as mediterranean Maestro at Berklee.

The Guardian Hawniyaz: Impressive Musicianship

Published on 18th August 2016 by The Guardian

Hawniyaz are an intriguing new group from the Middle East, featuring two celebrated Kurdish musicians. Kayhan Kalhor, a remarkable performer on the kamancheh “spike fiddle” was born in Kurdish Iran but now lives in the US, while Aynur, originally from the Kurdish region of Turkey, is now based in Istanbul. Here they are joined by another Kurdish musician, Cemîl Qoçgirî on tenbûr lute, and the Azerbaijani jazz pianist Salman Gambarov, who adds improvisation and western influences, rather like Thomas Bartlett in The Gloaming. This is an album of impressive musicianship dominated by Aynur’s emotional, versatile vocals. She demonstrated her range at Womad last month, and here switches from delicate to powerful and intense passages on Delalê and Rewend (Nomad). Gambarov adds gently drifting piano passages and is a thoughtful accompanist, though I would have preferred him to have eased off during some of Kalhor’s exquisite, often mournful solos.