About Ahmet Adnan Saygun
Ahmed Adnan Saygun (Turkish pronunciation: [ahˈmet adˈnan sajˈɡun]; 7 September 1907 – 6 January 1991) was a Turkish composer and musicologist. One of a group of composers known as the Turkish Five who pioneered western classical music in Turkey, his works show a mastery of Western musical practice, while also incorporating traditional Turkish folk songs and culture. When alluding to folk elements he tends to spotlight one note of the scale and weave a melody around it, based on a Turkish mode. His extensive output includes five symphonies, five operas, two piano concertos, concertos for violin, viola and cello, and a wide range of chamber and choral works. The Times called him "the grand old man of Turkish music, who was to his country what Jean Sibelius is to Finland, what Manuel de Falla is to Spain, and what Béla Bartók is to Hungary". Saygun's formative years in Turkey coincided with the radical changes in his country's politics and culture as the reforms of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk had replaced the Ottoman Empire – which had lasted nearly 600 years – with a new secular republic based on Western models and traditions. As Atatürk created a new cultural identity for his people and the newly founded nation, Saygun became a staunch believer in and an ardent follower of Atatürk's reforms. == Biography == Ahmed Adnan Saygun was born in 1907 in İzmir, then part of the Ottoman Empire – in today's Republic of Türkiye. There were frequent concerts given by the Ottoman military bands, and performances of Western works by chamber music ensembles at the time and this influenced Saygun to start his first music lessons in elementary school. He started playing the piano, the Ottoman short-necked lute and the oud at an early age and quickly found his passion writing music at the age of fourteen.
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