I recently purchased the program Mus2 as tool for composing music outside the Western 12-semitone even-tempered scale. This serendipitous occurence has precipitated my introduction to Turkish art music.

Turkish art music is the modern rendering (and extension) of a classical music continuum extending from melodies of nomadic times through the Ottoman era of court patronage and exquisite composition. That tradition continues unbroken into the modern era which has electrified the instruments and handed microphones to singers performing on state television and in large amphitheatres.

Turkish classical music was the music of the then most scientifically advanced society in western Eurasia, the official musical standard of an immense multi-ethnic empire which endured 500 years. It was and remains urban, mathematically sophisticated, sycretistic and extensible.

Turkish art music is among the richest system in terms of pitch: Turkish folk music recognizes 17 notes, the classical system recognizes (a slightly differing set of) 24, and modern practice effectively encompasses Western even temperament as well.

It is an emotionally moving music. The wavering expressions of the amazing vocalists (flawless mordent-like figures executed on series of intervals smaller than a quarter-tone) possess a piquancy difficult to match in a 12-tone system.

If you would like to listen to some music here's a search term for YouTube (URL contains non-latin characters). If this is your first listen, may I recommend a clip of the young superstar diva Zara singing with Orhan Hakalmaz.

There is a companion program to Mus2 called Mus2okur (the name is a pun: "music reader") which is an immense tutorial and digital library of Turkish art music. The authors of Mus2 responded to my review by gifting me with a copy of Mus2okur and I have fallen into it head-first.

Mus2okur is a complete and competent introduction (in English or Turkish) to Turkish music theory with all the pitches, all the scales in both notation and playback, all the rythmic meters, all the forms, along with thousands of tunes with lyrics transcribed in the Mus2 format. History and players are covered.

 I have had difficulty this week doing anything but learn from Mus2okr and watch clips on YouTube.

A scholarly description by Dr. Ozan Yarman of the various styles of Turkish music is found here.