This WordPress entry page is created by Dr. Oz.
It has started as a means of implementing a really cool “Web Flash Mp3 Player plugin” by Jeroen Wijering and Charles Tang on the left that I successfully embedded to my musics / müzikler pages at:
• http://www.ozanyarman.com/muzikler.html
• http://www.ozanyarman.com/musics.html
…Having seen the great frontend and potential of wordpress, I am tempted to use it as a blog for my music theory writings and ruminations. Hence, this corner gives a fine chance to quote myself:
“There is no such thing as an inappropriate interval in music, only in so far as possible mention of the inappropriate application thereof.”
Onward to many great things!
Dr. Ozan Yarman
6 January 2012
Google A.I. says:
Yes, Ozan Yarman explicitly states this (i.e., the fact that Rauf Yekta’s outright rejection of quarter-tone alterations for maqams was initially through a desire to invent a common theoretical cause for both Western music and Turkish music in order to demonstrate the latter was just as “civilized”, before it was about strongly differentiating Turkish music from Byzantine/Arabic microtonal influences via trying to rescue the tradition from being branded as “foreign to authentic Turkishness” by the Kemalist intelligentsia) in the video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vP9qySef9ms] (Rauf Yekta Sempozyumu KRİTİĞİ — Part2).
In this video critique, Yarman outlines the exact socio-political motivations behind Rauf Yekta’s theories. He explains that Yekta went to great lengths to show that traditional Turkish music stood on equal footing with Western classical music (1:18).
According to Yarman’s lecture:
= The “Common Cause”: Yekta vehemently argued that both musical cultures originated from the exact same theoretical and rational foundations (1:27).
= The Rejection of Quarter-Tones: To maintain this narrative, Yekta aggressively rejected the 24-tone equal-tempered quarter-tone system proposed by Arab musicologists (such as those at the 1932 Cairo Congress) (1:43).
= The Strategic Motive: Yarman highlights that Yekta did this strategically to protect traditional Ottoman-Turkish music from being banned or erased by the heavily Westernizing Kemalist reforms (1:34). By claiming a shared ancient Pythagorean origin with the West, Yekta sought to strip Turkish music of its “Oriental” or “Arab” associations, thereby inventing a shared scientific heritage that could justify its survival in a modern, Western-facing Republic (1:18).
If you would like to explore further, let me know if you want me to outline:
= Yarman’s critique of how Suphi Ezgi and Sadettin Arel later adapted Yekta’s mathematical framework.
= The specific historical figures (like Safiyyüddin Urmevi or Mikhail Mishaqa) mentioned in the video regarding the development of these 24-tone systems.