On April 18 I made my way to the Cemal Reşit Rey Concert Hall for a tribute event commemorating the jazz and pop singer Ayten Alpman (1930-2012) (image source: Ayten Alpman’ı anıyoruz! Kadıköy Life). Ms Alpman’s singing career began in the early 1950s, when she was encouraged to sing jazz by the New York-based Turkish producer Arif Mardin (1932–2006), a much-celebrated figure in the music industry who won twelve Grammy Awards. She leapt to fame in 1974, when her pop song *Memleketim* (‘My Homeland’), originally released in 1972, was frequently broadcast by the TRT during what is known in Turkish as the *Kıbrıs Barış Harekatı* (‘Cyprus Peace Initiative’) – the invasion of Cyprus by Turkish forces that eventually led to the partition of the island. Ayten Alpman rarely made recordings, producing only two LPs during the course of her career. She did, however, notch up several hits, including *Sensiz Olmaz* (‘I Can’t Be Without You’), *Yanımda Olsa* (‘If He Were By My Side’) and *Ben Varım* (‘I Am Here’). In 1999, a compilation of her best-known singles was released by Ada Müzik – more of this later.
In 1953, she married the jazz pianist, singer and composer İlham Gencer (1925-2023), and the couple had two children. She passed away on April 20 2012. As for İlham Gencer, he lived to the ripe old age of 97. One of the couple’s children, Ayşe Gencer (1956–2022), became a jazz singer in her own right. In 1988, she married the jazz trumpeter İmer Demirer, a musician of extraordinary talent whose performances I have frequently attended. Shortly before her premature death from cancer at the very end of 2022, she played her mother in a film entitled Bergen.
In June 2018, during the opening concert of the İKSV Jazz Festival – a ‘marchpast’ of the country’s leading jazz musicians past and present – I witnessed performances by (among many others) İmer Demirer, Neşet Ruacan, Sibel Köse, Ayşe Gencer and İlham Gencer. At that time I was new to the world of Turkish jazz, but my evaluations of the various performers have not changed over the intervening five years. My blog on that event contained the following paragraphs:
... The TRT Hafif Müzik ve Caz Orkestrası (otherwise known as the ‘TRT Big Band’) [then] took the stage under the direction of their conductor Kamil Özler. The first musician they accompanied in a solo was the trumpeter İmer Demirer, who is himself a member of the orchestra. Mr Demirer is one of the finest jazz musicians in the country, and his performance very much lived up to expectations. ...
The next soloist to be accompanied by the Big Band was Neşet Ruacan, whose lightning-speed guitar-playing gave the audience a good deal of pleasure. Following this, we heard the singer Sibel Köse, a Turkish jazz musician of supreme professionalism and flawless taste. ...
Next on the programme was Ayşe Gencer (who is in fact the spouse of İmer Demirer). Again, the quality was palpable. Here she is in *But Beautiful*.
Lastly, we listened to İlham Gencer, the father of the previous performer. This man, a ‘golden oldie’ born in 1925, still looks remarkably spry and dapper in spite of his advanced age. Although he is also a pianist, on this occasion he proved his mettle as a singer, and his rousing performance (in Turkish, French and English) made a fitting end to a celebration of the famous names in Turkish jazz throughout its history.
Little did I know then, of course, that İlham Gencer would outlive his daughter – whose performance in that concert in 2018 convinced me that of all the female singers featured in it, she was the one who most nearly approached Sibel Köse’s standard of professionalism.
The clock now moves forward to 2023. One torrid evening during the summer of that year, I went to the seaside park at Kalamış (slightly east of Kadıköy, on the Anatolian shore of the Sea of Marmara) to hear İmer play and Sibel sing in a concert commemorating İmer’s late spouse. Photographs of Ayşe Gencer were projected onto the wall behind the stage; as I noticed then, and later heard Sibel confirm, the occasion was a highly emotional one.
Back to 2025. At the tribute concert for Ayşe’s mother that took place on April 18, the musicians were Neşet Ruacan (guitar), İmer Demirer (trumpet), Can Çankaya (piano), Derin Bayhan (drums), Kağan Yıldız (double bass), Engin Recepoğulları (saxophone) and two vocalists – Sibel Köse and Ece Göksu. Given the deep impression that Ayten Alpman had made on the Turkish psyche, it was entirely understandable that there should be very few empty seats in the auditorium.
First, there was a series of instrumental numbers in which we heard solos from all the musicians; I especially enjoyed Neşet Ruacan’s and Can Çankaya’s tasteful playing, and savoured a satisfying duet between İmer and Engin Recepoğulları. Then singer Ece Göksu, one of Turkey’s up-and-coming jazz vocalists, took the stage. A native of Ankara, she sang in the Ankara State Opera and Ballet Children’s Chorus, later receiving tuition as a pianist at state conservatoires in Ankara and Istanbul. It was while in Ankara that she began to take an interest in jazz, and formed her first group. In 2007, she won a Fulbright Scholarship to receive instruction as a jazz vocalist at William Paterson University in New Jersey; she currently resides partly in New York and partly in Istanbul. In 2014 Slow, Hot Wind, an album of jazz classics featuring her along with Neşet Ruacan and double bass player Volkan Hürsever, was released. ‘Live in Assos’, meanwhile, appeared in March last year; accompanying her on this album are İmer Demirer and guitarist Eylül Biçer.
After three numbers from Ece, she took a break and Sibel came on stage, impressing everyone with her rich, strong tone and her flawless voice control in the long, quiet, gentle notes. In 'Someone to Watch Over Me', Can Çankaya produced some delicious up-and-down sweeps on the piano. In the middle of the next number Ece reappeared, taking over the song Sibel was singing. The two then began a duet consisting largely of nonsense syllables; meanwhile, İmer and Engin launched into some adventurous improvisations. I very much appreciated this part of the performance: in my opinion, the spontaneous and irrational element in jazz is one of its greatest strengths. After a few more numbers in which the singers alternated, and Neşet Ruacan’s excellent accompanying skills were showcased, we arrived at the last item in the concert. This was, of course, Ayten Alpman’s hit song *Memleketim*, and here the audience were invited to join in the singing. Not knowing the words myself, I could only marvel at the way the other members of the audience had memorised the words of this classic of the dim-and-distant 1970s. It clearly represents a significant landmark in Turkish popular culture.
If astrology bores you, you are hereby authorised to skip the next two paragraphs.
Why should this be? Well, the astrologer in me cannot help but point to the fact that when the Turkish Republic was inaugurated by Mustafa Kemal in Ankara at around 8:30 in the evening of October 29, 1923, the sun was in Scorpio, while the constellation rising over the eastern horizon (i.e., the ‘Ascendant’) was that of Cancer. Both these are water signs, water being the most emotionally-driven of the four elements. Cancer is the sign of ‘hearth and home’, and thus – by extension of the ‘protecting me and mine’ theme – of patriotism. Interestingly, the underworld planet Pluto (associated with death, rebirth, transformation and everything ‘deep’) is positioned in Cancer, very close to the Ascendant, while warlike Mars occupies the fourth house, the house (once again) of ‘hearth and home’. Any astrologer will tell you that these circumstances go a long way towards explaining why Turkish people should be deeply nationalistic (Cancer) and not at all unwilling to lay down their lives for their country (Scorpio, a sign ruled by – yes, you guessed it – Mars and Pluto).
The words of *Memleketim* touch on some classic Scorpionic themes. The sign of Scorpio is sometimes symbolised by the phoenix, an immortal bird from Greek, Egyptian, Persian and Phoenician mythology that cyclically regenerates; according to some accounts, it immolates itself before rising again from its own ashes. It thus symbolises the sun, which dies and is reborn every day. And indeed, the theme of sacrificial death and rebirth figures prominently in several lines from the song. Here are two examples:
*Bin can feda bir tek dostuma* (‘I’d give up a thousand lives for one loyal friend’)
*Yeniden doğdum dersin, derya olur gidersin* (‘You’ll say “I’ve been born anew” and flow like the sea’ – note the water imagery).
The Turkish words of the song were written by Fikret Şeneş (1921–2015). She created lyrics for a large number of Turkish pop stars, including Ajda Pekkan. The music, meanwhile, was taken from *L’aveugle* (‘The Blind Man’), a cheerful ditty about a blind violinist that was sung by the French singer Mireille Mathieu (1946-).
That is not the end of the story, however: 'L’aveugle' was originally a Yiddish folk song of the klezmer tradition that was used in the film Fiddler on the Roof, the plot of which is centred around the expulsion of the Jewish community from a village near Kiev by the Imperial Russian government in 1905 as a result of the ‘Pale of Settlement’ edicts. The original version of the song is entitled 'Rabbi Elimelekh'.
But enough of history. Here is a live performance by Ayten Alpman of her ‘forever’ hit song 'Memleketim'. And what a powerful voice the lady had! One thousand times Mashallah!
I cannot conclude without a word about her daughter Ayşe Gencer, whose death was a sad loss to Turkish jazz. May she, too, rest in peace! In the following recording, she is singing 'How Do You Keep The Music Playing?' with the TRT Jazz Orchestra at a concert held at the Cemal Reşit Rey Concert Hall in 2002 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the launching of her mother’s musical career.
Now, here is Ayten Alpman herself singing 'I Wish You Love' at that same concert. She is accompanied on the piano by her husband. (What a family of cultural icons they were!) For a lady of 71, she performs with commendable panache. Right at the beginning, İlham Gencer says: 'Are you nervous? I’m experiencing the excitement I felt fifty years ago.'
Finally, here is the collection of her singles that was released by Ada Müzik in 1999. Enjoy!
