Ece Göksu is one of Turkey’s up-and-coming jazz vocalists. A native of Ankara, she sang in the Ankara State Opera and Ballet Children’s Chorus. After receiving training as a pianist at the Hacettepe University State Conservatoire, in 2002 she moved to Istanbul, where she received further tuition in piano-playing at the Mimar Sinan University State Conservatoire. It was while at university 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, where she was taught by Nancy Marano, Cecil Bridgewater, Mulgrew Miller and others, meanwhile taking private lessons from Roberta Gambarini and Jay Clayton.
Ece Göksu, who currently resides partly in New York and partly in Istanbul, has taken part in festivals in the United States, Budapest and Dubai as well as in Turkey. In 2014 Slow, Hot Wind, an album of jazz classics featuring her along with Neşet Ruacan and Volkan Hürsever, was released. Live in Assos, meanwhile, appeared on March 1 this year; accompanying her on this album – as well as at the concert on April 27 – are trumpeter İmer Demirer and guitarist Eylül Biçer.
Issue 66, December 2023
Turkey’s Centenary Issue
