Mike's Oud Forums

Targan Oud Caprice...Amazing performance

damascene_oud - 2-5-2010 at 03:55 AM

Guys i thought to share this with you...Hakan Emre Ziyagil playing Targan's Oud Caprice.
To me it's just an amazing playing with outstanding technique, but personally i think that i didn't feel the spirit of the oud as oriental musical instrument, but rather a method to prove the infinite capabilities of this instrument in playing very difficult and challenging music beyond the traditional perception about it.
I didn't say "ahhh" at all to the music, but i definitely praise the playing of Hakan Emre Ziyagil and to me i think he is one of the best players.
Guys listen to it and tell me what you think.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5IK70WFYXs

spyros mesogeia - 2-7-2010 at 07:43 PM

excuse me but this is Not Caprice...if he wants to make some impros,or to make his self confidence to be shown,it's an other thing.Take a look to the Master Munir Nurretin Beken Recordings.You will understand the diference.Also Mavroudis Kontanis has a wonderfull recording.
Stop the speed....kills the music and the feeling sometimes....

jass - 2-9-2010 at 08:59 AM


This is not an amazing performance, it is a circus. And its not played like that anyway...I agree with Spyros, start being true to the music and stop the antics to show good you are...

I beg to differ

Alioud - 2-9-2010 at 12:58 PM

I would have to disagree with jass and spyros..

Aside from the fact that Hakan is one of the most talented oud players in the world today (and probably ever), I think this is one of the best interpretations of this Caprice I have ever heard.

We have to remember that the making of a good musician includes reinterpreting old works to give them new life. What use would it make if all players play the exact same thing (because it should be played like that). Using this logic, playing any of the old compositions would be no more than a futile exercise in producing identical records played be different people.

A piece of music played the same everyday simply bores the listener with the expected, no matter how good or even marvelous the piece is. This is how great music is sent to oblivion. But, a piece of music reinterpreted daily by different people simply gives new life and new meaning to the music itself.

Let me give you an example. I happen to be in love with Rachmaninoff's 3rd Piano concerto. I have the original recording played by Rachmaninoff himself and I read the Piano score a lot of times while listening.
Rachmaninoff was a beast on the Piano and he had a great passion while playing, but no one ever played the 3rd concerto like Horowitz, not even Rach. himself!! Horowitz did a complete reinterpretation of the concerto and even rewrote the score! sometimes taking Rach's music to a completely different level. Today, any pianist capable of playing Rach 3 plays Horowitz's score and not the original score.

Rach's 3rd concerto will live forever because pianists have passion to reinterpret it everyday. The same can be said about Chopin's or Liszt's work. A simple search in Youtube for the amazing pianist Lang Lang gives you a new meaning of the words "pianist" and "interpretation". No wonder, Lang Lang is not a favorite among rigid classical pianists simply because the piece (is not played like that). You can listen to a hundred pianists play the Moonlight Sonata and not be able to differentiate anyone of them, but simply listening to Lang Lang makes you go "Yeah!"

Music dies when it's repeated monotonously.

A guy once played oud in public while the late Munir Bashir was present. The player played Munir Bashir as if Bashir himself was on stage. When he came down and asked Bashir how he thought of him, Munir Bashir answered him "What did you do? Nothing. You simply imitated me. I didn't hear you play anything".

This is an amazing performance and Targan would be proud in his grave that his Caprice became a solid ground for musicians like Hakan to plant their ideas and interpretations.

Alioud - 2-9-2010 at 01:18 PM

I will save you the search on Lang Lang..

Franz Liszt's Hugnarian Rapsody No. 2 in C sharp minor is one of the greatest orchestral pieces rewritten for a Solo piano.

Listen to the original piece played by the Orchestra.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pN92591mDaE

I think Maksim (despite his gothic look) played it exactly the way it was scored by Liszt himself. Absolute notational perfectness. Listen to him here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byGI1mDi3no

Now, listen to Lang Lang play the same piece. I totally love his different and crazy interpretation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-EGKpbIBuw

Tell me.. Who owns Liszt's Hungarian Rapsody? Who should say it should be played like Maksim or like Lang Lang? Who owns music anyway and who has the right to say how it SHOULD be played??

My last example is a contemporary one..

This is Andrew York playing his own composition, a piece called Sunburst.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SV7TA0OSrik&feature=related

And this is the talented Li Jie playing her own interpretation of the same piece..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvmcNaMLYXs&feature=related

I don't think Mr. York will ever complain that the most talented classical guitarist today (in my humble opinion better than the late Segovia) decided to reinterpret his work.

Cyberquills - 2-9-2010 at 02:24 PM

INteresting thread guys. I see the pros and cons of both arguments and thank you for them! Maybe the issue is not that Hakan is being untrue to the music more than not indicating that it is his interpretation of it? Maybe listeners have been misled by thinking he would be playing Targan as it was originally written, instead of as how Hakan has chosen to interpret it?

Personally, I prefer the piece to be played a tad slower than Hakan did because I like to hear the individual notes as opposed to listening them blur into one another. The important word here is "prefer" :D.

Clearly stating that the piece is an interpretation would have prepared listeners for Hakan's version instead of Targan's original.

Cheers

CQ

spyros mesogeia - 2-9-2010 at 02:35 PM

I don't have to beg to difer Ali my friend,because playing music is not a racing process....
You have your Idols,and your exemples....I have my own....that is what makes us diferent,but...some things are ''Classical''....why don't we play the taksim in 2 seconds with 400 rishas per minut?
...Probably ever best player????????????I am really glad that I do not hear that from his mouth.....MODESTY my friend.....an artist must be gentle,modest,and to respect the rules.....
did you hear the original version?Targans?Do you think that he couldn't play it quicklier?
My personal opinion is that some things are sacred,and classical....the semais are not west music,and ofcourse not a race....
Personal opinion ofcourse...If you like it,It's your chice,my choice is Bekens.....or the Original one.
Greetings from USA

Alioud - 2-9-2010 at 02:56 PM

Indeed this is becoming interesting... :)

I completely respect your opinion Spyros.. BUT..

I am not Hakan.. and I don't have to be modest.. he has a lot of recordings posted in Youtube and you can evaluate him from a musical and technical point of view. The guy is excellent to say the least about him.

I also believe that it's up to you if you want to play a Taqsim in 2 seconds..

I play the Caprice and this is my musical school, and I have heard Targan play it and I've seen it's score, and I don't know if Targan could have achieved the same speed Hakan played but I am sure he was quite capable of playing it "faster".

Nothing is sacred.. and I mean it.. NOTHING. Not in music and not in anything in this universe. Semais and Taksims are boring repetitions and to say the least, once you've heard one you've heard them all. This is simply because of the rigidity and scholastic teaching of the eastern school of music. If it wasn't for a few composers who rewrote the history of Arabic and Eastern music, Semais and Taksims would only survive for historical and ethnic interest and would eventually find their places in music museums.

In the Violin world. There is a Violin before Paganini and a Violin after him. I don't see him holding the traditional violin methods before him as sacred, hence, he changed the way violin is played forever. The same goes for JS Bach who completely redefined melodic and harmonic compositions with his Tocatta and Fugue and wrote the history of the Counterpoint forever. I wonder if Handel was sacred to him.

I don't have a choice but one.. I don't want to hear the same music everyday, and certainly don't want to hear the exact same thing played by a different person everyday. If the world fails to reinterpret and reinvent music we would run out of composers forever, for what is composing other than reinterpretation and reinvention of well known sounds and well known feelings?

spyros mesogeia - 2-9-2010 at 03:07 PM

Ali my friend,
The whole way of thinking of the taksim is diferent.
I was an oboe solist for almost 10 years,believe me I know what the west is....
As for your opinion about this player is personal,I respect it but I will not say mine.
As for the ''boring'' coulture,let me tell you one thing.
The Byzantine music is at least 1800 years old,the Makams and the Persian music also,do you think that the western music is so reach to be able to compare it with the eastern?
I doubt...as for the videos on youtube I have seeing jazz on oud.It's his style,it's his choice,I have seen alot of his videos.
But personally I love Bacanos,Targan,TsolakoglouKenkulian,Sencalar,Melkon,and as for the actual players I prefer Bitmez,Tokcan,Bayram Coskuner,Beken,Kizilay,and ofcourse all the new players that they respect the principles.
It's diferent to play ''featurings'' of classical music,and something else to perform and make fun of coultoural treasures....
This is my opinion guys,with respect and honour to this magnificent instrument that I have dedicated my life.
A simple player....
Spyros

Sazi - 2-9-2010 at 03:32 PM

Ali, thank you for putting into words what I have always felt. Simply playing a piece exactly as it is written is like dusting off museum exhibits, or trying to create a forgery. I was invited to a "jam session" at a local café, only to discover that the regular participants don't actually jam, they just regurgitate old tunes note for note from whatever transcription they learnt it from, leaving no room for improvisation or personal touch. ( And of course if you don't know the tunes there is nothing to do!).

One thing I love about Omar Bashir, is that as I have so many recordings of him and it's obvious that I would have many different versions of the same pieces, yet the beauty is that he never plays the same piece exactly the same way every time. I can't speak for classical music, I am a folk musician, but the popular folk tunes were made that way by good players re-interpreting and adding their own touch.

I play a couple of classic pieces, that I learn by ear, combining many different versions of the pieces, with my own interpretation, and I really enjoy it, but when I play them with my classically trained friend, he is always trying to make me play them note for note and timing as whatever sheet he has of the score - that's not me playing in the flow, just a technical excersise.

Perhaps recorded music has blinded us to the fact that music is very much an inspired process, and when we perform we may feel more or less inspired by the sound, audience, life, and thus play differently at different times, and giving us some kind of absurd expectation that it must always be the same because the recording is always the same.

One thing I loved about Um Kalthoum was the way she made her musicians put away their scores and play the pieces in their own way, & they would be comfortable in the knowledge that they were putting something of themselves into the music, and get into the feeling of it rather than worrying about getting it " right " or doing it how everyone else has done it before.

spyros mesogeia - 2-9-2010 at 03:44 PM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njUic4yPkzI

speed and classy....everything comes clear to the ears like a diamond....
The notes are separated and you really hear the composition and not the speed...

Greetings and peace to all:wavey:

jass - 2-9-2010 at 06:22 PM

Hey Guys,

In terms of intepretation, he over does it. Thats all. He has a great technique. (not sure about best oud player of all time :)

Im all for experimenting or adding to a piece, but the core has to be respected. As in Rach's Horowitz' interpretation, Rach's core composition is respected, hence why it is what it is. I dont believe Hakan hasnt respected the 'core', he has just used Targans composition as a platform to show off and that why I dont like it. He turns a piece with beautiful phrases and patterns into a fast study which has no meaning and a mishmash of phrasing.

So, to reinterpret a piece, you can be original, go for it! But first understand its meaning and respect its core...these are the ingredients for the most successful interpretations and why Munir Bekens one for me is 1000 times better than Hakan's, but maybe he will start to understand more as he gets older...

Thanks for the discussion guys!

Jass

Luttgutt - 2-10-2010 at 05:58 AM

Don't forget this is just en ETUDE...
That is, it is technique exercise :)

jass - 2-10-2010 at 04:00 PM

Yes, but it is suppossed to be Targans not Hakan's...Again core is not respected...

FastForward - 2-10-2010 at 07:17 PM

Playing very fast is a futile effort to create white noise :)

I have no taste for very fast music that puts way too many notes in a short duration.

Repeating pieces doesn't necessarily mean that you can't add your own flavor to it. I think it is up to the player is his musical sense. Just today I was listening to an old piece that everybody knows, Samaii Bayati Thaqil (Arap Saz Semaisi), played by three different people with each one adding his own touch to it. They all sounded beautiful without having to play a billion gazillion notes in 0 seconds. The versions I was listening to were Sami Al Shawa, Samir Joubran, and Gursel Torun. There were parts for each player that I like more than others.

" Semais and Taksims are boring repetitions and to say the least, once you've heard one you've heard them all. This is simply because of the rigidity and scholastic teaching of the eastern school of music. If it wasn't for a few composers who rewrote the history of Arabic and Eastern music, Semais and Taksims would only survive for historical and ethnic interest and would eventually find their places in music museums."

Ali, I respect you opinion but completely disagree. In fact, these "rigid" structures are what have preserved most of the music we love and listen to everyday. It doesn't mean that people can't create new pieces and new structures. But, similar to studying math, you have to learn the basics and repeat problems over and over until you grasp the inner workings of these complex modes of playing (the Makam system).

The repetition are not boring but rather they are there to help put you in certain mood, sort of like hypnotizing you. Of course if they repeat too much the effect gets reversed but I don't think that a Taslim repeated 4 times is boring.

In fact, one can introduce his own subtle changes to the Taslims to make them even more ecstatic.

suz_i_dil - 2-11-2010 at 10:43 AM

To keep on the classical way of interpretating this piece I think we shall refer to the score itself, written by serif muhiddin targan, and actually it seems Hakan Emre who really follow the score, in terms of tempo.
Firsts measure are sixteenth notes (semiquaver), alegretto, then sextuplet of semiquaver allegro (120 to 170 bpm...So very fast actually). Those are the notes on Serif Muhiddin Targan book.

But actually this is not my point, and what I love in eastern music is this place let to the own interpretation of the piece, and not a point by point reading of the score.
As told by Ali, music is something alive, and when I listen a music I want to enjoy an artistic work and interpretation, if not I would go to a musical museum.

To my point classical music doesn't interfer with the expression of the artistic creavity. Listen for exemple Mustafa Said taqasim (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Z0kmrV7BEA ), he has a very strong personality in his interpretation, I would recognize his style between a thousand but he follow some rules indeed and stay in what one would maybe call "the old school style".

It is not also a question of tempo, play it slow or play it fast don't really matter for me, but make us feel something in it, for exemple this one is also a nice and creative interpretation of this piece to my ears by Nuri Karademerli:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCEeniXpRtw&feature=related


But I can't bear this kind of playing, only technic and technic and in which I don't feel anything:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOW9czaEtGY

Classical doesn't stop at one year or one composer. Gregorian vocals of the first century, baroque composition, renaissance, romantic and also contemporary like Bartok or Ravel are all consider as classical music and composers in western music, but all sound very different.

I'm not an expert of music history, but saying the makam has the same rules and way of interpretation since 1800 years would be a non sense. Eastern music has also followed many evolutions and mixing between cultures. So where to stop our interpretation of the classical repertory and makam? syriac vocals? wasla? Before or after the influence of central asia music on the makam? Which year ? Which day ?
Would Necati Celik had been consider as classical in the 18th century or would his head had been cut off for not following exactly the score written by the sultan?

I think that without people of the creativity of Hakan Emre, and with the rigidity of some of nowadays listeners, we would still be listening only to gregorian vocals in Europe, and that would be our only choice 2000 years after.

I guess some of Serif Targan composition were probably very "unclassical", strange and too modern at this time (I mean out out of his saz semai of course). But surely he is consider now as a great classical master, who largely influenced many musicians after.

Sorry for the long message, but my global idea finally is that "classical" definition is something very fuzzy in my mind and regarding to history in constant evolution anyway. So let's keep on the pleasure of our ears, of course a very subjective matter...

Cyberquills - 2-11-2010 at 03:34 PM

Spyros

Mate! Thank you for posting that youtube link. THAT is real playing :applause:. The notes are clear, it is not rushed it is a pleasure to hear. Ah!

Fastforward, Suz,
A1. You both have the right of it. if something is played so fast that the feeling is lost what you really lose is the music itself and the ability to let you and your listeners connect with it and be deeply enriched by it. "Firewire" playing (zip! Ping! Richochet! Quick! Quick!) holds no real value for me.

Again, great thought provoking thread everyone.

CQ

Oud Freak - 2-12-2010 at 08:32 AM

Quote: Originally posted by spyros mesogeia  
excuse me but this is Not Caprice...if he wants to make some impros,or to make his self confidence to be shown,it's an other thing.Take a look to the Master Munir Nurretin Beken Recordings.You will understand the diference.Also Mavroudis Kontanis has a wonderfull recording.
Stop the speed....kills the music and the feeling sometimes....


Emre's interpretation is awesome! It's maybe the first time ever that I find speed so attractive, so melodious and so musical. His impros are also outstanding, very refined and full of taste.

The Nureddin version is amazingly clean and certainly closer to the original spirit, but not attractive at all for me. In two words : conventional and boring.

Emre in his playing the Caprice is so creative!

jass - 2-12-2010 at 10:30 PM


Anybody seen this Caprice?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l862RwJCdY

I think he's playing a Turunz oud too, looks great and sounds pretty awesome!

Jass