Akbank Jazz Festival to be held in October

ISTANBUL

The 31st Akbank Jazz Festival, organized with the theme of “The Jazz State of the City Again,” will be organized from Oct. 1 to 10 this year.

The festival program, which will host special performances by more than 100 artists from the Turkish jazz scene in different venues, was announced on Sept. 8.

Akbank General Manager Hakan Binbaşgil said that last year, the 30th-anniversary album “Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow” was made within the scope of the festival, that nearly 30 online concerts were held with the “Jazz State of the House” project and that Akbank Sanat organized more than 150 events to leave behind the problems of the pandemic.

Stating that they focused on two issues at the festival, Binbaşgil said: “Our aim here is to protect our own artists and support them. Therefore, this year’s festival will present our own artists. Our second focus is our young people. Especially this year, we will present many young musicians. They will have the opportunity to come together with masters.”

Akbank Sanat Director Derya Bigalı said that they started the physical concerts in January and February last year, and in March, they moved the events to a different format under the title of “Jazz State of the House” due to the pandemic.

As for this year’s events, Bigalı said: “This year, we call it ‘The Jazz State of the City Again’ in autumn. Our theme this year is birds, the symbol of autumn.”

Bigali stated that Galataport Istanbul Paket Post Office and Gazhane Museum were added to the festival venues this year.

Noting that they will host more than 100 artists in 10 different venues in 10 days, Bigalı said: “There are different projects; different musicians will come together. You will see a different festival this year. We invited groups from Turkey in particular; we wanted to bring them together. “Some of the concerts will be broadcast online. We will also have concerts within the scope of Contemporary Istanbul.”

The festival, which will present a selection of jazz and different music genres to music lovers, will start with the “Elif Çağlar Quartet feat. Defjen Daf Ensemble” concert on Oct. 1 at the Galataport Istanbul Paket Post Office.

Cenk Erdoğan will be accompanied by reed player Muhammed Ceylan and violinist Emre Erdal in the OttoJazz Ensemble, which interprets Turkish music with jazz arrangements.

Ramazan Sesler will take the festival participants on a journey from fine maqams to Thrace-Balkan rhythms with the project “A Clarinet Legend from Father to Son,” accompanied by Anıl Şallıel on the saxophone and Kaan Bıyıkoğlu on the piano.

Also, Güç Başar Gülle’s latest project, “Synthetic Vision,” will be on stage for the first time at the festival.

Selen Gülün, Çağıl Kaya, Özge Fışkın, İlhan Erşahin, Arto Tunçboyacıyan, Barış Demirel, Kamufle & Lara Di Lara, Okay Temiz, Baki Duyarlar, Şennur Dinleyen, Tolga Karaslan, Ediz Hafızoğlu, Ceylan Ertem, Kaan Çelen, Tolga Bilgin, Tamer Temel, Ercüment Orkut, Volkan Topakoğlu, Oğuz Büyükberber, Can Kozlu, Derya Türkan, Tolga Tüzün, Apostolos Sideris, Deniz Taşar, Yunus Belgin and Atılgan Nalıncıoğlu will be other guests of this year’s festival.