Sufi music gathers with hymns at CRR

ISTANBUL - Anatolia News Agency

Ender Doğan (above) and Sufi music artist Rachid Gholam are set to take the stage with their ‘Sufi Breath from Andalusia to Istanbul’ concert tonight in Istanbul.

Ender Doğan and Sufi music artist Rachid Gholam are set to take the stage with their “Sufi Breath from Andalusia to Istanbul,” concert. The two musicians combine North African and Sufi melodies in the concert, which will take place at Cemal Reşit Rey salon (CRR) tonight.

Speaking to Anatolia News Agency, Doğan said that Gholam was one of the most important names in contemporary Arabic Sufi music. Noting that they would be on the stage together for the fourth time, Doğan said: “The concert titled “Sufi Breath from Andalusia to Istanbul,” focuses on Sufi music and the melodies it developed in North Africa … We will play the music in the North African Sufi style.”

Doğan said that Sufi music and dervish lodge music had a certain Islamic mysticism to them. “We will reveal the relations between the dervish lodge hymns developed in North Africa and Istanbul,” he said, adding that there were relations that people could not see, but were more abstract.

“There are many Sufi styles in North Africa. For example, Muhyiddin İbn-i Arabi is one of them. Muhyiddin İbn-i Arabi had a really important effect on Turkish, Istanbul and Ottoman style Sufi music,” Doğan said.

Noting that two musicians would reveal the relations between these locations, Doğan added: “There is an emotional road between them. We can call it emotional relation.”

The two cultures are feeding from the same source, and the concert aims to carry this culture to the present and the future. “The concert will reveal the existing relations and their main source in Istanbul,” Doğan said. “We will focus on Andalusian music in North Africa to reveal the main source of Sufi music.”

During the second part of the concert, there will be Turkish and Arabic duets, including a total of 20 songs, featuring traditional instruments such as the reed flute, the violin, rhythm instruments and the kanun. “There will also be Turkish music instruments and stringed instruments,” said Doğan. “When we talk about North Africa we are talking about the original Arabic music. We are mainly focusing on Arabic music, not ethnic African music,” he added. Doğan and Gholam are also preparing to come together again at Ramadan to give another concert, when they will perform in Tunisia in July.