Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Turkiyat Mecmuasi, sa.33, ss.641-679, 2023 (Scopus)
This study analyzes the incesaz ensembles in Direklerarası, one of the most important entertainment hubs of late Ottoman Istanbul, from the perspective of music sociology, and attempts to reveal their role in the transformation of Turkish music in the late Ottoman period. Direklerarası, a cultural center identified with Ramadan festivities in late Ottoman society, hosted a music economy that connected various commercialized music activities related to incesaz culture. Incesaz, an extension of Ottoman high culture, compensated for the loss in status it suffered in the late 19th century compared to Western music by broadening its socioeconomic base, eventually assimilating into commercialized popular culture in Turkey. This process of interacting with different taste cultures and audiences resulted in certain changes in the social background of its major performers, the composition of its instruments, the scope and quality of its repertoire, and the expectations of its audience. This study claims that Direklerarası played a central role in the transformation of Incesaz. In Direklerarası, which did not spatially or institutionally separate serious and popular music, incesaz ensembles had to appeal to a diverse audience with varying expectations, blurring the position of incesaz in the hierarchies of taste. Focusing on the period roughly from the 1870s to the 1910s, this study analyzes the taste structure of incesaz ensembles in the Direklerarası music scene in terms of interactions among places, performers, repertoires, and audiences, using documents derived from periodicals, advertisements, memoirs, and biographical sources.