On January 10th 2024, the AMA will host a solo Saz performance by Anatolian folk musician Derya Yıldırım. Following Derya’s performance, Şebnem Altunkaya, PhD candidate at ifeas, and Derya Yıldırım will hold a panel discussion on folk music(s) of Anatolia, its protest nature, and the genre’s revival. The discussion will be moderated by AMA-director Hauke Dorsch.

Derya Yıldırım is a singer and multi-instrumentalist currently based in Berlin. In recent years she has become one of the leading figures to bring Anatolian folk music to a contemporary audience across Europe.Born and raised in Hamburg, Derya learnt the piano, guitar, ud, saxophone and baglama from an early age. She studied at Hochschule für Musik und Theater in Hamburg (2013 – 2016), and then transferred to Universität der Künste in Berlin to specialize in the baglama with Taner Akyol – where she graduated in 2020. With her baglama playing and her striking voice, Yildirim mesmerizes audiences with her modern approach to the sound of Anatolian folk music. Yildirim works creatively with this repertoire – with an eagerness to lead it into the future without losing awareness of its past. Currently, she is active as a performer in numerous projects, such as the international turkish psych popband – Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek- with whom she has released the successful “Nem Kald,” EP (2017), their third album “DOST 2” (2022) the second of a two part series following 2021’s highly acclaimed DOST 1.As an artist, Yildirim brings her personal approach to anatolian folk music to diverse stages – from clubs to theatres and cinemas. Currently she is working with Ensemble Resonanz, a world’s leading chamber orchestra. The collaboration led to the project “Derya’s Songbook”, a performance which contains new commissioned works alongside new arrangements of traditional folk songs.

Photo Credits: Philomena Wolflingseder