The wordless Bildiş was played for the Ankara State Conservatory's collectors in the summer of 1943 by a drummer and a zurna player together, yet the repertoire notation names only the drummer, Cuma Nacak, as source performer; the zurna player Veli Töngel's name stayed on the collection sheet. Muzaffer Sarısözen collected and transcribed the melody, and the TRT Turkish Folk Music repertoire filed it among its dance tunes as no. 91. No dance tune registered to Amasya carries a lower number.

Catalogue Data

  • Repertoire no.: TRT Turkish Folk Music repertoire 91 (dance tunes section)
  • Region: Amasya; the repertoire gives no district or village, and the conservatory catalogue gives the place of recording as "Amasya province" (an estimate)
  • Source performer: Cuma Nacak (davul, drum); the collection sheet also records Veli Töngel (zurna, shawm)
  • Collected and transcribed by: Muzaffer Sarısözen
  • Date of collection: July 1943, day unknown; conservatory catalogue no. 3614, record 1112/A-1, titled "Bildiş ve Yeldirme", performers Cuma Nacak and Veli Döngel
  • Mode: Segâh scale; final and closing note Si
  • Metre: 4/4
  • Genre: dance tune (instrumental)
  • Music: anonymous
  • TRT link: TRT has no public page for individual repertoire items; the catalogue data of no. 91, its note on the collection sheet and a single page of notation can be seen on Repertükül.
  • Overview article: The Melody of the Yeşilırmak

Lyrics

Bildiş is a tune for drum and zurna, played for dancers; in place of words the notation carries the entry "Sözü Yoktur".

Story

As the repertoire note reports, the collection sheet lists the two performers together, with their trades: Cuma Nacak, drummer and farmer, with the year 1318 beside his name; Veli Töngel, zurna player and farmer, with the year 1317. These are most probably years of birth in the Rumi calendar, corresponding roughly to 1902 and 1901. The conservatory catalogue reads the zurna player's surname as "Döngel".

The catalogue lists four record sides made one after another by the same pair: "Amasya Üç Ayak ve Yeldirmesi", "Köçek Havası", "Bildiş ve Yeldirme" and "Tokat Oyun Havası". For all four the place is "Amasya province" and the date is given only as month and year, in square brackets; in other words, the record sheet does not reveal on which day, or where in Amasya, the recording was made. What the name "Bildiş" means, and with what dance and on what occasion the tune was played, no printed source has explained.

Musical Features

The name "Bildiş ve Yeldirme" in the conservatory list suggests that the record also carried a quicker yeldirme section following the tune. The TRT notation, by contrast, bears only the name "Bildiş", which may mean that the yeldirme was not transcribed, though the catalogue data leave the matter untouched. On its single page the melody is in the Segâh scale and in 4/4, with Si as both its final and its closing note. The fields reserved for the range have been left blank.

Performers and Recordings

The record Cuma Nacak and Veli Töngel made on drum and zurna in 1943 is the tune's known recording. The sources hold no trace of other players recording or publishing it in later years.

Bibliography

Online sources