"Pencerede Perde Ben" ("I Am the Curtain at the Window"), in which a young man bound for military service bids farewell to the girl he loves, is the only piece among the Amasya songs of the TRT repertoire to have been transcribed in the mahur scale. Its lyrics, built of seven-syllable quatrains, also give the beloved's name through the address "Baygın Hamide'm" ("my languid-eyed Hamide") added to the end of the third line of each quatrain. The song stands in the repertoire as number 18, and its subject is recorded as love and passion. Its name also comes up among the examples in our general article, which looks at the modes, lyrics and performance of the region's songs together.

Catalogue Record

  • TRT Turkish Folk Music repertoire no.: 18 (kırık hava)
  • Region: Amasya
  • Source performer: Yöre Ekibi (regional ensemble)
  • Collected by: TRT Istanbul Radio, Turkish Folk Music Directorate
  • Transcribed by: Nida Tüfekçi
  • Date of collection: unknown
  • Makam: Mahur; final and closing note G (sol)
  • Usul (metre): 2/4+3/4 (Demircioğlu gives only 2/4)
  • Range: from low G to high A, 9 notes
  • Words and music: anonymous
  • Repertoire record (from Repertükül, as no official TRT address exists): https://www.repertukul.com/PENCEREDE-PERDE-BEN-18
  • Ministry of Culture and Tourism audio recording: http://webtvpanel.kultur.gov.tr/WebTV_Contents/Publish/21092017143508/09ipenceredeiperde.mp3
  • Türkü Yurdu: https://www.turkuyurdu.com/pencerede-perde-ben-2697.html

Lyrics

Pencerede perde ben
Yeni düştüm derde ben
Yardan evvel ölürsem (Baygın Hamide'm)
Nasıl yatam yerde ben
Haydi de telleniver
Birazıcık eyleniver
Asker oldum gidiyom (Baygın Hamide'm)
Kaderine sayıver
Evleri görünüyor
Gönüldür yeriniyor
Çekilecek dert değil (Baygın Hamide'm)
Mevlam sabır veriyor
Küp içinde ireçel
İyi gün gelir geçer
Kötüye meyil verme (Baygın Hamide'm)
Ah ile ömrün geçer

The quatrain beginning "Haydi de telleniver" is the refrain; in the score it is sung again after the quatrain "Evleri görünüyor", and in the Türkü Yurdu text it is also repeated after the last quatrain. In English: I am like the curtain at the window, newly fallen into love's trouble; if I die before my beloved, how shall I lie in the ground? Come, put on your finery a little, linger a little; I have become a soldier and I am going, count it as your fate. Her houses are in sight, the heart smarts and grieves; it is not a pain one can bear, but my Lord gives patience. There is jam in the jar, good days come and go; do not give your heart to the wrong one, or your life will pass in sighs.

The repertoire score's glossary explains the idiom "derde düşmek" as falling in love, being seized by a hopeless passion; "yerinmek" as both to pity, to regret and to repent; "meyil vermek" as to love, to give one's heart; and "ah" as a curse, an imprecation. "Tellenmek" describes adorning oneself as a bride does with her tinsel, and "eylenmek" means to stop and linger a little; these two explanations are not in the glossary and rest on the familiar meanings of the local idiom. The first line of the last quatrain ("Küp içinde ireçel", "jam in the jar") is there, in a construction common in manis, to set up the rhyme rather than the sense; the real statement lies in the three lines that follow.

Its Story

The words bring a moment of parting to life: the speaker is a young man leaving for military service, and as he parts from his beloved he urges her to be patient. No printed source, however, tells for whom or on what occasion the song was composed. Whether a woman named Hamide really lived is unknown; the adjective "baygın" is most probably used here in the sense of languid-eyed, with a melting gaze, but this too is not explained in the source.

Musical Features

What sets the melody apart within the Amasya repertoire is its scale. In Demircioğlu's count of 48 songs, mahur appears in only one work, and this is it. In a repertoire where the hüseyni, uşşak and karcığar songs come to rest on A, this song's final note is G; its range spreads over nine notes, from low G to high A.

The sources disagree on the metre. Repertükül gives the score's usul as 2/4+3/4, meaning that the melody moves through alternating duple and triple bars; Demircioğlu, however, writes only 2/4. The difference may arise because Demircioğlu's tables take only the main measure of compound metres. Haluk Yücel, too, gives the work a place in the survey of Amasya's songs he published in 2018.

Collections and Variants

The text on Türkü Yurdu gives the same four quatrains as the repertoire lyrics and expands the refrain to "Haydi de haydi telleniver". The same page also carries a variant quoted from Cahit Öztelli's collection Evlerinin Önü (p. 216). This variant meets the Amasya text only in its first two lines and then goes its own way:

Pencerede perde bende
Yeni düştüm derde ben de
Bu sevda nasıl sevda
Duramıyom evlerde

Öztelli's variant has no military theme; in its place come a refrain beginning "Pencerenin altında a beyim / Zerdali dalı mısın" ("Beneath the window, my lord, / are you an apricot bough?") and a portrait of a beloved who reads a book and rubs musk into his forelock. The quotation does not say in which region this text was collected.

Performers and Recordings

Gülşen Kutlu is entered as performer in the Repertükül record. One of the audio files the provincial directorate has published among the region's songs is titled "Pencerede Perde", though it does not say who sings. No document has come to light showing the song on a record or album.

Bibliography

Academic studies

Official sources

Books

Other sources

Online sources