Murat Ses

Murat Ses was founding member, composer, keyboard, harmonica, and saz player of the group 'Mogollar', which was a trendsetter and one of the sound architects in modern Eurasian folk music. He is the creator of a unique musical style called 'Anadolu Pop' in the 70's that's still played in Turkey. One of his legendary compositions is e.g. Legend of Mount Ararat (Agri Dagi Efsanesi)!!! He's a member of SACEM in France. His LP 'Danses et Rythmes de la Turquie d'hier à aujourd'hui' was awarded Grand Prix du Disque by the Charles Cros Academie in Paris, France (1971). That award-winning album is probably one of the first world music albums except for Africa in its genre and from a region with a very complex music tradition. Nearly all of the music on that album is Murat's compositions and/or his arrangements from authentic Anatolian music. His music of 60s and 70s is still en vogue. A great number of record companies all over the world prefer to pick up his compositions and traditional arrangements to hint to Turkey's music of 60s and 70s. Sometimes as bootleg! Murat's Psychedelic music based on Anatolian ethnic musical structures is a gorgeous example for the mentioned era of Turkey's and region's music history. He has broad live experience and wrote numerous scores for film, TV, and documentaries. He is member of Artists Without Frontiers and voting member of The Recording Academy (Grammy Awards) in Los Angeles.

Regarding civilization and culture, Murat's point of view is a very special one, looking at and beyond the contemporary issues in a way that's building bridges between Western and Eastern values. In this approach, there would be 'no clash of cultures', since we all are 'one and same thing'. Maybe we are conceiving the whole 'one' matter from different perpectives and we believe that we are seing and experiencing differing matters. We should never forget that we are the same and 'one' thing, no matter our ethnic, cultural or religious heritage. This must be a universal mission for all of us.

As a free-lance journalist he makes music reviews for international print/electronicmedia (AfterTouch, Gibraltar...) and writes on topics such as contemporary culture, social aspects of information age, and independent art productions for the Istanbul daily "Cumhuriyet" on a weekly basis.

His solo album AUTOMATON was released in Austria by Clou (1990). It served as soundtrack for some documentary films including the scientific series 'Ancient Seamen' and 'Medical File'. His music enjoyed and enjoying airplay in the U.S.A (in twelve states), Canada (feature/interview in the renowned SoundMind show), France, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, Luxemburg, Turkey, Central Asian countries, and Austria. TV programs in Turkey, Germany, France, Austria, and Central Asian countries.

His second album BINFEN was at no.7 on the renowned station WUJC (by Jeff Johansen) in Cleveland, Ohio. He is a US Keyboard Discoveries alumnus (1992 by Titus Levi). Excellent critics in US, UK and Canadian press (Gibraltar, Hi-Tech Home, i/e mag, SoundMind, Aquarian, AfterTouch, Audion, Improvijazzation #18; all 90's thru today, to name a few). One of his traditional arrangements found its way into the program of the legendary disc-jockey Mr John Peel on the BBC (1994).

CULDUZ, Culduz, simply "The Star" indispensable to navigation, be it land, sea, air or space (Kervan Culduz!!!), is the third and last part of the trilogy. His hero, this time, is Piri Reis, the legendary seaman with his marvellous maps. In the wake of the new millenium, Murat emphasizes Anatolia's unique ethnic structure hosting a myriad of cultures since centuries, so that the careful listener will find out traditional islamic chant in a peacefully coexistence with some Eurasian church chant. Especially, Creuset (The Melting Pot) is the track in this vein. Most of this album was recorded in San Francisco, CA in 1999.

As he likes to stress the conceptual aspect of music producing, he is very interested in composing soundtrack for movies and documentary films.

AUTOMATON (Slave with Ewer Device) is the first part of a trilogy. It is based on Murat's impressions of the mechanical fraud which was drafted and constructed by the Anatolian scientists during the first half of the thirteenth century.

BINFEN, the second part of the trilogy, based on the aviation history, was released in 1995. Binfen features the synthetist-composer Tan Ses, a talented computer/MIDI composer (a member of AKM, Vienna), who is also part of live performances.

CULDUZ, the third and last part of the trilogy, dedicated to Piri Reis "Kaptan-i Acun", was released in 1999.

Murat's album under the name Automaton² (automaton squared) is his fourth solo album. Parts of the same were recorded in Miami, FL in 2001-2003. The subtitle of this upcoming album is San Francisco/Miami Impressions. Murat put his impressions of these great cities into his music. Released in 2005.

Another release of 2005 is