The Analysis of Erzurum's Âşık Reyhani's life and his musical work

The tradition of minstrelsy has continued non-stop for centuries since Anatolia became our homeland. As transmitters of culture, minstrels in almost all societies are those who can bridge daily life and art. Our oral tradition's importance comes from the fact that it perpetuates the culture. To this end, the minstrelsy in Anatolia maintains the master-apprentice relation. There are many minstrels who reached poetic and musical mastery, and Âşık Yaşar Reyhani is one of most important ones who labored for this culture and trained many apprentices. Âşık Yaşar Reyhani was born in 1932 in Hasankale, Erzurum, and he made his living as a minstrel. When we analyze his 44 "broken melodies", we end up with very important results in terms of type, accent, tempo direction, metronome, octave, and tonal center. B-flat 2 and F-sharp are the most often used semitones for the "broken melody" folk songs. Âşık Yaşar Reyhani mostly used the hüseyni melody type makam or and sang in 5 octaves, according to our analysis. He often used A (la) as the tonal center and 4/4 tempo. And he used Andante (77-108) as the metronome. The fact that he was born in Erzurum, home to other popular minstrels such as Emrah and Erbabi Summani; that he met with other folk poets who visited his village; and that he learned the songs of the previous minstrels of the area resulted in having a solid musical foundation. Performing often at weddings and in coffee shops in the region helped him improve his music, and it led him to be influenced by the musical tradition of the neighboring town, Kars. He also hosted many minstrels in his own coffeehouse and performed with them. When we analyze his work in its totality, we see that he included both cheerful and sad incidents of its time in his songs. As he approached his subject matter critically, he was able to freely write and perform poems and folk songs. Even his marriages and homesickness when he was living abroad became the subject of his songs. Often attending musical organizations in both Turkey and abroad, he also proved his success outside of his country and won many awards. Especially his success in Konya's Minstrels Festival gained him distinction among the Anatolian minstrels. His distinguished position was crowned by the honorary doctorate title awarded to him by the University of Michigan in the United States. Many were also impressed by his improvisations, which is an important part of the minstrelsy tradition. He and his family moved to Bursa in 1989 and continued his successful work there until he died on December 10, 2006.